John McWhorter

linguist, professor

Columbia linguist who makes the mechanics of language riveting, explaining etymology and morphology with infectious enthusiasm and precision.

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Top 4 Power Words

Words known to be used by John McWhorter
  1. n. 1 the branch of biology that deals with the form and structure of animals and plants; 2 the branch of linguistics that deals with word structure

    The morphology of slang is constantly evolving.
  2. n. a dictionary

    Adding a new word to the mental lexicon is a joy.
  3. n. Now Rare orderly or systematic arrangementGram; Linguis. the arrangement of and relationships among words; phrases; and clauses forming sentences; sentence structure the study of thisComput. the structure of statements in a computer languag

    Syntax is the scaffolding of human thought.
  4. n. the study of the sound system of a given language and the analysis and classification of its phonemes

    Phonology dictates how we perceive music in speech.

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