Words like thence and thither are all but obsolete in English, but they were actually quite useful!The Thai words for fire, die and rim sound an awful lot like the English words 'fire,' 'die' and 'rim.' How could that be? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 274: "Hither and Yon." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Do you know the difference between a rabbit and a hare? And what then is a bunny? Follow John through the etymological warrens of these furry creatures. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 273: "Down the Rabbit Hole." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
It may seem apparent how we got from busyness to business, but the origins of the word “busy” itself are shrouded in mystery. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 272: "Giving You the Business." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
As a daily listener to WNYC Public Radio in New York City, John has noticed that a certain announcer frequently mispronounces words on air. He has thoughts. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 271: "When Is Code-Switching Inappropriate?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Working backwards from existing languages, linguists have had great success reconstructing Proto-Indo-European. Does that mean we can do the same for all language families? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 270: "The World's Largest Family." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
A cyclone came through and blew off most of English’s clothes, says John, in Part II of his discussion of Indo-European. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 269: "English is Practically Naked." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
There are at least five defining features among hundreds of related languages from English to Hindi to Russian. And what does any of that have to do with the Hittites? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 268: "Family Ties." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
The simple verb 'to go' quickly gets complex in just about any language and English is no exception. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 267: "Going Deep." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
What does the '-bat' in 'acrobat' have to do with the word 'come'? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 266: "Come Under Scrutiny." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Reflexive pronouns are redundant in a way, sure, but they’re also quite common in many languages. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 265: "Have Your Own Damn Self a Merry Little Christmas." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
There’s good reason to believe that sophisticated speech began long before homo sapiens hit the scene. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 264: "When Did People Start Talking?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Does Ayesha Rascoe have a good radio voice? Not according to many NPR listeners, who find her "loud ," " high-pitched" and generally "grating ." Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 263: "Who's Afraid of Ayesha Rascoe?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
A recent study suggests that a new dialect is emerging in the southern part of Florida. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 262: "What Is Miami English?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
The trial transcript of a 225-year-old murder is filled with fascinating evidence of the way we used to talk. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 262: "Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Many English verbs have three forms — sing, sang and sung, for example. The problem is that speakers seem to want only two. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 260: "I Got My Nails Did!" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
'Too' — whether about excess, addition or contradiction — evolved from 'to.' Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 259: "To vs. Too." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Some languages adopt their “health” word from the concept of wholeness — a metaphor that makes perfect sense. Other languages, however, adopt their “health” word from trees. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 258: "Picture of Health." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Like the French word 'droit,' English’s 'right' has taken on a number of useful metaphorical meanings. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 257: "The Right Stuff." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
In this favorite from the archives, John discusses some unwritten rules of English that can be remarkably difficult for a learner of English to master. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 95: "Age, Color, Origin, Material." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
The word “record” can be broken down into two parts, the '-re' and the '-cord.' But what do those parts even mean? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 256: "One for the Record Books." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
An encore presentation of a much loved episode about the speech patterns of Bette Davis, George Gershwin, Louis Armstrong and countless other Americans of the 1930s. Why do they all sound like that? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 96: "Why Do People in Old Movies Talk Like That?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
So many of our words have ugly associations that are particular to a historical time or event. Should we expunge them entirely from our vocabulary? Can we? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 255: "Past Master." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Words that come to mean “want” often start out meaning something else. Take “want,” for example. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 254: "Are You Tryna Hear This?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Henry James wrote his final novels just over a century ago — and yet somehow they are far less accessible than works written much earlier. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 253: "The Ambassadors." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Possession is more or less about ownership, and we denote that in English by adding ’s to the end of a word. But of course there’s far more to the story than just that. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 252: "Apostrophe S." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
There’s a rumor going around social networks that “knocked up” traces back to American slave trading. Is there any evidence for that etymology? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 251: "Is 'Knocked Up' Racist?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
It’s tempting to imagine that a sentence will translate rather neatly, word by word, from one language to another. It’s also naive. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 250: "What a Young Brain Can Do." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
The book and lyrics of 'The Music Man' are replete with everyday, ordinary dialogue that, nevertheless, demonstrates how English often works. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 249: "What Do You Talk?" With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
English used to have a more or less typical array of second person pronouns, with thou and thee for the singular — subject and object cases, respectively — and ye and you for the plural. So what happened? Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 248: "The Problem with You." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices...
Comedian Rodney Dangerfield was fond of introducing jokes with a kind of redundancy, for example: “My wife, she told me I was one in a million. I found out she was right.” But those seemingly superfluous pronouns are filled with promise. Visit Lexicon Valley . A Booksmart Studios production. Episode 247: "The Rodney Dangerfield Pronoun." With John McWhorter. Produced and edited by Mike Vuolo. All rights reserved. Learn more about your...
