Unanswered Questions
8,676 questions with no upvoted or accepted answers
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When did "bright-eyed and bushy-tailed" first appear in print with its current figurative meaning?
Christine Ammer, The Facts on File Dictionary of Clichés, second edition (2006) has the following entry for the phrase "bright-eyed and bushy-tailed"
bright-eyed and bushy tailed Lively and ...
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8
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2
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Why do New Englanders (specifically, Connecticut people) say the word "bring" and almost never use "take"?
Why do New Englanders (specifically, Connecticut people) say the word bring and never use the word take? I've lived in Connecticut for a long time.
I grew up in the Midwest and Deep South and people ...
7
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3
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Is there a word equivalent to "sighting" but for hearing?
I'm trying to write a sentence like
Nobody goes near the caves because of monster noises.
"Nobody goes near the caves because of monster sightings" doesn't work because people have not ...
CommunityBot
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7
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0
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Was 'without' always the opposite of 'with'?
It seems that the word without was constructed as the opposite of within (or vice versa, but either way, they're a pair). However, we also use the word to mean the opposite of with, and that poses a ...
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How are /ɪ/ and /ʌ/ realised in the Nottingham (East Midlands) accent?
I've got a sample of a few words pronounced by a Nottingham accent representative: https://youtu.be/2fCSeDEZeVU
My ear is far from perfect and this is why I'd like to ask for your help in this ...
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6
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0
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408
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What does the word ‘delicacy’ mean in Dickens’s “A Tale of Two Cities”?
This passage is from Dickens’s A Tale of Two Cities, chapter 9 book the second:
From this room, many such dogs have been taken out to be hanged; in the next room (my bedroom), one fellow, to our ...
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6
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1
answer
376
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Is there any implication of drunkenness in "high lonesome" as used in the term "high lonesome sound"?
Wiktionary has the following entry for "high lonesome sound":
high lonesome sound (music) An expressively emotional, powerful and earthy style of musical expression associated mainly with ...
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5
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323
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How can we decide which noun complement should be used in uncountable form and which shouldn't?
Look at these sentences:
They were held hostage.
They were held captive.
Here, are "hostage" and "captive" working as adjectives?
If they are, then why can't we say "A ...
CommunityBot
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5
votes
1
answer
390
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What's behind the mispronunciation of "overarching"?
Listening to Inside Politics Sunday today (10/19/25), I heard a journalist, Astead Herndon, mispronounce overarching with a /k/ instead of a /ch/.
I think there is a recognition that the gerontocracy ...
CommunityBot
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5
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0
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392
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Why do grapes and plums specifically have words for their dried counterparts?
I've been going down a rabbit hole recently about how and where raisins and prunes got their names. I understand the etymology of the two (coming from French, probably from goods that had to be dried ...
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Glottal stop after the obstruents
This is my first post here, so if I make any mistakes, please correct me.
At the beginning, I must specify that I mean the Standard Southern British English/General British/modern RP.
I'd like to ask ...
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548
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'To lie' and 'to lay' / 'to rise' and 'to raise' / 'to fall' and 'to fell' <-- Did English used to have more pairs like this?
My understanding is that there aren't many pairs of intransitive and transitive verbs in modern English. Off-hand, I know of three (though I think there are more):
lie vs lay
rise vs raise
fall vs ...
5
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301
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Is linking R to a vowel in British English an intentional effort or a natural occurrence?
If I am not wrong, the linkage between words happens naturally when you try to pronounce the words quickly. Unlike American English, where the ending R is always clearly pronounced, British ...
5
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1
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445
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There’s one letter (for you) to sign
The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language by H&P says (Page 1394):
(d) Infinitival extensions
[11] i a. A few replies are still to come. b. There are still a few replies to come.
ii a. One ...
CommunityBot
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How can I distinguish between supplements and modifiers as proposed in The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (CGEL)?
In CGEL, the authors use the term 'adjunct' as an umbrella term to cover an element that is either modifier or supplement. On page 1350, the authors explain the properties of supplements to ...
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