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Kory Stamper Profile picture
Kory Stamper
@KoryStamper
Lady what writes dictionaries & books about 'em (@PantheonBooks). Professional TV cusser and language prodder. Myaamia and Finnish, she and her.
Jan 4, 2021 • 19 tweets • 5 min read
I'm taking a break from lexicography to read the Trump-GA call transcript, and I am now very much looking forward to the dissertation that will be written on T's shifting use of "won" in this rambling argle-bargle. I am a language professional. My entire career is based on my finely honed ability to analyze discourse and draw logical boundaries around the uses/meanings of individual words in context.

I'm a third of the way through this and have no fucking clue what I'm reading here.
Aug 27, 2020 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
"The microphone on the Amazon Halo Band isn’t meant for voice commands; instead it listens to your voice and reports back on what it believes your emotional state was throughout the day." I have a whoooooole extra-spicy batch of questions! 1/n Per article: "It picks up on the pitch, intensity, rhythm, and tempo of your voice and then categorizes them into 'notable moments'..."

So, what's in your training dataset? What's the gender, race, age split? What dialects were included? 2/n
Jul 25, 2020 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
I SURE CAN! BUCKLE UP, BUTTERCUPS.

Yoho's non-pology starts with "the abrupt manner of the conversation I had with my colleague from New York." Coupla things about that statement: 1/x 1. He's apologizing for his "abrupt manner" like he's Fitzwilliam Goddamned Darcy and not for what he said. Notice the subtle deflection, as if the words themselves were incidental and not actually offensive. But, okay, let's focus on this: he's sorry for his _manner_. 2/x
Jul 24, 2020 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
There's so much to unpack in this shitshow of a snippet, but let's zero in on how they describe AOC's delivery of "fucking bitch": "punching each syllable in the vulgarity." 1/? First, that's a weird verb to use in that phrase. Usually we see "emphasizing," "enunciating," "pronouncing," or "stressing" used with "each syllable." "Punch" isn't even in the corpus I checked (COCA for the nerds). So, the verb draws undue attention to the phrase. 2/?
Mar 19, 2020 • 6 tweets • 3 min read
So we've got this quarantine on, and you're suddenly looking at your bookshelves, whining like an over-tired toddler about how there's nooooothing to reaaaaaad in the hooooooouse, and the library's closed, and what if Amazon shuts down? I got a cure for what ails ya! 1/4 1. Buy used book from Federal Street Books, owned by my lovely friends & former coworkers. Inventory is online and they'll ship! The owners rescued this western MA institution recently; keep 'em afloat! federalstreetbooks.com 2/4
Mar 6, 2020 • 14 tweets • 3 min read
"Quarantine" has a pretty complicated etymology. WOULD YOU LIKE TO HEAR ALL ABOUT IT, YES YOU WOULD, SETTLE IN, MY NERDS

1/13 The kind of quarantine that we're all thinking of originated in Venice in the 1300s: ships had sit at anchor for 40 days before coming into port to prevent the spread of the plague. In Venetian, this was called "quarentena,” which originally meant “40 days.” 2/13
Dec 18, 2019 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
Because I am a giver:
That "X" in "Xmas" is actually the creation of 12th-c monks & scribes who used the first letter in the Greek _Khristos_ ("X," or sometimes "XP" for the first two letters) as shorthand for "Christ." Monks, as I understand it, are totes into Jesus. 1/3 Our earliest written use for this shorthand goes back to 1100AD, in the phrase "Xp̄es mæsse," or "Christ's mass." CHRISTMAS. ITSELF SHORTHAND FOR A LONGER PHRASE. 2/3
Oct 31, 2019 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
IF, officially:
Vermont --> Vermonter
New York --> New Yorker
Rhode Island --> Rhode Islander

THEN:
Massachusetts --> ... It is just like Massachusetts to be all, "ooooh, we're so _old_ and _special_, we refuse to have our denonym follow the established pattern, ooooh."
Oct 4, 2019 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Friends: I finally got to see the window where the (17th-century) Defenestration of Prague happened, which started the Thirty Years' War and gave English everyone's favorite word, "defenestration." #levelupnerds an etching of the defenestr...This is the window which wa... Since the video where I talk about "defenestration" is no longer online, some fun defenestration facts:

