17 Burst results for "Wayward Inc."
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Pot of soup where we like to take samples from time to time. Well, thank you for explaining. All right, take care now and be well. You too. Bye bye. Bye bye. What are the language collisions in your house or your neighborhood or your city? Let us know 877-929-9673 or send your stories about language in email to words at wayward radio dot org. Hello, you have a way with words. Hi. This is Madison calling from Wilmington, North Carolina. Hello, Madison. Welcome to the show. Well, I was calling to ask you about something that my grandfather used to say. Which is that he would tell us to take Churchill's advice. And I wanted to see what I could learn about that phrase. Take Churchill's advice. Oh boy, a Churchill had a lot of advice. Some of it good, some of rascally. What was it? So when he would tell us that we knew that he was basically telling us to go try to use the bathroom while you have the chance. Churchill device says, go to the bathroom every chance that you get. So if you're on a road trip and you're stopping for gas and you're like, well, I don't really have to go right now, but you know, I may as well take Churchill's advice. We're here. Or something like that, you know? Yeah, yeah. Why would Churchill say that? I have no idea. Like you said, Churchill was known for saying a lot of wacky things. So I was just wondering, is that something like do other people say that? Is that something that, you know, where would he have gotten that from? Is that something his family made up? Because I've never heard anybody or run into anybody else who knows what that means. First of all, Madison, I would say that's excellent advice, wouldn't you? Yeah, you know, it does come in handy. Right. Carpe p.m.. But it didn't come from Churchill as you might have suspected. Okay, there is a quotation floating around that a lot of people repeat that goes something like never pass up the chance to sit down or go to the bathroom, and it often gets attributed to Churchill, but it sort of like one of those memes that go around the Internet like, you know, you see a picture of Abraham Lincoln, which says, don't believe everything you read on the Internet. The source of that quote. Yeah, so that's not advice from Churchill, but there is a bit more to that story, isn't there grant? Yeah, there really is. There was a contemporary of Churchill. One of the biggest scandals of the age in the late 1940s was when the king of England abdicated the throne to marry the American Wallace Simpson, who had been divorced twice. And Edward wrote a book that was first serialized in newspapers across the English speaking world. And in that book, and in those serialized articles in the newspapers, he uses an expression that's very similar to that. He says, perhaps one of the only positive pieces of advice that I was ever given was that supplies by an old courtier who observed only two rules really count, never miss an opportunity to relieve yourself, never miss a chance to sit down and rest your feet. And this is from his book called a king's story, 1951, and at that point he was no longer king who was his official title as the duke of Windsor. And there's a British scholar called Nigel Rhys, who for a very long time has been researching quotations. And he has a fantastic newsletter called quote unquote and a great website by the same name. And he believes Nigel Rhys believes that it may go back even further among the royals, the royal families. He thinks it may have been said by the very first duke of Wellington Arthur wellesley as always make water when you can. Because it's attributed to that first duke of Wellington, but I don't have a date on that. But it is possible that instead of Churchill, it comes from other British August figures of note. Who have to make lots of public appearances. I mean, this makes sense to me. Yeah. Yeah, you're always being shuttled around from important event to important event and people always wanted to catch your eye or catch your arm and talk to you and don't forget that you have very human needs that are private that don't involve other people. Well, that makes sense. Madison, thank you so much for calling today. And it doesn't matter that your grandpa didn't get it quite right. It was still really good advice to pass along to you. It is, and you know he had a lot of good advice. Thank you for letting me ask about that. That was a lot of fun. Yeah, it was. All right, take care. Call us again sometime. Bye. Take care. Bye bye. And you know if there's a famous saying or quotation that you've been repeating for years and now you're wondering, do I have that right? Is that really the person who said it? Do I even have the words right? Let us check that for you. 877-929-9673 email words at wayward radio dot org or find a dozen other ways to reach us at wayward radio dot org slash contact. Our team includes senior producer Stephanie Levine, engineer and editor Tim Felton, and quiz guy John Chanel. We'd love to hear from you, no matter where you are in the world, go to wayward radio dot org slash contact. Subscribe to the podcast here hundreds of past episodes and get the newsletter at wayward radio dot ORG. Whenever you have a language story or question, our toll free line is open in the U.S. and Canada, one 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three, or send your thoughts to words at wayward radio org. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Special thanks to Michael Brest Lauer, Josh eccles, Claire grating, Bruce rogo, Rick seidan worm and Betty Willis. Thanks for listening. I'm Martha Barnett. And I'm grant Barrett until
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Hey, Samantha. So my grandmother, she used to say a phrase that a lot of my peers have never heard of before. And whenever we were walking down the sidewalk together, holding hands, we come to some obstacle. We have to let go of each other's hands and she'd say bread and butter. And then we link back up again. And I didn't realize until I went on a school trip later with my friends walking on the sidewalk kind of the same deal. And they also what are you saying? Why are you saying that? It's just always made me wonder where that came from. I've never heard anyone else say it. So I was just wondering, what's this? What's the root of that phrase? So you're holding hands with your grandmother and so something comes between you like a mailbox or fire hydrant or a light pole. Yeah. Well, Samantha, you can tell your kids that you're carrying on a very, very old tradition. This goes back centuries. It's the idea that the two people who are going around that object should be inseparable. They should stay inseparable. You know, as inseparable as butter and bread, if you butter a piece of toast, you can't un butter it, right? That makes sense. It goes back to a very old superstition that evil spirits or even the devil could take various forms and come between people physically, you know, whether the devil takes the form of an animal or a pebble or a small child running between them, and if you don't do something to counteract that mishap, then the two of you may quarrel later, or have bad luck, and so there's there are a whole lot of phrases that you can use. Bread and butter, some people instead of saying bread and butter, they say needles and pins or one person says needles and the other person says pins and then they hook pinkies and make a silent wish. Milk and cheese are a longer one bread and butter come to supper. And also particularly among black speakers of American English, there's a long tradition of warning against splitting the pole you'll be told don't split the pole, which is that same idea that you don't want to separate the two people who are walking together. And if you want to show your Friends who've never heard this expression, a great example of this, there's a great episode of The Twilight Zone back in 1960 where a very young and very handsome William Shatner, he and his wife were walking along in their separated by lamp post, and he says, bread and butter. Oh, okay. So the bread and butter is saying is at least a hundred years old, but the superstition Martha, and I remembering that this is what we're talking back to the classical era as far as we know, right? Right, all