Words interest me, which I suppose makes sense given that I do a lot of reading and writing. I’m particularly interested in the power that some words have, how we decide how much power to give them, and what informs our choices about what words to use. The idea of language reclamation seems quite appealing …
In this series, I dig a little deeper into the meaning of psychology-related terms. This week’s term is concept creep. The term concept creep was first described by psychologist Nick Haslam in a 2016 paper. He wrote that there’s been semantic expansion (i.e. expanded definitions) of words representing various phenomena, so those words now encompass …
I love words, which I suppose is part of why I love writing. Certain words/phrases in particular really float my boat and give me no end of amusement. Earlier this week, I wrote about intending to wait until I was no longer in high dudgeon to send a complaint email (about the rodent infestation on …
This post on the word shit rounds out a parade of posts on fabulously versatile expletives. Shit is useful as a verb beyond just the toilet sense. I like the construction of “I shit you not”; if you made it “I shit thee not,” it would almost sound classy. If you’re shitting on me rather …
While fuck is one of the more aggressive swear words in the English language, there are a lot of other ways to use it, and it’s pretty high in cathartic value if you’ve happened to, say, drop something heavy on your foot. It really is remarkably versatile, even if remains taboo as an imprecation (a …
A Fan-fucking-tastic Word: The Linguistic Versatility of Fuck Read More »
This post came about as a result of going down a rabbit hole after looking up whether “the crack of ass” was actually a variation of saying “the ass crack of dawn“, or whether I was just making that up in my head. Ass is a very versatile word, and it’s become particularly popular in …
To round out the week of fluff posts, I have a non-list post for you. I read a lot of blogs written by Americans, Brits, and assorted other folks from around the world. We don’t all write (or talk) the same way. These kinds of things interest me, so I thought I’d do a post …
Do We Talk Funny? How We Speak in Canada vs. the US & UK Read More »
Recent discussions in the blogosphere have got me thinking about the different ways that different people may use the same words. When it comes to mental health conditions, there are technical medical/psychiatric/psychological definitions of terms, but those aren’t necessarily the definitions that people are using in casual conversations. Then there are connotations to words that …
How We Talk About Mental Illness: Definitions vs. Connotations Read More »
Mental illness can involve feeling really crappy and having a lot of difficulty functioning. That’s not the experience of everyone with mental illness all of the time, but it’s there in the mix somewhere. Yet sometimes it seems like people want to avoid the ugly bits, and talk around mental illness rather than talking about …
Is It Helpful to Talk Around Mental Illness Rather than About It? Read More »
I’m in my 40s and Gen-X, so compared to the kids on the internet these days, I’m old. I also spend very little time on social media, so I’m pretty out of the loop. There are a few acronyms that I use, like lol, TMI, IRL, and WTF, but for the most part I’m clueless. …
