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You can sometimes find acquaintance and commonality in the most unusual places. I first found Alexis Chateau’s blog around two years ago. I can’t quite remember how, maybe it was the chronicles of her travels around the southern US states. Yet it ended up being her posts on Jamaican culture that I found the most … Continue reading Cornwall and the Linguistic Diaspora
I used to do these every week, but now I do them when I have to stop and think about whether I am using the right word or see people using them interchangeably or using one when they mean the other. It’s been 18 months since my last (!) This is one that, until a … Continue reading Wrong Word Wednesday #73: Annex or Annexe?
It’s been a rather shocking year for politics. First, the UK decided to vote itself out of the European Union. In the aftermath (actually, before that), the remain campaigners accused the leave campaign of lying. Leave were told to stop using several key strategies, one of which was the claim that the UK sends £350m … Continue reading Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Year
I know I can be a Grammar Nazi. I have to be – people pay me to be a be a Grammar Nazi! However, even I know that there are some grammar rules than practically nobody obeys. I’m not talking about using “less” when you mean “fewer”, I mean those that help language flow. Something … Continue reading The Grammar Rules That It’s Ok To Break
Other titles in this series: Anglo-Saxons; Vikings Let’s get one thing out of the way before we start… whether you call him William: Duke of Normany, William the Bastard or William the Conqueror the man who invaded England from Normandy was not French. He hated the French and they hated him. He was actually of … Continue reading Origins of the English Language: The Norman Conquest
I used to do these every week, but now I do them when I have to stop and think about whether I am using the right word or see people using them interchangeably or using one when they mean the other. This is one that made me pause for thought because I’m sure I’ve used … Continue reading Wrong Word Wednesday #72
Oxymorons – they can be amusing or ironic, or they can give you a headache as you try to get your head around them. We use oxymorons all the time. They are terms that make sense initially, but appear to present a contradiction by fusing together two different and opposing words or terms.
A bit of a follow up from a previous post here. As a west country lad, it is pretty much expected of me to like cider. I freely admit to this being a recent addition to my alcohol tastes. I have friends in Bristol, lived in Devon for five years and my girlfriend lives in … Continue reading Words With Different Meanings (US vs UK): Cider Edition
(Depending on where you live in the world and which version of English you speak). I went to an Asian pre-wedding party on Saturday night. The person getting married is the best friend of my brother. But hold it there for a moment. When I used the word “Asian” what did you assume I meant? … Continue reading Words With Different Meanings (US vs UK)
The pen is mightier than the sword -Edward Bulwer-Lytton. (And just as deadly in the wrong hands as Jack Nicholson’s Joker proves in Batman: The Movie). Words can do many things. They can hurt an individual or they change humanity for the better or worse. They can be used to spread the truth and to … Continue reading Favourite and Least Favourite Words of a Linguistics Nerd