the way back at least to St. Augustine in the fourth century ADs. Yeah, he has a passage about that, doesn't he grant? Yeah, I was talking about exactly like you said. Stones or dogs coming between friends walking arm in arm and how it's bad luck and sometimes how the dogs would go after the boys in order to get justice. Oh my goodness. I'm a Latin teacher. I will have to look up that section. Christina, I think the fourth chapter, if you want to find that inside Augustine oh, thank you so much. Oh wow. Well, thank you for teaching Latin, good for you. I'm glad to hear that still being taught in the schools. What grade do you teach? Anywhere, 6th grade through 12th grade. Wonderful. Doing the good work. Thank you for doing that Samantha. Yeah. Thanks. Thanks. You have a great day. Take care. Good luck. Bye bye. Bye. 877-929-9673 or email us words that wayward radio dot org. Our team includes senior producer Stephanie Levine, engineer and editor Tim Felton, and quiz guy John Chanel. We'd love to hear from you, no matter where you are in the world, go to wayward radio dot org slash contact. Subscribe to the podcast here hundreds of past episodes and get the newsletter at wayward radio dot ORG. Whenever you have a language story or question, our toll free line is open in the U.S. and Canada, one 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three, or send your thoughts to words at wayward radio dot org. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Special thanks to Michael breslauer, Josh eccles, Claire granting Bruce rogo, Rick sidon worm and Betty Willis. Thanks for listening. I'm Martha Barnett. And I'm grant Barrett until next
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Here's a cool term that you might want to extend as a metaphor in your own life. And that's the term channel fever. Channel fever refers to the feeling that sailors get when they're nearing home. You know, they're so anxious and excited. But they're not quite there yet. So the English term, so it's English sailors in the English Channel, but not quite to the port yet. Originally, yeah, yeah, probably probably arose during World War II, you know, coming back across the channel and seeing those white cliffs of Dover or something. Channel fever. Channel fever. When anything is almost over, you know, you're experiencing that channel fever. Yeah, we've extended the term senioritis in our House for that. Ah, there you go. Right, senioritis is when you're in high school and you're almost done and you just don't care about grades or class or anything about ready to graduate. So senior, you could have senioritis for almost ready to depart for a big trip. That senioritis for the trip. You're ready to go. Ready to go. Even though it's days away, you're at paying attention to what you're doing because your mind is already at the destination. 877-929-9673. Hello, you have a way with words. Hello. This is Mary in Laramie, Wyoming. Hello, Mary and Laramie. How are you doing? Well, I am hoping that you all can give me some information with regard to a term that my mother who was from Fort Worth Texas used frequently and that term is possible bath, as in take a possible bath, as opposed to a tub bath or a shower bath, or a bed bath or a sink bath. A possible bath. And what do you think she meant by that? Well, in our family, it meant taking a bath in the sink and just washing off the smelly parts of the body as in the one foot in the sink, the other foot in the sink. Under the arms, et cetera, et cetera. So that's what she meant by it. But I never could understand the meaning of the word possible. And I only heard it have only heard it in my lifetime coming from the mouths of Texans. Well, the expression is pretty straightforward. There's a saying that first you wash up as far as possible and then you wash down as far as possible. And then you wash your possibles. Okay. That is really interesting. Well, you're going to love this. It's not just Texas, in fact, if you take a look at James Joyce's 1922 novel Ulysses, there's a description of a possible bath in there. After heaven's sakes, that's amazing. How about that? One of the characters talks about how she washed up and down as far as possible and somebody else says, well, did you wash possible? I love it. Oh, thank you. Yeah, yeah, it's also in Maya Angelou's wonderful book. I know why the cage bird sings. Wash as far as possible, then wash possible. Very good. Well, thank you so much for doing the research on that. We're always glad to help. Thank you so much for your call, Mary. You bet. Thank you. Thanks, Mary. Bye bye. Bye. What is the euphemistic of refined speech that you use to talk about difficult or awkward things 877-929-9673 email words at wayward radio dot org or tell us on Twitter at W ay WOR D. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weisler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"If you need a different idiom to describe somebody who's really corrupt or really crooked, you can always say, he was so crooked, he could hide behind a corkscrew. Isn't that a great visual? Yeah. That reminds me of my favorite one. It's calling something a revolving SOB. He's an SOB, no matter which way you look at it. And so that's good. 877-929-9673. Hello, you have a way with words. Hi, this is Daniel patullo. I'm calling from Youngstown, Ohio. Hi, Daniel. Welcome to the show. Thank you for having me. So I've always had this question in my head, and I've never really been able to find an answer. Whenever I was getting my puppets car, when I was younger, without missing the beat, you would always say, we're off like a herd of turtles or a turtle hurdles. And now I don't know if he just came up with this. I've tried to look it up before, but I've never found out. And he was the kind of kooky dude, so kooky dude. So heard of turtles. This was your father or your grandfather. My grandfather, the grandfather. Grandfather. Okay, we're off like a herd of turtles. And did he mean anything more than we're leaving? No, it was just every time we got in the car to go somewhere, it was off like a herd of turtles or her to hurdles. You know what, Daniel, I've never heard the turd of hurdles part. I really like that. The other expression, we're off like a herd of turtles, a lot of people say it's one of several sort of fanciful sayings for taking off like that. Like we're off like a dirty shirt at the end of the day or we're often a cloud of whale dust and we're off like a herd of turtles. I mean, it's funny, isn't it for several reasons. I mean, first of all, I don't think herd is the right word for turtles. I don't know that I've ever seen I heard of turtles. I once tried to find the collective noun for a bunch of turtles. And some people say the word is bail BAL. Bale of turtles. What your dad does with playing with the words is really funny. It's what we call a spoonerism where you switch those letters around like you say the lord is a shoving leopard instead of the lord is a loving shepherd that kind of thing. And it goes back quite a ways until the 1930s at least ever since then. People are saying off like a herd of turtles, but Martha, you talked about off like a dirty shirt, but that implies speed where a herd of turtles is rather slow and disorganized. Really slow and disorganized. I wonder, I wonder if your grandfather was hoping people would hurry up and get in the car. You would think that, but we always had to, you know, we've had plans with him. We'd always have to set the time a half an hour earlier just for him. And so he would show up just on time. He was always tardy. He was more turtle like, huh? Yeah. Yeah, he would. Well, he sounds like a clever guy. Yeah, kooky dude. Oh yeah, he is. Thank you, Daniel. Thank you very much. Thanks for calling. Bye bye. Bye bye. Take care. Take off like a dirty shirt and call us 877-929-9673 or email us words at wayward radio dot org. Hello, you have a way with words. Hi, this is Jeffrey Smith from newburn, North Carolina. Hi, Jeffrey. Welcome to the program. Hi, Jeffrey. Well, there's an expression I've often heard and I just kind of wondered what is so right about rain. You know? It just seemed like, you know, I suppose if you're in the desert, you like rain, but other than that, rain makes a lot of mud. It ruins a lot of picnics, and I was just wearing where it