OnWords
An exploration and celebration of language and all of it's many quirks, with KMUW commentator Lael Ewy.
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As a writer and a teacher of writing, I worry constantly about the death of writing, and I worry that emoji are leading the charge.The smartphone has…
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The word “tech” has become ubiquitous.It’s a descriptor: high tech, tech geeks, tech jobs—all these refer to that which revolves around microchips and the…
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“AI” is a term that crops up with increasing frequency as automated systems perform functions once squarely in the realm of human thought and control.An…
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The word “regulation” takes on different meanings depending on where you stand.Libertarians tend to bemoan it. Environmentalists are likely on board.They…
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I started worrying about the word “idiot” while discussing whether or not our smartphones are making us stupid.The word “idiot” shares its roots with…
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When you think about a word like “organic,” we think about how it’s seeded throughout the language.Chemists might contend that “organic” refers to…
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It seems like it will never arrive. But once it does, spring seems like the the only possible way to be.We use the word spring for that time of year when…
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“Inflection point” is a term originating in mathematics that describes the point on a curve at which the direction of the curve changes.Business seems to…
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Considering how much time we spend with screens, we don’t spend much of that talking about the word “screen” and all the ways we use it.The screen on your…
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It’s not so much that there’s more insulting language these days but that it isn’t very good.Calling a Millennial lazy or entitled, for example, simply…