Vocabulary.com Blog
Articles from January, 2010
Blog Excerpts
The 800-Word Myth
Have you heard that "the average teenager uses just 800 words in daily communication"? Despite being widely reported in the media, this factoid simply isn't true. Linguist David Crystal debunks the myth here.
In the newest chapter of the late-night television wars, "Tonight Show" host Conan O'Brien has announced that he won't go along with NBC's plan to bump his show to a midnight time slot to make way for Jay Leno at 11:30. After O'Brien made his announcement, he was the recipient of an immediate outpouring of support online. Thousands joined the Team Conan Facebook group, while thousands more expressed their allegiance on Twitter using the #TeamConan hashtag. Where did all this "Team" talk come from?
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Word RoutesExploring the pathways of our lexicon
"Tweet" Named Word of the Year, "Google" Word of the Decade
After much good-natured debate at its annual meeting in Baltimore, the American Dialect Society has made its selections for Word of the Year and Word of the Decade. As proof that we're truly living in a digital age, the winner of Word of the Year for 2009 was tweet ("to post an update on Twitter") and the Word of the Decade for 2000-09 was google (the generic verb meaning "to use Google or another search engine").
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Word RoutesExploring the pathways of our lexicon
The American Dialect Society's "Word of the Year" Nominees
Greetings from Baltimore, where the American Dialect Society is holding its annual conference. Along with scholarly presentations about American linguistic varieties, the ADS is also making selections for Word of the Year (2009) and Word of the Decade (2000-09). ADS members fixed on a final list of nominees for the different categories that will be up for a vote on Friday.
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As the American Dialect Society gears up to vote for Word of the Year, the City Dictionary website has announced its own selection of "words with local flavor."
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Our own Mark Peters takes a look back at a decade in euphemisms, by trawling through the annual selections of "most euphemistic" words by the American Dialect Society — from courtesy calls to scooping technicians.
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When did shall go out of fashion as the first person marker for the future tense? Or was it ever in fashion? This month in the Lounge we look at the career of English's most mismanaged modal.
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