What does ‘quid pro quo’ mean?

Latin is a famously dead language, but it was busy enough while it was alive that echoes of it can still be heard in the modern world. One particular Latin phrase has been front and centre in the news recently as the impeachment enquiry into the activities of President Trump… Read More

Plant-based, Sarawak, and Big Five: October’s Words in the News

A couple of months ago, the Impossible Burger brought us a new meaning of the everyday word, impossible. But, of course, Impossible isn’t the only brand of meat substitute on the block. In fact, the increasing attention on this new development in food culture has made plant-based a household… Read More

From ‘Brexiety’ to ‘prorogation’: how Brexit has changed the way we use language in 2019

Britain’s exit from the European Union has dominated the news agenda since 2016, when Brexit was nominated by Collins Dictionaries as its Word of the Year. 2019 was supposed to be the year that Britain finally left the EU. At the time of writing, however, that still hasn’t happened, in… Read More

The rich tapestry of language provides a varied Word of the Year 2019 list

In a year dominated by contentious political issues as well as environmental concerns, it is hardly surprising that many of the words Collins’ lexicographers found coming to the fore during 2019 were either directly political in nature, such as ‘entryist’, or being used most frequently in political contexts, such as… Read More

Collins Word of the Year 2019 shortlist

Climate strike has been announced as the Collins Word of the Year 2019. climate strike (ˈklaɪmɪt ˌstraɪk) noun: a form of protest in which people absent themselves from education or work in order to join demonstrations demanding action to counter climate change Discover the rest of the words… Read More

These are strange, anxiety-inducing times – but there are reasons to be cheerful

These are strange, anxiety-inducing times – but there are reasons to be cheerful. That’s what the English language seems to be telling us in 2019. Having trawled websites, newspapers, magazines, social media, and everyday conversations, Collins’ lexicographers have detected an uptick in words linked to both environmental and digital derangement… Read More

Top 10 Crossword Tips

Bamboozled by crosswords? Here are our top ten tips to help you hone your puzzle-solving skills! Crossword Tip #1: Quick crosswords Crossword puzzles tend to be basically ‘quick’ or ‘cryptic’. A quick crossword usually relies on a one- or two-word clue which is a simple definition of the answer required. Read More

9 Spelling Differences Between British and American English

It is sometimes joked that the United Kingdom and the United States are two countries separated by a common language. Indeed, while the British and the Americans understand each other the vast majority of the time, there are still many important differences between UK and US English, which can lead… Read More

Spanish word of the week: despertar

despertar VERB to wake up Despertar means to wake … up, that is when you wake someone else up. In other words it’s transitive. Despiértame a las ocho, mamá. Wake me up at eight, mom. If you want to describe waking up of your own accord — in other… Read More