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Plymouth Across Oceans: From Old English Farm to Colonial Icon
Episode 130
From a humble Old English ‘plum-tree farm’ in Devon to the heart of early American colonization, this episode traces Plymouth’s migration across the …
1 week, 3 days ago
From ‘-aholic’ to Dungaree to Bandana: How English Builds Words from Borrowed Roots
Episode 129
Etymology, borrowing, and cultural diffusion are on full display as we trace the evolution of the suffix ‘‑aholic’, the Indian‑derived fabric term ‘d…
1 week, 3 days ago
From *cunnan* to 'Can': Tracing the Rise of a Modal Verb
Episode 128
Explore how Old English ‘cunnan’—to know or possess skill—evolved into today’s modal auxiliary ‘can’. From preterite‑present verbs and French influen…
1 week, 3 days ago
From Distinctiones to Emojis: Tracing the Evolution of English Punctuation
Episode 127
Explore how early scribal marks turned into modern punctuation—from medieval ‘distinctiones’ to Gutenberg’s printing press, Aldus Manutius’s semicolo…
1 week, 3 days ago
The Morphological Rise of ‑preneur: From French Loanword to English Suffix
Episode 126
In this episode we trace how the French word entrepreneur entered English in the early 19th century, broke into a productive suffix ‑preneur, and spr…
1 week, 3 days ago
Greek Roots, Shipwrecks, and Southern Modals: The Unexpected Journeys of English Words
Episode 125
In this episode we follow how a Greek construction birthed the word ‘microscope’ and sparked a cascade of scientific terms; we examine how a 14th‑cen…
1 week, 3 days ago
Folk Etymology: The Power of Misunderstanding in English
Episode 124
In this episode we explore how folk etymology—our instinctive reshaping of foreign words—has left a lasting mark on English vocabulary. From sparrowg…
1 week, 3 days ago
Voice Recognition and the Accents of Tomorrow: How AI Is Redefining English Pronunciation
Episode 123
Explore how modern speech‑recognition technology is nudging speakers toward machine‑friendly phonetics, echoing past efforts to standardize RP for br…
1 week, 3 days ago
Alfred’s Alphabet: How King Alfred Preserved Old English
Episode 122
Explore how King Alfred of Wessex turned Latin texts into vernacular Old English, establishing a written standard that would echo through centuries. …
1 week, 3 days ago
Welsh English: How Wales Negotiated a Hybrid Dialect
Episode 121
This episode traces the story of Welsh English—from medieval bilingual manuscripts to modern policy and digital expression. It examines how Welsh spe…
1 week, 4 days ago