English language on sale Friday October 2, 2009
Words – they’re brilliant aren’t they? They can convey whole worlds or cut off meaning in its prime. They also have all kinds of weird and wonderful associations for different people. So I was interested to hear about Adopt a Word (thanks to @fmpickering via Twitter). The idea of actually possessing my very own piece of the English language was more than a little bit exciting. The scheme sadly doesn’t assign you global copyright for your chosen word. What it does do (which is even better) is to allow you to choose a word of your very own, with your adoption money going to help children with speech, language and communication difficulties. It’s interesting to see why people are drawn to a particular word. Why did Sara Cox pick ‘mither’ and what made Arabella Weir opt for the wonderful ‘pusillanimous’? I can see why Stephen Fry chose his particular word. But which one did I decide to take away and give a good home to? ‘Interesting’. Put it in the word search box in the Adopt a Word home page to see why…
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