“Spurred by my father’s death, I returned to the Czech Republic hoping to reconnect to him. In doing so, I also reconnected with my native tongue, and with parts of my identity that I had long ignored.”
words
Posted inBlog Post
How Do Words Get Added to the Dictionary?
Four times a year, lexicographers update and add words to the OED. Katherine Connor Martin helps decide what makes the cut.
Posted inEditor's Pick
Falling in Love with Words: The Secret Life of a Lexicographer
In an excerpt from her new book, Merriam-Webster lexicographer Kory Stamper describes how she fell in love with words and offers a peek into the complex process of making dictionaries.
Posted inBooks, First Chapters, Nonfiction, Story
Falling in Love with Words: The Secret Life of a Lexicographer
Merriam-Webster lexicographer Kory Stamper describes how she fell in love with words and offers a peek into the complex process of making dictionaries.
Posted inNonfiction
Our Favorite Words Of 2016
From akasha to kompromat, a guide to the words we learned in 2016.
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Ever-Shifting Definition of ‘Progressive’
Who gets to be a “progressive”?
Posted inNonfiction, Quotes
The Linguistic Morphology of Reaction GIFs
From visual emojis depicting simple emotional states, it’s a short step to the more dynamic emotion or reaction gifs, used by certain internet subcultures to respond or react in playful ways to an online discussion. These are gif images, often originating from internet memes, that depict elements of body language that can be too complex for an emoticon to describe. Essentially, it’s an innovative way for speakers to convey a sense of gesture on the internet.