Tarry or hurry?
It is surprising how similar the verbs in the title sound, though they are antonyms: tarry means “to linger, delay,” while hurry refers to haste.
Climate Adaptation – who will we become in a warming world?
Climate change has become an everyday reality. Communities, businesses, and nations are being battered by impacts that would have seemed impossibly apocalyptic a decade ago: unprecedented heat waves, destructive storms, crop failures, floods, and wildfires. Global action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is too slow, and we are likely to breach 2 degrees Celsius above […]
Abraham Lincoln and the election of 1860 [timeline]
The presidential election of 1860 was, in the words of eminent Civil War scholar James McPherson, “undeniably the most important – and pivotal – in all of American History.”
On big and little foxes
This is a story about how the fox got its name. I discussed the word fox ten years ago (see the post for March 23, 2016), but today I have more to say about the subject.
The right-wing revolution is guaranteed to continue long past Trump
Analysts are taking the pulse of the MAGA movement, seeking to understand whether it can sustain its momentum without its godfather, Donald Trump. In fact, the right-wing movement energetically was rolling along in the early 2010s, before the MAGA label emerged and while Trump was starring in The Apprentice.
Supper with an etymologist
It does not require much philological preparation to guess that supper is a word containing the root sup- and the suffix -er. Yet in the days of King Alfred and even much later, the inhabitants of Anglo-Saxon England had no such word.
Gender Justice in these times
Teaching, researching, and writing about gender—about what gender relations could be in a just world if we put the work into imagining that just world into existence—feels a lot like scrabbling uphill over dangerous terrain only to find mountains beyond the mountains we have already scaled.
The kings of etymological rings
It is amazing how many words Indo-European languages have for “supreme ruler; potentate.” In English, the main one is king.
How can they do it when we can’t?
Salamanders can regenerate lost limbs, but mammals cannot. Recent discoveries about cell potency and positional information are helping scientists understand why, while opening new possibilities for regenerative medicine.
And what of Eurovision’s future? The Eurovision Song Contest celebrates its 70th anniversary, Vienna
Eurovision celebrated its 70th anniversary in Vienna amid controversy over political neutrality, voting integrity, and national withdrawals. Philip V. Bohlman considers the performances that defined Eurovision 2026 and what they reveal about the contest’s future.
What does environmental change ask of societies?
Environmental change is no longer an abstract concern. It is encountered in daily life, in regional disruptions, and in global debates.
Binomial expressions
Why do we say chicken and egg but never egg and chicken? English has hundreds of these fixed binomial expressions, each following subtle linguistic rules. From Yakov Malkiel’s early studies to the forensic clue that helped catch the Unabomber, binomials reveal how deeply word order shapes meaning.
Brothers and sisters
The readers of this blog may have noticed that I usually try to stay away from the oldest words in English, those with ancient Indo-European roots.
How to create visual (graphical) and video abstracts
Although the concept of visual abstract began even before the widespread use of the internet, with journals like Angewandte Chemie and Tetrahedron Letters featuring graphical abstracts in the late 20th century, it wasn’t widely used across all journals until the surge in scholarly papers and information overload.
Pen to Paper with Alexander Mikaberidze
Historian Alexander Mikaberidze reframes the Louisiana Purchase as part of a global story of empire, revolution, and political ambition. He discusses archival discoveries, Napoleonic history, and why the Purchase still matters today.
A few etymological pebbles
The readers of this blog must have noticed how often I suggest solutions connected with sound imitation. Time and again I say that a certain noun or verb owes its origin to onomatopoeia.