Thanks to Maureen B. for a PayPal donation. Dave makes a couple of corrections. Thanks to Jack Sprat Café on E. Franklin Street in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, for providing space for the Word Nerds’ remote studio. (2:08)

Nostalgia of place: We have returned to Chapel Hill, NC, where we both attended university; the meaning of the word “nostalgia” and related concepts; history vs. nostalgia. (4:08)

Music bumper from “Back in the Days” by Teej (10:08)

Some of our Chapel Hill memories; nostalgia as an emotional phenomenon. Can you go home again (with apologies to Thomas Wolfe)? Nostalgia and technology (11:56)

Song: “The Good Old Days” by The Lodger (29:46)

Rude Word of the Week: “sappy” (33:07)

Music bumper from “Natural Man” by Lil Ed and the Blues Imperials. (36:14)

The dark side of nostalgia: wishing for good old days that were not so good (36:42)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 44:49

size: 41.1 Mb

rating: PG (One of our definitions of our Rude Word gets slightly crude at one point.)

The Lodger
“The Good Old Days” (mp3)
from “Life Is Sweet”
(Slumberland)

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Teej
“Back In The Days” (mp3)
from “Schenectady”
(Afrazmusic Corp)

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Thanks to renaissance247 for the email suggestion of this show topic. (2:33)

Practical problems in translation; “good” and “bad” translation; the importance of accuracy (3:36)

Music bumper from “Foreign Affair” by Brad Wheeler (9:37)

Translating well-known texts: Martin Luther, Rainer Maria Rilke (10:33)

Song: “Strange Day in Mexico” by The Clintons (19:26)

Rude Word of the Week: “shmuck” (23:21)

Music bumper from “Make Me Understand” by Matt Thorpe (26:48)

Unfortunate mistakes in translation (including one on our very website!) (27:45)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 36:39

size: 33.6 Mb

rating: PG-13 (Our Rude Word is a rude word in Yiddish, we use some other rude words to discuss it, and we talk about the rudeness of the name of the talk-back link on our website.)

Brad Wheeler
“Foreign Affair” (mp3)
from “The Future Was Yesterday”
(Origin Records)

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Investing something (language or money) with value; potency and context (2:10)

Profanity and language in different cultural contexts; a citation from John Ciardi, the Charles Hodgson of the 1980s (8:30)

Music bumper from “Topsy” by The Jay Lawrence Trio (10:39)

Reputation as value: political capital, economic perception, relative value (13:05)

Song: “Gimme the Money” by Harper (21:50)

Rude Word of the Week: “piss-poor” (26:19)

Music bumper from “Just Looking” by The Jerrys. (28:41)

What creates value? Tangible vs. intangible exchanges (29:26)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 39:59

size: 36.6 Mb

rating: PG-13 (We discuss some taboo insults from non-English languages.)

Jay Lawrence Trio
“Topsy” (mp3)
from “Thermal Strut”
(OA2 Records)

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Harper
“Gimme The Money” (mp3)
from “Down To The Rhythm”
(Blind Pig Records)

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Thanks to Patrick M., Alan H., Leandro B., Stuart W., Dmitriy P., and Peter L. for PayPal donations. Thanks also to Tom D., Tomas A., Anne J., Steve H., and Peter H. for emails. (2:11)

The need to revisit “old” topics (3:16)

Palimpsest, adaptation, homage, interpretation (5:07)

Music bumper from “Second Life” by The Dave Stapleton Quintet (15:34)

Changing and evolving styles; the evolution of slang (17:34)

Song: “Rehash” by JLK (21:07)

Rude Word of the Week: “has-been” (24:20)

Music bumper from “Tonight” by Zach Ashton. (27:25)

Historical and cultural context (27:54)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 33:41

size: 30.9

rating: PG (Explication of a possibly rude German slang word.)