could have come from a wide clear, so pleased with rain. Unless I missed it like rain like a king monarch's reign or something. No, your original idea is the right one. It's rain. And so how would you hear it? What kind of situation would you be in? Were you here? Well, my father detection and he had an anecdote more than Carter had liver pills and everything was had to have a follow-up. Well, is this correct? Yep, that's right as rain. And it's like, so he's confirming that is correct. But he always had that twist. So there could be some twist that he was born and raised in Dallas, Texas, southern and I'm Dan Yankee from Connecticut and New Jersey. And I just wondered was it a colloquialism from Texas or is there some other reason for rain that I don't know about? No, it's pretty old right as rain goes back to at least the late 19th century and there were actually a lot of expressions like this like right as a book or write as nails or right as the bank, but this is the one that survived and I'm thinking that it's probably just because of the alliteration, you know that the two R's there right as rain. And also there may be the idea that sometimes when rain comes down it comes straight down in a straight line and it's just absolutely right, you know sort of a right angle to the earth. But we don't really know much more about it than that. It's a pretty straightforward term. Well, just trying to prepare to ask you this question, the thing started running around my mind like two rs. I never thought of it being perpendicular to the earth. I also was thinking maybe it had to do with people talk about when you have to clean rain, everything smells fresh and it's started or something. But I thought I would serve it up to you guys in the two knock it out of the park. Well, I don't know if that was fun. Jeffrey, thank you so much for your call. Call us again sometime, all right? Okay, thanks for taking my call. Bye bye. All right. Bye bye. Jeffrey mentioned having more of something than Carter has pills. Well, Carter was a brand name and Carter cell liver pills, and you can find out more information about that and thousands of other things on our website at wayward radio dot org. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant, Rachel Elizabeth weisler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot org. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"As I was thinking about this. It's like, what would spit nickels, a slot machine, but that doesn't seem like you'd be mad. No, it's just one of a variety of these things that you spit. You're so angry that, well, there's just the expression I'm so angry I could spit or I could spit. Yeah, people who would say I could spit just meaning they're angry or I could spit tax, I could spit nails, I could spit rust, I could chew nails. I could spit rivets. I could spit blood. Or I could really ten feet. A lot of these. Who spits when they're angry? Well, camels may be camels. Yeah. Well, I don't know if they're angry, but they definitely spit. And then I'm going to Australia if they spit chips. If they're thirsty. Chips if they're Thursday. I'm so thirsty, I can spit chips. Some people thirsty. They spit cotton. But anyway, the origin of this is murky, but it's really just about you being so angry that you do something extraordinary that you're out of your head. You're behaving unusually. When we are angry, we don't act ourselves. That is true. That's true. My mom chose to spit Nichols. And the other one she used to say if we were in the car on a motorcycle with speed past this, she'd say, he's going to go head over ten cups. So I have no idea why he would go head over tin cups. Martha, that's one of a set, isn't it? Head over heels, of course. But to rump over tea kettle or head over tea cups and ass over elbow or head over appetites or head over apple cart. All different variety of things. And these go back well into the 1800s. And they're all polite ways of saying that you have fell down and you're discombobulated and probably you felt so so far that your rear end went over your front end. Oh, okay. Kind of cartoon style. It's cartoon style. Maybe even a little bit like what they're today on the Internet they call this the full scorpion. The full scorpion is where you fall down face first and your back legs go up over your head, kind of like a scorpion's tail, reaching for a sting. Landing. Wow. Yeah. So they're both pretty straightforward. They are. And yeah, now that you're saying them, it's like, oh, wait. Yeah, it sounds like your mom had a lot of expressions, juice. She did. And her name was Mary Martha. So I always remember taken by that name. So, yeah. I'll say it again. You can't have too many Martha's. Thanks for calling. I really appreciate it. Well, I really love you too. Thank you again for taking my call. All right. Bye bye. Bye bye. Bye bye. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Have no idea. Absolutely, Marianne. And we've heard from other listeners about this too. We've had questions from Andy and Lebanon, Indiana, Sally and sturgeon bay, Wisconsin, ray and Wisconsin, and Jim and maryville Tennessee as well, and probably others that I'm forgetting. This kind of buck three 80 falls in what we might call indefinite hyperbolic numerals. These are terms used for approximate small dollar amounts. And there are a lot of variations on this one. Dollar three 80, buck one 80, buck two 80, about three 80, buck three 90, about two 98, buck two 95, and these are all exactly what you said. You had it exactly right. They're all about kind of evading the real number. Sometimes because you're embarrassed that it was too high. Sometimes because you're embarrassed so low. Sometimes just to dismiss the thing as being important, which sounds like what your father sometimes did as well. It's not your business to know. Yeah, I was trying to do the math there and think, well, how many pennies would that be? But it makes sense of it. And you know, it just didn't make any sense to us. We're just like a buck three 80. Okay, dad. Sure. Thanks for playing. It's not necessarily just that particular amount, whatever that amount is. I mean, there's also nickel 95, for example. 77. Yeah. Yeah, these are all made up numbers. None of these numbers are real. They're all completely invented. Whoever says it, they don't mean it. Yeah, he was having fun. Oh, he did. And he had a bunch of us have fun with, so that's really fun to hear that there's a lot of different ways to do it. But yeah, we always knew just stop asking. You're not getting anywhere. Well, I'd imagine a man with 8 kids gets tired of questions. So he probably had a lot of adventure techniques. Yes he did. He did indeed. Well, thank you so much. That's really fun to hear and it just will be a delight for my family to hear about it too. So thank you. It's a delight to have you share your memories. We really appreciate it. Thank you all. Bye bye. Bye bye. Memories and language go hand in hand. Call us with your language questions. Tell us about your memories, 877-929-9673, words at wayward radio dot org or on Twitter at WA ORD. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weisler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"You called with this question. I gotta say, Robin, you sound like you've made Martha's day. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Our pleasure. You call us again sometime, all right? Absolutely. Absolutely. You take care of yourself now, right? Be well. Thank you. Bye bye. Bye bye. Thanks, Robin. Bye bye. If there's another language that you speak where they use a specific number to mean an indeterminate amount, let us know 877-929-9673 are tell us about it in email words at wayward radio dot org or talk to us on Twitter at wray. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weisler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"We got an intriguing voicemail from will hasseltine, who was telling us about the first pep rally he ever attended. It was when he was in kindergarten, and he remembers his teacher getting the kids ready by saying, we're going to a pepper alley, or at least that's what he told his mom later that day that we all went to a pepper alley, and his mom, of course, thought that was really, really funny, that little misunderstanding. But he swears that that's what his teacher said, we're going to a pepper alley, and we'll want to know, is there such a thing? And of course, that's what I thought was an adorable childhood misunderstanding, but the truth is there is such a thing as pepper alley. But it's not the same thing as a pep rally, which you would do at school where everyone gathers to cheer on the team that's going to fight in the big game against their dreaded opponents. That's right. But if you look in slang dictionaries, you'll see that pepper alley is actually a state of being beaten up. It comes from boxing slang, where the verb to pepper, of course, means to hit somebody repeatedly. You pepper them with punches, but it's also a pun on a place in South London called pepper alley, where apparently a lot of this went on. So will is still convinced all these years that he heard correctly as a kindergartner. I mean, maybe his teacher was from Britain or something. But I suspect it's just a mishearing, but it's kind of adorable that he's still hanging on to the belief that he heard correctly. Absolutely. Will there's probably a really good chance that you misheard. But, you know, keep believing brother. Grant and I love to hear about those childhood misunderstandings, and you can share yours by calling us 877-929-9673. Hello, you have a way with words. Hi, my name is Amelia. And I'm calling from Arlington, Virginia. Welcome to the show. Hey, Amelia. Thank you. I have something that my wife said recently that I was wondering if you could help me out with. Well, yes, please. She and I have been married for a number of years now are both in our mid 30s and we're both from the Midwest. She's from Iowa and I'm from Ohio. Everyone she'll say something that I've never heard before never heard anyone else say before. So I get to figure out is it an Ohio thing or just something her family says or something she's made up herself. Most recently, she said she was talking about our neighbor who was wearing these sweatpants that had holes all the way through them and she said, oh wow, he's really getting the goodie out of that pair of pants. And I realized, yeah. See, I could tell that you met, she's getting the most out of them. She's like, get the goodie out of it. And I thought, you know, it kind of sounds like a phrase that people say, but then I realized I thought more about it. I don't know anyone else who says that. And her mom was in town recently, and she said it, and I asked her about it, she didn't know where it came from. And her sister also says it. So it's definitely in their family, but nobody knows where it came from and I tried looking it up online and there really isn't much out there about this phrase. So I was curious if you guys had any insight onto it. Well, I think that that's probably pretty straightforward is probably related to the idea of a goodie being the edible kernel of a nut, particularly Hickory nuts and walnuts. Since the late 18th century or so, the term goody has been used to mean something tasty or desirable, you know, like candy or even hard to get at crab meat, you know, get the goody out of a crab shell. Let's see. It's also been used for the yolk of an egg, so the good part, I guess, of an egg. And the flesh of an orange sometimes. Oh wow. Yeah. So all those words are kind of the same. They come from the same place, like the middle of something. Kind of. Yeah. Yeah, the middle, and also just the good part. You know, like a goody bag has goodies in it, or a goody picker. I love that term, goody picker. It's a pointed instrument for digging the meat out of a nut. Is it regional at all? All over. Goody is kind of scattered throughout much of the United States. The south and a little bit in the Midwest. So I'm not surprised that your wife picked that up there. That's interesting about the nut because her mother, my mother in law, grew up on a farm and her dad had a bunch of black walnut trees and would like harvest them and their stories about her the basement being full of walnuts. So I wonder if they know that we had a walnut tree, whatever house is, I know that feeling. Yeah. They are all about scarred about it. I think this is how much it's stained on. Oh, that's really interesting. Well, I'll pass it along to them. I think they'll be interested to hear. All right. Amelia, thank you for helping us get the goodie out of this question. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks so much. Thanks a lot. Best of your wife. Thanks. Bye. Bye bye. When you marry into a family, you don't just marry your spouse. You marry their language. And there's a lot that you might not understand. Martha and I can help you sort that out. 877-929-9673, or talk to us on Twitter at W ay WO RD. Our team includes senior producer Stephanie Levine, engineer and editor Tim Felton, production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler, and quiz guy John Chanel. We'd love to hear from you, no matter where you are in the world, go to wayward radio dot org slash contact. Subscribe to the podcast here hundreds of past episodes and get the newsletter at wayward radio dot ORG. Whenever you have a language story or question, our toll free line is open in the U.S. and Canada. One 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three, or send your thoughts to words at wayward radio dot org. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Special thanks to Michael Brest Lauer, Josh eccles, Claire rotting Bruce rogo, Rick sidon worm and Betty Willis. Thanks for listening. I'm Martha Barnett. And I'm grant Barrett until next time, goodbye. Bye.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Everything in there that's conceivable, you know? Right, okay, because I've only ever heard that and then once I was watching, you know, English show, a British TV show recently. And they said that so and so thought he was all that and the plate of witch crackers. Yeah. Yeah, there are other people have played around with it, a plate of fries, a plate of chips, a plate of green beans, a plate of biscuits and gravy. They've done a variety of different things, but usually all that in a bag of chips is the more common. But yeah, it comes from black American English and like a lot of terms left the speech of black Americans and entered the mainstream to the usual channels of popular culture and it's a little dated now just so you know. And that used by the time. Of coming back around to some who knows. Maybe much younger people start saying it. Thanks to you. Maybe we're transcending right now. As we speak. Maybe. Maybe not. We are all that in a jumbo bag of chips. Thank you so much. I was very hopeful. All right, take care. All right, bye bye. Thanks for calling. Bye bye. Well, if you're slang is new, or you're slaying his old, we'd love to talk about it 877-929-9673. Our team includes senior producer Stephanie Levine, engineer and editor Tim Felton, production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler, and quiz guy John Chanel. We'd love to hear from you, no matter where you are in the world, go to wayward radio dot org slash contact. Subscribe to the podcast here hundreds of past episodes and get the newsletter at wayward radio dot ORG. Whenever you have a language story or question, our toll free line is open in the U.S. and Canada, one 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three, or send your thoughts to words at wayward radio dot org. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Special thanks to Michael Brest Lauer, Josh eccles, Claire rotting Bruce rogo, Rick sidon worm and Betty Willis. Thanks for listening. I'm Martha Barnett. And I'm grant Barrett until next time, goodbye. Bye..