Podcasts by Word-Origin Wednesday
Word-Origin Wednesday is the weekly podcast that walks you through a word origin in five minutes or less.
Further podcasts by The Grammar Geek
Podcast on the topic Gesellschaft und Kultur
All episodes
Ghost and Ghoul (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-10-30T11:33:19
"Ghost" is a pretty old word. "Ghoul," as an English word, not so much.
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October (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-10-23T11:50:04
The names of "October" and a few other months make a lot more sense if we look at Latin and the Roman calendar.
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Sympathy (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-10-16T11:21:42
The everyday meaning of "sympathy" has shifted over the years, but it's always had some connection to its Latin and Greek roots.
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Hysterical (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-10-09T11:11:42
Before it entered everyday English, "hysterical" was medical Latin.
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Autumn and Fall (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-10-02T12:21:13
Do you say "autumn" or "fall" to describe the season between summer and winter? Get the lowdown on the history of both words.
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Dead Duck (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-09-25T12:24:11
"Dead" and "duck" go way back, but the term "dead duck" is only a couple of centuries old.
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Landlubber (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-09-18T12:22
The often miswritten and mispronounced "landlubber" goes back a few centuries.
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Nice (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-09-11T12:23:10
"Nice" has had at least a dozen definitions over the last few centuries.
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Peruse (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-09-04T11:45:55
The Modern English "peruse" came from the Middle English "peruse" . . . or maybe it came from French.
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Factory And Manufacturing (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-08-28T12:48:21
With Labor Day approaching, let's look at "factory" and "manufacturing." They were both borrowed from Latin.
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Escalate (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-08-21T12:49:20
"Escalate" is fairly new word, and the current definition has been around since just the 1950s.
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Put Up Your Dukes (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-08-14T12:47:09
"Put up your dukes," which has been around since at least the 1800s, is one example of Cockney rhyming slang.
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Nickname (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-08-07T13:19
The transition from "ekename" to "nickname" is a fine demonstration of the transition from Middle English to Modern English.
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Posh (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-07-31T12:24:46
"Posh," as it is used today, first appeared in print a little more than a century ago. But where did it come from?
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Karaoke (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-07-24T13:19:46
It took several languages to bring "karaoke" to English in the 1970s.
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Honeymoon (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-07-17T11:24:25
"Honey" and "moon" are very old. "Honeymoon" is relatively new, meaning it's a mere 500 years old.
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Aioli (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-07-10T13:11:03
"Aioli" comes from French, as do the words for many prepared foods.
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Mascara (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-07-03T12:27:59
"Mascara" is linked to many words from many languages, many of which go back centuries before commercially available mascara hit store shelves.
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Liar (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-06-26T11:35:10
The word "liar" goes way back. As it turns out, people have been lying for a long time.
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Salary (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-06-19T12:33:54
"Salary" is related to something in your kitchen, and it's not celery.
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Omelet (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-06-12T11:36:18
Like a lot of food-related words, "omelet" comes from French. Its origin has nothing to do with eggs.
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Humble (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-06-05T11:26:36
"Humble" came from French, which took it from Latin. It's always meant "lowly," although that's not how people use it today.
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Lavaliere (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-05-29T13:37:11
A lavaliere is a fancy pendant. It's also a type of microphone. To find the origin, we go back to 17th-century France.
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Memorial (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-05-22T12:55:43
"Memorial" comes from Latin and is related to a slew of other English words, including "remember" and "memorandum."
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Phases Of The Moon (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-05-15T11:14:54
"Waxing," "waning," "crescent" and "gibbous" go back a long, long time.
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Whiskey (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-05-08T12:30:34
"Whiskey" has been through some changes in its journey to English from (no surprise) Gaelic.
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May Day and Mayday (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-05-01T12:37:58
May 1 is May Day (two words) in the United States. Don't confuse it with "mayday" (one word), the distress call for pilots.
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Verbiage and Verbage (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-04-24T14:57:06
The often misused "verbiage" has been around for a few centuries, and its corrupt offspring, "verbage," is older than you might think.
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Easter (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-04-17T14:58:19
"Easter" goes back to Old English and then goes back further. Celebrations of spring are older than Jesus.
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Rhythm And Rhyme (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-04-10T12:56:55
"Rhythm" and "rhyme" are related words, both in meaning and etymology.
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Stay-at-Home Parent (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-04-03T13:30:28
"Stay" and "home" and "parent" are old words, going back centuries. Words to describe someone who tends to the home and children are also very old. English speakers began using the term "stay-at-ho...
