If you catch your blue jeans on a nail, you may find yourself with a winklehawk. This term, adapted into English from Dutch, means “an L-shaped tear in a piece of fabric.” And: What’s your relationship with the books on your...
Chris from Castro, New York, is curious about bum rush or bum’s rush, which refers to forcibly removing someone from an establishment. In 1987, Public Enemy’s debut album Yo! Bum Rush the Show popularized the use of bum rush to mean...
The first-ever “Word by Word” awards were presented by A Way With Words co-hosts Martha Barnette and Grant Barrett as part of a sold-out celebration at the San Diego Natural History Museum. To celebrate its tenth year of independent production...
If everyone on the planet spoke a single language, wouldn’t that make life a whole lot easier? For that matter, is a common world language even possible? Maybe for a minute or so—until new words and phrases start springing up. Also, did you...
heinie n.— Note: Perhaps a play off of “Heinie,” now outdated slang for a German. «The evening crowd at Kirmser’s dressed like everyone else, the men with our hair clipped short, sometimes in a military-cut heinie.» —by...
lynching n.— «The hostile crowd that confronted a lone Modesto police officer and his police dog early Sunday threw glass bottles at the officer, and one suspect punched him in the face, according to details released by police Tuesday...