The term wordsmith is formed by analogy with older words such as blacksmith, goldsmith, silversmith, and locksmith — all denoting skill and expertise with a particular medium. This is part of a complete episode.
Leave a comment
1 comment
More from this show
If you’re going to hit the road in a motor home, best to bone up on some of the slang used by RV enthusiasts, like stinky slinky, PUPs, and gassers. A stinky slinky is a sewer hose, a PUP is a pop-up camper, and a gasser is a motor home powered by...
A listener in Lorain, Ohio, wonders about the origin of the terms happy and happiness. Both come from an older word hap, meaning “chance” or “luck,” also the source of happen, mishap, hapless, happenstance, happy-go-lucky, and perhaps. Language...
I often hear wordsmithing used in the specific context of group writing. While preparing a formal document as a group, we will come to a point where we have generally agreed upon what we want a sentence or section to say, but don’t want to take the time to work out the exact wording as a group. In these situations, someone will often suggest “we leave the wordsmithing” to one of the team to do after the meeting.