OnWords
An exploration and celebration of language and all of it's many quirks, with KMUW commentator Lael Ewy.
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We’ve probably all been there. In the middle of a heated debate, our frustrated opponent hauls out the ol’ “what about . . .” followed by some horrible…
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For some reason, the word shutdown has been on my mind lately…but let’s look at the word itself. Like many in English, it’s a compound word, and my copy…
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The underpinnings of Donald Trump’s leadership style have often been described as “transactional.”Observers and analysts seem to mean by this term an…
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The holiday season and the year’s end have a lot of people taking stock.Gratitude proliferates on social media, a new thanks for every day, for family and…
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After this year’s midterm elections, news-types spent countless hours trying to decide if the results could be described as a “blue wave” or not.“Blue…
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The term “dog whistle” pops up in politics with much higher frequency these days.A literal dog whistle is a whistle that emits sounds at a pitch beyond…
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When an American uses the term “witch hunt,” a few inter-related referents come to mind.The first of these is to the Salem, Massachusetts witch trials of…
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You can’t avoid the word “pumpkin” this time of year, even if you’re the sort of person who avoids pumpkin flavors or pumpkins themselves.“Pumpkin” is a…
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Those who do search engine optimization for a living contend that the hashtag is not all that useful, since few people actually use them to search for the…
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Recent debate over removing Confederate statuary from public spaces illuminates the intersection of words and other forms of expression.The civil rights…