Coquette

Niall O'Donnell Leave a comment

This morning I passed a touristy apron at a stall here in Palermo. It featured a map of Italy with different regional types of pasta. I spotted the word reginetta (beauty queen/young queen). I’d never seen the word before, but assumed it was a diminuitive form of regina (queen), as the suffix -etta is often used as a (usually) feminine diminuitive form in Italian.

Just like the -ette suffix in English, borrowed from French, and found in words like cigarette, etiquette, majorette, among many others. Just after seeing reginetta though, a particularly interesting example came to mind: coquette. Continue reading →

My Genial Friend

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I came across an interesting false friend recently, when a student referred to a person as genial. Now, this might seem fine to me, but is was clear from the context that a word like brilliant would have been more appropriate. How can we explain this seemingly strange error, confusing two such obviously different words? Continue reading →

Let There Be Light

Niall O'Donnell 4 Comments

It’s not at all uncommon to come across homonyms in English: words that are spelled and pronounced identically, but have entirely different meanings. Today though, I thought for the first time about a rather curious example of this: light. Continue reading →

He’s Quite Adamant

Niall O'Donnell 2 Comments

The word adamant (unwilling to change one’s opinion, certain in one’s belief) is a very interesting word. And if you read Greek mythology, fantasy literature, and/or comic books, you might know why… Continue reading →

You Love to See it

Niall O'Donnell 4 Comments

You’ve probably noticed this phrase (and of course you hate to see it) online in the last year or so, particularly on Twitter. I’ve got no patricularly strong feelings about the expression itself, but it has made me think a lot about how language spreads, and how that’s changed recently. Continue reading →

A Split Infinity

Niall O'Donnell 5 Comments

I was listening to Radiohead this afternoon, specifically their most recent album, A Moon Shaped Pool (it’s pretty good).

I’d noticed, as I often have before, the pun in the lyrics of the song “Decks Dark:” in split infinity. A play, of course, on split infinitive, but it made a question come to my mind that had never occurred to me before: what’s the link between the words infinity and infinitive? Continue reading →

Call of Doody

Niall O'Donnell 3 Comments

Recently I was talking to a student about the pronunciation of the word duty. And as is so often the case with English, it became one of those well-it-depends moments. Continue reading →