Word Fun for Web-footed Verbivores
othing is more entertaining than human languages. All humans speak a language regardless or their intelligence or IQ. We speak even if we can't speak! If we can't speak or hear, we speak with our fingers and if we can't see, we read our fingers. Fingers work just as well as tongues and lips. The magic is in how much we tell of ourselves when speaking, our minds, our histories, our societies. We generally speak unconsciously; that is, we focus on what we are saying and not how we are saying it. So when we begin examining how we speak (which is what linguistics does), very interesting insights emerge.
On this page we will try to keep you in touch with the websites that explore all the fascinating facets of language. We are starting out small but will grow over time. Keep an eye on us.
YOUR NAME IN OTHER LANGUAGES
Click hereFUN WITH WORDS
- The Funny Things Kids Say Children are learning machines. So, if we learn from our mistakes, they should make a pile of speech errors, some of which are bound to be funny. We aim to collect them all.
- Funny Signs Around the World Art by linguistically challenged sign painters
- Limericks (G-rated) We offer these glisteningly clean limericks just to prove it can be done.
- alphaDictionary's Laughing Stock: Puns, limericks, spoonerisms, palindromes, and every other type of wordplay: a one-stop laughing center.
- Supercool Company Names Names of businesses that are particularly appropriate for the business they are conducting, such as The Reid and Wright Learning Centre, Bush and Hedges Landscaping, to mention only two.
- The Morty Skusting Writing Avoidance Center A classless room of automatic writing machines that generate memos, essays, haiku . . . even tombstones. No writing skills required. Why wake up your brain just to write a masterpiece?
- Palindromes: Words and phrases that are spelled the same way forwards and backwards. (So, why isn't palindrome spelled the same way forwards and backwards?)
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Word Oddities
- International Tongue Twisters: Have a ball!
- Words That Contradict Themselves We call them contronyms. .
- Collective Nouns A list of colorful expressions of groupings.
ETYMOLOGY (Word Origins)
- Where do Words Come From? Dr. Goodword's explanation of the ways new words emerge in language.
- The Online Etymological Dictionary An excellent dictionary with etymologies going back to Latin, Greek, and Old Germanic.
- House of Logorrhea (11,387 arcane words) Here is the word list you have all been waiting for: words that have become obsolete for good reason. Still, they each have a small story about our history to tell.
- Fun Words Martha Barnette is a logophiliac with a hatful of words with surprising histories. If you love our Good Words, you will like this website, too.
- Etymology of Names Here is what your name started out meaning.