Dave Stapleton Quintet
“Second Life” (mp3)
from “The House Always Wins”
(Edition Records)

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JLK
“Rehash” (mp3)
from “Nothing More Than Something To Wear”
(Karmic Hit)

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Thanks to Martin P. for a PayPal donation (1:58)

We are in Jonesborough, Tennessee, the oldest town in Tennessee, home of the International Storytelling Center and host to the National Storytelling Festival. (2:19)

Why do people tell stories? Morality tales, expressions of heritage, stories that break the ice, stories that support the ego (5:14)

Music bumper from “Edgar Meyer Winter” by Shibboleth (13:28)

Different kinds of storytelling performances that we have seen: folk music, reminiscence stories, cowboy poetry, telling traditional tales (15:20)

Song: “The Story” by Jason Silver (22:19)

Rude Word of the Week: “turkey” (25:41)

Music bumper from “Nada” by Jaime Beauchamp. (29:36)

The future of storytelling: what will storytelling look and sound like in future generations? Benjamin Shepherd, Ruthanna Ruben, Caden Watts (30:17)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 37:35

size: 34.4 Mb

rating: G (No “adult stories” were recounted in this edition. Furthermore, kids should be told stories all the time.)

Paralinguistic vs. linguistic tics (1:59)

Causes of linguistic tics; tics as style identifiers; some classic linguist tics (5:32)

Music bumper from “Telepop” by The Jerrys (16:35)

Linguistic tics in languages other than English (17:15)

Song: “Uh Huh-Oh No” by Anne Summers (21:16)

Rude Word of the Week: “dingbat” (23:58)

Music bumper from “Road to Rhodes” by Scott Helm. (28:35)

Some uses of linguistic tics (29:18)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 35:32

size: 32.6 Mb

rating: PG (Our song has a couple of mildly suggestive moments.)

Anne Summers
“Uh-Huh, Oh-No” (mp3)
from “Very Classy”
(Beatville Records)

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Thanks to Emma H. and Mary T. for PayPal donations (2:07)

Syntax: not just word order, but sentence structure in general. Which came first, the thing or the act? (2:33)

Music bumper from “Finger Food” by the Shook-Russo Quartet (11:27)

Rhetorical uses of syntax (14:14)

Song: “Upside-Down” by Yo La Tengo (20:07)

Rude Word of the Week: “flip-flopper” (24:04)

Music bumper from “Tell Me a Bedtime Story” by the Jay Lawrence Trio. (27:37)

Syntactical variations from language to language (28:42)

Music courtesy of the Ioda Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 34:49

size: 31.9 Mb

rating: G (We quote from a poem about Santa Claus.)

Yo La Tengo
“Upside-Down” (mp3)
from “Upside-Down”
(Alias)

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The Shook-Russo Quartet
“Finger Food” (mp3)
from “Shook-Russo Quartet Featuring Greg Gisbert”
(Summit Records)

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Jay Lawrence Trio
“Tell Me a Bedtime Story” (mp3)
from “Thermal Strut”
(OA2 Records)

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At the time this is posted, our web site is not fully functional. It will be fixed soon, so that you can find things and make PayPal donations. (1:54)

Dave and Barbara were recently featured in the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s podcast. (2:23)

This show features samples of great recorded rhetoric from the 20th and 21st centuries. Our principle sources were the websites American Rhetoric and The Free Information Society.

A couple of famous “mea culpa” speeches

• Richard Nixon’s “Checkers” speech (September 23, 1952) (5:16)
• Bill Clinton’s denial in the Monica Lewinsky scandal (January 26, 1998) (10:34)

Calls to action/calls to arms

• Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s call for war against Japan (December 8, 1941) (12:25)
• Adolf Hitler’s declaration of war against Poland (September 1, 1939) (18:02)
• Winston Churchill’s first speech as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom (May 13, 1940) (21:56)

Music bumper from “Grapes” by Evan Stone (24:48)

Speeches at historical events

• John F. Kennedy in Berlin (June 26, 1963) (26:02)
• Ronald Reagan in Berlin (June 12, 1987) (28:31)
• Martin Luther King at the Lincoln Memorial–the “Dream” speech (August 28, 1963) (30:20)

Song: “Speech” by LPG (35:40)

Rude Word of the Week: “broken record,” featuring a broken-record argument between Chris Matthews and Kevin James on MSNBC (Video of the full exchange) (May 15, 2008) (38:01)

Music bumper from “The Corner of Sacco and Vanzetti” by Shibboleth. (42:36)

