D3X73R

I'm often told (by Brits) that Americans are prudes when it comes to language. And I can often demonstrate the error or hypocrisy in their claim. Tidbit/titbit is one I've covered here so far. Another one is levee , which an Englishman informed me is used because Americans don’t want to say (AmE) dike / ( BrE) dyke for a built-up bank to prevent the overflow of water. So let me count out my objections to his claim: 1. Levee has been used in North America since the 18th century. (Orig. AmE) dyke has only been (slang (or a hyponym ) for 'lesbian' since the 20th century. So, Americans definitely didn't start saying levee to avoid association with lesbians. 2. If you're an American like me, you primarily know levee from Don McLean's song American Pie , where it is a convenient rhyme for Chevy . (This is at the top of the 'Lynne's most hated songs' list. I hope I haven't earwormed you with it. My day is ruined.) I think of it as a Louisian...

It's been too long since I've posted here. And it will be a bit longer still. I'm currently in the US doing a tour of dictionary archives as part of my research for some on-going projects. Since I have limited time here, I'm working in the evenings to prep for the days in the archives. But I did want to let you know about some podcasts that I don't think I've mentioned here on the blog. Helen Zaltzman , for her Allusionist podcast, interviewed Rachele de Felice and me about our research on please and we had such a good time talking that we just kept on doing it. So, on her following podcast, she included some of our discussion about thank you . Click here for Allusionist 33: Please Click here for Allusionist 34: Continental (including thank you ) For more of me talking about polite words, click on the 'politeness' tag at the bottom of this post. And this was longer ago, but I also appeared on the Relatively Prime podcast talking ( again ) about maths ...