All Verbal Energy
Ruth Walker, member of the Monitor familyMs. Walker has passed on. Here’s a brief bio and a link to some of her best columns.
Shaking off late-summer hebetudeThere are several roots for our terms for summer doldrums – and none of them are positive.
Give us your tired, your poor cosmopolitansA new term of political insult from the White House carries some serious baggage.
Peal, repeal, rappel – and climbing downAfter the Senate’s healthcare votes, the word ‘repeal’ took on a new fascination for me.
Awakening to all kinds of possibilitiesWhy English has so many forms for the verbs referring to coming out of sleep
Putting the ‘roar’ into extraordinaryMaking the case for a go-to term for journalists who want to signal newsworthiness.
‘Collusion’ and its playful rootsA look at the surprising etymology of this dark word in the news.
When the sense of reality starts to flickerA vintage mystery-thriller flick provides a very current term for a form of psychological warfare that seems much in use lately.
Setting down the rules on ‘deposing’A look at a word with two very different senses alive and well in the news columns.
Emoluments: grinding out or softening up?A high-flown term for ‘salary’ seems to be rooted in a metaphor of ground grain, but the word’s sound symbolism suggests something else.
Just how many ‘behalves’ make a whole?An obsolete term still has its place in some legal contexts.
Unshackling the roots of ‘impediment’A hardworking ancient three-letter root turns out to be at the foot of many words across Indo-European languages.
Going off, leaving the furniture in chargeThe Monitor’s language columnist is reminded that bureaucracy is literally ‘rule by desks.’
Public memorials and private memorandumsA leaked memo and the controversy about Confederate memorials are both potentially monumental stories.
Will France be all right in the center?After the French presidential election, a look at our vocabulary for describing political parties.
Negotiating in haste, and not at leisureThe roots of this common word hint that striking a deal can be such hard work.
Refugees and the cities of sanctuaryThe story of the Huguenots may have some lessons for us today.
A ‘re-accommodating’ hospitality industryAfter the “dragged passenger” incident, United Airlines has an opportunity to learn what it really means to “accommodate” the public.
Congress, all caught up in their caucusesA look at a distinctively American political term and its distinctively obscure derivation.
Are those crickets I hear, even under snow?A phrase much in use lately to describe uncomfortable silences reminds us how idioms work best when they stay in touch with their origins.