Extemporaneous speech: Joseph Welch versus Joseph McCarthy in the U. S. Senate (Video clip) (June 9, 1954) (45:32)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 53:22

size: 48.9 Mb

rating: PG (Passing reference to sexual relations in our discussion of Bill Clinton)

Grimace from the Word Nerds Forum corrects us on our example of a syllogism. (2:31)

Content versus style; tropes and schemes defined; and some examples of tropes. (Note: despite what Dave says in this segment, Edward P. J. Corbett’s book Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student is only available in hardback.) (4:46)

Music bumper from “Under the Stairs” by Sonic Deviant. (12:18)

Schemes: a transference of order; shifts of structure in language (12:54)

Song: “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” performed by The United States Air Force Band and the Singing Sergeants (29:15)

Rude word of the week: blowhard (34:11)

Music bumper from “Nada” by Jaime Beauchamp. (37:13)

Next time we will examine some examples of rhetoric in public speech. (37:52)

Dave reads Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address. (38:39)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and the United States Air Force Band

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 42:48

size: 39.2 Mb

rating: PG (Howard gives one slightly suggestive example of litotes.)

Dave thanks Michael, Tim, Emma, and Clint for their support through their PayPal donations to the show. (See the button on the right-hand navigation column of our web page.) (2:00)

Rhetoric, dialectic, syllogism and enthymeme defined and illustrated. Howard’s major source is Classical Rhetoric for the Modern Student by Edward P. J. Corbett. (2:26)

Music bumper from “Road to Rhodes” by Scott Helm. (10:44)

Modes of persuasion in contemporary discourse: Limbaugh/Moore vs. Obama/Huckabee (11:26)

Song: “Liar” by Shoestring Strap (19:15)

Rude word of the week: bullshit artist (22:34)

Music bumper from “Telepop” by The Jerrys. (27:09)

Anticipation of part 2: figures of speech and rhetorical techniques (27:56)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 35:07

size: 36.8 Mb

rating: PG-13 (Our Rude Word would probably get you sent to the principal’s office in a U.S. middle school.)

Listener feedback (2:22)

Eke-names, mascots, and a shout-out to a former student (5:18)

Music bumper from “Grapes” by Evan Stone. (17:34)

Monikers–deliberately chosen or applied names (18:23)

Song: “Familar Names, Familiar Games” by Doug McLeod (22:50)

Rude word of the week: your worst nickname (27:05)

Music bumper from “Melancolica” by Mauricio Cuburu. (30:12)

Nicknames–conferred on us often without our consent, and frequently expressive of relationships (30:59)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 40:10

size: 36.8 Mb

rating: PG (The president of the United States called his former chief of staff a rude nickname–and we cite it!)

Our show is introduced this week by the man called Anne from Israel, known to Word Nerds Forum members as RabiAkiva. (0:01)

We encourage you once again to check out Charles Hodgson’s book Carnal Knowledge, a wonderful dictionary containing words and expressions for parts of the human body. (2:46)

A MyChingo message from Jason in West Australia (4:51)

Howard and Dave use their interest in road cycling to talk about jargon, lingo, and other forms of insider language. (6:35)

A greeting from the Reduced Shakespeare Company podcast (18:37)

Acronyms, abbreviations, and other forms of “inside-the-beltway” jargon (19:15)

Song: “Inside Joke” by Little Thom (25:41)

Rude word of the week: “wheelsucker” (30:13)

Music bumper from “The Corner of Sacco and Vanzetti” by Shibboleth. (33:33)

The inside jargon of the world of con-men, circus workers, and magicians: ballyhoo, patter, and cant (34:30)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 40:38

size: 37.3 Mb

rating: PG-13 (Our song has some hilarious references to procreation and uses a couple of naughty words.)

