Lexicon Valley from Booksmart Studios
A podcast about language, with host John McWhorter. lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, April 22, 2025
The Story of Us
John talks about the subject of his new book by Avery Publishing — Pronoun Trouble : The Story of Us in Seven Little Words. Please subscribe at www.booksmartstudios.com and thank you for listening! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, March 11, 2025
Fire, Die, Rim
The Thai words for fire, die and rim sound an awful lot like the English words fire , die and rim . Why is that? John explains. To help support Lexicon Valley please consider a paid subscription — visit www.booksmartstudios.com and sign up today! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, January 07, 2025
Hither and Yon
Words like thence and thither are all but obsolete in English, but they were actually quite useful! John explains. SUBSCRIBE to LEXICON VALLEY — please go to www.booksmartstudios.com to become a paid member and receive our BONUS segments. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, November 27, 2024
Down the Rabbit Hole
Do you know the difference between a rabbit and a hare? And what then is a bunny? Follow John through the etymological warrens of these several words. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, October 15, 2024
Giving You the Business
It may seem apparent how we got from busyness to business, but the origins of the word “busy” itself are shrouded in mystery. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, September 09, 2024
When Is Code-Switching Inappropriate?
As a daily listener to WNYC Public Radio in New York City, John has noticed that a certain announcer frequently mispronounces words on air. He has thoughts. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Thu, August 01, 2024
The World's Largest Family
Working backwards from existing languages, linguists have had great success reconstructing Proto-Indo-European. Does that mean we can do the same for all language families? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Fri, July 12, 2024
English Is Practically Naked
A cyclone came through and blew off most of English’s clothes, says John, in Part II of his discussion of Indo-European. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, June 10, 2024
Family Ties
There are at least five defining features among hundreds of related languages from English to Hindi to Russian. And what does any of that have to do with the Hittites? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, April 30, 2024
Going Deep
The simple verb to go quickly gets complex in just about any language and English is no exception. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, March 18, 2024
Come Under Scrutiny
What does the bat in “acrobat” have to do with the word come ? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sat, December 30, 2023
Have Your Own Damn Self a Merry Little Christmas
Reflexive pronouns are redundant in a way, sure, but they’re also quite common in many languages. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, November 06, 2023
When Did People Start Talking?
There’s good reason to believe that sophisticated speech began long before homo sapiens hit the scene. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Fri, September 29, 2023
Who's Afraid of Ayesha Rascoe?
Does Ayesha Rascoe have a good radio voice? Not according to many NPR listeners, who find her loud , high-pitched and generally grating . John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, August 21, 2023
What Is Miami English?
A recent study suggests that a new dialect is emerging in the southern part of Florida. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, July 17, 2023
Report of the Trial of Levi Weeks
The trial transcript of a 225-year-old murder is filled with fascinating evidence of the way we used to talk. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Fri, June 09, 2023
I Got My Nails Did!
Many English verbs have three forms — sing, sang and sung, for example. The problem is that speakers seem to want only two. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, May 09, 2023
To v. Too
Too — whether about excess, addition or contradiction — evolved from to . John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, April 24, 2023
Picture of Health
Some languages adopt their “health” word from the concept of wholeness — a metaphor that makes perfect sense. Other languages, however, adopt their “health” word from trees. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, April 03, 2023
The Right Stuff
Like the French word droit , English’s right has taken on a number of useful metaphorical meanings. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, March 20, 2023
Age, Color, Origin, Material
In this favorite from the archives, John discusses some unwritten rules of English that can be remarkably difficult for a learner of English to master. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, March 06, 2023
One for the Record Books
The word “record” can be broken down into two parts, the re and the cord . But what do those parts even mean? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, February 20, 2023
Why Do People in Old Movies Talk Like That?
John is traveling this week and so we’re running a previous episode about the speech patterns of Bette Davis, George Gershwin, Louis Armstrong and countless other Americans of the 1930s. Why do they all sound like that? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sun, February 05, 2023
Past Master
So many of our words have ugly associations that are particular to a historical time or event. Should we expunge them entirely from our vocabulary? Can we? John weighs in. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sun, January 22, 2023
Are You Tryna Hear This?
Words that come to mean “want” often start out meaning something else. Take “want,” for example. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sat, January 07, 2023
The Ambassadors
Henry James wrote his final novels just over a century ago — and yet they are far less accessible than works written much earlier. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Mon, December 26, 2022
Apostrophe S
Possession is more or less about ownership, and we denote that in English by adding ’s to the end of a word. But of course there’s far more to the story than just that. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, December 13, 2022
Is "Knocked Up" Racist?
There’s a rumor going around social networks that “knocked up” traces back to American slave trading. Is there any evidence for that etymology? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Fri, November 11, 2022
What a Young Brain Can Do
It’s tempting to imagine that a sentence will translate rather neatly, word by word, from one language to another. It’s also naive. English, after all, is relatively straightforward, while most languages are far more gunked up with complexity — perhaps none as much as Yimas. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sat, October 29, 2022
What Do You Talk?
