Search the Site

Your Search:
70 71 72 73 74 Displaying 711-720 of 3488 Results

  1. Blog Excerpts

     How "Selfie" Was Born in Australia (And Took Over the World)
    Wed Nov 20 00:00:00 EST 2013
    Oxford Dictionaries has named selfie its Word of the Year, bringing a great deal of attention to the trendy word. As it turns out, this social-media-friendly term for a photograph of oneself first cropped up in Australia, where the "-ie" ending is often used to form new words.

  2. Word Count

     Will the Real Gettysburg Address Please Stand Up?
    Tue Nov 19 00:00:00 EST 2013
    Today is the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address. Or, to put it another way, the best-known American speech is seven score and ten years old. Although it's famous, familiar, and was often memorized by schoolchildren, the text of the Gettysburg Address is uncertain: we all know the words, or many of them, but it turns out that there are many Gettysburg Addresses, not just one.

  3. Weekly Worksheet

     Getting to the Heart of Gettysburg
    Tue Nov 19 00:00:00 EST 2013
    One hundred and fifty years ago today, Abraham Lincoln delivered one of the most famous American speeches: The Gettysburg Address, a speech that reportedly lasted less than two minutes and that he considered "a flat failure." Use this worksheet to help students use vocabulary and key lines from the address to discover Lincoln's lasting message to Americans.

  4. Blog Excerpts

     "Selfie" Wins as Oxford's Word of the Year
    Tue Nov 19 00:00:00 EST 2013
    The word selfie, defined as "a photograph that one has taken of oneself," took over social media this year, so it's no surprise that it has also been named as Word of the Year by Oxford Dictionaries. Selfie beat out other contenders like bitcoin, binge-watch, and of course, twerk. Read the full announcement from Oxford University Press here.

  5. Word Routes

     A Well-Traveled Metaphor: "Goldilocks" Visits Many Houses
    Mon Nov 18 00:00:00 EST 2013
    We all know the old fairy tale: Goldilocks enters the house of the Three Bears and samples their porridge, their chairs, and their beds. Each time she finds one item that's "just right." In recent years, the familiar story has been making the rounds, with the word "Goldilocks" showing up in some unexpected contexts, from astronomy to economy.

  6. Word Count

     To Have and to Receive: Two Usages of "Have"
    Fri Nov 15 00:00:00 EST 2013
    Noel Anenberg, a regular reader of this column and author of the forthcoming book The Dog Boy, asked me about a usage of have that implies, Anenberg writes, "the speaker's active role in the events." Compare "I had my house cleaned" and "I had my car stolen."

  7. Word Count

     Predictable Answers to the Question "What is English?"
    Thu Nov 14 00:00:00 EST 2013
    In What is English? And Why Should We Care?, Tim William Machan looks at the nooks, crannies, accents, dialects, words, and other details that have made English English over the centuries. After reading this book, you'll agree that "English serves as the password to a kind of cross-cultural, transhistorical club that one might or might not want to join."

  8. Word Count

     Bizarro World: Opposite Idioms
    Wed Nov 13 00:00:00 EST 2013
    In recent weeks, we've talked about idioms that are misheard, and thus miswritten. Now, we'll discuss some idioms that say the opposite of what they mean and whether they're "acceptable" English.

  9. Word Count

     Crosswords, Aha Moments, and the Joy of Being Misled
    Tue Nov 12 00:00:00 EST 2013
    We'd like to welcome Adam Cooper, a writer and linguist, as our newest regular contributor! Here Adam explores how solving crosswords (both American-style and British-style) can offer unexpected pleasures in wordplay. "Sometimes being misled, at least for a little while, can lead you to the most rewarding destinations," he writes.

  10. Word Count

     Five Stupidly Simple Ways to Improve Your Writing
    Mon Nov 11 00:00:00 EST 2013
    When I was a senior editor at a daily newspaper, I occasionally used to edit a journalist who had terrific story ideas. Much of his work ended up on the front page of the newspaper. He won awards, too. Lots of them. But he was a terrible writer.
70 71 72 73 74 Displaying 711-720 of 3488 Results