Terry from Franklin, Indiana, recalls a moment of confusion when she was working on a horse farm in south-central Pennsylvania. She asked a co-worker, “Are we going to let the stallions out today?” The co-worker responded, “No, they’re already in.” Terry says the conversation devolved into “Who’s On First?” routine, because Terry didn’t understand that in that part of the United States, where the dialect is heavily influenced by German, let can mean “leave.” Other expressions heard in that area include leave the horse go or leave the book sit, all reflecting the multiple meanings of the German verb lassen. This is part of a complete episode.
In Hong Kong English, Add oil! means something like “Go on!” or “Go for it!” A recent addition to the Oxford English Dictionary, this expression of encouragement comes from Cantonese (加油 or gā yáu; rendered as jiāyóu from Mandarin) and draws on the...
A Green Bay Packers fan wonders why a quarterback who’s tackled is said to be sacked. The roots of the word sack as in “bag” goes back thousands of years, all the way to Akkadian, later spreading through Greek, Latin, and then to Romance and...
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