The book and lyrics of The Music Man are replete with everyday, ordinary dialogue that, nevertheless, demonstrates how English often works. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Fri, October 14, 2022
The Problem With You
English used to have a more or less typical array of second person pronouns, with thou and thee for the singular — subject and object cases, respectively — and ye and you for the plural. So what happened? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, September 28, 2022
The Rodney Dangerfield Pronoun
Comedian Rodney Dangerfield was fond of introducing jokes with a kind of redundancy, for example: “My wife, she told me I was one in a million. I found out she was right.” But those seemingly superfluous pronouns are filled with promise. John explains. Lexicon Valley is a reader-supported publication. Please consider becoming a paid subscriber. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, September 13, 2022
Is Negro a Slur or Just Antiquated?
The racial reckoning of the past several years has altered the way we think about and use language, often for better but occasionally for worse. And sometimes, as John explains in this episode, what we tend to believe is at odds with what is most likely true. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, August 31, 2022
One Is the Loneliest Number
Only , lonely , alone and even atone all derive from the number one , which, by the way, wasn’t always pronounced as if it began with the letter w . John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, August 16, 2022
Throw Up, Turn Out & Believe
Words like chit-chat, pitter-patter and wishy-washy are formed that way for a reason beyond the pleasing way that they sound. The vowel change actually signifies something more meaningful to our human way of thinking. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, August 02, 2022
Why Fidget Poppers Are "Satisfying"
What does the proliferation of so-called ASMR (autonomous sensory meridian response) videos say about the nuanced use of the word satisfying ? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, July 19, 2022
Why Do We Dot Our i's?
As a guest on The Late Show, John told Stephen Colbert that there was nothing especially interesting to say about the word I . Well, he takes that back — there is, it turns out, much to say. Have a listen. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, July 06, 2022
You Are SO Articulate. Really.
Do you remember learning — in grade school most likely — the difference between a count noun and a mass noun? Probably not, and yet chances are that you use them correctly. That’s because you’ve mastered your native language. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, June 22, 2022
When Words Collide
We are frequently asked — often by young listeners who are fascinated by language — how English could possibly accumulate the many thousands of words that make up its vast vocabulary. It’s a topic that’s just too fun not to revisit now and again. Please follow us on Twitter (@lexiconvalley) and leave a rating and/or review on Apple’s Podcasts app. Also, if you have a question that you’d like John to answer in his biweekly Q&A column, then send it along to BooksmartStudios@gmail.com. Thanks so much! This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, June 07, 2022
The Haphazard History of C
Hi Valley residents! It's Bob Garfield, former LV host, begging asking you to subscribe to my Bully Pulpit column at bullypulpit.substack.com . It's free, unless you wish to be a paid subscriber, for which you receive not a single extra bonus but the satisfaction of helping to keep my work going and my voice in the world. Either way, I'd be honored and delighted to have you aboard. Meanwhile, check out my most recent installment , in which I share Some Personal News and announce my retirement from radio/podcasting. And now, back to the Valley … The letters C and K can both represent what we might call a Hard C — as in Cosmo Kramer or Calvin Klein. Not to mention Q, which usually indicates that same sound. Why does the English alphabet have this confusing redundancy? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, May 25, 2022
JFK's Most Famous Sentence
On Jan. 20, 1961, President John F. Kennedy delivered — to an audience seated both outside at the U.S. Capitol and at home in front of their televisions — his inaugural address. Millions were stirred that afternoon by the rousing line: And so, my fellow Americans — ask not what your country can do for you; ask what you can do for your country. Every part of that exhortation, as John McWhorter explains, is a fascinating linguistic lesson. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, May 10, 2022
The Evolution of 'Woke'
What does it mean to be woke ? Has the word problematic become problematic? Today in the Valley, John McWhorter talks with Banished host Amna Khalid about the fraught vocabulary of modern censorship. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Thu, April 28, 2022
Reviving Dead Languages
More than half the world’s approximately 7,000 languages will have no speakers left in the coming decades. Some are working feverishly to preserve or maintain them. Others are asking: Why bother? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, April 12, 2022
Let Sleeping Dogs Lay
Do you know that the past participle of the intransitive verb lie is lain and that its past tense is lay, not to be confused with the present tense of the transitive verb lay? Oh, and do you know that no one really cares if you use them all correctly? John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Sat, April 09, 2022
Bonus: How Did Nigeria Get Its Name?
You might guess that Nigeria and Niger derive their names from the Latin word for “black,” especially since both countries were formerly colonized by Europeans. Guess again. John explains. Bonus segments are normally for paying subscribers only, but we’re making this week’s free for all! To support my work, please consider becoming paying subscriber. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, March 29, 2022
Where Is the Name Ketanji From?
