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. Continue reading...
This week's news is marked by Olympic torch bearing ineptitude leading up to the Sochi Games, speculation as to discussion topics at a Fed conclave, and the Indian government's diplomatic retaliation after a member of its corps was arrested and strip searched while on a mission in the United States. Continue reading...
As the last days of summer waned, students in three high schools from San Bernardino County, California were heating up the Vocabulary Bowl leaderboards. Finally, it was the Etiwanda Eagles who soared to number one. Continue reading...
Learn how Broward County Public Schools' strategic approach to district-wide Vocabulary.com integration resulted in widespread adoption by teachers and significant literacy gains for students. Continue reading...
In a segment that aired last night on Bloomberg TV, Vocabulary.com executive producer and lexicographer Ben Zimmer appeared on Pimm Fox's "Taking Stock" on Bloomberg TV, describing the adaptive learning power of Vocabulary.com and the Vocabulary.com App, and quizzing Pimm on some of the some super-challenging vocabulary players with advanced vocabularies might encounter. Continue reading...
Kitty. Tron. Legit. All these words appeared in the 2011 edition of the yearbook I sponsor. Students used these as slang; all three were used to describe something cool. Aside from legit, which seems to have been around for a while, I'm not sure the other two stuck. Continue reading...
If recipe suggestions pulled from several major US newspapers and Epicurious.com are to be believed, Thanksgiving remains a celebration of abundance. But unless you're someone who trucks in red fife, uses remoulade interchangeably with mayo, and refers to a Baskin Robbins ice cream cake as semifreddo, you might find the holiday to be more about an abundance of new words as much as it's about an abundance of food. Continue reading...