Austin Tichenor of the Reduced Shakespeare Company left us an audio comment via our MyChingo button. (1:55)

It was Dave’s turn to travel to German-speaking Europe this past month. (3:04)

The inspiration for this show was our recent experience trying to express fine differences in meaning in a second language. Synonyms yield these subtle distinctions. (4:42)

Music bumper from “Just Looking” by The Jerrys (13:29)

Regional variations in sets of synonyms, and their applications (14:14)

Song: “The Same One” by Little Mack Simmons (19:18)

Rude word of the week: “dullard” (23:54)

Music bumper from “Necessary Rain” by Emile Westergaard. (26:58)

Age and experience and the ability to make subtler distinctions (27:30)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and IODA Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 34:02

size: 31.2 Mb

rating: PG (Only a tiny, mild bit of borderline rudeness in our audio feedback.)

Download “The Same One” (mp3)
from “The PM+Simmons Collection 1971-1982″
by Little Mack Simmons
Electro-Fi Records

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We’ve been away. While we were gone, the Nerd Number died. But now you can leave an audio message with our MyChingo button. (1:52)

Definitions of “abridge,” plus some related words (4:16)

Music bumper from “Trifle 3″ by Fuzzy Logic (10:16)

In April, Dave interviewed the RSC (that’s the Reduced Shakespeare Company, not that “Royal” bunch). (10:58)

Song: “Left Out” by A Void (19:28)

Rude word of the week: “half-assed” (22:53)

Music bumper from “Make Me Understand” by Matt Thorpe. (25:21)

Intentions and functions of abridgment (26:13)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 32:54

size: 30.2 Mb

rating: PG (Our Rude Word is about as rude as we get this week.)

This week’s show will have a forum thread in the Rude Words category, since it deals with really rude language. Please bring us your favorite expletives (both rude and non-rude). (3:02)

This show was inspired by an email suggestion from a listener. Thanks to Katherine Pennavaria. (3:40)

Defining “expletive”; grammatical categories of expletives (4:45)

Music bumper from “Baja Taxi” by Brain Buckit (12:20)

Attributive expletives and infixes: filling out words and sentences with rude words, both for rhythmic effect and for shock value (13:06)

Song: “C’est la F**king Vie” by Ginny Clee (24:10)

Rude word of the week: “f**king” (as an attributive expletive) (28:34)

Music bumper from Essence by Evan Stone. (31:59)

Curses, extended curses, and interjections (32:23)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 42:28

size: 38.9 Mb

rating: R (The last two-thirds of the show is about very rude language. Our lovely featured song is not one you want to play at work.)

Howard gives a shoutout to Henrik Hansen and to the Danish language-related podcast Sproghjørnet. (2:17)

Howard and Dave give an overview of auxiliary verbs, of which modal verbs are a subset. (3:17)

Music bumper from “Just Looking,” by The Jerrys (9:32)

Modal verbs and grammatical mood (10:11)

Song: “You Can Never Hold Back Spring,” by Tom Waits (15:49)

Rude word of the week: “wannabe” (18:14)

Music bumper from “Melancolica” by Mauricio Cuburu (22:08)

Modal verbs in languages other than English (22:49)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 30:31
size: 28 Mb

rating: G (We managed to talk about this without being rude.)

Dave responds to a post by SimonW11 from the Word Nerds Forum about an eggcorn; talks about why our blog has looked different; and explains Howard’s current absence from the USA. (Howard visited Annik Rubens of Schlaflos in München while in Munich.) (2:03)

Howard and Dave define prepositions, adpositions, and post-positions, and discuss how they function. (5:10) �

Music bumper from “Bongo Booty,” by Vincent Van Go Go (11:15)

The semantic malleability and syntactic adaptability of prepositions (11:52)

Song: “If You Could See Yourself Through My Eyes,” by Andy Pratt (21:47)

Rude word of the week: “up yours” (24:34)

Music bumper from “Under the Stairs” by Sonic Deviant (26:45)

Prepositional clichés (27:26)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and IODA Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 34:29
size: 31.6 Mb

rating: PG-13 (Our Rude Word is unpacked and analyzed in all its rude glory.)

Download “If You Could See Yourself (Through My Eyes)” (mp3)
from “Resolution”
by Andy Pratt
ItsAboutMusic.com

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• Stream from RealNetworks / Rhapsody

The vocabulary of sport: rule-based terms and slang terms (1:58)

Music bumper from “Natural Man,” by Lil’ Ed and the Blues Imperials (21:36)

How sports language functions (22:03)

Song: “Sitting Around Keeping Score,” by Spymob (26:11)

Rude word of the week: “palooka” (29:35)

Music bumper from “Road to Rhodes” by Scott Helm (32:36)

Sports metaphors in everyday speech (33:16)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and IODA Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 41:16
size: 37.8 Mb

rating: PG-13 (We discuss the sexual meaning of some metaphors from baseball.)