--basically, Catholic envoys were sent to tell the Prague Protestant leaders to stop building churches. This was not well-received! OUT THE WINDOW YOU GO. (1/x)
Sep 18, 2019 • 7 tweets • 1 min read
Time for this announcement again: Please throw at me every single argument you have against a dictionary documenting an established use of "they" that you don't like, for I am HERE FOR IT.
Apr 23, 2019 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
This has reminded me of my very favorite moment from 11th grade honors English. Please buckle up. 1/? So we were reading Steinbeck's "The Grapes of Wrath," and our teacher, who had the energy and breeding of a young dressage horse, was introducing us bright young things to the Christ archetype in literature. 2/?
Apr 4, 2019 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
#TeamFeministHarpies Also, what a horrible indictment of "the older generation." I'd wager the vast majority of older folks learned, in their halcyon youth, that it was not okay to rub noses with women at work.
Jan 22, 2019 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Because I know that no one* reads bibliographies (and I'm currently working on the bib for my new book), here is a tiny THREAD OF AWESOME SOURCES FOR YOU, IN NO PARTICULAR ORDER

*except academics looking for more primary sources or vain authors looking to see who's cited them 1. "You Could Look It Up" by @JackLynch000 is a book about the books about everything. Serious scholarly chops but also SO readable. You have no idea how valuable that is, says the lady who has been reading ASTM manuals for the last two years. amazon.com/You-Could-Look…
Jan 5, 2019 • 6 tweets • 2 min read
Yesterday, I got an email that made me LOL for the wrong sorts of reasons. The emailer loved my book, but they couldn't stand @FiatLexPodcast because I was _just too enthusiastic and chipper_. They were convinced that some producer had told me to punch it up so people would be interested. But I sound sooooo fake, and the emailer just cannot stand it!

So, coupla things.
Dec 7, 2018 • 7 tweets • 2 min read
Kids and people, it's time once more for a little chat about the word "Xmas." Grab a mug of glad tidings and buckle up! 1/x There are folks who hate "Xmas" because they believe it is a secularization of the word "Christmas"--that it literally removes "Christ" from "Christmas." Except the use of "X" for "Christ" goes back to the early Christian church. 2/x
Nov 19, 2018 • 7 tweets • 3 min read
Good morning, my little dinner rolls. I'm going to do something a little uncharacteristic this morning: some 🌟self-promotion🌟. Buckle up, buttercups. Many of you know that I was a lexicographer at Merriam-Webster for a bajillion years. I wrote a funny, smart, profanity-laden book about it--my love letter to the English language. You should read it! amazon.com/Word-Secret-Li…
Oct 24, 2018 • 6 tweets • 1 min read
I just got back from my local post office, where I overheard a dude on the phone say, "Nah, I don't need a flu shot. I eat tons of protein, I stay healthy."

I shook my head so hard that I think I broke something loose. "The flu shot has mercury in it, I don't put that in my body!" says local man who drinks New Jersey tap water and used to break open thermometers to play with the quicksilver inside.
Oct 16, 2018 • 4 tweets • 3 min read
JAWN! Now's a good time to give it up for @MerriamWebster and this article I wrote for them on "jawn": merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/… Language changes, so dictionaries do, too. @Dictionarycom has a whole emoji section on their site now which will help you not be an utter embarrassment to your emoji-fluent children. dictionary.com/e/list/emoji/1/
Jul 29, 2018 • 4 tweets • 1 min read
||: Don't forget about
Jul 2, 2018 • 10 tweets • 2 min read
A quick break from writing about color (!!!!!, also ?????) for a little thread inspired by questions I got at the Chautauqua Institution last week. (1/?) For context, I spoke last week on dialects and how they enrich the language. I finished up by talking about how English is larger than our own experience of it, and how that's a good thing! (2/?)
Feb 4, 2018 • 5 tweets • 2 min read
TONIGHT, SUPER BOWL LII:
WICKED V. JAWN.
merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/…
merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/… End of Q1: JAWN UP BY 6