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  1. Blog Excerpts

     Has Shakespeare's Dictionary Been Discovered?
    Thu Apr 24 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    Just in time for William Shakespeare's 450th birthday comes word of what could be an extremely important Shakespearean find. Two rare-book dealers have in their possession a copy of a sixteenth-century quadrilingual dictionary (bought on eBay!) that they claim belonged to Shakespeare himself. The dictionary is already known to be a favorite reference of the Bard, and the owners of this copy think the annotations are in Shakespeare's hand. But there are already many doubters. Read about it in the Guardian here.

  2. Blog Excerpts

     It's Shakespeare's Birthday and We've Got Party Favors!
    Wed Apr 23 12:00:00 EDT 2014
    It's William Shakespeare's 450th birthday today. What better way to celebrate than with a whole host of learning resources focused on his words?

  3. Blog Excerpts

     How ALL CAPS Became Code for YELLING
    Tue Apr 22 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    Ever wonder why we think that someone who types a message in all capitalized letters appears to be YELLING? In The New Republic, Alice Robb digs deep into the roots of how the ALL CAPS style has been interpreted in the Internet era (with some help from our own Ben Zimmer in the digital archaeology department), and explains why excessive capitalization is bad netiquette. Read her piece here.

  4. Word Count

     That Tricky 'E': Making Verbs Out of Nouns
    Mon Apr 21 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    We have occasionally invoked Tom Lehrer when discussing how the simple letter "e" can change the meaning of many words, citing his song "Silent 'E.'" That "e" can also magically change a word into another form, such as a noun into a verb. This being illogical English, there are few "rules" as to what it does, though.

  5. Candlepower

     The Sweets of Easter
    Fri Apr 18 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    Easter, which this year falls on April 20, is an important religious holiday for millions of Christians. It's also a major candy holiday, now second only to Halloween in the United States. But there's more to Easter candy than sugar and food dye: there's also some fascinating linguistic and brand history.

  6. Wordshop

     The Real News About the Redesigned SAT
    Wed Apr 16 16:00:00 EDT 2014
    Ever since College Board President David Coleman announced that the redesigned SAT would replace its testing of more obscure words such as mendacious or treacly with the analysis of more frequent, multiple-meaning words in context, educators have been fretting about what this may mean for the study of vocabulary and for the precision of the next generation of American students' English in general.

  7. Word Count

     What Shakespeare Knew About the Rhythms of English
    Wed Apr 16 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    One of the things everyone remembers about Shakespeare, whether they spent a few weeks on one play in high school or an entire semester on several plays in college, is that he wrote in iambic pentameter. Some may also have vague recollections about their teacher explaining that iambic pentameter isn't difficult to understand, because English "naturally" falls into its rhythms.

  8. Blog Excerpts

     "Staycation," "Bleisure," and Other Made-Up Travel Words
    Tue Apr 15 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    Is the travel industry particularly susceptible to making up words like "bleisure" (combining "business" and "leisure") and "staycation" (for a stay-at-home vacation)? Associated Press travel reporter Beth J. Harpaz investigates — with help from our own Ben Zimmer, who says that such neologisms "come in handy in a business sector where there's often a need to come up with clever marketing spin." Read the AP article here.

  9. Dog Eared

     A Powerful Debunking of Whorfian Exaggeration
    Mon Apr 14 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    Whorfianism — the idea that language shapes thought, and each language creates a distinct worldview — is an appealing idea. But there's one problem: Whorfianism, at least dogmatic Whorfianism, is a huge load of bunk, at least according to John McWhorter's new book The Language Hoax: Why the World Looks the Same in Any Language.

  10. Word Count

     When Is the Best Time to Write?
    Fri Apr 11 00:00:00 EDT 2014
    I was born a night owl. I used to think 2 am was the perfect bedtime and I resented having to get up before 8:30. Paradoxically (or perhaps I mean, annoyingly), I had to be at work by 6 am in the years I worked as a senior newspaper editor. I loved my job but I was miserable, sleepwise.
59 60 61 62 63 Displaying 601-610 of 3488 Results