Where Do Ninjas, Zombies, and Robots Come From?

English is a language made up almost entirely of other languages. Between the fifth and seventh centuries, tribes from lands that would become Germany, Denmark, and the Netherlands showed up in Britain. The languages they spoke developed into Middle English, butted heads with Old Norman (pre-French), and, in Shakespeare’s time, got a dose of Latin and Ancient Greek. Along the way, individual words from a host of other languages were added to the mix.

Nowadays, we use all sorts of words we don’t even realize come from other languages. And with the amount of communication, travel, and migration across great distances happening today, the evolution continues.

Here are ten loanwords—words “borrowed” from other languages and incorporated into English, often with a slightly tweaked meaning—to illustrate the huge amount of non-English in the English language.

1 Aiyo Originating in the Dravidian languages of southern India (that’s Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada, and Telugu), aiyo is one of the newest English additions. It was adopted by the Oxford English Dictionary in October 2016 and defined, simply, as a phrase “expressing distress, regret, or grief; ‘Oh no!’, ‘Oh dear!’.” But according to commentators from southern India and Sri Lanka, where the phrase originates, “Oh dear!” doesn’t come close to capturing the range of meanings it can convey. Many extreme emotions can be expressed with these sounds, from disgust to fear to joy. So many meanings in one exclamation—aiyo!

2 Alcohol In Arabic, al-kohl (الكحل) originally meant a fine powder of certain chemicals, and Latin adopted the word alcohol in the thirteenth century. Since fine powders were thought of as being “distilled” from other things (based on how people thought about alchemy and medicine in the Middle Ages), the meaning merged with other things that had been distilled. The word showed up in English in the sixteenth century, and by the mid-eighteenth century the “spirit of wine” was in full swing.

3 Chocolate Let’s face it: “chock-lit” is easier to pronounce than cacahuaquchtl. That sweetest of sweets came to English by way of Spanish, but started out as an Aztec beverage made of cocoa powder (try saying cacahuaquchtl five times fast) and other spices—not the sugary treat we’re used to today. That’s one theory; others postulate that it comes from Aztec words for “bitter water,” or Nahuatl for “beaten drink,” or that cacahuaquchtl was changed by Spanish conquistadors to combine the Maya word chocol (hot) and Aztec atl (water). Why? Because caca can mean another thick, brown thing in Spanish, and no one wants to be mixing up chocolate with feces.

4 Money The thing that makes the world go round goes way back (understandably). Middle English adopted moneie from the Old French word monoie, meaning “coinage, metal currency.” Even farther back, there’s the Latin word monēta, meaning “place for coining money” or “coin,” which comes from the goddess Juno Moneta, who was worshipped in a temple in or near a mint. There’s proof for folks who think money is divine.

5 Ninja In English (and especially Hollywood), a ninja kicks butt in all black and a mask. But in the original Japanese, a ninja was a spy—not a sneaky martial-arts maniac like we’re used to seeing, but one who was supposed to blend in. Today, “ninja” retains its warriorlike connotation, but it’s also used in a range of situations to imply stealth, cunning, and skill. Just ask a kitchen ninja, tech ninja, or gaming ninja if you don’t believe it.

6 Penguin Most penguins waddle their tuxedo-clad selves around the Southern Hemisphere, but the word “penguin” is believed to come from the Welsh pen gwyn, meaning “white head.” Sure, penguins don’t have white heads, but the name was originally used for the now-extinct great auk, which also didn’t have a white head, but did have white spots around the eyes. When sailors rounded the tip of South America around 1580, they spotted a “foule, which the Welsh men name Pengwin”—that is, a bird that resembled the great auk. It’s still known by the name the Welsh sailors bestowed upon it nearly five hundred years ago.

7 Robot A long time ago, in a galaxy over in Central Europe, robots emerged as the brainchild of a Czech sci-fi writer in the 1920s. Long before C-3PO and R2-D2 roamed the galaxy, Karel Čapek’s play R.U.R.—short for “Rossum’s Universal Robots”—introduced the idea of artificial people created to work for “real” humans. And (spoiler alert) they end up rebelling against humanity. Since robota in Czech means “labor, drudgery,” it’s hard to blame them. And that idea clearly sticks in the imagination, since robots are about as common as warp drives and lightsabers.

8 Schmuck In American English, “schmuck” is an insult; it basically means “fool” or “idiot,” but with a slightly harsher and more Yiddish ring to it. However, it derives from the Yiddish word shmok, which means “penis,” so some Jewish communities consider the word extremely vulgar. In another twist, shmok is believed to come from Old Polish smok, meaning “grass snake, dragon.” Maybe that’s where J.R.R. Tolkien got the name for Smaug, who is definitely a smok in terms of fire-breathing deadliness, but not exactly a schmuck—though Bilbo Baggins might not agree.

