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Blog Excerpts

On the Trail of "Wombat"

How the word "wombat" entered the English language turns out to be a surprisingly complex story. Australian linguist David Nash tells the tale here.

This year marks the three hundredth anniversary of the birth of Samuel Johnson, the great pioneer of English-language lexicography. To celebrate, the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale University has launched Dr. Johnson's Dictionary, which presents a word a day from Johnson's landmark Dictionary of the English Language (1755). Words are taken from the annotated proof copy of the first edition held at Beinecke, adorned with handwritten corrections by Johnson and his helpers. Some early selections follow below. Continue reading...

Blog Excerpts

Trans-Atlantic Word Winners

The trans-Atlantic words of the year have been selected on the Separated by a Common Language blog. Best American-to-British import is meh, and the best British-to-American import is vet (the verb). Read all about it here (and read our own discussion of meh here and vet here).

Blog Excerpts

Trans-Atlantic Words of the Year

Over on Separated by a Common Language, Lynne Murphy has her own trans-Atlantic twist on the usual Word of the Year selections. Make your nominations for "Best American to British import" and "Best British to American import."

Blog Excerpts

VT Bee @ OUP

On OUPblog (the official blog of Oxford University Press), Ben Zimmer sings the praises of the Visual Thesaurus Spelling Bee.

Blog Excerpts

Debatable Words

On Word Face-Off you can look at different word-based analyses of the second presidential debate between McCain and Obama.

Blog Excerpts

A New Word for New Life

On Wired Science, Brandom Keim has coined a new word: astrobioethics, "a branch of ethics involving the implications of life science in space." He's hoping his neologism will make it into the dictionaries some day.
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