The first edition of the Oxford English Dictionary debuted in 1888; it was missing the word “bondmaid.” It took 50 years to include it.

Mr. Tersigni is a cultural critic. Have you ever obeyed the suggestions of a digital writing assistant to replace a word or restructure a sentence without knowing how, why or even if it made your ...

Dictionaries are deceptively simple, and incredibly ambitious. NPR's Don Gonyea talks to Stefan Fatsis about his book, ...

The word was coined in the 1930s, probably by the president of the National Puzzlers’ League, “in imitation of polysyllabic medical terms,” according to the Oxford English Dictionary, “but occurring ...

Are you smarter than a spelling bee contestant? If you can spell these words, you might be. Merriam-Webster has announced the hardest words to spell in the English language ahead of the 92nd annual ...

Henry is the author of Enough Is Enuf: Our Failed Attempts to Make English Easier to Spell Detroit News, December 1906. Roosevelt sits stunned in a boxing ring after losing his match with the ...

Tear in eye your dress you’ll tear. So shall I! Oh, hear my prayer, Pray, console your loving poet, Make my coat look new, dear, sew it? Just compare heart, beard and heard, Dies and diet, lord and ...

You're currently following this author! Want to unfollow? Unsubscribe via the link in your email. Follow Mark Abadi Every time Mark publishes a story, you’ll get an alert straight to your inbox! Enter ...

Just to work from "A" to "ant" took the original Oxford English Dictionary team around 10 years. They thought they'd reach "Z" in that time — but gathering definitions for hundreds of thousands of ...

A word which baffled the producers of the latest series of Race Across the World is among 10 Welsh words to be added to the ...