Wordorigins.org

OUP has put out a couple of videos of Ammon Shea, author of Reading the OED: One Man, One Year, 21730 Pages, commenting on the new Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary. First up, Love, Pregnancy, and Venereal Disease:

And then, comments on how the thesaurus is organized and how one can encounter some rare treasures in its pages:

Hat tip to the OUP Blog.

(Disclosure: Oxford University Press is the publisher of my book, Word Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends. Additionally, if you click through the links and make a purchase, I receive a very small referral payment from Amazon.com.)

Oxford University Press has just published the Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary. I haven’t seen it and this is not a review, but given OUP’s track record with such reference works, it would be surprising if it were anything but an invaluable reference. At $400, though, it’s not for everyone, but taking a gander at it the next time you’re in your local library will certainly be worthwhile.

The OUP Blog has some fun facts about the HTOED.

And OUP-US is running a contest in which a copy of the HTOED is one of the prizes.

(Disclosure: Oxford University Press is the publisher of my book, Word Myths: Debunking Linguistic Urban Legends. Additionally, if you click through the links and make a purchase, I receive a very small referral payment from Amazon.com.)

The Huffington Post has some photos of signs that use a few too many quotation marks. The God and the fireworks signs are the best.

Languagehat has an excellent, if somewhat disturbing, example.

Mark Peters over at Good has an article on crash blossoms, confused readings of poorly worded/punctuated newspaper headlines. As in: “Violinist linked to JAL crash blossoms,” a story about a violinist whose career took off after his plane didn’t. Crash blossoms are like snowclones, eggcorns, mondegreens, and the Cupertino effect.