Show 254 Friday 12 January

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Hi, I’m Sarah. Welcome to The Daily English Show.

Etymology is a noun which means:
The study of the origin and history of words and their meanings.
And The origin and history of a particular word.

I think etymology is fascinating. Because I’m a language geek I guess.
But I love thinking of a word and then looking up where it came from.
For example: umbrella.
Umbrella came into the English language in the 17th century from Italian.
It comes from the Italian word ombrella dimin. of ombra which means shade.
So it came from Italian.

One of the things I love about my dictionary is that it has the origins of words. Not all dictionaries do. See, check it out.
By the way, most English students in Japan have these kind(s) of dictionaries. But I’ve met a lot of people who don’t know how to use them properly.
Actually I don’t know a lot of the functions either. But there’s one button which is my favorite button: the jump button.
You can have fun for hours with the dictionary, with the jump button. Because there might be a word in the definition that you’re not quite sure about. So you jump to that word and then you find another word. And you’re like hmm what does this mean ... and then before you know it, hours have passed.
Like before I saw dimin. And I thought “oh, I wonder what that means” and then ...
And it means “Diminutive”
adj. extremely or unusually small
n. a shortened form of a name, typically used informally
And there’s an etymology dictionary on the internet which I recommend checking out.
So, have a look here.

STICK NEWS

Kia ora in Stick News today David Beckham is moving to America. He’s going to play soccer for five years for a team called Los Angeles Galaxy.

David Beckham is a 31-year-old soccer player from England. He used to play for the English team Manchester United. Since 2003 he’s been playing for Real Madrid in Spain.
Now he’s moving to America.
He’s going to be paid 1 million dollars a week.
His wife Victoria likes pretty clothes, so her nickname is Posh. Media are now speculating that she’ll have fun hanging out in LA with her movie star friends.

And that was Stick News for Friday the 12th of January.
Kia Ora.

the snow report

This is what the snow looks like in front of the studio windows today.
It doesn’t look much different that yesterday really.
My injury’s still not better, so I can’t go snowboarding.
This is sad.

conversations with sarah
#153 What’s middle English?

Step 1: Repeat Kaoru’s lines.
Step 2: Read Kaoru’s lines and talk to Sarah.

Sarah Tell me a word you want to know the etymology of.

Kaoru OK. Pen.

Sarah Pen? Ok then. Pen is from Middle English which is from Old French penne from Latin penna which means feather.

Kaoru Oh. What’s Middle English?

Sarah It’s one of the kinds of English that came before Modern English which is what we speak now. Have you heard of Chaucer?

Kaoru Yeah. Canterbury Tales right?

Sarah Yeah. Have you read it?

Kaoru Only in Japanese.

Sarah Oh, OK. Well that’s Middle English.

Kaoru Can you understand it?

Sarah No, not really. I took a paper at university of Middle English, but it was kind of hard.

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