Follow news of stalling Middle East negotiations from a vocabularian's perspective by learning 10 words from this week's New York Times new coverage. Continue reading...
In the same way sightings of fading technologies like typewriters and 45 RMPs in the film adaptation of Perks of Being a Wallflower create an impression of nostalgia and disconnection, so too do sightings of words like smug, regret, stumble, muffle, and paranoia in the language of Stephen Chbosky's novel. Check out these words and more in four new Vocabulary Lists. Continue reading...
With the baseball season underway, the sport's colorful lingo comes to the fore once again. Our own Ben Zimmer talked to KUOW-Seattle about the origins of some baseball terms, like "cup of coffee," "hitterish," and "southpaw." Catch the interview here. Continue reading...
A literacy coach set out to storm the Vocabulary.com school leaderboards by herself and ended reaching her goal with an army of middle schoolers at her side, setting off a blaze of word learning excitement at her school. Continue reading...
Leslie Jamison's "cerebral, witty, multichambered essays [that] tend to swing around to one topic in particular: what we mean when we say that we feel someone else's pain." The word for this phenomenon, of course, is empathy, which Jamison explores in a bold and interesting way. Continue reading...
Hasbro, the company that makes Scrabble, is revising the game's official dictionary, and they're letting Scrabble fans pick one of the words to include. Some worthy contenders include zen, ew, and bestie. You can join in the Scrabble Word Showdown on Facebook here, and check out the authoritative take on Hasbro's contest from Stefan Fatsis on Slate here. Continue reading...
A few of my female friends have a fun hobby. Not knitting. Not kickboxing. Not baking pies. Not vampire-slaying. Hating Gwyneth Paltrow. I haven't fully grasped my friends' loathing in the past, but I'm beginning to understand, thanks to a humdinger of a euphemism Paltrow used to describe her impending divorce: conscious uncoupling. Continue reading...
A great choice for middle school readers, A Long Walk to Water by Newberry award-winner Linda Sue Park introduces two true stories set in Sudan. Continue reading...
With the teams competing in the NCAA Men's Basketball Tournament whittled down to the Final Four, "March Madness" is coming to a close. (Actually, as has been the case for a few decades now, March Madness extends into the beginning of April, when the semifinal and final games are played.) In honor of college hoops, I've selected a "Final Four" of important terms associated with the tournament. Continue reading...
At a pep rally focused on academic achievement, about 500 students at New York City's High School for Public Service-Heroes of Tomorrow celebrated their Vocabulary.com monthly leaderboard win. Continue reading...