President Biden’s Supreme Court nominee has said that her parents picked “Ketanji” from a list of West African names supplied by a relative. But West Africans speak hundreds of languages spread out across many hundreds of miles. Can we get more specific? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, March 15, 2022
The Ukrainian Language
As John likes to say, Proto-Indo-European — the original ancestor of many European and Asian languages — began on the steppes of Ukraine. This is his linguistic love letter to a region and a people under siege. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, March 01, 2022
How About This Weather?
To describe inclement weather in English, we might say that “it” is raining, which seems natural to a native speaker. But does “it” refer to the sky, the outdoors, the god of precipitation? Maybe it’s not so natural after all. In fact, many languages do weather quite differently. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, February 15, 2022
Joe Rogan and the N-Word, by Way of Kyiv
You may have noticed, among widespread coverage of looming Russian aggression, an unfamiliar pronunciation of the Ukrainian capital Kyiv. What’s with the name change? And what does it have to do with Joe Rogan’s use of the N-word? John McWhorter explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, February 01, 2022
Son of a B***h on a Hot Mic
A hot mic caught President Biden using the epithet to describe a Fox News reporter. Where did “son of a b***h” come from, and why are modern speakers increasingly choosing other insults? This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, January 18, 2022
RIP: Sidney Poitier, Lani Guinier, Max Julien
Actors Sidney Poitier and Max Julien and law professor Lani Guinier — all of whom died this month — have last names that reveal fascinating stories about pronunciation, etymology and language change. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Wed, December 29, 2021
300 Years of Language Peevery
Self-styled language experts — and let’s face it, that includes all of us — have lamented the decline of English for centuries. From shifting pronunciations to newfangled words to evolving grammar, everyone from Jonathan Swift to John McWhorter has a pet peeve or two. What’s yours? Happy New Year! In the warm and generous spirit of the holidays, we’re offering 30% off a subscription to Booksmart Studios until the end of the year. You’ll get extra written content and access to bonus segments and written transcripts like this one. More importantly, you’ll be championing all the work we do here. Become a member of Booksmart Studios today. Thank you for your support. * TRANSCRIPT * JOHN McWHORTER : From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter and yeah, Christmas. A Christmas show, a show about Christmas words, but do you really want that? Think about it: “Here's where the word Christmas comes from, and there it went.” “What's the etymology of tinsel ?” Do you really? I don't really, but I know that, well, Christmas did happen and podcasters are supposed to do this and so what I will do is: There are these albums, real albums. Well, not exactly real, but this is the era of the LP. And the Firestone Tire Company used to put out these Christmas Carol LPs to make you buy Firestone tires. This was back in the mid 60s, and my parents had some of the Firestone Tire LPs. They had beautiful covers. They look like, you know, classic Rudolph Christmas presents. And for people of a certain age — and I'll admit that I am at that point — the Firestone Christmas albums somehow often come off as what Christmas, as in tacky American Madison Avenue Christmas, is all about, at least sonically. And my favorite cut from the ones of those that I have had forever — this is what I remember my parents playing in the late 60s, early 70s, Charlie Brown Christmas, The Energy Crisis, and Firestone Christmas LPs — was Gordon McRae — yes, Gordon MacRae from the film of Carousel, etc. He's always pulling up his pants to show that he's masculine. Gordon MacRae, who was all over the variety shows back then, he's singing “Go Tell It on the Mountain,” and he's trying to sound what they would have called in 1965, soulful. This cut is both bad for the reasons you'll completely understand, but also good. It's actually kind of a good arrangement, and Gordon is trying his best and I play this in my home every Christmas season. People who know me are familiar with it. This is Go Tell It with Gordon 1965. Here we go. [“Go Tell It On the Mountain” sung by Gordon MacRae] So a little Christmas, okay. But, you know, I don't feel like doing a Christmas show; I just want to do some stuff. And what I've been thinking about lately, just randomly, is how utterly — talk about random — how utterly random people's linguistic pet peeves always seem, a
Tue, December 21, 2021
Four Calling Birds? Not Exactly.
