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Words You Should Know

Words You Should Know

Written by: Kris Spisak
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 A few stolen minutes out of your day to talk words and communication, because Ben Franklin and Kurt Cobain both influenced our modern English language, spelling memes deserve to be debunked, and our daily lives are surrounded by the evolution of and the influence of words. Forget the grammar police. There is so much more to this conversation. Words. Language. Human communication. Everything begins here. Foreign Language Audiobooks
Episodes
  • #45 – A Grammar Mayday Over “Mayday” & the Latest in Words You Should Know

    #45 – A Grammar Mayday Over “Mayday” & the Latest in Words You Should Know
    Oct 13 2021
    A few stolen minutes out of your day to talk words and communication, because our daily lives are surrounded by the evolution and influence of words. Forget the grammar police. There is so much more to this conversation. Episode #45 – A Grammar Mayday Over “Mayday” Approximate transcript: Welcome to episode number 45, where we’re talking distress signals—not because we’re feeling distressed necessarily, at least I hope note, but because there are secret grammar mistakes hiding in plain sight if you know where to look for them. Really? Yes indeed. Or if you don’t have language correction tendencies, let’s bring it down to a simple question: where does the word “Mayday” come from? How about S.O.S.? There are stories here, folks, and we’ll get into them today. But first, let’s dive into… The Latest in Word, Language & Writing News And we have a lot worth touching on today. Rather than going in depth into any of these stories, I’m going to remind you that links to all of these updates are in the show notes. Here are the top 7 language news stories since our last episode: Helsinki’s mayor recently suggested the Finnish capitol should be an “English-language city.”The Oxford English Dictionary just had a “K-update,” adopting over 20 new words from the Korean language.Merriam Webster’s definition of the term “Anti-vaccer” has gone under attack.The New York Times declared recently, “Gender pronouns are changing, and it’s exhilarating.” (I love that energy.)Blockchain technology could provide secure communications for robot teams. (Because, yeah, we’ve got to think about these things too)A Facebook exec on moderating hate speech outside the US, answered, and I quote “Language is a challenge.” (Ha, yep. And wow the language stories we could go into with Facebook, but I’m holding off since this is a quick review)And lastly, Psychology Today just published an article called “Why terms of address matter,” speaking to the idea of what we call one another having consequences for the relationship. (Fascinating. Seriously.) That’s seven stories. There’s so much more to cover. In fact, I had trouble narrowing down the top stories for this episode, so follow my social media feeds to stay in the loop with the latest in communications news. Follow me @KrisSpisak on Twitter and @KSWriting on Facebook. Links to everything I’ve mentioned are in the show notes on my website. Intrigued? Excited about what you can bring to your next water cooler conversation? (Whether it’s an actual water cooler or something along those lines on Zoom?) You could argue that how we as people connect with each other is changing faster than ever, couldn’t you. More on communications news next time, though. It’s time to dive into to today’s… English Language History & Trivia Have you ever wondered where the word “Mayday” comes from? Does it have something to do with the first of May and a Maypole? No. Does it have something to do with permissions and a Jennifer Garner movie, where the grownups say yes to everything the kids ask for a single day? Nope, that’s “Yes Day,” not Mayday. “Can” vs. “may” conversations aside… So, mayday, mayday. Let’s explore where this term comes from. Let’s set the scene. You’re on a ship, sailing across the Atlantic Ocean. A storm, far out on the horizon, is already producing waves that bounce your vessel up and down, into peaks and valleys, crests and troughs, and then comes the wind, tearing at anyone on deck, and the rain, whipping the sleeves of your shirt and the hair on your head, and the thunder that booms so loud it echoes across the roiling sea… Okay, am I channeling Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Caruso? Maybe. Maybe not. But what is a ship captain to do? How do they signal their distress? Mayday. Mayday. It’s spelled as one word, not two, for you know if there was a space involved, we’d be back to the first of May, talking picnics and May pole dances. You know the word, but what about it’s origin? Supposedly, “mayday” was coined by Frederick Stanley Mockford, a senior radio officer in Croydon, a town in England, but whether he’s the first official person to say this is not quite proven. That’s not the important part of the story. Mayday was first tested as an emergency distress signal on planes that flew between England and France across the English Channel, as well as with air traffic between the U.S. and France. You’re seeing France as a big part of this story, and it will all start coming together for you here. The word “Mayday” comes from the French phrase similarly pronounced “m’aider” (excuse my terrible French accent; that’s “M-apostrophe-A-I-D-E-R), which is a simple, literal request. Help me. And when that call out is Anglicized, we get “mayday” (M-A-Y-D-A-Y). But wait … there’s a problem. This must be fake news. Why the hesitation? Well, it comes down to ...
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    14 mins
  • #44 – Pleased as Punchy Punch with a Drink & the Latest in Words You Should Know

