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  1. Candlepower

     Some "Cherpumple" for Thanksgiving?
    Wed Nov 24 00:00:00 EST 2010

    What's "cherpumple"? Let naming expert and word-watcher Nancy Friedman define it for you...

    Cherpumple: A dessert comprising cherry, pumpkin, and apple pies, each baked inside a layer of cake. The word is a portmanteau of cherry, pumpkin, and apple.

  2. Blog Excerpts

     OK? OK!
    Wed Nov 24 00:00:00 EST 2010
    A new book by Allan Metcalf, Professor of English at MacMurray College and Executive Secretary of the American Dialect Society, is all about the history of a single word: OK. You can read a Q&A with Metcalf about OK: The Improbable Story of America’s Greatest Word on the Oxford University Press blog here.

  3. Word Routes

     A Brief History of the "Pat-Down"
    Tue Nov 23 00:00:00 EST 2010
    The outrage over new security procedures enforced by the Transportation Security Administration has thrust the word pat-down into the news. Airline passenger screenings in the U.S. now involve full-body scans, or if the passenger refuses the scan, a full-body pat-down. While the TSA faces backlash against these so-called "enhanced pat-downs" (an unfortunate term reminiscent of "enhanced interrogation techniques" at Guantanamo), plain-old pat-downs have been part of the lexicon of law enforcement for decades.

  4. Weekly Worksheet

     Celebrating Fibonacci Day
    Mon Nov 22 00:00:00 EST 2010
    November 23rd has been named Fibonacci Day since 11-23 doubles as the date's abbreviation and the first numbers in the Fibonacci Sequence (1, 1, 2, 3...). The Italian mathematician Leonardo Fibonacci used this sequence in lots of wacky ways--from predicting the population growth of rabbits to exploring the "golden ratio" formed between two consecutive numbers in the sequence.

  5. Teachers at Work

     Don't Ask Me: Writing Teacher Breaks Rules, Doesn't Care
    Mon Nov 22 00:00:00 EST 2010

    Writing teacher Margaret Hundley Parker has a dark secret she has to reveal.

    Here's my confession: In the summer, I don't care about rules. I pen prose that would give a good copy editor a heart attack. I don't mind if someone "lays" down for a nap, I get in the line for "ten items or less" and refrain from muttering fewer under my breath. The news "impacts"people and I don't flinch. It's very liberating. The down side of all this is when friends—or worse, new acquaintances—ask me word questions and I give wrong answers. It's not that I do a brain cleanse every June, it's that I can't articulate the rules when I'm not really thinking about them.

  6. Word Routes

     "Get Your Geek On" at Public Libraries
    Fri Nov 19 00:00:00 EST 2010
    There's a new campaign to boost awareness of U.S. public libraries that goes by the curious name, "Geek the Library." I'm all for the campaign's stated mission of improving public perceptions of libraries by championing their importance to local communities. But what really fascinates me is the way they're using geek as a transitive verb to mean "be geekily enthusiastic about." I guess you could say I geek innovative uses of the word geek.

  7. Word Count

     Passing the Blame: A "Scapegoat" by Any Other Name...
    Thu Nov 18 00:00:00 EST 2010
    We welcome back Merrill Perlman, who writes the "Language Corner" column for Columbia Journalism Review. Here she considers how "scapegoat" gets turned into "escape goat" — an error that actually has an etymological basis.

  8. Word Count

     The Tweet Police Are Watching!
    Wed Nov 17 00:00:00 EST 2010
    Last spring the New York Times reported that more and more grammar vigilantes are showing up on Twitter to police the typos and grammar mistakes that they find on users' tweets. According to the Times, the tweet police "see themselves as the guardians of an emerging behavior code: Twetiquette," and some of them go so far as to write algorithms that seek out tweets gone wrong.

  9. Blog Excerpts

     DARE on Twitter
    Wed Nov 17 00:00:00 EST 2010
    The Dictionary of American Regional English is a sprawling, monumental reference work, with a fifth and final volume scheduled for publication in 2011. But if you want a daily dose of DARE goodness, just follow the dictionary's Twitter feed! The Twitter handle is @DAREwords.

  10. Teachers at Work

     The Tyranny of Phrasal Verbs: Turned On or Turned Off?
    Tue Nov 16 00:00:00 EST 2010
    We welcome back Fitch O'Connell, a longtime teacher of English as a foreign language, working for the British Council in Portugal and other European countries. Here Fitch considers one of the biggest stumbling blocks in the English-language classroom: the dastardly phrasal verb.
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