Spymob EP

Spymob

Spymob, Inc

• Buy at iTunes Music Store
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Download “Sitting Around Keeping Score” (MP3, 192kbps)

Reasons for equivocating (4:37)

Music bumper from “Ockham’s Shaving Kit,” by George Hrab (14:46)

Verbal and lingual ways of equivocating (15:27)

Song: “Maybe I’ll Wait,” by Robin Welty (21:36)

Rude word of the week: “weasel” (25:16)

Music bumper from “Telepop” by The Jerrys (28:57)

Paralingual and nonvocal equivocation (29:36)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and IODA Promonet

Theme music by Kick the Cat

Closing music from “Grapes” by Evan Stone

Show Yourself Strong

Robin Welty

Paradiso Music

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Download “Maybe I’ll Wait” (MP3, 192kbps)
show time: 38:52
size: 26.7 Mb

rating: PG (Not all that rude; quite polysyllabic)

Linguistic cues for endings (1:56)

Music bumper from “My Living Will,” by The Finale (10:05)

Non-verbal and non-oral cues: body language, “the thin envelope” (10:50)

Song: “Last to Leave,” by Hot Rod Cadets (17:49)

Rude word of the week: “unflushable” (21:26)

Music bumper from “Go Away” by Poptart Monkeys (22:36)

Technological changes in the way we end things (23:09)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

Closing music from “Grapes” by Evan Stone

time: 32:18
size: 22.2 Mb

rating: PG (A young child should not really be using our Rude Word to designate a person.)

Tags: language, endings

What we mean by fustian language: pompous, bombastic ways of saying very little by using a lot of syllables; some quotations from fustian speakers and writers (1:54)

Music bumper from by “Fancy Prance” by Itchie Cat (13:04)

Our favorite fustian terms (13:35)

Song: “Confused,” by Natalie Brown (20:50)

Rude word of the week: “windbag” (24:54)

Music bumper from “Winter Wind,” by Jon Schmidt (27:08)

Why is fustian language sometimes unavoidable? (27:56)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 35:51
size: 24.6 Mb

rating: PG (Not especially rude, but full of very challenging words.)

Tags: language, fustian

The philosophical underpinnings of humor (2:01)

Music bumper from by “The Corner of Sacco and Vanzetti” by Shibboleth (11:20)

Categories of humor (11:57)

Song: “Inside Joke,” by Little Thom (22:51)

Rude word of the week: “bombing” (or shall we say, this segment is bombing this week?) (27:23)

Music bumper from “Make Me Understand,” by Matt Thorpe (29:31)

What makes something funny? Perspective and delivery (30:12)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 36:12
size: 24.9 Mb

rating: PG-13 (We discuss some provocative sexual and religious aspects of joke humor, and our song has a few mildly rude words.)

Tags: language, jokes, humor

Various ways the Word Nerds audience can converse with us, and with each other (1:59)

Face-to-face conversation (4:59)

Music bumper from by “Conversations” by Saurab Bhargava (14:43)

Conversing on the telephone (15:21)

Song: “Cool Conversation,” by Dminor (20:51)

Rude word of the week: “loudmouth” (25:13)

Music bumper from “Done Talking,” by George Hrab (26:56)

Email, IM, and Internet conversation (27:14)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 38:30
size: 26.5 Mb

rating: PG-13 (We discuss the conversational conventions of sexual intimacy.)

Tags: language, conversation

Responses to listener emails. Howard was recently a guest on EatFeed. (1:51)

Dysarthria: pathological elision (9:47)

Elision as an agent of language change: “everyday” elision and “expedient” elision (11:24)

Music bumper from by “Telepop” by The Jerrys (17:47)

Elision in the learning of other languages (18:25)

Song: “Whatcha Gotta Say for Yourself,” by Phil Golub (22:20)

Rude word of the week: “mofo” (27:10)

Music bumper from “Tonight,” by Zach Ashton (31:33)

The inverse of elision: hypercorrection (32:02)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 38:13
size: 26.2 Mb

rating: R (Our Rude Word is an elision of one of the most taboo words in North American English–and we explicate it.)

