Yep, it's another newsletter from A Way with Words! There's something kind of special about the language a family invents for its own use, so we talked about it on this past weekend's show. We also tried to narrow down the difference...
Do you know where your participle is dangling? Martha and Grant salute National Grammar Day. Also, when you’re scribbling on a piece of paper, do you find yourself expecting spellcheck to kick in and underline your misspellings with squiggly...
A California caller gets a clarification about when to use “a” and “an” if the next word starts with a vowel sound. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “Articles for Words with Vowel Sounds” Hello...
mundane n.— «This is my best effort at a summary of Karyn Ashburn’s talk.…On those occasions when she showed up at a con to meet Elise, she saw lots of fans in groups talking. To her they seemed angry and rude. To Elise they seemed...
disemvowelling n.— «For those not familiar with the concept, disemvowelling, pioneered by Teresa Nielsen Hayden, is the most effective troll-repellent yet invented. You leave the troll’s comment up, but remove all the vowels from it...
palaeoaeolian n.— «Found a word my discussion leader professor wants to get used in scientific journals someday: palaeoaeolian. As in “palaeoaeolian rock”—a rock that was shaped by winds over the centuries. If it gets coined...