Happy New Year! In the warm and generous spirit of the holidays, we’re making this week’s bonus segment free to all. But there’s more: Until the end of the year, you can get 30% off a subscription to Booksmart Studios. You’ll get extra written content and access to bonus segments like this one. More importantly, you’ll be championing all the work we do here. Become a member of Booksmart Studios today. “The Twelve Days of Christmas” is a slog. It's repetitive, replete with archaic imagery and long — and so one can be forgiven for getting a bit sloppy with the lyrics. That's what happened with the phrase “colly birds,” which eventually mutated to “calling birds.” Wait, what's a colly bird? John explains. JOHN McWHORTER: For our bonus segment, I want to share something that I think is just a joy. The Twelve Days of Christmas — you know that Christmas carol that kind of goes on and on? You know, you’re singing it wrong and the kids are singing it right. Think about it: You're standing there and somebody starts singing that song and you've got some eggnog, or hopefully something stronger. And you know that eight-year-old who's standing there next to you, and maybe they've got the lyric pretty much down? But there's something that you always hear them do. I'm almost sure I did this at a certain age. And so it's (singing): “fiiiiive golden rings!” Well, everybody does that. Then you hear the little girl next to you: “four colly birds, three French hens, two turtle doves,” because they don't know what a “calling bird” would be. 🎶 MUSIC (Bing Crosby and The Andrews Sisters) 🎶 So “four colly birds, three French hens,” right. But you know what? Do you know what a “calling bird” is? And yet, if you were writing the lyric, would you put that? Like, OK, a bird that calls, but who ever says, “Ooohhhh, look, it's a calling bird.” That's not something anybody says. And you know what? “Colly birds” is right! Nobody wrote about calling birds! That's something that people thought it was, because nobody knows what a colly bird is anymore. A colly bird is a bird that's black. It's coal colored, it's coaly . And then the sound changes. And so in earlier British dialects, you talked about, “Oh, that coaly bird,” except you'd say, “Well, it's a colly bird.” And so it's a colly bird! So five golden rings and then four black birds — not that they're calling; if you think about it, when you give people birds, usually they're petrified. They're not calling unless it's a talking parrot, and you just know that this song is not about parrots. So it's not “five golden rings, four calling birds, three French hens”; it's colly! From now on, you should listen to that girl next to you — you know, let's call her Delia — and she's going “five golden rings, four colly birds, three French hens” and you say, “Oh no, no, no, Delia, it's calling birds
Tue, December 14, 2021
Why Does the Letter "A" Look That Way?
An alphabet, one of humanity’s greatest innovations, is far from intuitive. Our own English lettering was borrowed from the Romans, of course, but where did they get it from? And where did the concept originate? John has answers. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, December 07, 2021
BONUS: Lexiconundrum #1
To continue our celebration of the re-release of 10 original Lexicon Valley episodes with Mike Vuolo and Bob Garfield, we’re making today’s bonus content free for everyone. Presenting the fan-favorite “Lexiconundrum” — a portmantastic puzzle for the ages. This week, an homage to Bob’s ancestors. * TRANSCRIPT * MATT SCHWARTZ: Hey, Matt Schwartz here, one of the executive producers at Booksmart Studios. This week's bonus Lexicon Valley is a remastered gem straight out of the archives: the short-lived but much-loved Lexiconundrum. I like to think of these not as mere word puzzles, but as a lexical challenge — a test of your linguistic wits. So without further ado, I present to you Bob Garfield and Mike Vuolo. BOB GARFIELD: Each week, for our listeners, you are gonna come up with what I call the Lexiconundrum. Tell us what this week's Lexiconundrum is. MIKE VUOLO: This first Lexiconundrum is a kind of homage to you, Bob. Your name, Garfield was not your ancestors' original name. It used to be— GARFIELD: Garfinkle. VUOLO: So your ancestors, presumably upon arriving through Ellis Island, do you think somebody arrived at Ellis Island whose name was, like, Martin Garfield and he was like, “I wanna be called Hymie Garfinkle”? GARFIELD: To Judaicize their names? (Laughs.) Yeah, I don't think you don't see much of that. VUOLO: But maybe one reason that your ancestors settled on Garfield was that it preserved the vowel progression in their last name: A I E. So my challenge to the listeners is to find a name — a name of somebody relatively famous; not your cousin, not your nephew — whose first and last name has the vowels A I E in that order, and no other vowels. And just to make it simple for the purposes of this challenge, we will not consider the letter Y to be a vowel. So for example, Charlie Daniels of the Charlie Daniels Band, Charlie and Daniels both have A I E — and only those vowels — in that order. Daniel Radcliffe, he is the actor who played Harry Potter in the Harry Potter movies. GARFIELD: Well that’s good, Mike. So you've not only given us the puzzle, but also the solution. VUOLO: Well, those are two solutions which are now ineligible. You have to come up with another one. GARFIELD: I’m on it. Well, that wraps up the shakedown cruise of Lexicon Valley. All right, Mikey, later gator. (Music) SCHWARTZ: In the original airing, listeners had about a week to think of their answer and email it in. You have 10 seconds. But you can always hit pause while you think about your answer and tweet it to @LexiconValley . All right,
Thu, December 02, 2021
Happy Days Are Here
To celebrate the re-release of ten original Lexicon Valley episodes — remastered, ad-free and for paying subscribers only — Mike Vuolo and Bob Garfield return as hosts for this special show about the word “happiness.” Please let us know if you’d like more episodes from the archives, or more Mike and Bob, or both! (As seemingly indefatigable as he is, John McWhorter does, in fact, require occasional time off.) This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, November 30, 2021
But Wait, There's More!
