Inspired by Atlantic writer Mark Bowden's "In Praise of Fancy Words," Southern California Public Radio talk show host Larry Mantle invited listeners to call in or post their favorite words on his show. The result is "In praise and defense of grandiose, flowery, sesquipedalian words," a pretty fantastic list of words people say they love to know. We're featuring it as List of the Week! Continue reading...
Despite its popularity among teens, you're not going to find class sets of Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series in the English department book rooms across the country. Even if most teachers don't incorporate trendy literature into their class syllabus, it doesn't mean that they can't take advantage of the excitement of the fad and harness it to teach some valuable lessons about writing, editing, and word choice. Continue reading...
Explore our comprehensive selection of ready-made curriculum resources and learn simple, effective ways to create engaging activities that boost your students' comprehension. Continue reading...
Unless you've been living under an Internet-free rock, you've probably seen the enthralling video of Scotland's Susan Boyle singing on the television show Britain's Got Talent. According to the latest numbers, the video of Boyle's performance has already attracted more than 100 million online views. But it's not only her singing prowess that is attracting worldwide attention: it has also been reported that "Web searches for the term gobsmacked spiked after Boyle used the British slang meaning utterly astonished when describing her reaction to newfound widespread acclaim." Continue reading...
Linguist Neal Whitman draws a bead on the expression young guns (not to be confused with younguns), and finds that sometimes the so-called "Recency Illusion" isn't an illusion after all. Continue reading...
Teachers: Spend a few minutes exploring the free resources on Vocabulary.com now and get more out of vocabulary learning, reading, and writing all year. Continue reading...
In writing about Fed chairman Ben Bernanke, New Yorker staff writer Nick Paumgarten invoked a very specific sense of the verb jawbone. Continue reading...
Eleanor Catton, who was awarded the Man Booker Prize earlier this week for her novel The Luminaries, uses the rare and interesting spume. Continue reading...
In a commencement address given at Stanford University in 2005, Steve Jobs used words like karma, entrepreneur, intuition, and idealism. What word would you want to give a college grad to equip them for life? Continue reading...