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Category: "HotForYOURWords"
Truthiness
Let’s get Marina equal time on The Colbert Report. Word Request for “Truthiness” Colbert’s re-invention of “Truthiness” is similar to O’Reilly’s of “Pinhead”. Both unknowingly re-invented a word used previously. [...]
Heide Klum is an übermodel
But, what does that mean? When I tell my students in Germany and Austria that über is used like an adjective in English, something is übercool, they always gap in [...]
“British” is not English: de-Pict-ing the origin of the name “Britain”
“King Arthur was British, not English,” I have occasionally commented, only to be asked: “There’s a difference?” Fair question: few Americans could articulate the difference, and even the English blur [...]
The English: A Nation of Anglers? Dedicated to Izaak Walton
The English: A Nation of Anglers? Dedicated to Izaak Walton :wink: We get the name of our language from the English people; but where did their name come from? The [...]
How to tickle the teacher
“Russia is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.” Winston Churchill And no Russian is more tantalizingly enigmatic than our dear teacher. Is she a blonde playing a [...]
To beg the question
The phrase “to beg the question” or “begging the question” seems like an innocent enough phrase that I never had much interest in knowing what it meant or where it [...]
Make Love
HotForWords tells us how universal “love” is as a word. “Love” is part of many phrases also. A word’s use in phrases can raise linguistic questions. Do the connotations of [...]
Mox Nix
I would have guessed that the word mox nix (meaning “it makes no difference”) came from Latin. So when I heard someone speaking in German use mox nix I thought [...]
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