We’re giving John McWhorter a well-deserved day off. But the show must go on, so we’re bringing back a couple of Lexicon Valley legends for a special reunion episode. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, November 23, 2021
BONUS: In Language, Context Is King
The late philosopher Paul Grice formulated four brief maxims by which conversations are generally governed. Most humans find it relatively easy to observe them. Machines, on the other hand, not as much. Normally, John’s Lexicon Valley bonus segments are behind the subscriber paywall, but we’re making this week’s bonus segment free for everyone. With more content now than ever before, we are deeply grateful for your attention and hope that you’ll become a Booksmart Studios supporter . Happy Thanksgiving week! * TRANSCRIPT * 🎶 THEME MUSIC 🎶 JOHN McWHORTER: So what we learned about today with the irony was, in broader perspective, about maxims. It's the maxims created by the philosopher of language Paul Grice — we linguists call them the Gricean maxims — and what the maxims are about are certain underlying assumptions that we make about conversation, about how we use language. These things are unspoken — nobody would teach them — but they are yet another way that we can see that speaking is not just about describing things and giving orders and asking questions. It's more than that; social interaction is weirder and richer than that. So with irony, what goes on is that you are breaking one of the maxims, and it's called the Maxim of Quality. The Maxim of Quality is an unspoken agreement that we make as people to, when we are communicating, tell the truth. The idea is that the default assumption is that we are calling upon somebody's attention in order to tell them something that is true. If you flout, as we say, the Maxim of Quality, it means that you don't tell the truth. Irony is all about flirting with, flouting, the Maxim of Quality. So “very funny” when it wasn't very funny. You flout the Maxim of Quality in order to communicate something, but the idea is that you broke this maxim. Now there are other maxims. The nice thing is that there aren't like 34. It's one of those things where you would imagine that Grice would have become one of these people to whom he has a hammer, and therefore everything is a nail. No, there aren't that many. There are only four. But another one — and one you end up thinking about after you think about the Maxim of Quality — is the Maxim of Quantity. What's the Maxim of Quantity? That is an underlying agreement that when somebody asks us for information, we tell them enough — not too much, and especially not too little. There's an agreement that we're actually going to give what the person was asking. And so let's say you have two children and somebody asks, “Do you have one child?” You're not supposed to answer “yes,” knowing that you actually have two because of course, it is true in the strict sense that you have one child.
Tue, November 16, 2021
That's Not What Irony Means, Alanis
Language is tricky. It doesn’t do what you think it should. It’s as messy as almost anything that’s created by natural selection. And that’s what makes it so fun. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, November 02, 2021
Can You Play “Jew” in Scrabble?
Scrabble and other similar games have been the subject of an ongoing lexicographic debate in recent years, with some arguing that ethnic slurs have no place in the official dictionary or on the board. Many tournament players, however, decry the banning of words — the game, they say, is merely descriptivist. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, October 19, 2021
A*#holes and B%tches
Dividing up nouns as “masculine” and “feminine” — like, for example, in Spanish — has not been a part of English for many centuries. And yet our language remains peppered throughout with gender, often overtly in terms like Mrs. and Mr., which evolved from “mistress” and “master.” Sometimes, however, it’s more subtle. John explains. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit lexiconvalley.substack.com
Tue, October 05, 2021
On the Singular 'They' and Slippery Slopes
English has been calling out for a gender-neutral pronoun for more than a century, with many failed attempts at invented words and portmanteaus. Singular "they" — once the scourge of schoolhouse grammarians — has now emerged to become the pronoun of choice for many outside the so-called gender binary. TRANSCRIPT From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter, and you know, these days, some of you probably know I'm writing pieces for The New York Times, and in The New York Times, not long ago, I wrote a piece about the new, new usage of “they.” And as you might imagine, I like it. Well, I've gotten a lot of very interesting feedback about my take on that. I wouldn't say hate mail, just mail from people very urgently telling me that I'm probably making a mistake, that I don't understand the full import of the call to use “they” in this new, new way. I'll let you know soon what I mean by “new, new.” I thought I would dedicate this episode to a response to people who just can't get with the new, new “they.” And it's not because they don't understand that language changes, but they see this as societally different from the way language generally changes. Folks, I get you, but let's talk about it. Let's talk about “they.” It's a word that's been uniquely subject to transformation. There's always something going on with “they” in English, it seems. Way back in Old English, the word for “they,” for one thing, was not what you'd expect. You'd think that would be something like thag or something. No, it wasn't. The word for “they” was HEE-uh, of all things. Hee-uh. And so, you just had to make do with that. And I say “make do” because HEE-uh is “they.” “He” is hē and “she” is hēo. So all of those are a