Language Lovers

Are you ‘mabobing’? Read Lucy Mangan’s new article to find out.

12th Feb 2016

I am mabobing as I type this, according to CorrinFoley – making random, fidgety movements (banging my foot against the chair, rapping my fingers on the keys between sentences). It’s because I have so many decisions to make in this column, the first of… Read More

Are you ‘kwl’ or ‘cool’? Lucy Mangan looks at your word submissions from the last fortnight

12th Feb 2016

News reaches me – via contributor kaiwaiipanda – that if you are under a certain age, you do not write “cool” in your texts. It is apparently only cool to write “kwl”. I m old, fthr tm. It is possible that they have sound reasons for this otherwise inexcusable… Read More

‘Drynuary’ is nearly over, so what’s next on the word list? Here’s Lucy Mangan with your update…

29th Jan 2016

How are you? Have you survived Dry January? Or ‘Drynuary’, as submitted by Tommy, which if we’d thought of it earlier could have saved us all vital nanoseconds over the last four weeks. When you consider how boring all conversations about dry January are, a nanosecond saved on such discussion… Read More

New Year Etymology Corner – we take a look at the word of the moment, ‘resolution’

8th Jan 2016

‘Resolution’ is one of a group of nouns that come from the Latin word solūtus (meaning ‘made loose’) and are all related to verbs ending in ‘-solve’ (from the Latin solvō, meaning ‘I release’). Other members of this group are ‘dissolution/dissolve’ and ‘absolution/absolve’. They all suggest some sort of release… Read More

Gloving, Basic Income, and Lemmium: December’s Words in the News

8th Jan 2016

As we settle back into our routines with fresh faces and Christmas behind us, we’re bringing some great neologisms into 2016 that December gifted to our linguistic stockings. The adjective nonbinary isn’t exactly new, even when referring to gender (where it indicates a person who identifies as neither female nor… Read More

Lucy Mangan looks at your first word submissions of 2016

8th Jan 2016

Happy New Year to you all! I trust you all had a lovely break and are now enjoying unparalleled success with your chosen resolutions. I am not. But in a crazy twist no one saw coming, I have conceived another one which renders any guilt or fretting about this impossible. Read More

Christmas etymology corner – ‘Eggnog’, ‘Hot Toddy’ and the trusty ‘Regmaker’

9th Dec 2015

It is the party season, and you might be intrigued to know what is behind the names of some of the drinks you could be offered this Christmas. One drink that is especially associated with the festive season is eggnog, whose name comes from nog, an old dialect word for… Read More

‘Black Friday’, ‘Moon Hitler’ and ‘Cyber Monday’: the Christmas madness begins with November’s words in the news

7th Dec 2015

You know, it seems like the Christmas season starts earlier every year. But I’m not talking about seeing Christmas decorations in a shop in late August (which, by the way, actually happened). I’m referring to the fact that people couldn’t wait until 27 November to start talking about Black Friday. Read More

Lucy Mangan’s ‘awesomesauce’ take on your new word submissions

20th Nov 2015

A bumper crop of delights this week, thank you, and from a wealth of new contributors as well as doughty old timers! Thank you, everyone – it feels like Christmas has come early. Welcome to Willow, first of all, a newcomer who gives us “awesomesauce”, which I love almost as… Read More