Dangerous Crooked Scoundrels
Insulting the President, from Washington to Trump
Edwin L. Battistella
From Our Blog
English noun phrases have something called a 'temporal interpretation.' That's linguist-speak for how we understand their place in time relative to the tense of the verb.
Posted on February 5, 2023
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Reading Dan Chaon's novel Sleepwalk last summer, I noticed his use of the verb itch to mean scratch.
Posted on January 1, 2023
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When I received the letter granting me emeritus status, I naturally got curious about the etymology.
Posted on December 3, 2022
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English spelling can be endlessly frustrating. From its silent letters (could, stalk, salmon, February, and on and on) to its nonsensical rules (i before e except '¦.), to the pronunciation of ough (in cough, through, though, and thought).
Posted on November 6, 2022
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When we are moving briskly though a supermarket, skimming ads, or focusing on a big purchase, it's easy to be a less-than-careful reader.Â
Posted on October 8, 2022
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September means back to school for students, but for those of us in unions, it is also the celebration the American Labor Movement and a good opportunity for us to take a look at some of the language of the labor movement.
Posted on September 27, 2022
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I'm intrigued by the not-so-great debate over the pronunciation of caramel, which is instructive both socially and linguistically. Is the word pronounced with that second a, as caramel or without it, as carmel?
Posted on August 14, 2022
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I've been noticing compound possessives like Kace and I's texts or at Paul and my home. Both examples struck me as a little odd.
Posted on July 3, 2022
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Last summer, my city's community forum had a post that generated considerable discussion about the meaning of the word kid. Our governor had announced, via Twitter, that 'All Oregon kids ages 1-18, regardless of immigration status, can get free summer meals' from the state's Summer Food Service Program.
Posted on May 29, 2022
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A few years ago, a student dropped a linguistics course I was teaching because the textbook used contractions. The student had done some editorial work and felt that contractions did not belong in a college textbook, much less one he was paying 50 dollars for. It was probably all for the best. If he didn't like contractions, he probably would've hated the course.Â
Posted on April 10, 2022
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I was reading a column in a chess magazine when I came across the description of a game's finish as a bygone conclusion. 'That's really weird,' I thought, 'It should have said foregone conclusion.'
Posted on March 6, 2022
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English verbs show tremendous variety. Some have a lot of semantic content and serve as the main predicate of a sentence'as transitive or intransitive or linking verbs.
Posted on February 6, 2022
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Any large organization or bureaucracy is likely to have a style guide for its internal documents, publications, and web presence. Some organizations go a step further and develop what is known as a control language.
Posted on January 9, 2022
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If you are a writer, you've probably gone down a rabbit hole at one point or another. The idiom owes its meaning to Lewis Carroll, the author of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, in which Alice literally does that.
Posted on December 12, 2021
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'He wondered if he were hallucinating.' I came across that use of the subjunctive while listening to the audiobook of Neil Gaiman's American Gods.
Posted on November 8, 2021
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When I was growing up, someone in authority told me that way to pronounce often was offen, like off with a little syllabic n at the end. Often was like soften, listen, and glisten, I was warned, with a silent t.
Posted on October 4, 2021
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Superman has been around for more than eighty years. The word "super" been a part of English much longer. It was borrowed into English from Latin, and in Old English we already find the word "superhumerale" to refer to a religious garment worn over the shoulders.
Posted on September 5, 2021
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Where does the relative clause begin and the main clause end? Why does the teacher sometimes call them adjective clauses? Should I use that or which or who? And what is the story with restrictive and non-restrictive?
Posted on August 1, 2021
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The study of language has generated a lot of outlandish ideas: various bits of prescriptive dogma, stereotypes and folklore about dialects, fantasy etymologies, wild theories of the origin of language. Every linguist probably has their own list. When these ideas come up in classes or conversations, I have sometimes referred to them as crazy, wacky, loony, kooky, or nutty. I'm going to try to stop doing that.
Posted on July 8, 2021
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When Perseverance, the Mars rover, landed on the Red Planet on 18 February 2021, I found myself asking a familiar question: where are the Martian scientists?
Posted on June 8, 2021
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First off, there are more pronouns than you might think. Personal pronouns get most of the attention nowadays, especially the widely accepted singular they and other non-binary pronouns. But personal pronouns are just one group among several.
Posted on May 2, 2021
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Modals are a special group of helping verbs, e.g. "can" and "could." The distinction between dynamic, epistemic, and deontic uses of modal verbs is one of the most puzzling pieces of the verb system. For me, the easiest way keep things straight is with the mnemonic ABC: for ability, belief, and canon. So when you encounter a modal, ask how it is being used. Is it A, B, or C?
Posted on April 4, 2021
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I grew up in the golden era of standardized reading tests. We were taught to read for information, and our progress was tracked by multiple choice tests asking us 'What is the main point of the passage?' In retrospect, it was bad training for reading (and for writing), and it took me a long time to change my habits.
Posted on March 10, 2021
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The label "natural" connotes a certain imagery: freshly grown food, pure water, safe consumption. Things described as "natural" are portrayed as being simple and lacking the intervention of culture, industry, and artificiality. Let's take a closer look.
Posted on February 7, 2021
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Recently I had occasion to use the word unsaid, as in what goes unsaid. Looking at that phrase later, I began to ponder the related verb unsay, which means something different.
Posted on January 3, 2021
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The COVID crisis has led me to rethink a lot that I've taken for granted. One the saving graces helping to get me through long days of remote teaching and evenings of doom-scrolling was the opportunity to take long walks.
Posted on December 6, 2020
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Many grammatical superstitions and biases can be traced back to overreaching and misguided language critics: the prohibitions concerning sentence-final prepositions, split infinitives, beginning a sentence with a conjunction, or using contractions or the first person.
Posted on November 1, 2020
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A while back, I wrote a post on How to Write a Biography, with some tips for long-form writing about historical and public figures. However, that's not the only kind of biographical writing you might be called upon to do. You might need to write about yourself.
Posted on October 9, 2020
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Posted on September 6, 2020
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Posted on August 4, 2020
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Posted on July 5, 2020
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Posted on June 7, 2020
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Posted on May 3, 2020
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Posted on April 5, 2020
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Posted on April 2, 2020
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Posted on March 1, 2020
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When people talk about grammar problems, they often mean usage issues'departures from the traditional conventions for edited English and the most formal types of speaking. To a linguist, grammar refers to the way that language is used'by speakers of all types'and the way that it works'how it is acquired, how it changes, and so on.
Posted on February 2, 2020
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My book group recently read a 2017 mystery called The Lost Book of the Grail by Charlie Lovett. In the novel, an English bibliophile and an American digitizer track down a mysterious book thought to lead to the Holy Grail. The chief clue: a secret message hidden in the rare books collection of the fictional Barchester Cathedral Library.
Posted on January 5, 2020
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