Quiz Guy John Chaneski’s puzzle about synonyms might have you reaching for a thesaurus. For example, what 19th-century novel might have been titled Self-respect and Bias? This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Synonymous Novel Title Word...
What kind of book is most often requested by people who are incarcerated? The book that prison inmates ask for the vast majority of the time is a dictionary. These books, as well as thesauruses, prove useful for mastering reading skills, writing...
Claire from San Antonio, Texas, has a story about misunderstanding a word when she was young. When she saw a book with thesaurus on the cover, she grabbed it and started reading, thinking she was about to learn about a new type of dinosaur. This is...
Why do we call a frankfurter a hot dog? It seems an unsettling 19th-century rumor is to blame. Also, if someone quits something abruptly, why do we say they quit cold turkey? This term’s roots may lie in the history of boxing. Plus, a transgender...
A thesaurus, a collection of synonyms, derives its name from the Latin word thesaurus, or literally, “treasury.” This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Origin of the Word “Thesaurus”” I got a call from Quinn in Wyoming who was asking...
Hundreds of years ago, the word girl could refer to a child of either gender, and the word boy applied specifically to a servant. The Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary is a useful resource for understanding which terms were in...
