In South Africa “umlungu” is a word that’s commonly used to refer to white people. It comes from isiXhosa, the language of the country’s Xhosa people. It’s always been a mystery how the word ...

This word rose to popularity from out of nowhere and became embedded in Aussie culture. An OAM recipient says it is the most ...

Google Books Ngram, an online tool that tracks the historical frequency of word usage in print, shows remigration peaking in 1797 amid a surge of nativist sentiment that would soon produce the Alien ...

On the evening before Thanksgiving, the president of the United States took to his social media platform to claim in a lengthy screed that immigration was destroying the country. In one spurious ...

In “Spoken Word: A Cultural History,” Joshua Bennett traces the roots, rise and influence of a movement that continues to reverberate. By Tas Tobey When you purchase an independently reviewed book ...

We may receive an affiliate commission from anything you buy from this article. In "Spoken Word: A Cultural History" (Knopf), Joshua Bennett looks back on the development of this vibrant form of ...

Why is Christian Science in our name? Our name is about honesty. The Monitor is owned by The First Church of Christ, Scientist, and we’ve always been transparent about that. The church publishes the ...

Tariffs are President Trump’s favorite word. That’s not an exaggeration. “I always say 'tariffs’ is the most beautiful word to me in the dictionary,” he said at a rally just hours after his ...

Ever since its first use, in the sixth century, the word “modern” has been a term of opposition, writes Patricia Seed, a professor of history at Rice University. It remains “an empty signifier that we ...

It may conjure images of Family Matters' bespectacled, suspenders-clad Steve Urkel. Or the theoretical physicist Sheldon Cooper from The Big Bang Theory. Or Scooby-Doo's Velma. Or you may ...