9 Uber This originally German word, complete with umlauts (über), traveled a windy road before it arrived at its present-day English meaning. Its literal German meaning: “over.” Figuratively, it implies that something or someone is bigger or better (like the Übermensch, a kind of philosophical Superman). It first got used in English to mean “very, super.” For example, “I’m über excited” or “that party was über cool.” Today, of course, many city-dwellers know it as a way to get a ride with a few taps of a finger.

10 Zombie This one’s origin is a little uncertain—but chances are you’re not going to be pondering etymology if one of them is trying to eat your brains. The word probably comes from a West African language: zumbi means “fetish” in Kikongo, and nzambi is a word for “god” in Kimbundu, but the idea arose—not from the dead, but for the first time—in Haiti during centuries of slavery. The idea was that slaves who committed suicide to save their bodies from the cruelty of their masters would be condemned to wander for eternity, undead. The brain-eating part came later.

English has borrowed plenty from other languages, but it’s a two-way street: words like le weekend in French, párking in Spanish, and intānetto (Internet) in Japanese are becoming increasingly common around the world. Whether you see language evolution as uber cool or something to cry aiyo! about, understanding how linguistic borrowing takes place can make you a real language ninja.

Alright or All Right—Which Is Correct?

People are often surprised to learn that alright is not an accepted spelling of all right. Although the one-word spelling of alright is seen in informal writing, teachers and editors will always consider it incorrect. To use the expression with impunity, it is best to spell it as two words: all right.

It’s possible that you stared at your paper in wonder the first time your English teacher marked alright as an incorrect spelling. It is equally possible that your English teacher saw nothing wrong with the spelling alright and that you are reading this because a coworker or editor has challenged you on it for the first time. So how did it come to this, and how did you manage to live your whole life to this point without knowing that alright is not all right?

Spelling Evolves Over Time

If you ever want to delve into a subject that is completely engrossing, read about etymology, which is the study of the origins of words and how they have changed through history. Words evolve in spelling and meaning over time, and in the case of the adjective/adverb all right, the accepted spelling is currently in flux. It can take hundreds of years for a variant spelling of a word or a two-word compound like all rightto take root sufficiently before it is considered correct. Alrightseems to have begun to appear in the late 19th century (Mark Twain used it, for example) and slowly became more common in informal communication–both in fiction and reality. This is true in both British and American English.

A good prediction would be that alright will eventually become accepted. Other English compounds beginning with “all” have dropped one l and contracted into one word, such as already, although, altogether, almost, and always. Of course, some of these words changed slightly in meaning, post-contraction, and alright remains perfectly synonymous with all right—for the moment.

Can I Ever Use Alright?

The quick answer is no, for two reasons.

The first is simply that no established dictionary fully accepts alright as a correct spelling. At worst, it is not listed or is flagged as wrong, and at best, as in the Oxford English Dictionary, it is considered a “nonstandard variant.” Respected style guides such as the Chicago Manual of Style and the AP Stylebook forbid its use.

The second reason is that in some contexts, alright will not work, and in all contexts, all right will never fail. Both mean “OK,” “acceptable,” “well,” or “safe,” but all right can have other meanings too.

Chloe’s test answers were alright.

This conveys the sense that generally, Chloe’s test answers were “just acceptable.” But what if that is not what you meant to say?

Chloe’s test answers were all right.

With all right written as two words, the most likely meaning of this sentence is that all of Chloe’s answers are correct, but it could also mean that Chloe answered her questions adequately. Another clarifying phrase would be helpful to resolve the ambiguity, but in either case, the spelling would be considered correct.

Here’s a tip: Thus, use this as your guiding principle: if you use alright in formal writing, you put yourself at risk of being viewed as a below-average speller. If you always use two words, you can never go wrong.

The battle of alright vs. all right is ultimately a no-brainer, because all right is always all right.

If you use alright informally in emails or texts to friends, however, your recipients will certainly know what it means. But when your writing is being published or evaluated, do yourself a favor and avoid this word completely.

10 Wonderful Words to Learn for Dictionary Day

Happy Dictionary Day!

October 16, 1758, was the birthdate of the American lexicographer Noah Webster. If you’ve ever wondered who decided that Americans should write color while the British write colour, Noah Webster is your guy.

To celebrate our love of lexicography, here are ten wonderful words to add to your vocabulary today:

Antipode n. A direct or extreme opposite. Angelica often gets into heated conversations with Duane, her ideological antipode.

Desiccated adj. Dried out or totally drained of moisture. The kitchen was bare, save for a desiccated old orange peel lying in the sink.

