Vocabulary.com Blog
Articles from 2011
Blog Excerpts
Conan's "Thrice" Campaign
Late-night talk-show host Conan O'Brien doesn't see why new words like chillax and frienemy should be added to the Oxford English Dictionary when useful old words like thrice have fallen out of favor. Watch Conan's campaign to get people using thrice again here.
This is a strange expression, often heard in the form: “You’ll be laughing on the other side of your face [when X happens].” But what does it mean and where does it come from?
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Once again the American Dialect Society has performed its not-so-solemn duty in anointing a Word of the Year (aka WOTY), and the 2010 winner is app, as in, "There's an app for that." I'm just back from Pittsburgh, where the ADS held its annual meeting in conjunction with the Linguistic Society of America, and I've got the full report.
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The American Dialect Society’s annual meeting is coming up, and like all word nerds, I have Word of the Year fever. I won’t be in Pittsburgh for the meeting, but as the only euphemism columnist in this star quadrant, I want to make a case for euphemism of the year.
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