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  1. Backstory

     Emily Listfield, Author of "Best Intentions"
    Fri May 22 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    My novel Best Intentions built on this kernel of an idea: What happens when you think you know what the person you love is thinking — and you're dead wrong? I think we've all experienced this in various relationships — you may act with the best intentions to make someone else happy but without real communication, the results can be disastrous.

  2. Blog Excerpts

     Know Your '90s Catchphrases
    Fri May 22 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    "Psyche!" "Don't go there!" "Take a chill pill!" "Not!" The Children of the '90s blog takes a loving look back at catchphrases that "enjoyed a substantial heyday before being put to rest for being insanely irritating."

  3. Word Routes

     McDonald's Puts the Accent on Advertising
    Thu May 21 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    McDonald's has launched an ambitious marketing campaign for its new coffee line, McCafé. In one commercial currently saturating American airwaves, viewers are advised that you can "McCafé your day" by enlivening your daily grind. The ad extends the acute accent mark at the end of "McCafé" to various other words: a "commute" becomes a "commuté," a "cubicle" becomes a "cubiclé," and so forth. Will this wordplay work with American consumers, or will the exotic diacritics fall on deaf ears?

  4. Blog Excerpts

     Thesaurusi?
    Wed May 20 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    How do you pluralize the word "thesaurus"? Both "thesauruses" and "thesauri" are perfectly acceptable. But would you believe "thesaurusi"? It's rare, but it's out there. Brett Reynolds, professor of English at Humber College, investigates the pluralization error on his blog English, Jack.

  5. Word Routes

     Which Words Do You Love and Which Do You Hate?
    Tue May 19 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    Sometimes our perspective on language isn't exactly rational: we love some words and absolutely despise other ones. What inspires such deep feelings, and why does word hate often seem to run hotter than word love? In the case of words like impactful, discussed in yesterday's Red Pen Diaries, the bad vibes may arise because of an association with vacuous management-speak or other institutional jargon. But other times a word is disliked because it just sounds, well, icky. A look at some of the favorite and least favorite words selected by Visual Thesaurus subscribers offers some insight on verbal attractions and aversions.

  6. Candlepower

     Red Pen Diaries: "Impactful"
    Mon May 18 00:00:00 EDT 2009

    Apparently, "impactful" is a word (and by this I mean it's recognized by a handful of reasonably reputable sources).

    I choose not to use it, however. I think it sounds horrible, like an impacted wisdom tooth or, heaven forefend, an impacted bowel.

  7. Book Nook

     Teaching English as a Foreign Language
    Mon May 18 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    In this excerpt from Active Literacy Across the Curriculum: Strategies for Reading, Writing, Speaking, and Listening, Heidi Hayes Jacobs advocates developing students' "word power" by borrowing methods from the foreign language classroom.

  8. Edulinks

     Fun With Idioms
    Mon May 18 00:00:00 EDT 2009

    These sites can help your students decipher some common English idioms.

    Funbrain: Paint by Idioms

    UsingEnglish.com: Dictionary of English Idioms

    The Idiom Connection

  9. Word Routes

     Mailbag Friday: "These Ones"
    Fri May 15 00:00:00 EDT 2009

    Welcome to another edition of Mailbag Friday! Carol B. writes in with today's question:

    As an American living in Australia, I'm overwhelmed by the common use of "these ones." I came across it yesterday in a British memoir! It grates on my nerves. Anybody else?

  10. Blog Excerpts

     Reshaping the Environmental Lexicon
    Thu May 14 00:00:00 EDT 2009
    "Cap and trade" or "pollution reduction refund"? "Global warming" or "our deteriorating atmosphere"? Environmental action groups are proposing new messaging techniques to build public support for their causes. The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times provide two different angles to this developing story.
231 232 233 234 235 Displaying 2321-2330 of 3488 Results