7 Shakespearean words to add to your vocabulary

It’s English Language Day! The annual event where language lovers come together to celebrate the great William Shakespeare and a chance to celebrate multilingualism in English-speaking countries around the globe. We’re celebrating with this list of 7 Shakespearean words to weave into your vocabulary. Without further ado, let us go… Read More

What is brain fog anyway?

Brain fog has been on people’s minds in more ways than one during the pandemic and after the recent lockdownversary. Whether you’re struggling to concentrate in meetings, finding creative thinking nearly impossible, or you’ve lost interest in cracking into that latest bestseller, brain fog has become… Read More

Restore Our Earth

April 22 is Earth Day and this year’s slogan is ‘Restore Our Earth.’ Earth Day is older than you might suspect. So attuned are we now to environmental anxiety, aka solastalgia, that it’s easy to presume such an ecologically aware event must be a recent institution. Read More

Cracking the police code: 11 Line of Duty acronyms explained

BBC’s Line of Duty is back after a two-year hiatus and we couldn’t be more excited to resume our role of armchair detective. But for civilians, deciphering all the police jargon can be pretty difficult. When you’re busy nicking bent coppers, you don’t have time to waste on trivial things… Read More

Lockdownversary

The twenty-third of March marks the anniversary of the first UK lockdown, that fateful Monday evening when the PM announced drastic measures to halt the spread of COVID-19. On social media there is talk of a lockdownversary, a portmanteau word which shows how elastic English is. Read More

RNA vaccine and vision board highlight new words for March

One year ago, in March 2020, there was a very clear theme linking many of the new words that were being added to Collins Dictionary. Terms such as social distancing, contact tracing, shutdown order, and… Read More

World Book Day: read up on the language of books

Thursday marks UK World Book Day. Fifteen million UK primary and secondary pupils will receive a £1 voucher to cash in for a book priced by publishers at a nominal £1. The aim is to encourage reading for pleasure. Reading for pleasure is, paradoxically, not pure and simple pleasure. Read More

From sploot to EGOT: discover the latest words added to the Collins Dictionary

Have you ever seen your pet sploot? You may well have done, even if you didn’t know that there was a word for it. This is what an animal does when, instead of tucking its legs neatly under its own body, it lies flat on its… Read More

Spanish word of the week: claro

This week's Spanish word of the week is claro. Claro is a word you’ll very often hear in conversation. The more you use it appropriately in your own conversation, the more natural your Spanish will sound. Read More