Word of the Week

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Category: Word of the Week Blog

Learning about the history of words is fascinating and fun. Words are the building blocks of all communications so we must have a professional understanding of their meanings. We also love exploring the origins and history of words.

English is one of the great languages of the world because it absorbs words from every language. All attempts to control English have failed. It is not constrained by academics or dictionary writers. Words survive because the people that use them need them, like them and a lot more often than you would guess just want to have fun with them.

Psychobabble—mental health jargon

Wife talking to WOTW man in Sydney restaurant. He imagines that he is being psychoanalysed because she is using psychobabble.

Psychobabble is psychological jargon used inaccurately and pretentiously that sometimes normalises unacceptable behaviour or criticises normal behaviour. It is also known as therapy-speak or pop psychology. A more specialised branch of psychobabble is neurobabble. It is the vocabulary of the consulting room that has escaped into everyday conversation—trauma, triggered, boundaries, validation, gaslighting. It turns the […]

Meeting behaviours

A humorous editorial illustration of a meeting of intelligent professionals behaving irrationally—experts fixating on familiar solutions, everyone debating minor details, the boss dominating the discussion and others reluctantly agreeing, while one frustrated participant watches the meeting unravel.

Australian professionals are experienced and well-educated yet put them in meetings with clear objectives, agendas to address, or problems to solve and peculiar behaviours start to manifest. The Ringelmann effect suggests that the more people in a meeting the less value they contribute. Max Ringelmann discovered in the 1880s that as more people pulled on […]

How to talk the language of the Tour de France

AI generated illustration showing some key words of the Tour de France

I love the Tour de France. It combines beautiful landscapes with thrilling sports action. There is colour, drama, controversy, charismatic sportsmen, crashes, tactics, speed and endurance. The first Tour de France was held in 1903 and the development of the race defined endurance cycling. The gruelling rides over the mountain passes had never been contemplated […]

The ancient origin of the sheriff’s posse

An illustration of the sheriff of Dodge City with his posse in a stand-off with the Sheriff of Nottingham and his soldiers. In the US and medieval England posse comitatus was the common-law term for the authority of a sheriff (or marshal) to conscript able-bodied man to assist them in keeping the peace or to pursue and arrest a felon.

My generation learned about good versus evil by watching  recycled American TV westerns. Shows like The Lone Ranger, The Rifleman, Bonanza, and my favourite, the Cisco Kid, portrayed the good guys triumphing over lawlessness in the Old Wild Western Frontier. The bad guys (wearing black hats), after shooting up the saloon, were pursued out of Tombstone, […]

The sound of mucus

AI generated image of a Julie Andrew's parody or inspired image as if singing the Sound of Mucus

We all find it a bit difficult talking about the gunk we excrete when we are not well. When I went to see the doctor recently I prepared carefully to explain my symptoms. Our excellent, Old English word, snot, meaning the mucus from our nose is not a word you use to a highly trained […]

To boldly split the infinitive

to boldly split your infinitive-- To explore strange new worlds To seek out new life and new civilisations To boldly go where no man has gone before Star Trek

Most of us were taught grammar in a very basic way—we can recognise nouns, verbs, adjectives and how to put them together in sentences. But we were forever in fear of splitting our infinitives even though most of us didn’t even know what it meant, let alone when we were doing it. Even now, when […]

Dark woke—is it here in Australia?

“Dark woke” is a new term used to describe an aggressive, meme-literate form of progressive activism. It has been coined to suggest political campaigning from the left has adopted a new, more combative style. In the US, dark woke reflects a shift from civility to confrontation—progressive politics attacking the right with sarcasm, irony, and unapologetic […]

Contumacious behaviour

U.S. District Judge James Boasberg has just accused the Trump administration of “deliberately and gleefully” violating his order and showing “contumacious behaviour”. Boasberg had issued a ruling on the US government’s lack of compliance with his orders to cease deportation of alleged Venezuelan gang members under the Alien Enemies Act. He is requiring the administration […]

Bonkers—the perfect British word for US politics

Infographic showing frequency of bonkers and other British words in the US April 2025

There are few words in British English with the same mix of whimsy and judgment as “bonkers”. It is playful but still sharply critical. It suggests things are a combination of mad, silly and crazy, as in “you’re stark raving bonkers!”. And now, according to a recent Daily Mail article, “bonkers” is booming in the […]

Tariff, tariff, tariff the most beautiful word in the dictionary

Old image of a merchant handing money to a monarch with the caption: “To me, the most beautiful word in the dictionary is tariff, and it’s my favorite [sic] word.”

“Tariff” is the word of the moment. All we are hearing at the moment is “tarff, tariff, tariff” after Trump has announced he is imposing tariffs on friends and foe alike—China, Canada, Mexico, the European Union and, of course, Australia. And it is not new for the rest of the world to think that “with […]

Fairy smut and romantasies

A fairy in a bath tub representing "fairy smut".

While I was in England I was introduced to “fairy smut” by our niece (she is in her thirties by the way). Sometimes the world surprises you in ways that make you smile. Acotar—A Court of Thorns and Roses Invited to lunch, we asked Cate about her book collection. Rather sheepishly she told us most […]

An English pilgrim

Top left—@faithentwisle at Worcester Cathedral; bottom left @timentwisle at Tewkesbury Abbey; right is Worcester Cathedral.

The cathedral at Worcester My wife and I are in England to catch up with some family and are staying in Tewkesbury in Gloucestershire. We went to the nearby city of Worcester for a half day trip. A nice lunch and a visit to the cathedral were the agenda. I always feel like a pilgrim […]