Busted Melon - 7 December 2015

While compiling the Oxford English Dictionary, lexicographer James Murray exchanged hundreds of letters a week with authors, advisors, and volunteer researchers. A new collection online lets you eavesdrop on discussions about which words should be in the dictionary and why — incl ...  Show more

Why do speakers of the same language have different accents? A lively new book called Why We Talk Funny offers a linguist’s look at how and why accents develop. And: If you’ve “stood up” at a wedding, were you supporting the marriage or objecting to it? Plus, a new expression mak ...  Show more

TRY LINGODA TODAY - https://try.lingoda.com/ThinkingJuly $25 Lingoda Discount when you use the code THINKINGJULY - https://try.lingoda.com/ThinkingJuly What is the world's oldest country? This question is not as easy to answer as you might think. We need to discuss what a country ...  Show more

On March 2, we celebrate Read Across America Day, a time when schools across the U.S. encourage kids to dive into the magical world of books. But why March 2? Well, it’s no coincidence—that’s the birthday of a man whose impact on children’s literature is nothing short of legendar ...  Show more

📥 ⁠⁠⁠⁠Grab this episode's FREE PDF⁠⁠⁠⁠ with 10 advanced expressions from this episode, complete with quizzes and example sentences, to learn today’s vocabulary 3x faster! 🎓 ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Join my weekly online group lessons⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ A children’s fairy tale gets a cheeky modern twist as Ch ...  Show more

Watching the film Legally Blonde one day with the subtitles on, numerous perfectly innocuous words were partially asterisked out, because of a technological problem I can't name here lest this episode be blocked from your podfeed, thus becoming an example of the problem itself ...