By Allan Metcalf. OK. Mark your calendar now for March 23, OK Day. It’s the day we pause to celebrate the birthday of OK in Boston, Hub of the Universe, on March 23, 1839.
OK?
Yes, OK! How can we sufficiently sing the praises of America’s and the world’s greatest word?
Let’s try. OK is the expression we use countless times every day to make arrangements, give approvals, and get by, often with a cascade of OKs. More...
By Ben Yagoda. A cool data-visualization website called Information Is Beautiful has a page titled “Rhetological Fallacies: Errors and manipulations of rhetoric and logical thinking.” Here’s a taste. More...
By Geoffrey Pullum. I heard a Brazilian iron-ore magnate speaking on a BBC news program about how he had become so rich, and he said that at one point “the price of iron ore came from $10 a ton to $180 a ton.” I realized that there was a subtle mistake in English usage here: Even if the price is still $180 now, we do not say that the price came from $10 to $180; we say the price went from $10 to $180. But why? More...
By Ilan Stavans. The etymology of Chicano is surrounded in mystery. I’ve seen its roots traced to Nahuatl, specifically to the term Mexica, as the people encountered by Hernán Cortéz and his soldiers conquering Tenochtitlán in the early quarter of the 16th century where known. In Spanish, the word is pronounced Meshika: the x functions as sh. Mexico, as a nation, opts to look at the Mexicas as their defining ancestors. Curiously, when first registering the name, the missionaries spelled it Méjico, with a j. It transitioned to an x when the country ceded from Spain, becoming independent in 1810. More...
By Anne Curzan. “Politeness is another word for deception,” James W. Pennebaker, chair of the psychology department at the University of Texas at Austin, is quoted as saying in a recent article in The Wall Street Journal. The statement brought me up short because it is so different from how I discuss politeness in my courses. Read more...
By Max Ramseyer. A debate among higher-education leaders at Duke University broke out in 2003, when news emerged that Nannerl O. Keohane, then president, was working with faculty members, led by Elizabeth Kiss, then an associate professor of political science and philosophy, to found the Kenan Institute for Ethics. More...
By Clifford A. Robinson. I am a perfect example of the kind of unlearning and relearning that Professor Davidson discusses this week in her MOOC, “History and Future of (Mostly) Higher Education.” As a Ph.D. candidate in classical studies, I am more comfortable researching and writing alone in a carrel, handling antiquities such as Greek papyri or Latin manuscripts, than plunging into new media in collaboration with my peers. More...
By Charles Huckabee. The Washington State Legislature has approved a bill that will allow students brought into the country illegally as children to be eligible for state financial aid, The Seattle Times reported. The state’s governor supports the measure, Senate Bill 6523, and is expected to sign it into law. Under the legislation, students will be eligible for a need-based grant program if they have been given federal “deferred action” status and meet other conditions, such as getting a high-school diploma in the state. More...
By Charles Huckabee. Seven former employees have filed a federal lawsuit against the Harris School of Business, a chain of for-profit institutions with campuses in several states, and its parent company, the Premier Education Group, The New York Times reported. The lawsuit accuses the schools and the company of defrauding the federal government through practices like misleading students about their career prospects and falsifying records to keep them enrolled, so the schools could continue receiving the students’ federal grants and loans. More...
By . At least nine students and one event organizer were killed on Monday, and others were feared to be trapped, after a roof collapsed during a South Korean university’s freshman-orientation event, according to reports by the Associated Press and Xinhua, the state news agency of China. About 560 students of the Busan University of Foreign Studies had gathered for the event, which took place at a resort in the southeastern city of Gyeongju. More...
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