little ominously similar. Hē, hēo, HEE-uh is “he,” “she,” “they” in the earliest English that we know. And if you talked about “to them,” like, you know, “give them the log,” “give the log to them,” then it was hem, just as it was in the singular. And so hem, “to him,” hem, “to them.” So there was a lot of this similarity. And it got really bad because, as you might imagine, hē and hēo, “he” and “she.” There were people who would say, just, hē for “she,” but then you've got hē and hē, meaning both “he” and “she” — hardly unheard of in languages, but this was a language where it hadn't been that way before. And of course, these things are different from dialect to dialect. So people would have known something is falling together. And then, HEE-uh. Well, after a while, you say that over and over and you might get hē, hē, hē. That was falling to sound like “he” and “she” too. This falling together would have felt funny to some people. And even if they weren't thinking of it consciously, it's the sort of thing where if English is the language that you're speaking — and English used to be a certain way — you might want to fix that. So you've got this HEE-uh
Wed, September 22, 2021
The Pandemic's Effect on Language
Turns out that some languages are less intelligible through a mask than others, and, believe it or not, it all depends on how often you use certain consonants. It’s called the McGurk effect and it’s the closest that linguistics comes to actual magic. * FULL TRANSCRIPT * From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter and you know, in line with the fact that the Booksmart version of Lexicon Valley is going to be somewhat more topical than the Grand Old version, I want to discuss something that I've tried not to get too much into because of my motto that life is always happy in the valley and that is the pandemic, especially since it could be argued that we're coming out of it. And I feel a little better about referring to it at length. And I want to discuss language and the pandemic and beyond the level that some people started asking back about a year and a half ago. What about all of these new terms? And, you know, the answer is, well, you know, what about them? So social distancing, you can't do a show about that. Yes, we learned a bunch of new words and expressions. But still, the question is — especially, you know, a year and a half out — what kind of effect has there been on language from all of this stuff that we've had to go through? And, you know, one of the first things that you might think about is these God-damned masks. What kind of effect does it have? For example, someone very near and dear to me was talking about how when she goes to a store and she has to tell them whether or not she's going to use credit or debit, well, when you're in there and everybody's masked, the cashiers have told her that it's hard to understand whether people are saying credit or debit because those two words differ only in their initial consonant, as we call it. So is it cr- or d- ? There is no problem with that at all in normal life. But when you've got a piece of cloth in front of your mouth, it can be somewhat muffled and you can't make up for that by looking at people's mouths and doing a little bit of passive lip reading as we all do, whether we're conscious of it or not. So credit, debit, what did you say? And so, my sweetheart tells me that she walks into the store and she has to actually enunciate or shout credit or debit. What's going on with that? THE McGURK EFFECT Do these masks actually muffle speech in that way? Do they create a kind of a confusion? And, you know, we would expect that they would. They certainly are. And one way that we know it is that linguists are aware of something called the McGurk effect. And the McGurk effect is one of these things where you can have fun in a class showing people that linguistics can be magic. And what it is, is that if you show a video clip of somebody saying gah , but then what you play them saying is not gah , but bah — you have those two things going on — the pe
Tue, September 07, 2021
What Do They Speak in Afghanistan?
Dari and Pashto are the two major, official languages of Afghanistan, and are even siblings in the Iranian subfamily of Indo-European languages. One, says John McWhorter, is “disarmingly approachable” while the other is “deliciously intimidating.” *FULL TRANSCRIPT* WHAT DO PEOPLE SPEAK IN AFGHANISTAN? From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter and here is our question for this episode. What do they speak in Afghanistan? Notice my melody. I put Afghanistan on the low pitch. I didn't say, what do they speak in Afghanistan? I don't mean that precisely. I mean, what do they speak in Afghanistan? The low pitch means that it's a concept that we already know. And by that I mean that we know why I'm talking about Afghanistan and that the reasons are extremely unfortunate. But because this is a language podcast, it occurs to me that we might want to cover, among all the sorts of things that we're thinking about Afghanistan, what is it that the locals there speak? What do they speak in Afghanistan? You might reasonably suppose that it's Arabic. If I were a layman, I think that's the first thing that I would think. As a matter of fact, I remember when the Taliban first started making the news a good long time ago, I kind of wondered what language is all of that taking place in? And it isn't anything that kept me awake at night, but I didn't know as much of the time and I thought Arabic, I guess. But if you're looking at scenes in Afghanistan, no, they're not speaking Arabic, but then they're not speaking Afghan or Afghani either. Properly, there is no such language. You might think there was because, say, Turkmenistan, Kazakhstan. In Turkmenistan, they speak Turkmen, among other things. In Kazakhstan, they speak the language