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Follow peace talks in Syria, the discredited governor of Virginia's indictment, and continuing coverage of Obama and the NSA....from a vocabularian's perspective! Continue reading...

Writing about Afghan poet Matiullah Turab, Azam Ahmed of The New York Times used the word aphorism in describing the importance of poetic language in Afghan culture. Continue reading...

In an essay on writing in last week's The New Yorker, John McPhee describes drawing boxes around "perfectly O.K." words in a search for the "mot juste." Meanwhile, Virginia Woolf tells us words are a messy tangle that will always elude our best efforts to tie them down. Continue reading...

A few days after high school senior Katelyn "Lyn" Leech posted a list she'd created from the Broadway hit Hamilton using the Vocabulary.com list builder, her Twitter notifications went through the roof. She knew something was up, but it wasn't until she logged on that she saw what it was. Hamilton creator and star Lin-Manuel Miranda (@Lin_Manuel) had tweeted Lyn's list to his large following. Continue reading...

Stay on top of the New Jersey traffic scandal, Obamacare fallout, NSA hacking, Pacific Rim trade negotiations, and Internet law...from a vocabulary perspective! Continue reading...

Support students over the summer break with Vocabulary.com's ready-made resources to supplement independent reading. Continue reading...

An optimistic person expects all the best things to happen! Is it raining money yet? A pessimistic person is a downer. Who cares if it's raining money? They'll never get any. Continue reading...

Set learning goals and track student progress throughout the Vocabulary Bowl season. Motivate students to build their vocabulary with competition and gamification. Continue reading...

If you're standing in solidarity with France following last Friday's horrifying Paris attacks, it can help to remember that solidarity, which means "unity for a common purpose," is itself a French word. Solidarity showed up in English in 1829, following a long tradition of French-to-English language transfers that traces back to William the Conqueror and the 1066 Norman invasion. Continue reading...