Booze’ was once a popular term in the slang or ‘cant’ of the criminal underworld, which may explain its rebellious overtones today. Susie Dent Read Quote
In South Korea, some 20 million people share just five surnames. Every one of Denmark’s top 20 surnames ends in ‘-sen,’ meaning ‘son of,’ a pattern that is replicated across Scandinavia. British surnames have never favoured such neatness, and we can be grateful for that. Susie Dent Read Quote
I like to introduce a few lost gems when I can to fellow word-lovers, and would genuinely love some of them to make a comeback. Susie Dent Read Quote
In the earliest days, make-up and moralising were intertwined. The ‘cosmetic slops and washes’ of the 17th and 18th centuries aimed to smooth complexions and revive a woman’s ‘bloom’ – but their critics were never far behind. Susie Dent Read Quote
Slang has different functions: many of the words we use are playful and a lot are tribal – we speak the same way as the groups we are part of. A great deal are also euphemistic, so it’s no surprise that a third of us are perplexed by their meanings and origins. Susie Dent Read Quote
The battle between server and servee is as ancient as it is well disguised, and it follows, therefore, that waiters have developed a private lingo that allows them to mock, complain, or simply entertain themselves. Susie Dent Read Quote
Footballers, managers, pundits and fans make up possibly the biggest tribe of them all, especially in this country. Whatever is said by pundits is echoed across sofas and in pubs all over the nation. Susie Dent Read Quote
In the middle of the 20th century, aspirations to sound ‘proper’ were passionately pursued. Dictionaries as late as the Seventies include many pronunciations that could cut the proverbial glass. Susie Dent Read Quote
One of the things I noticed is that if you look up the word ambition you will see that when it’s applied to women, it’s almost always negative. If a woman is ambitious she’s cutthroat, she’s seen as more unpleasant. Whereas when its attached to a man it’s far less negative. Susie Dent Read Quote