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"What book is it? And he said, we'll make it a mystery like that chapter out of it. He was like, his name's Lyman, and we would always refer to him as Lima ism, because he's full of catchy little phrases and such. That's marvelous. I love it. Making a Whipple for reduces poke or a hoot nanny for a sky wampus or a Tim paddle to tie up the moon. I mean, there's so many of these. And I hope we've helped get to the bottom of this mystery for you. You have. Thank you. I can't wait to share it with my dad. Take care now. Hi to Lyman. Thank you. Bye bye. Thank you. Bye. Bye bye. We'll share your family's phrases with us, 877-929-9673 are send them to us in email. That address is words at wayward radio dot ORG. Hello, you have a way with words. Yeah, hello. My name is Gerald. I am in gasby point Rhode Island. Welcome to the show. What's up? I have a question about the word dashboard. I think I can parse out where the board part comes from, but the dash part. I'm baffled by. So you're thinking about the dashboard on a car or a vehicle? Yeah. Yeah, and you're exactly right that dash is the key part of that word. In the 1300s, dash meant to strike suddenly and violently, but over time it also came to have the meaning of to sprinkle or to splatter. So if, say, you ran through a driving rain to get to my house, Gerald, and you showed up at my door, I might say, you know, come on in, your clothes are dashed with mud. And that's the kind of dash that we're talking about here because back in the days of horse drawn carriages, the term dashboard was applied to this panel of wood or leather that went in front of the driver. It was set on the carriage in front of the driver and passengers to keep them from being dashed by water or mud or snow. The term applied to that panel was then applied later to the panel that protected the occupants of horseless carriages from the heat of the oil and the engine. And then over time we kept adding things to it, dials and other options. So it's really this vestige of the old days when you had to protect yourself against mud and water and snow. Nice. Well, that's a great explanation. I kind of expected something like that. But oh, did you? Didn't know. What brought it to mind? Why were you thinking about dashboards? Well, it wasn't, it wasn't actually in reference to a vehicle at the time. I was using a dashboard to manage something on the social media account. Yeah. That's where I wanted to go with this, exactly. It is very interesting that it's now made this third jump into the computing world where it's a screen or interface that shows us statistics or charts or analyses of our underlying data in a human readable format, right? Yes. And who knows? Maybe there'll be a fourth act who can say when we get these neural implants. We'll have middays, maybe. Well, Gerald, thanks for the call, really appreciate it, take care now. Yeah, thank you. Thank you. Bye bye. Is there a word or phrase that's puzzled you? Call us about it 877-929-9673 or send it to us in email that address is words at wayward radio dot org. And if you just can't wait, hit us up on Twitter. We're at wayward. Hi there, you have a way with words. Hi. This is Laura, calling from Dallas. Hey, Laura, welcome to the show. What can we do for you? Well, thank you so much. I'm really excited. I have a question about a phrase that I've been hearing a lot. My parents say it and my mom said, my grandma said it as well. And it is another country heard from. And what context would you hear this in? Well, I have a ten month old daughter. And so she'll be kind of playing quietly and all of a sudden she'll start babbling or talking and my mom will say, oh, another country heard from. Where my same with my little baby cousin, he'll be fast asleep and all of a sudden he's awake and talking and this, okay, another country has from. So it's when somebody just kind of somebody blurts something out. They were unexpectedly speaking and you hadn't expected them to put in any input at all. Exactly, yes. It almost is like their way of acknowledging the baby. It's usually towards the babies, but like that they have joined the conversation and it's kind of like a, it seems like a welcome. Yeah, okay. Have you ever heard them say it in a dismissing way to an adult? Like somebody gives an unwanted opinion or gives an opinion where they weren't asked for an opinion? Not really dismissing, but more of my younger sister if we're all here together and maybe she sleeps later than everyone else. And then she will slowly come down the stairs after everyone is already, you know, talking and having breakfast, then she might get, oh, another country heard from. You finally decided to join us. Yeah, maybe that is a good use. I like that one. She's all where's the coffee? You'll sometimes also hear it if somebody breaks wind or burps. Sometimes you'll hear somebody say that in response to that. But you'll also hear another county heard from without the. And that actually was the original form going back to 1868. And so it's got a long history. Now, I'm going to throw a bunch of stuff here at you. So bear with me, okay? Okay. The expression had a burst of popularity in the 1876 presidential election. Now this was when Samuel J tilden was against Rutherford B Hayes and they had this campaign and even the election tally after all the votes were cast was so close that the ballot recount when it was reordered was like a county by county thing. And some of the far flung counties were very slow to report. So when the newspapers reported on the ballot slowly coming in, they would headline these little blurbs, another county heard from with the results from that county. So we're going to keep up. This was in the newspapers at the time. However, even though a lot of books will tell you that this expression comes from that election, it does not come from that election, although the election may have firmly permanently put it into the lexicon because that expression existed before that election. It appeared before that election in ads and editorials, letters, headlines, and so forth. And it always is like you've used it. It's always like, okay, here's an opinion. Here's somebody spoke up that we weren't expecting to hear from, or sometimes it's kind of dismissively used. That's why I asked about that. Here's something we don't care about with a thing that they insisted on saying. In newspapers, it's like letters to the editors. Here's somebody with an off the wall opinion that we decided to print just so we can make fun of them. That sort of thing. And they'll title it another country heard from. Sorry, another county heard from. But somewhere around 1900 or so, it starts to switch to another country heard from. I don't know why, but my theory is and Martha, I don't know what you think about this, but my theory is, this is when the United States start to be a little more worldly. And we started to get more international news in our newspapers. And another county heard from started to disappear from popular speech and you just don't find it that much anymore. And you also will see variants like another city heard from or another ward heard from. Award is a voting district in the city. Anyway, that's what we know. So 1868. Every time this comes up, Martha and I both furiously look at all the old databases to see if there's anything new and we can create it. We can never find it earlier than 1868. I look desperately, but I can never find any earlier than that. Interesting. Thank you so much. That's great. Yeah. We were happy to hear from your country. So thank you for calling. Oh, thank you so much. Thank you. Take care now. Bye bye. Thank you. Bye bye. And we would be happy to hear from your county or country to 877-929-9673. That number is toll free in the U.S. and Canada. And if you're anywhere else in the world, you can email us words that wayward radio dot org. We will try to get people on from anywhere in the world, believe it or not. And you can talk to us on Twitter at ORD. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words and wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc, a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Yeah, and she made a shirt for it too. Yeah. Yeah, you have to spell cuppers, see you PPA, but had a tonic cup of cappuccino, ta-da. And there's a wonderful segment where she and one of her music students play pilot, music passages from Bach, which require that you play a passage forward and backward at the same time in order for it to be what the composer intended. And it's quite lovely. Both of them have these burping bed posts as they're called. And it's really quite brilliant. They also have a great shot of her playing the oboe at the spiral J in the great Salt Lake, which is just outstanding. Just wonderful stuff. 877-929-9673. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radio dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Don't want to be licking your computer screen though. No. I'm going to lick your Windows 10 installation. And then there's an expression that Martha brought up on the show once, which on one meaning it's Mexican Spanish slang. And one meaning it means to kind of scope out good-looking people in its itar un taco de ojo to throw a taco of the eye, but in another meaning it can mean to look but not by. Of course, window shopping itself in English can also mean to kind of cast admiring glance at all. The good-looking people around you without any intention of really going after them are asking them for dates or anything. But Martha, we have to mention the Canadian one. That's maybe maybe we can just borrow that one. What do you think? Oh, that's a fun one, yeah, I like that one. Twain? Tracking. That's Newfoundland, right? Yeah, yeah, you hear it mostly in Newfoundland. Let's go Twain. It's a window shopping dates back about a hundred years, probably from British dialect term, which really meant to be indecisive or something along those lines. But for some reason, just kind of landed a Newfoundland and stayed there. So why don't we sandy? Why don't we just coin a word right now and we're going to borrow that Newfoundland term and say that if your window shopping on the Internet, you are tracking? Okay, that sounds great. It works. No? Yeah, instead of computer hacks, you have computer tweaks. I like it. Okay, sounds great. Do you have a better idea? Yeah. She sounds suspicious. Yeah, it's just sounds like she's ready to put us on a home, Martha. Well, you know, I will definitely tell her about family. What do you say though, sandy, if you're shopping and you're like, you want to tell something in your family that you were looking for baby clothes and you mean online? How would you just casually throw this sentence out there? I'd probably use browse to be drowsy online. I think I might just say shop. I don't know. I like wacky. I like twerking. I do too. Oh, sandy, thank you for the call. I know we'll get a lot of response. We'll ask everyone to send their suggestions for a new word for shopping on the Internet, all right? Okay, I appreciate you. Thank you so much. You guys have a great day. Bye bye. Thanks, sandy. Thanks to senior producer Stephanie Levine, editor Tim Felton, and production assistant Rachel Elizabeth weissler. You can send us messages, subscribe to the podcast and newsletter and catch up on hundreds of past episodes at wayward radio dot org. Our toll free line is always open in the U.S. and Canada, 877-929-9673, or email us, words at wayward radios dot ORG. Away with words is an independent production of wayward Inc a nonprofit supported by listeners and organizations who are changing the way the world talks about language. Many thanks to wayward board member and our friend Bruce rogo for his help and expertise. Thanks for listening. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Until next time, goodbye. Bye bye..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Someone has been unfaithful as a spouse? Oh. Yeah. That's what I meant. That's where the recessive gene comes in because it skips generations. And so if you don't understand genetics, you might think that your spouse has been cheating on you or sleeping around. You don't have red hair and the redheaded baby is born. But also, Martha, did you know this that sometimes red haired people were seen as unlucky? Oh, sure. Yeah, you might have avoided them like you avoid a black cat? Yeah, there was superstitions, yeah. Martha, you mentioned the late 1800s for this, but there were some other versions of it back then, too, right? Yeah, I'm looking at a newspaper from 1899 that refers to somebody as being as sad as a red headed cross eyed stepchild. You know, it's that child who's a little bit different from the rest of the family. So, yeah, redheads have dealt with a lot over the years. They've dealt with Ginger ism as it's called, you know? Just have stereotypes. We're coming out of that a bit, though. I do feel like my redhead has not been picked on. It's been more embraced. And even the freckles have been embraced as being different and unique. So I'm hoping that's all changing. That's wonderful. I think Harry Potter probably had something to do with that. Weasley's, you know? Part of the reason tribe was seen as a strength. Wow, well, thank you so much. Thank you, Megan. We really appreciate your call. Give our best to your family, all right? Bye bye. 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three email words at wayward radio dot org. Hello, you have a way with words. Hi, my name's Dwayne Francis I'm in New York and my question is what is the meaning of the word karate? Toronto? Yes. It's a word I learned. From my parents, they're from the USVI. The United States Virgin Islands. And it's a word that my mother and her siblings would use. And it would refer to I'm not talking much concern about the meaning of both the origin that they use it to refer to like clutter. And I can't figure out where this word comes from or how it's properly spelled or the only significance that it has. Clutter. Okay. And how would you spell that if you had to spell it? Oh, well, I guess, and I would say CAR UTP LE. That was just guessing, but I can't find it anywhere. That's about right. It does appear in a couple of dictionaries of Virgin Islands language. There's one by Kareem Nelson hull, the virgin island dictionary. And he has an entry for it, and he calls it a collection of items seemingly junk that is placed where it is causing an obstruction or making an area unsightly. And he spells it COR T oh. And then there's another entry on the website of Christian dictionary dot com by Robyn Stearns. She has an intrigue that's very similar for that. The spelling is LE. Missing that last O. And it's very similar. And I have a theory on where that comes from. And this goes back to a dictionary of Jamaican English published by Fred Cassidy and Arby Lepage. And in this book, they talk about a word from new world Spanish carrot tos, I guess I shouldn't have trilled that are. It's carotid. And that means stuff missed the latest things are junk. And it's used in Puerto Rico and Venezuela and other Spanish speaking countries around the Caribbean. Wow. There's also a word in Jamaican other Caribbean countries that mean junk or miscellaneous things or stuff that are very similar carotid karrueche kuroko and tons of different spellings that are all pretty similar, not exactly like they're all missing that L, for example that are very similar to corrupt. Wow. Well, thank you so much. I would have never made that connection with the Spanish type of things. Yeah, because you know, you know, the virgin honeys, it's got all those layers of English. It's got, of course, it's got the English. It's got a little bit of Spanish. It's got a little bit of French, a little bit of Danish, it's got the African heritage. Dwayne I'm wondering about the sense in which you use it. Is it a really negative sense or is it just kind of mild, you know, I got a little bit of clutter on my desk or is it no was used when if mom walked in in the room was in disarray, you were going to hear that word. Coronal. Oh, yes. Did you have a light accident? She'd be like, I can't. I can't work in all this column. You know, you have to keep all this corrupt up, you know? Who? I always loved the virgin island as accident. It always made me feel warm. There was something home like about it. Another theory is that there's just a bit of catheters here where the consonant sounds in clutter where rearrange to give us karate. So that's what metathesis means where sounds swap in a word. Like bird used to be bred and exactly used to be dripped. Exactly. Metathesis. Oh, okay. But anyway, that's the best I have to offer you. And I appreciate you. Thank you both so much. Our pleasure. Thanks for calling. Thanks for calling. Take care now. All right, you too. Bye bye. YouTube bye bye. Bye bye. Bye. We talk about English from all over the world, and we'd love to hear what's going on in your corner of it. Call us 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three or send your questions and stories about language to words that wayward radio dot org. Support for way with words comes from Jack and Caroline Raymond. Proud sponsors of wayward Inc, the nonprofit that produces and distributes this program. You're listening to a way with words. The show about language and how we use it. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Grant, as you know, my mom was a public school teacher for 25 years in my hometown of Louisville, Kentucky. And Laura was a city with a long history of racial segregation. And in 1975, Louisville began court ordered busing to desegregate the schools, and this was a really tense time. So my mom welcomed her new nervous 7th graders from all over the city with an odd bit of homework. She said, go out and find me a black and white and yellow caterpillar. She wanted them to focus on their weird teacher and this unexpected task rather than on themselves in each other. And sure enough one of them found a caterpillar and brought it in. And the kids put it in this big container with a branch of milkweed leaves, which monarch caterpillars like to eat. And over the next few days, the students watched as it attached to one of those leaves and hung down in that J shape that they do. And then form this beautiful blue green case called a chrysalis. And inside that case, the caterpillar's body broke down into a chemical soup. And a few days later, it reformed as a butterfly. And the kids got to watch it emerge and dry its wings and together when it was ready, they set the butterfly free. That first homework assignment became a yearly tradition in room two ten. And the kids learned the words metamorphosis from the Greek for change form. And they also learned the word chrysalis, which comes from the Greek word for gold. Because the case of some butterfly chrysalis or gold and on a monarch chrysalis, it's got these gorgeous gold dots. And the Greek word Chris sauce meaning gold also gives us the word chrysanthemum, which means golden flower. We lost my mom way too early, almost three decades ago. But you know, when I run into her former students, I still hear about those butterflies. And this is why this week I was over the moon grant to find my first ever monarch caterpillar in the wild. I was so excited..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Support for a way with words comes from Jack and Caroline Raymond. Proud sponsors of wayward Inc, the nonprofit that produces and distributes this program you're listening to away with words, the show about language, and how we use it. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Did you ever think about why we spell the word ghost the way we do? Why do we spell it G HOST? Well, it wasn't always that way. And here's what happened. In the mid 15th century, there was an English businessman named William caxton who moved from London to the wealthy city of Bruges in what's modern day Belgium. And there he got in on the ground floor of a new technology, the printing press. Eventually he moved back to England. And in those days type setting was still really new. It was time consuming. It was challenging to learn. And so it made sense that caxton would bring in workers who already knew the business, even if they weren't that familiar with English spelling. So he recruited some fellow printers whose native language was Flemish, which is the variant of Dutch that was spoken there in Bruges. An English spelling in those days was still a little bit unsettled, but generally the English spelling for ghost was gas at that time. And in Flemish, on the other hand, the initial hard G sound before a vowel was rendered as GH, so in Flemish, the word for ghost was spelled GH, EST. So when these Flemish speaking typesetters came across words that resembled similar words in their own language, they'd often add that H after the G and in fact, you can find books from the early days of printing in English that include an initial GH in words like girl and goose and guest and guest and goat. Those spellings didn't last, but there was one expression that appeared over and over in a lot of the early works that caxton printed, and that term was wholly ghost. And the expression holy ghost appeared so often in those early works with that Flemish spelling that the initial GH in that word happened become standard in English. And that's one of the wonderful stories that you'll learn in the new book by linguist Erica Oakland is called highly irregular white tough through and do don't rhyme and other oddities of the English language and grant the book is really a lot of fun to just page through and get answers to those questions. Those pesky questions about why English is so strange. Yes, it really is a great book she's done all new research it looks like. It's well written, easy to read and something that I think you could recommend to middle schoolers, high schoolers, college kids, the family, and I very much enjoyed it. Yeah, it's a very amiable, accessible book, it answers questions like, you know, what's the difference between big and large, really? Why can we say big about certain words in large about other ones or why do we say how come when we want to say, why? There are all these kinds of questions that she answers very thoroughly, and you get a taste of the history of the English language as well. Yeah, so this book highly irregular by Erica Oakland will be linked on our website. We know you're reading something interesting too. Tell us about it 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three or share your favorite books in email, words at wayward radio dot org. Hello, you have a way with words. This is a model. Where are you calling from varina? I'm calling from Dallas, Texas. What can we do for you? Well, I was wondering, you know, I'm a German living in Texas. And I always stumbled here across the world called doofus. Which for me is a German is very hilarious because do written the way it is, but to announce those it's like a word for to be stupid or daft. But children, or teenage, I would say this in German. And I think it's so funny that here you have this Latin suffix U.S., you know? Which makes it so big and so and I really wonder where this comes from. Oh, yeah, it's good that you made the connection there. So doofus reminds you where the word doof and German, which means adult or a stupid man, right? And that U.S. suffix probably got attached to the word because it's modeled after a word goofus, which has approximately the same meaning, but it's about 50 years older. It's another another English word for stupid person. We have a lot of those in English. Interestingly, we don't quite know how doofus got into English in the first place. We do know that there's a word dauf, which comes into English through Scots English, probably from Germanic roots which meant listless or dull and this may ring some bells for you. And this is related to the award Germanic word meaning death DEA F meaning that you can't hear. I think the modern word in German is Taub. Is that right? Help. Yeah. To help. Doof actually in German actually comes from Taub. In early 20th century in Berlin, doof was borrowed from low German to mean stupid because death had all these other meanings because in some dialects of German, you could say something is you can talk about deaf rocks. If rocks are Taub, it means they have no usable minerals or deaf eggs means unfertilized or deaf seeds. I mean they don't germinate, or soup without flavor could be called death. You know, it's unsavory. And so deaf takes on more meanings than just can't hear. It's all about kind of lacking the essential quality. And that's what doof kind of borrowed from the word Taub. In these dialect sensors. But interesting, you do first doesn't really show up in English until the 1960s, and yet it seems like a word that's been in English forever. I thought that maybe it's come here with other immigrants who had come, especially to Texas, you know, define and all this. But maybe I'm wrong. It's possible. You know, before the two world wars, Germans accounted for one of the largest immigrant groups in the United States and there were a lot of German speakers. And then the two world wars meant that German stopped being spoken as a second language among a lot of people. But it's possible that that is how doofus came into use in the United States that there was there were still enough German speakers in the United States, even after the suppression of German as a second language. Especially in Texas, we have this Texas German which really spoken anymore. We have some German words in English like persona tight people say in dumb cough people probably know, but there's also German, right? Yeah, those cops is a very colloquial way of saying dumb cops, you know, which is done as a dumb head literally. Literally read. But those I don't think you will sign it in dictionaries. So this is really spoken language, you know? And children's children and teenagers language. And it's not really it's not very, I think people now don't say dove so much anymore. So 20 years ago that did not have much more so hipster rich for this. Yeah, that's true. Yeah, it definitely came during the 20s when Berlin was this really big party town. It was part due to this part of the sling of Berlin. I doofy as well. Doofy kind of meaning dummy was a big term then too..