Transcript of “Technical Tick Tweak”
You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.
I’m Grant Barrett.
And I’m Martha Barnette.
We received some feedback about our conversation regarding the expression tight as a tick.
Yeah, we had a call about why we say tight as a tick, and Martha and I explained that it’s those little guys who bite your skin and fill themselves with your blood.
Exactly.
Well, we heard from Holly Gaff, who is a professor of biology at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia.
And she says that she enjoyed learning about the history of that expression.
And then she writes, however, as a tick researcher for more than 25 years, and I sort of dreaded what came next.
She said, I did want to encourage you to not refer to ticks as insects.
They are not insects.
I normally do not correct people since it is not really important, but given your interest and love of precision in language, I thought I would reach out.
Ticks are arthropods, but then they split off from the lineage that leads to insects.
So I just wanted to say thank you, Holly, and thank you for modeling how to correct someone.
Yeah, that was very gently done, and I appreciate it.
However, you must be a brave soul to spend so much time with ticks.
I hope she really enjoys her work because I don’t want to do it.
Yeah, well, I think it would be fascinating to hear more about it, right?
By the way, we also had a number of comments from people who thought maybe it had to do with ticking, that blue and white striped cloth that you might have on a mattress or a pillow.
But it’s not from ticking, is it?
No, no.
Yeah, we did have several people mention that, but the fact is that that’s not the origin of it.
Yeah, it absolutely has to do with the arthropod, the arthropod to tick.
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