Videos made for Mental Floss (mentalfloss.com/) from Arika Okrent (twitter.com/arikaokrent) and Sean O'Neill (rocketrobinson.com/).
3:18
Shoulda Woulda Coulda. Where does that L come from?
Arika Okrent
Shared 4 years ago
11K views
3:50
Highly Irregular: Why Tough, Through, and Dough Don't Rhyme and Other Oddities...
5.7K views
1:47
Things Labeled 'American' in Other Countries
Shared 6 years ago
10K views
3:47
Number Words and the Human Body
14K views
2:46
Secrets Given Away By Silent Letters
Shared 7 years ago
21K views
3:48
What is a Word
23K views
3:51
Why Isn't There A Word For That?
19K views
3:38
Common Words That Mean Something More Specific To Experts
8.5K views
3:40
The Story of 'Cool'
15K views
3:52
Why Is It 'My Lord' But 'Your Highness'?
4:17
What Causes a Foreign Accent?
39K views
2:09
Fancy Words for Mundane Health Problems
5K views
1:43
Interesting Holiday Word Origins
6.5K views
2:48
Tricky Grammar in Christmas Songs
8.4K views
3:32
The Story of Figurative "Literally"
8.7K views
2:08
Hidden Metaphors in Anatomical Terms
7K views
2:39
Spot the Words Hidden in These Words
18K views
2:38
Weird Syntax III: The More The Merrier
6.8K views
2:02
Weird Syntax II: Sexiest Man Alive
7.5K views
2:03
Weird Syntax: Part I. "How Dare You"
9.1K views
3:59
Why Do We Have Irregular Verbs?
Shared 8 years ago
81K views
2:33
The Story of "Gross"
2:06
Words We Got From Weather
9.2K views
5:18
How Do We Know How Languages Are Related?
41K views
1:42
5 Comma Types That Can Make Or Break a Sentence
38K views
2:10
Mysterious Word Parts, Demystified
1:53
Whole Phrases Hidden in English Words
31K views
2:26
Negative Words That Turned Into Positive Words
2:32
The Story of Basic English
1:48
Classy Insults from Latin and Greek
Words That Are Older Than They Seem
3:09
Where Do the Calendar Months Get Their Names?
118K views
2:47
How British and American Spelling Parted Ways
116K views
2:14
Words That Don't Seem Related, But Are
8K views
2:24
Words That Seem Related, But Aren't
27K views
2:25
Octopi, Platypi, Walri, Oh My!
Shared 9 years ago
13K views
Words That Have Lost Their Better Halves
16K views
Isaac Newton's Forgotten Invented Language
34K views
2:49
Why Does Q (Almost) Always Go With U?
55K views
3:21
The Story of ASL
189K views
2:40
Words We Invented By Getting Them Wrong
122K views
3:17
How Do You Say Pecan?
156K views
3:33
Horrible Jargon We Got Used To
76K views
2:20
The Double Vocabulary of English
247K views
3:10
Word That Are Their Own Opposites
47K views
4:02
The Story of the Umlaut
71K views
2:05
French Phrases Hidden in English Words
236K views
Why Do Animals Make Different Sounds in Different Languages?
137K views
4:08
Why Do We Say 'Merry' Just for Christmas?
66K views
2:19
Word Origins Hiding in Plain Sight
62K views
3:49
Why Are There So Many Different Names for Germany
168K views
2:01
Fancier Words for the Shapes in Your World
8.3K views
3:43
How Did Language Begin
231K views
2:45
Where do the Days of the Week Get Their Names
260K views
Why Does 'Terrible' Mean Bad and Terrific Mean Good?
24K views
What is the Real Origin of OK?
Shared 10 years ago
215K views
The Evolution of Dude
127K views
3:15
Why is Y a sometimes vowel?
56K views
3:45
Words That Aren't What You Think They Are
30K views
4:04
Why is English Spelling So Weird?
379K views