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Heard from Dan O'Neill in Fairbanks, Alaska, who writes, what common English word is alternately described as reddish, whitish and bluish. Live it. How did you know the idea? I think I read it when I'm reading Dickens or something as a kid and I looked it up and I was like, wait, how can it mean all these things? It's like English. Get your act together. Vivid, ID. There's gotta be an etymology here, Martha. Yeah, well, in Latin, it means a bluish color or black and blue, like a bruise and it came to figuratively mean envious or spiteful or malicious, but then later on for some reason in English, it also took on the meaning of ashen or pallid, and it can also mean reddish. Oh, yeah. So if you're livid with rage, maybe you're reddish, but also sometimes people's all the blood drains from their face when they're in raised as well. So lots of things can happen when you're in rage. Yeah, so strange word. I think you're right. We should make that our motto. English get your act together. Help us get English's act together, call us 8 7 7 9 two 9 9 6 7 three or English doesn't have its act together in email words, wayward radio dot org. Support for way with words comes from Jack and Caroline Raymond. Proud sponsors of wayward Inc, the nonprofit that produces and distributes this program. You're listening to away with words. The show about language and how we use it. I'm grant Barrett. And I'm Martha Barnett. Despite his aspirational name, Oxford spires academy is in the impoverished outskirts of the town that is home to the famous university in England. About 20% of the teens who attend this school are white. The vast majority are refugees and economic migrants from all over the world. They speak a mix of 30 languages. And according to teacher Kate clanchy, this creates something magical, a community without a majority culture or religion, and a mix so extreme that no one can disappear into their own cultural grouping. Everyone has to make friends, companions, and enemies across racial and language divides. And grant as a result, her students end up writing some remarkable poetry. And some of its collected in a book called England poems from a school. Kate clanchy believes that one of the things that makes these young writers so good is actually the process of language loss and change. All of these students came to English after the age of 6 and whether through migration or deafness or dyslexia all of them went through a period where they lost their native language when as one of them put it silence itself was my friend. And Kate clanchy writes in her gorgeous introduction to this book. That locked down period may be painful, but it feeds the inner voice. And I'll give you an example of what I'm talking about. Here's a poem by one of her students rakia Khartoum. It's called my mother country. I don't remember her in the summer, lagoon water sizzling, the Kingfisher leaping or even the sweet honey mangoes. They tell me I used to love. I don't remember her comforting garment, her saps of date trees, providing.
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Anthony burgess talks about grammar and he says grammar has its own fascination and in a ghostly manner its own peculiar truth there is a satisfactory bonus about grammar which the flesh of vocabulary or alexis requires before it can become vertebrate and walk the earth. That's beautiful that's very lovely. What's the book again A mouthful of air title for a book read it now because he had a real fascination with languages and foreign languages and and i love what he says about the bonus of grammar bonus of the structure in which everything hangs and then he gets up and walks words at radio dot org support for a way with words comes from jack in carolina. Raymond proud sponsors of wayward inc. The nonprofit that produces and distributes this program. You're listening to a way with words. The show about language and how we use it. I'm grant barrett burnett. I've seen more and more people use the word. Google ganger. you know this term. Right adapted from d'appel ganger in german which means double goer like somebody's double But google ganger is a person with the same name as one self who's online references or mixed among one's own search results Grant i google alerts for you and i see that you have at least one google ganger a whole bunch. I think i encountered this word. In two thousand seven. I get googlers australia and new zealand and a kid playing soccer in alabama judge in california and there was one who died in texas actually with my name. Oh wow well. There's another martha barnett without the eon. The end met her. 'cause we read the word of south festival there at the same time but we just miss each other but there's also with the e with the on the end of barnet. There's the martha barnette golf classic in south carolina. I did meet one of the grant. Barrett google ganger when we did our show in dallas years ago is a great guy stagehands. Of course he was a stagehands. The theater in texas with him. Yeah two grandparents on stage together testing. What could be better than martha de to time lords meeting it was kind of wonderful. I look for the blue box. Why do i think that We probably are going to hear some other. Google ganger stories. I would love to hear some more. There's a couple of famous ones of the guy who made the film with all the people with his name. there's a couple of festivals that have happened with people who all have the same common name together..
A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"wayward inc." Discussed on A Way with Words: language, linguistics, and callers from all over
"Comes from jack and caroline raymond proud sponsors of wayward inc. The nonprofit that produces and distributes this program. You're listening to a way with words. The show about language and how we use it. I'm grant barrett burnett a while back. We had a conversation about. What would you put on your tombstone. You know how do you distill your life into an epitaph am i and how am i going to tell the world about myself right and we had a lot of listeners call and right with what they were proposing for their own epitaphs. We heard from julie phipps. Who said i've decided to put on mine. I enjoyed it. May i be excused. And there's a reason she did that. She says i grew up in texas. And i always had to say it before. I left a meal that my mother had prepared for us. She's from a very small town in mississippi and boy manners where everything so whether it was broccoli. Brussels sprouts whatever i always say. I enjoyed it. May i be excused. So i always thought that would be a great epitaph right. Yeah i like that one. And we also heard from seth in new york who said that he was unfortunately faced with the responsibility of coming up for epitaphs for his parents and he said that his dad whether it was at a bar mitzvah or wedding he would always ask the band play this one song and the one song was you are the sunshine of my life by stevie wonder and says says i used to cringe at it and think it was silly and then his parents ended up passing away twelve days apart so he had to come up with two gravestones and on his father's side. The epitaph is you are the sunshine of my life. And i'm his mother's side it says forever you'll be in my heart. Sweet is nice and one more from sam written burg who lives in new york city. He says that his uncle jack took a trip to somewhere in the south west and brought back a snapshot of one of his favourite sets of tombstones probably in the late nineteen forties..