Mellifluous adj. Pleasing to the ear; sweetly melodic. Karl’s mellifluous voice enraptured the entire audience until the end of his aria.

Opprobrium n. Harsh disapproval or criticism, especially by a large group of people. Smith decided not to run for office after an ill-advised tweet earned him the opprobrium of half his followers.

Pelagic adj. Of or related to the open sea. As much as I’ve enjoyed our pelagic adventure, I’m ready to get back to dry land.

Pulchritude n. Physical beauty. Sandra twirled at the end of the red carpet so the crowd could take in the pulchritude of her sequined gown from every angle.

Rhadamanthine adj. Severely or inflexibly strict. (Often capitalized) Our Rhadamanthine camp director sounded the wake-up call promptly at 5 o’clock every morning.

Skulduggery n. Dishonest behavior; trickery. After investigators discovered several secret offshore accounts, the president of the bank finally admitted to being involved in the financial skulduggery.

Susurrus n. The sound of whispering or rustling. Claude heard his own name somewhere in the susurrus coming from the antsy crowd.

Unctuous adj. Greasy or oily feeling; also, excessively flattering or obsequious in a sycophantic way. Sophie was suspicious of the promises made by the unctuous vacuum cleaner saleswoman.

What words do you think people should use more often? Let us know in the comment section or via our Facebook and Twitter feeds!

Comma Between Subject and Verb

With few exceptions, a comma should not separate a subject from its verb.

My friend Cleo, is a wonderful singer.

Writers are often tempted to insert a comma between a subject and verb this way because speakers sometimes pause at that point in a sentence. But in writing, the comma only makes the sentence seem stilted.

My friend Cleo is a wonderful singer.

Be especially careful with long or complex subjects:

The things that cause me joy, may also cause me pain.

The things that cause me joy may also cause me pain.

Navigating through snow, sleet, wind, and darkness, is a miserable way to travel.

Navigating through snow, sleet, wind, and darkness is a miserable way to travel.

Mistaking a dangling participle, laughter was heard anyway.

If the title of this post doesn’t make any sense, it shouldn’t.

This is going somewhere, I promise! Bear with me.

Today, while scouring Tumblr and various forums for “The Best Picture on the Internet,” I came across the following:

I am certain that most people read to the last frame and, caught up in Johnny Carson’s joke, didn’t think twice about whether or not Dean Martin knew what a dangling participle is. Those who did think about it might assume (wrongly) that a dangling participle is when someone confuses ‘can’ and ‘may.’  A very small group of readers may have gotten so hung up on Mr. Martin’s lack of grammar knowledge that they completely missed Carson’s joke. If you are part of this last group, pat yourself on the back and relax, you probably already know what this post is about. For the rest of the world, read on.

Dean Martin doesn’t really know his grammar. 

While Dean was spot on with his correction of Carson’s question, “Can I?”, he should have stopped there. A dangling participle is neither the confusion of ‘can’ and ‘may’ nor is it something that you can cover with a long coat.

So, what is a dangling participle?

It’s really not as painful as it sounds.

Simply, a dangling participle is an adjective ending in -ing (present participle) that does not correspond logically to a noun in the sentence.

For clarity’s sake, let’s have a look at a couple sentences and identify the parts:

Julie walked excitedly to the diving board.  

(“Diving” is the present participle. It is an adjective ending in -ing that is modifying a clear noun, “board.”)

Walking around the pool, Julie heard someone call her name.

(“Walking” is the present participle. “Walking around the pool” is the participial phrase modifying the noun, “Julie”.  That Julie is the one “walking around the pool” makes logical sense. The participle here is not dangling. This is a correct sentence.)

Walking around the pool, a voice called her name.

(Again, “walking” is the present participle, and “walking around the pool” is the participial phrase modifying the subject. However, here the noun “voice” does not make sense. The “voice” is not the one “walking around the pool.” Since it is not clear who or what is “walking,” the participle is left “dangling.”)

Here are more examples of dangling participles:

Incorrect: Turning around quickly, the ground was wet.

(The participial phrase “turning around quickly” does not make sense modifying the noun “ground.”)

Correct: Turning around quickly, Julie slipped on the wet ground.

(The participial phrase “turning around quickly” makes sense modifying the noun “Julie,” who was “turning.”)

Incorrect: Falling into the pool, the splash attracted a lot of attention.

(It doesn’t make sense for the noun “splash” to be “falling into the pool.”)

Correct: Falling into the pool, Julie made a huge splash.

(Again, setting “Julie” as the noun being modified is more clear and logical.)

Fixing dangling participles

When you have a dangling participle in your writing, it’s likely that the intended and correct noun was used as the subject of the previous sentence or is “understood” by context.  However, when the noun following a participial phrase does not clearly link to what is happening in the sentence, it should be changed. Reword these sentences by clearly restating who or what is being modified by the participle.

