Latest articles by Arika Okrent
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21 wonderful words for windfeature Do you know a willy-willy from a williwaw?
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Why is 'colonel' spelled that way?feature Blame the French — and a little tactic called "dissimilation"
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Where did the word 'dude' come from?feature A massive, decade-long "dude" research project has finally yielded convincing results
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11 totally redundant place namesfeature Lake Tahoe means Lake Lake. La Brea Tar Pits means The Tar Tar Pits. And more!
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11 brand names with plural problemsfeature We're looking at you, LEGO
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Why are 'rhyme' and 'rhythm' spelled like that?feature Blame some showoffs in the 16th century
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Fascinating facts about 10 national anthemsfeature Andorra is the only nation whose anthem has a first-person narrative. France's anthem is incredibly gory. And more!
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5 nations that sit out of alphabetical order at the UN General Assemblyfeature When you're a club with 193 members, as the United Nations is, it can be hard to keep things fair for everybody
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Haiti is teaching kids in the wrong languageThe Explainer Most Haitians speak Haitian Creole. And yet, the country's traditional language of education is French — which less than 10 percent of Haitians speak fluently
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5 words that are spelled weirdly because someone got the etymology wrongfeature Never run with sizars
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11 classy insults with classical Greek and Latin rootsfeature Next time you punk a ructabunde, don't be so excerebrose
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12 onomatopoeias from around the worldfeature Chik chik pok pok is the sound of a train in Korean. Ghrutu ghrutu is pig grunting in Georgian. And more!
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21 fancy medical terms for mundane problemsfeature Overdid it last night? Just explain to your boss that you've got a bit of veisalgia.
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7 sentences that sound crazy but are still grammaticalfeature Believe it or not, this sentence is grammatical: "The rat the cat the dog chased killed ate the malt."
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11 remnants of the Bastille you can still see todayfeature A piece of the French prison's actual moat wall? You'll find it in the subway.
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9 little translation mistakes that caused big problemsfeature The importance of good translation is most obvious when things go wrong
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16 characters from other languages that make great emoticonsfeature Pro tip: Obscure Indian alphabets can really step up your game
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11 words from a 1940s song about slangfeature Betty Hutton sings about how hard it is to understand her boyfriend, who uses too much slang
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9 fascinating facts about the schwafeature You probably don't realize it, but schwa is the most common vowel sound in English
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11 versions of 'Average Joe' from other countriesfeature Morten Menigmand sounds anything but normal. And yet...
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Listen and compare: 15 different Irish accentsfeature Not all accents on the Emerald Isle are the same
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Now you can Rickroll your friends (or enemies) in Klingonfeature "I am certainly considering a blood oath with you."
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What online dictionaries are learning about usfeature They've been tracking your word lookups for nearly two decades. And the results are striking
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4 crazy, early foreign language versions of Beatles songsfeature Spoiler: The Russian interpretation of "Let it Be" is not exactly inspirational
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