Tags: language, elision, slurring

Dave talks a bit about our changeover to our new blog site (1:51)

Howard and Dave explore the etymologies of “hyperbole” and “exaggeration” and discuss why speakers tend to exaggerate. (4:01)

Comic uses of hyperbole (10:45)

Music bumper from by “Bongo Booty” by Vincent Van Go Go (14:02)

Political and commercial uses of hyperbole (14:38)

Song: “Immortal,” by Cindy Alexander (20:48)

Rude word of the week: “fascist” (24:08)

Music bumper from “The Corner of Sacco and Vanzetti” by Shibboleth (27:33)

Understatement, the flip-side of hyperbole: meiosis and litotes (28:09)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network and GarageBand.com

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 33:28
size: 23.2 Mb

rating: PG (Young kids should not be playing the dozens nor doing “yo’ mama” jokes.)

Tags: language, hyperbole

Howard shares his memories of his trip with his students to Hobro Gymnasium in Denmark. (8:53)

Revisiting our show on Insidious Idioms, we explain our categories of idiomatic distinctions: national, regional, and socio-economic class differences. (11:36)

Music bumper from by “Make Me Understand” by Matt Thorpe (15:07)

International textures: expressing the same idea in different languages, and the perils of mistaken translation (15:43)

Song: “Fill Me In,” by Hollins Steele (21:42)

Rude word of the week: “pot to piss in” (25:41)

Music bumper from “Dancing Cow” by Liquid Floor (27:25)

Variations of idioms by class and region (28:06)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 36:45
size: 25.3 Mb

rating: PG-13 (We discuss some amusing mis-translations of American idioms, some of which have sexual implications in other countries and languages.)

Tags: language, idiom, culture

We do tend to be very sensitive to “the N-word.” Sometimes I think that it is the only taboo word left in the English language. Yet the modern history of terminologies for people of African ancestry is confusing. Martin Luther King, in the 1950s and 1960s, used to refer to the struggles of “the Negro.” (Malcolm X referred to “the so-called Negro.”) When I was in high school in the early 1970s, the term “black” (which is the most commonly accepted neutral term nowadays) was actually the beginning of a phrase which was much more hurtful than “——;” namely, “black son of a bitch.” Only recently has “black” begun to reclaim its place from “African-American” as the most common accepted term for a person of African heritage.

It’s difficult even to write about this topic, because it’s difficult to talk about race in America. We are all self-conscious about it–and that results in some occasionally tortuous attempts at political correctness. I remember once hearing someone (I think it was a liberal politician, but I’m not sure), while trying to distinguish a black African from a white African, refer to the person in question as an “African-American African.”

In a recent podcast about puns, I told a joke that may have been perceived by some as mildly racist. The term “squaw” has been misunderstood by some to be etymologically related to a prostitute, or a woman’s genitals (the etymology is actually neutral, from a Narraganset word meaning simply “woman”). I knew that, but I told the joke because it contained three different puns in the punchline–a pun on the word “square,” one on the word “sides,” and one on the word “hypotenuse.” I realized right after telling it that some listeners might be uncomfortable with the term “squaw,” even though it is not originally an epithet. If I had it to do again, I probably would have chosen a less politically charged joke.

Music bumper from “Nada” by Jaime Beauchamp (11:26)

Some serious puns (12:11)

Song: “Absinthe Minded,” by Adrienne Pierce (16:03)

Rude word of the week: “dullard” (as in somebody who just doesn’t get puns) (19:03)

Music bumper from “Driving Song” by Bob Hughes (22:01)

Bilingual puns (22:40)

Music courtesy of The Podsafe Music Network

Theme music by Kick the Cat

time: 28:19
size: 19.5 Mb

rating: PG (Puns often have double or triple meanings. Our song celebrates a rather infamous alcoholic drink.)

Tags: language, linguistics