Kazakh. But it's not always like that. So, for example, in Pakistan — our sister podcast Banished , which is hosted by Amna Khalid happens to come to mind — Aman Khalid is Pakistani. Originally, she speaks not some language called Paki, which doesn't exist to my knowledge. She speaks Urdu. She doesn't speak Paki. Same thing with Afghanistan. There is no Afghani language. Noticed that you've never heard of it. Have you ever heard anybody say, well, my original language was Afghan? There's a reason, there is no language like that. And that's because there are two main languages in Afghanistan. And, you know, we can go through our whole lives and never hear them if we don't happen to be people who live in Afghanistan or somewhere close to it. The two languages are Dari and Pashto, Dari and Pashto. Most people in Afghanistan, whatever they spoke on their mama's knee, speak Dari. About half of the population of Afghanistan speak Pashto. A great many people, of course, speak both. And there are other languages. But the big two, the official ones and the ones that almost anybody knows one of and
Tue, August 24, 2021
The Morphing of Critical Race Theory
There’s a lot of passionate argument about whether “Critical Race Theory” should be taught in schools. But the meaning of CRT differs greatly depending on who you talk to. What did CRT originally mean, and what does it mean now? What are our children actually being taught? And why do some terms tend to become so thorny over time? Click play to find out. *FULL TRANSCRIPT* JOHN McWHORTER : From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley , a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter and we need to talk about something. WORD MEANINGS CHANGE OVER TIME As I often do, I'm going to start from way outside and then I'm going to zero in. As you'll see, that is a general process that I consider very central to the passage of people and things and words through time. We need to talk about something. So let's start with something like audition . We all know what an audition is. You're picturing somebody nervous on stage. Think about what that word, quote unquote, should mean. The aud is about hearing. The reason that we say audition is because the original idea was that you would listen to someone recite something. Now, it was a natural drifting that you would go from someone reciting something on a stage or in a performance to someone playing an instrument or even someone doing a dance, something that doesn't involve sound at all. It could be a mime these days who auditions, but it started out being about hearing someone say something and then it changed. Words’ meanings change. No one today would say: How dare you use the word audition for dance? What's happening to language? Nobody says that because we all know that words don't always mean what they mean, that the form is often different from the content and that's just the way it is. Lewd. Lewd used to mean that you were unlearned. It meant that you didn't know things. Now, no one who knows that says, how dare you imply that those people aren't intelligent, when what you're really talking about is issues of morality and sex or whatever lewd is about. You know, you can learn that it used to mean unlearned, but you don't wish that it still did. There isn't a sense that it's wrong that unlearned drifted into meaning that you can't keep your pants up or something like that. One more, to get a little closer to what we need to talk about. Democratic, and no, I don't mean Greece. I mean the party here in the United States. Democratic once stood for very different things than it does now. Most of us know that Democrats were the party of segregation, for example. There's actually, there's a silly book, and I'm not going to name who wrote it or what the book's title is, because many of us write silly books now and then. I have once or twice, but a silly book that was basically saying that Black people need to stop voting Democratic so much because Democrats have often been quite racist in the p
Tue, August 10, 2021
Mare of Easttown and the Philly Accent
In the 7-part crime drama, Mare of Easttown , Kate Winslet plays a flannel-clad cop with a thirst for Rolling Rock, an appetite for hoagies and a tendency to pronounce water more like wooder . John McWhorter — who also, it turns out, grew up in Philly — discusses his hometown’s enigmatic accent and Winslet’s courageous attempt at imitating those impossibly difficult vowels. Most actors don’t even bother. *FULL TRANSCRIPT* JOHN McWHORTER : From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, a podcast about language. I'm John McWhorter and I want you to listen to this. MARE : I doubt the thing’s gonna live very long. STORE OWNER : Well, you'd be surprised. I mean, my mother turtle? Outlived her. MARE : If it’s taken care of, sure. If you feed it and give it clean water and make sure it's not swimming in its own filth. It’s for my grandson, he's four and has trouble focusing on tasks. That was from the newish series Mare of Easttown . That was Kate Winslet as the Mare protagonist talking. And, you know, if you want to be picky — and of course we don't, except just for this episode we do — there was something a little bit off about that line in terms of the pronunciation. And the reason we're going to be picky about that on this show is because finally, I want to do an episode devoted to the famous Philly accent, the Philadelphia accent. Finally, a Philadelphia show or movie actually takes the trouble to have people talking the way people actually talk in that city. Generally, if something's in Philadelphia, people either, you know, sound like they're from Los Angeles or there's this idea that people in Philadelphia must talk like New Yorkers because New York is close and, you know, you figure, well, Rocky must have sounded kind of like he was from New York because