Kel Richards

Language

28 October 2023 9:00 am

The weather bureau tells us that we are now officially in an ‘El Niño event’ and, as a result we…

Language

21 October 2023 9:00 am

The word ‘special’ means: ‘Exceptional in quality or degree; unusual; out of the ordinary; excelling in some way’ (Oxford English…

Language

14 October 2023 9:00 am

Noel Pearson and others have insisted the Voice referendum ‘is not about race’. Does that make sense linguistically? The word…

Language

7 October 2023 9:00 am

A reader has asked me about the common expression ‘virtue-signalling’. The meaning, I think, is fairly clear. It is a…

Australian notes

30 September 2023 9:00 am

The Managerial Class Recently I spoke at the Sydney Institute on the subject of George Orwell’s justly famous essay ‘Politics…

Language

30 September 2023 9:00 am

Every so often I like to share with you new words being added to dictionaries. Dictionary.com has just added 566…

Language

23 September 2023 9:00 am

One of the powers of language is that it can give us the words (the tools) to think about our…

Language

16 September 2023 9:00 am

I need to loudly lament (once again) the deceptive misuse of the word ‘mistake’ by people who have a black…

Language

9 September 2023 9:00 am

Here’s a brand new Australian political expression I’ve just coined: ‘cane toad politics’. I expect it to take its place…

Language

2 September 2023 9:00 am

A national survey has found 64 per cent of Jewish students say they’ve experienced anti-Semitism at university. At Sydney University…

Language

26 August 2023 9:00 am

The power (and the usefulness) of language is that it gives us names for ideas. And a name is like…

Language

19 August 2023 9:00 am

We all know J.R.R. Tolkien from his epic The Lord of the Rings, voted best novel of the 20th century.…

Language

12 August 2023 9:00 am

The Albanese government has established a ‘Makarrata Commission’ with a budget of $5.8 million dollars. So, what is this word…

Language

5 August 2023 9:00 am

‘They’ is not a singular pronoun. It’s a fairly simple concept, but some people are struggling to grasp it. The…

Language

29 July 2023 9:00 am

The compound noun ‘rage apply’ is (I am told) the name being given to a new trend in workplaces around…

Language

22 July 2023 9:00 am

Some trendy new expressions will probably have the lifespan of a fruit fly (for the scientifically minded, that’s between 30…

Language

15 July 2023 9:00 am

Is the word ‘bonzer’ no longer part of the living Australian language? Bernard Salt thinks not, writing in the Weekend…

Would Jesus vote ‘Yes’?

12 July 2023 5:00 am

And what would the Good Samaritan do?

Language

8 July 2023 9:00 am

We all know what ‘dictation’ means –  speaking words aloud for someone to write down. Once every office had its…

Language

1 July 2023 9:00 am

I have written here in the past about the expression ‘weaponised words.’ There are many examples: ‘fascist’, ‘Nazi’ and ‘hard-right’…

Language

24 June 2023 9:00 am

A Speccie reader has asked me for the origin of the expression ‘mumbo jumbo’ – and there turns out to…

Language

17 June 2023 9:00 am

For a number of years British journalist Philip Howard wrote a weekly language column for the Times in London (he…

Language

10 June 2023 9:00 am

It is an exciting moment when I discover a new word – and this time it’s a word that focuses…

Language

3 June 2023 9:00 am

Recently I came across the expression ‘weaponised words’– the idea that words with a standard, accepted meaning can be changed…

Language

20 May 2023 9:00 am

Have you come across the word ‘transabled’? This is a new one on me, and I find it a frightening…