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Leverage (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-03-27T11:58:09
"Leverage" has been in the English language since the 18th century, but its position in everyday corporate speak is fairly recent.
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Tea (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-03-20T15:02:48
Tea has been around for thousands of years, but English speakers didn't need a word for it until they started trading it in the 1590s.
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Butt Cheek (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-03-13T14:38:12
"Butt" and "cheek" have been around for centuries. It took a while for English speakers to put them together.
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Ambulance (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-03-06T15:08:19
"Ambulance" has been an English word since the 18th century, before motor vehicles, and is related to the word "amble."
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Selfie (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2019-02-27T00:00
"Selfie" is a fairly new word, but its root word and suffix are centuries old. Some people don't like "selfie," but resistance is futile.
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Hiatus (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-03-28T11:46:52
By tracing "hiatus," meaning a break, back to its ancient Proto-Indo European roots, we find it has some modern cousins with similar meanings but very different sounds.
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Penultimate (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-03-21T11:50:48
"Penultimate" and its cousin, "ultimate," both come from Latin. As the meaning of "ultimate" shifts, poor "penultimate" is being left behind.
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Carnival (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-03-14T12:02:19
The current popular meaning of "carnival" goes back to the 1920s, but the original meaning, which involves meat, goes back centuries.
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Buck (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-03-07T13:03:27
We've been using the word "buck" as slang for money since the 1850s. There are two theories to explain why.
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Booze (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-02-28T12:51:32
The slang term "booze" goes back many years as a noun and many more years as a verb. And what's a boozeroo?
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Lent (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-02-21T12:56:07
The proper noun "Lent" evolved from a series of longer words ultimately related to spring.
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Valentine (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-02-14T13:01:33
On Valentine's day, you might send a valentine to your valentine. All of those uses share the same origin.
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Complicit (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-02-07T12:58:13
"Complicit" is Dictionary.com's 2017 Word of the Year. It's less than a century old, but the original "complicity" is much older.
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OK (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-01-31T13:14:38
Which came first, "OK" or "okay"? And what does Martin Van Buren have to do with it?
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Fake News (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-01-24T13:13:22
The American Dialect Society named "fake news" its 2017 Word of the Year. The term has been around for a while, but the past few years, it seems to be everywhere.
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Unkempt (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-01-17T13:29:27
"Unkempt," which means "sloppy or disheveled," goes back centuries. It's not the same as "unkept."
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Carbonara (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-01-10T12:52:40
Carbonara dishes typically contain bacon and a cream sauce, but the origin of the word probably involves coal. Let's explore the various theories.
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Cleave (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2018-01-03T13:19:45
"Cleave" can mean "to split" or "to stick to." How did that happen? We explore "cleave" and other contronyms in this week's Word-Origin Wednesday.
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Auld Lang Syne (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-12-27T14:23:05
We sing it every year on New Year's Eve, but what does "Auld Lang Syne" mean and where did it come from?
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Xmas (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-12-20T13:22:15
"Xmas" is a common, but sometimes frowned-upon, shortening of "Christmas." Let's look at the history of both words.
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Surcharge (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-12-13T13:16:06
"Surcharge" came to English from French in the 15th century, long before retailers and credit card companies were sticking it to us.
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Scuttlebutt (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-12-06T13:30:40
Not enough people use the word "scuttlebutt," which means gossip. It comes from the nautical world.
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Turkey (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-11-29T13:28:45
Two different birds have been called "turkey," but the name stuck for only one of those birds.
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Thanksgiving (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-11-22T15:01:58
"Thanks" and "giving" are pretty old words. When did people start combining them into "thanksgiving," and when did "Thanksgiving" get capitalized?
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Octopus (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-11-15T13:21:48
The origin of "octopus" helps us determine the preferred plural.
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Bobby Pin (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-11-08T13:29:45
The bobby pin was invented shortly after World War I. Whom or what was it named after?
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Slipshod (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-11-01T11:37:53
"Slipshod," which means "sloppy" or "thrown together," comes from early Modern English.
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Halloween (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-10-25T12:23:53
"Halloween" is a Scottish contraction from the 1700s.
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Transgender And Cisgender (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-10-18T12:18:17
"Transgender" and "cisgender" originated in the 20th century, but the individual parts—"trans," "cis" and "gender"—all come from centuries-old Latin.
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Biceps And Triceps (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-10-11T12:42:54
"Biceps" and "triceps" both come from Latin. Think you know their proper singular form? Think again.