    #44 – Pleased as Punchy Punch with a Drink & the Latest in Words You Should Know
    Sep 22 2021
    A few stolen minutes out of your day to talk words and communication, because our daily lives are surrounded by the evolution and influence of words. Forget the grammar police. There is so much more to this conversation. Episode #44 – Pleased as Punchy Punch with a Drink & the Latest in Words You Should Know Approximate transcript: Welcome to episode number 44. I’m pleased as Punch that I’m back, though I’m, of course, not nearly as aggressive as the origins of that expression. “Pleased as Punch.” Sparked from violence? From a spiked party drink? No. Well, not quite how you’d think. Punch drunk. Feeling punchy. Punch lines. So many stories, and we’re not pulling punches in today’s conversation, but first, after such a long break, let’s dive into… The Latest in Word, Language & Writing News Now, you’d think when it comes to news about the English language, that a few months of summer break wouldn’t be that dramatic. This language of ours, or a version of it, has been around for an incredibly long time. Yet… we have so much to discuss. We’ve talked about how artificial intelligence models have been advancing when it comes to natural language processing, how GPT-3 threw the world for a loop, being able to generate sentences, poetry, news articles, textbooks, and so much more. Some panicked. Many were excited. Many more were perhaps confused. Either way, GPT-3 from OpenAI will go down in the history books as a defining moment of transformation when it comes to machine-learning and language processing. Now in August, (and I’m recording this in September 2021 so future listeners have that in perspective), in August 2021, Tel Aviv-based artificial intelligence startup AI21 Labs introduced a program they’ve named “Jurassic,” which released as an “open beta,” meaning there are far fewer restrictions for access, as compared to GPT-3, which requires wait lists and similar hurdles. With different parameters, “Jurassic” is said to have more “depth” and “expressivity,” but we’ll see what happens next. There is so much to follow with AI language technology. Not only who the players are and what the technology can do, but what does this mean for the ease of creating fake news, the continuation of past biases captured in the many texts these systems are using as the foundation of their learning, and on the positive side, how these tools can be used to take storytelling and communication to heights not yet imagined. More on all sides of this conversation coming soon. And speaking of discoveries that are transforming our understandings of things, did you hear that experts have recently decoded a 700-year old King Arthur manuscript, one of the earliest versions of the tales, which had its pages recycled into the bindings of four volumes of French philosophy texts? The discovery was made in 2019, but the text has only recently been taken apart, with the roots of so much we know about Camelot, as well as some fascinating differences. A romance for Merlin? Oh yeah, that’s there and more. There’s so much more to cover—and links to everything I’ve mentioned are in the show notes on my website—but I’ll save further explorations for the next episode. It’s time to dive into to today’s… English Language History & Trivia Did you know September 20th is National Rum Punch Day? No? Well, as I’m recording this on September 20th, maybe I’ll just have to raise a glass when I turn off my microphone—nope, no ice cubes clinking in the background at the moment, but cheers to you all the same. The word “punch,” as in the drink, most likely comes from a Sanskrit word (pañc), meaning “five.” Why “five”? Well, it’s said the drink was originally made from five ingredients: alcohol, sugar, lemon, water, and either tea or spices, depending on the source. High five to that? Or are you now thinking about being punch drunk? Perfect association, I know, but the expression “punch drunk” doesn’t come from drinking too much alcoholic punch at a seventeenth century British literary salon or a twentieth or twenty-first century frat party. Much like “slap happy,” which first arose in the 1930s, “punch drunk” was first coined in the 1910s, in reference to mental impairment after repeated blows to the head. Yikes. I know there’s a lot of history there, but boxing is not my sport. Not my cup of tea—or should I say, not my cup of punch? So “punch,” the drink, comes from Sanskrit, but “punch” as in a jab, as in a one-two punch, body blow, or any other version of a forceful strike, this word comes from a Middle English word (pouncen) meaning to “emboss” or “pierce.” Think about a hole puncher, and you’ll see the connection. Then jump that forceful piercing or embossing action into a verb form with your fist, and there you go… or at least that seems to be the story. “Punch” actually shares a similar etymological root with the...
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    11 mins
  • “The Plural form of ‘You’ Already Exists” – encore episode

    “The Plural form of ‘You’ Already Exists” – encore episode
    Sep 8 2021
    A few stolen minutes out of your day to talk words and communication, because our daily lives are surrounded by the evolution and influence of words. Forget the grammar police. There is so much more to this conversation. “The Plural form of ‘You’ Already Exists” – encore episode Apple Podcasts | Android | Spotify | Amazon Music | YouTube Welcome to the summer series of the Words You Should Know podcast, where no, I’m not going to go into the etymology of summer, dog days, or solstice (been there, done that). But, instead, we’ll revisit “Story Stop Tour” events of earlier this year and popular episodes you may have missed from years past. This will be a seven episode break, with new episodes resuming on Wednesday, September 22nd, 2021. So welcome to the encore of Episode 14: “The plural form of ‘you’ already exists (and all these other words you’ve always wanted),” originally released January 23, 2019. Enjoy the show! For the approximate transcript of the full episode: See Episode #14 of the Words You Should Know podcast. Sign up for my English language tips and trivia email newsletter for more articles and podcasts like this. If you like what you’ve been hearing, don’t forget to subscribe to this podcast (via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Android, Google Podcasts, Stitcher, or RSS) so you’ll never miss out on another word you should know. Many thanks to those of you who have taken the time to rate my show wherever you listen. Words. Language. Communications. We’ve got this. The post “The Plural form of ‘You’ Already Exists” – encore episode appeared first on Kris Spisak.
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    8 mins
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