The Allusionist

Adventures in language with Helen Zaltzman. TheAllusionist.org

http://theallusionist.org/

Eine durchschnittliche Folge dieses Podcasts dauert 22m. Bisher sind 213 Folge(n) erschienen. Dieser Podcast erscheint jede zweite Woche.

Gesamtlänge aller Episoden: 3 days 12 hours 42 minutes

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23. Criminallusionist


Phoebe Judge and Lauren Spohrer from the podcast Criminal stop by to talk about the linguistic challenges of crime reporting. They also share their episode ‘Pants on Fire’, about lying. It’s an extremely useful handbook if you fancy becoming either a h...


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 October 29, 2015  21m
 
 

22. Vocables


La la la, dum di di dum, a wop bop a loo bop a wop bom bom – why are songs riddled with non-words masquerading as words? Hrishikesh Hirway from Song Exploder and songwriter Tony Hazzard explain. Read more about this episode at http://theallusionist.


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 October 21, 2015  10m
 
 

21. Eponyms I: The Ballad of Bic and Biro


Naming something after yourself: a grand display of egomania, or the humble willingness to be overshadowed by your own product? Stationery expert James Ward tells the tale of the people who begat the eponymous ballpoint pens Bic and Biro, because,


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 October 14, 2015  17m
 
 

20. Baby Talk


Why do we all sound like idiots when we talk to babies? Don’t be embarrassed, we’re helping them acquire language. Child psychologist Ben Jeffes explains. There is more about this episode at http://theallusionist.org/baby-talk.


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 October 7, 2015  9m
 
 

19. Architecting About Dance


“Talking about music is like dancing about architecture” is a problematic statement: not just because nobody can agree on who came up with it, but because dancing about architecture doesn’t seem particularly far-fetched. Talking about dance,


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 September 24, 2015  12m
 
 

18. Fix part II


The messiness of English is the price of its success. It is the most widely spoken language in the world, geographically, being an official language in 88 different countries, and there are countless different versions of it all over the world.


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 September 9, 2015  13m
 
 

17. Fix part I


The English language is a mess. And if you don’t like it, what are you going to do about it – fix it? Good luck with that. In the early 18th century, a movement of grammarians and authors wanted to set up an official authority to regulate English,


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 August 28, 2015  17m
 
 

16. Word Play


Words are all over the place. So how do you turn them into fun games? Here to show the way is Leslie Scott, founder of Oxford Games and inventor of more than forty games – including word games such as Ex Libris, Anagram and Flummoxed,


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 August 12, 2015  13m
 
 

15. Step Away


‘Step-‘, as in stepparents or stepchildren, originated in grief. Family structures have evolved, but are stepmothers now so tainted by fairytale associations with the word ‘wicked’ that we need new terminology?


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 July 30, 2015  18m
 
 

14. Behave


Sometimes words can become your worst enemy. Clinical psychologist Jane Gregory tells how to defuse their power. There’s more about this episode at http://theallusionist.org/behave. This episode concerns mental health,


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 July 1, 2015  13m