Tim from Manhattan Beach, California, says his grandmother used to carry a brown paper bag and call it her poke sack. The word poke, in this case, means bag, making poke sack a pleonasm, which is an expression using more words than necessary to convey its meaning. This type of poke comes from French and is related to the words pouch and pocket. To buy a pig in a poke is to purchase something without carefully inspecting it. This is part of a complete episode.
Deviled Eggs (episode #1554) 09/14/2020:
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Play It by Ear (episode #1553) 08/31/2020: How does social context shape our perception of language? When hiking the Appalachian Trail, a young woman from Wyoming found that fellow hikers assumed she... [more]
Moon Palace (episode #1552) 08/17/2020: What happens in a classroom of refugee and immigrant youngsters learning English? Their fresh approach to language can result in remarkable poetry — some of... [more]
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Cherry Bombs (episode #1551) 07/27/2020: An ornithologist says there's a growing movement to change the name of a pink-footed bird currently called the flesh-footed shearwater. The movement reflects a growing... [more]
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