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Crib, conjunctions

January 17, 2014 2 Comments

Around the Web: Cribs, Conjunctions and Listicles

What happens when a language’s last speaker dies? Why can’t we tell a Californian accent from a Canadian one? A linguistic investigation of the term crib (inspired by MTV Cribs) leads back to Shakespeare. Is the listicle a contemporary poetic format akin to the haiku? (What’s a listicle?) Allen Metcalf examines common words at the Lingua Franca blog. [...]

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Alphabet

scrabble

February 6, 2013 132 Comments

Are Scrabble tile values in need of an overhaul?

Invented by out-of-work architect Alfred Butts during the Great Depression, Scrabble is a staple of word lovers’ lives. The popularity of this beloved game took off in the mid-1950s and has been an essential part of the canon of classic board games ever since. To determine Scrabble’s tile values, Alfred Butts carefully analyzed letter frequency in [...]

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Lexical Investigations

13

Feb

The Lost Language of Love and Courtship

In: Lexical Investigations 11

To modern ears, the following excerpt from Anthony Trollope’s He Knew He Was Right, published in 1869, sounds risqué. Trollope writes: It is not pleasant to make love in the presence of a third person, even when that love is all fair and above board; but it is quite impracticable to do so to a [...]

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5

Nov

Lexical Investigations: Anarchy

In: Lexical Investigations 3

Anarchy The word anarchy has held the negative connotations of lawlessness leading to disorder and chaos since the sixteenth century, but in 1840, the first self-proclaimed anarchist started to project a more positive sense of the word. Pierre-Joseph Proudhon (pictured) wrote in his work What is Property? that, “property is robbery,” and that, “Although a [...]

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1

Oct

Lexical Investigations: Happiness

In: etymology, Lexical Investigations 95

“The pursuit of Happiness” was thought to be an unalienable right by the writers of the US Declaration of Independence. However, in 1776, the definition of happiness evoked a different meaning than it does today. When the framers of this historic document wrote about “Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness,” what exactly did they mean by [...]

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