A laptop with a skull wearing a crown on its screen

The Life Changing Linguistics of… Nigerian Scam Emails

How do scammers use language to trick their victims?
A falling leaf

Eleven Poems for Fall

Cozy up to autumn with verse from Dylan Thomas, Rainer Maria Rilke, Robert Frost, Rita Dove, and more.
Portrait of a woman looking at the camera

On Hyphens and Racial Indicators

The AP dropped hyphens from expressions of heritage such as "Asian American." Some scholars are asking, with or without hyphens, aren't we all "American"?
David Berman

David Berman

Three poems by writer and musician David Berman.
Robin Williams In 'Dead Poets Society'

How “Carpe Diem” Got Lost in Translation

"Carpe Diem" doesn't actually mean "seize the day." The fact that we understand it that way suggests we are more traditional than we like to admit.
Source: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cover_of_Strange_Affair_by_Edwin_West_-_Illustration_by_Harry_Schaare_-_Monarch_Book_1962.jpg

Pulp Fiction Helped Define American Lesbianism

Between 1950 and 1965, steamy novels about lesbian relationships, marketed to men, inadvertently offered closeted women much-needed representation.
A person holding a newspaper on fire

How Language and Climate Connect

While we’re losing biological diversity, we’re also losing linguistic and cultural diversity at the same time. This is no coincidence.
Gypsy Rose Lee seated at a typewriter

Who Really Wrote The G-String Murders?

Gypsy Rose Lee, the most famous burlesque star of the 1940s, wrote a series of letters published by Simon & Schuster that may prove her authorship.
Jeremy Irons in Steven Soderbergh's "Kafka."

Franz Kafka’s The Trial—It’s Funny Because It’s True

Just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they’re not out to get you.