Yearly archives: 2012
Lol or pulchritudinous: which words do children really use in their writing?
’Twas a caliginous night. . . Fingers on your buzzers, please. Which of the following would you expect children today to use in their writing: gr8, lol, apotropaic, caliginous, cerulean? Yes, that’s right, the last three. This is just one of the happy findings from the BBC Radio 2 500 Words short story competition, run [...]
When south is north and right is left
Last week I drove north from Oxford for two whole days and arrived at the beautiful south. This is not because I’d done a Francis Drake but because one of the very most northerly parts of the island where I live is called ‘south land’ or ‘Sutherland’. I’d have called it something less confusing but [...]
Boomerang vocabulary: words that return to their origins
“Neither a borrower nor a lender be” may have been good advice for Laertes in Shakespeare’s Hamlet, but it isn’t practical for a language. English is both an avid borrower (ballet, schmooze, wok) and a generous lender: consider German das Baby, French le week-end, and Japanese aisu kuriimu (‘ice cream’—try saying it out loud). Occasionally, [...]
Totes amazing new words added to our online dictionary – obvs
Walking around in your leopard-print onesie while proudly sporting guyliner may lead to some guffaws and eye-rolling among family and friends, but whatevs! You know you’re totes on trend. The above sentence contains just some of the new words and terms added to Oxford Dictionaries Online in our latest update which covers a whole range [...]
Kapow! The language of comics
Chances are, if asked to think of the language of comics, terms like kapow!, blam!, and zap! wouldn’t be far from your mind. This is largely thanks to pop art and the Adam West Batman TV show, which emblazoned these terms across our screens, often accompanied by shrill trumpets blaring madly. I used to cringe [...]
The changing meaning of ‘socialist’
On May 6, France held their presidential elections, picking François Hollande over the incumbent Nicolas Sarkozy. Hollande is a socialist (a member of the French Socialist Party), a word that on occasion apparently confuses a large number of Americans, as many use it in a manner that is perhaps inconsistent with its intended meaning. Hence, a [...]
Incentivizing proactive synergistic visions, going forward
Have any of you out there received a memo yet informing you that 21 May is National Memo Day? No? Me neither! Nevertheless, in honour of this world-shaking event, I thought it would be apt to imagine how such a memo might read: To: all stakeholders From: Director of Insight and Strategic Marketing Subject: [...]
Time to get ill: Beastie Boys lyrics in the Oxford English Dictionary
Like many folks of my generation, upon hearing about the death of Adam Yauch, aka MCA, I’ve spent the last few weeks revisiting my Beastie Boys’ albums. At one point during my listen, I began to wonder about their lyrics and what kind of mark they’ve made on the English language. Is it possible that [...]
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