Incorrect: Julie walked excitedly toward the diving board. Moving around the pool, a voice called her name.

Correct: Julie walked excitedly toward the diving board. Moving around the pool, she heard a voice call her name.

So, as you see, dangling modifiers don’t have anything to do with ‘can’ and ‘may,’ and Dean Martin didn’t really know anything about grammar. No one is perfect. Luckily, Johnny Carson did know a thing or two about comedy, and we all benefited from the gaffe.

Test your skills:

How would you correct the title of this post?

What Is a Relative Pronoun and How Does It Work?

A relative pronoun is a word that introduces a dependent (or relative) clause and connects it to an independent clause. A clause beginning with a relative pronoun is poised to answer questions such as Which one? How many? or What kind? Who, whom, what, which, and that are all relative pronouns.

Relative clauses are also sometimes referred to as adjective clauses, because they identify or give us additional information about the subject of the independent clause they relate to. Like adjectives, these clauses in some way describe that subject. Relative pronouns, like conjunctions, are words that join clauses—in this case, a relative clause to its main clause. The type of relative pronoun used depends on what kind of noun is being described.

Who: Refers to a person (as the verb’s subject)

Whom: Refers to a person (as the verb’s object)

Which: Refers to an animal or thing

What: Refers to a nonliving thing

That: Refers to a person, animal, or thing

The woman who came to the door left flowers for you.

I am not sure whom this book belongs to.

Interpretative dance, which I find a bit disconcerting, is all the rage.

Is this what you were talking about?

She finally visited the coffee shop that had such great reviews.

Possessive Relative Pronouns

It surprises some people to learn that both who and which can take the possessive form whose. Some will argue that of which is a better construction when talking about things rather than people, but this results in unnecessary awkwardness. The truth is that whose has been widely and correctly applied to nonhumans for hundreds of years.

She apologized to the boy whose glasses got broken.

The house whose owner is on vacation has an unsightly garden.

The house, the owner of which is on vacation, has an unsightly garden. (This is correct but cumbersome.)

Compound Relative Pronouns

The term compound relative pronoun sounds complex, but it really isn’t. Simply put, compound relative pronouns apply universally to a number of people or things. They include whoever, whomever, whichever, and whatever.

Please tell whoever may call that I am not available.

Whomever you hire will be fine with me.

Whichever train you take from here, you will end at Charing Cross station.

Carly will be successful at whatever she chooses to do in life.

Grammar Conundrum No. 1: That vs. Which

Two relative pronouns whose functions are easily confused are that and which.

Here’s a tip: The rule of thumb is this: that introduces a restrictive clause, and which introduces a nonrestrictive clause.

A restrictive clause is an essential part of its sentence; if it were taken out of the sentence, the sentence’s meaning would change. Nonrestrictive clauses are just the opposite.

The wardrobe that has the fur coats in it leads to Narnia.

If we were to excise the clause “that has the fur coats in it” from the sentence, the meaning of the sentence would change. We would no longer know which wardrobe leads to a magical land with talking animals, which was the intention of the sentence. This kind of clause gets a that. The word which, on the other hand, should introduce a nonessential clause that can be removed from a sentence without changing the sentence’s meaning.

The wardrobe, which contains several fur coats, leads to Narnia.

Here, “which contains several fur coats” is a parenthetical remark that can be removed without materially altering the sentence. Nonrestrictive (or nonessential) clauses are set off with commas, as shown in the example above.

Grammar Conundrum No. 2: Who vs. That

Not every style guide agrees on whether that is an acceptable relative pronoun to use when referring to people. To some, the following sentence may sound incorrect.

The teacher that gives out candy is always the students’ favorite.

The truth is, this sentence is perfectly fine. Yet you may want to consider that your readers could disagree. Go with the safer bet, who.

The teacher who gives out candy is always the students’ favorite.

Grammar Conundrum No. 3: Keep Pronouns and Antecedents Close

An antecedent is the noun that a pronoun refers to. To ensure clarity, place an antecedent immediately before the relative pronoun referring to it.

The park at the end of our street, which is pristine, is a favorite place of mine.

An unnecessary ambiguity is created in this sentence. What is pristine, the park or the street? Reordering the sentence can help, but rewriting it would be even better.

The pristine park at the end of our street is a favorite place of mine.

And that’s the relative pronoun in a nutshell. Relatively painless, wasn’t it?

Grammar Basics: What Is the Perfect Form of “Be”?

Many of the most commonly used nouns have irregular conjugations in the past simple and perfect forms. “To be” is one of these. Learn more about perfect forms.

To learn more about grammar and to help us celebrate National Grammar Day this March, visit our new resource page.