Category: Word Watch

Recently I had the pleasure of explaining an old expression to my young friend Liam Vavasour. We were discussing electoral predictions, and I mentioned that …

The subject for this month is linguistic mysteries – the things you hear or read that make you wonder, sometimes with amusement, sometimes with disgust, …

I know it’s a movie-house cliche, but it’s scary nonetheless – the story of the demon twin, the entity that seems identical to some nice, …

Professor Leland Yeager of Auburn University, a good friend of this column – and this column needs good friends – writes to issue a warning …

People who don’t like this column – and there are people who don’t like this column – complain about its haughty tone, its arrogant desire …

Every year, Lake Superior State University justifies its existence by issuing a Banished Words List – a list of “badly overused words and phrases” that, …

Woe is us! We live in a degenerate age. Nobody reads any- more; everybody just visits his favorite blogs. Nobody writes anymore either; everybody just …

It is always interesting to see the effect of public events upon our language. The case of Sept. 11 and its aftermath is especially interesting, …