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Ridicule (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-10-04T12:02:06
English speakers might have taken "ridicule" from Latin or might have taken it from French. A related English word definitely came from Latin. Listen to find out what that word is!
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Hippopotamus and Bluetiful (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-09-27T11:57:35
This episode features a centuries-old Greek word and a new American word. Which is which?!?!
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Kindergarten (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-09-20T12:01:13
"Kindergarten" came to English in the 19th century from Germany. Its literal meaning has been mostly forgotten, and its spelling often is too.
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Uber (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-09-13T12:17:28
"Uber" came to us from German and existed for decades in English as a prefix before taking on its current meaning.
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Decimal (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-09-06T12:07:27
"Decimal" comes from the Latin word for "tenth." Its etymological cousins include "decade," "dime," "December" and..."decimate"?
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Tattoo (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-08-30T12:58:40
"Tattoo" has two meanings: a skin marking and a military signal. Are they related? Not at all.
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Conservative (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-08-23T12:32:09
"Conservative" came to English in the 14th century and hung around for 400 years before becoming what it is today: a word almost exclusively applied to politics and religion.
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Liberal (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-08-16T12:43:56
"Liberal," which comes from Latin via French, has been part of the English language since the 14th century, but it didn't have its current political definition until the 19th century.
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Until (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-08-09T14:00:03
"Until" can be traced back more than 1,000 years, all the way to Old Norse. This episode also includes a discussion of the related preposition "till" and a definition of Middle English.
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Recuse (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-08-02T15:18:08
"Recuse" has been all over the news in 2017, but the word isn't new. In fact, it's more than 600 years old.
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Baseball Metaphors (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-07-26T12:55:35
As baseball became America's pastime in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, its lingo leaked into the rest of the English language. Be sure to cover all your bases and listen to this week's Wor...
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Irregardless (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-07-19T14:03:24
"Irregardless," one of the most hated words out there, has been around since at least the 1870s.
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Shindig (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-07-12T12:41:28
The next time you attend a shindig, make sure to tell one of your fellow guests the history of the word "shindig." (It most likely comes from sports, but that's all I'm telling you for now. You'll ...
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Gaslight (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-07-05T13:27:55
The word "gaslight" has been around for as long as, well, gaslights have been around. But the word took on a new meaning in the 1940s, and that meaning has experienced a recent resurgence.
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Pumpernickel (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-06-28T12:16:27
Pumpernickel, a dark rye bread, came from Germany. The word "pumpernickel" also came from Germany, but it originally had nothing to do with bread.
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Myriad (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-06-21T12:07:28
"Myriad" comes from French via Latin via Greek. Curmudgeons today say it should be used as an adjective only ... are they right?
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They (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-06-14T05:08
"They" has been in the English language for centuries as a plural pronoun—and, yes, as a singular pronoun too.
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Impeach (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-06-07T12:34:52
"Impeach," an often misunderstood word, came to Middle English from Latin via Old French.
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Bucket List (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-05-31T11:23:06
In a 2011 interview, Rob Reiner claimed that his 2007 movie "The Bucket List" introduced the term "bucket list" into English. Is he right?
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Sandwich (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-05-24T11:39:19
People have been putting meat between two slices of bread forever, but it didn't really catch on until the 18th century. Over the years, sandwiches themselves have evolved...can the word "sandwich"...
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Umpire (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-05-17T13:02:41
"Umpire" goes back to the 1300s, centuries before the first baseball game was played.
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Honky (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-05-10T11:40:52
"Honky" has been part of African American Vernacular since the late 1950s, but its origins might go back to the 19th century.
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Jeez and Other Minced Oaths (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-05-03T12:30:29
People started saying "jeez" in the 1920s as an expression of surprise or annoyance. Learn about its origin and the origin of other minced oaths.
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Fun and Funner (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-04-26T14:05:21
"Fun" has been part of the English language for centuries, but its use as an adjective is fairly recent. The comparative "funner" is widely criticized, but is that really fair?
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Shot of Whiskey (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-04-19T12:41
There's a story floating around social media that attempts to explain the origin of "shot," as in a shot of whiskey. Is the story true, or is it a myth? Find out on this week's #WordOriginWednesday!
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Nimrod (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-04-12T13:35:07
These days, "nimrod" is used as an insult, but for centuries it meant something very different. Is Bugs Bunny responsible for the modern-day meaning? Listen to find out.
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Ginormous (Word-Origin Wednesday) from 2017-04-05T12:54:38
This week on Word-Origin Wednesday: ginormous and other portmanteaus.
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