Sylvester Stallone looked like he was a refugee from a Scorsese movie. But no, there is a very distinct Philadelphia accent. And how do I know? Well, as many of you know, I grew up in Philadelphia. I grew up in Philadelphia in the 1970s and 80s. And the accent, the grand old accent is actually fading now. But I'm old enough to have been raised within it in its prime. And, you know, I have a fondness. I remember as late as the 90s, I’d call my mother's work and I'd get one of the the secretaries there on the phone , not the phone, but the phone . And one of them might say, oh, Shelly's out . My mother's name was Shelley. It would be Shelly's out . To me, that's warmth. That to me is a blueberry muffin. That to me is how people are supposed to talk. And to the extent that the white and the Black Philadelphia accent overlapped — and of course, they were different — but even now, I just love hearing either a white or a Black Philadelphian say now instead of now. Now we're going to do it now. That means that this is going to be a
Wed, July 28, 2021
English Has a Bee in Its Bonnet
Welcome to the new Lexicon Valley from Booksmart Studios! On today’s episode: What is a spelling bee, anyway? Why do spelling bees pair particularly well with the English language? And we’ll explore the tempting but complex prospect of spelling reform. Plus: A special subscriber-only bonus segment, to show you what you can get if you become a paying subscriber to Booksmart Studios. * FULL TRANSCRIPT * JOHN McWHORTER : From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, I'm John McWhorter. Earlier this month, a 14-year-old, Zaila Avant-garde from Louisiana, became champion of the 93rd annual, mostly annual, spelling bee — it went on hiatus for three years during World War Two and then again last year because of you know what — the mostly annual Scripps National Spelling Bee. AVANT-GARDE : Wait, what is the language of origin? MODERATOR : It's formed in Latin from a Swedish name. AVANT-GARDE : Murraya. M-U-R-R-A-Y-A. MODERATOR : That is correct. Avant-garde beat out the second-place finisher, Chaitra Thummala. She got tripped up by this compound word: neroli oil. THUMMALA : Neroli oil? MODERATOR : Yes, it's a fragrant, pale yellow essential oil that darkens on standing, is obtained from the flowers, especially of the sour orange, and that is used chiefly in cologne and other perfumes and as a flavoring material. THUMMALA : Neroli oil? MODERATOR : Neroli oil. THUMMALA : Are there any alternate pronunciations? MODERATOR : I see just the one. THUMMALA : Neroli oil. Um, language of origin? MODERATOR : The first part of the entry contains, consists of a French element derived from an Italian geographical name. The second part went from Greek to Latin to French to English. THUMMALA : Neroli oil. N-E-R-E-L-I O-I-L. Neroli oil. MODERATOR : Neroli oil is spelled N-E-R-O-L-I O-I-L. THUMMALA : Thank you. This 12-year-old Chaitra was composed up there on stage. But when you flub a word, when you're that close, that's gotta sting. And I know it does because the only spelling bee I was ever in when I was six or seven years old was one where I was so confident and frankly, I was a good speller. They asked me how to spell cement and I just rattled off S-E-M-E-N-T. It was just a mistake. I knew it was C and that took care of me and I never got to go again and I had frankly never gotten over it. Come to think of it, have you ever seen an Italian spelling bee? Have you ever heard of Russians doing spelling bees? I doubt it because there's something peculiar about English that makes it particularly bee-w
Tue, July 13, 2021
Introducing Lexicon Valley with John McWhorter
Lexicon Valley offers a close examination of language, exploring its power to inform and misinform, to elucidate and obfuscate. Hosted by renowned Columbia University linguistics professor John McWhorter, Lexicon Valley will analyze the words and phrases that dominate our discourse and make the headlines. John H. McWhorter is an associate professor of linguistics at Columbia University. He earned his B.A. from Rutgers, his M.A. from New York University, and his Ph.D. in linguistics from Stanford. Professor McWhorter’s interests include American linguistic history, nonstandard dialects, the perceived legitimacy of languages, and the standing of language mixtures in media and education. McWhorter has taught Columbia's Introduction to Linguistics and many other courses, including Languages in America, The Languages of Africa, Language in Society, Language Contact and the History of the English Language. He is the author of more than 20 books, most recently Nine Nasty Words : English in the Gutter — Then, Now and Forever . Others include The Power of Babel : A Natural History of Language, Losing the Race : Self Sabotage in Black America ; Our Magnificent B*****d Tongue : The Untold History of English; and Words on the Move : Why English Won't — and Can't — Sit Still (Like, Literally). He is also contributing editor at The Atlantic. Lexicon Valley is coming this July! If you haven’t yet, please consider a paid subscription to Booksmart Studios! It’s only $7/month or $70/year and will get you extra podcast episodes, extended guest interviews and an opportunity to engage directly with our hosts. Plus, you’ll be supporting all of the work we do here at Booksmart. Lexicon Valley is just one of at least three shows that we’ll launch this summer. Others include: * Banished : An earnest and thought-provoking show about our reassessment of the many people, ideas, objects and even works of art that conflict with modern sensibilities. What can we learn about our present obsession with cancel culture by examining history, and what might it mean for freedom of expression? * Bully Pulpit: A wry and pointed take on politics, media and society from longtime public
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