Word Matters – Details, episodes & analysis
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Word Matters
Merriam-Webster, New England Public Media
Frequency: 1 episode/17d. Total Eps: 105
Word Matters is a show for readers, writers, and anyone who's curious about the English language. Join Merriam-Webster editors as they challenge supposed grammar rules, reveal the surprising origins behind words, tackle common questions, and generally geek out about the beautiful nightmare that is our language.
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Apple Podcasts
🇨🇦 Canada - education
25/10/2025#96🇨🇦 Canada - education
01/10/2025#94🇨🇦 Canada - education
30/09/2025#65🇨🇦 Canada - education
29/09/2025#33🇨🇦 Canada - education
28/09/2025#22🇬🇧 Great Britain - education
28/09/2025#63🇨🇦 Canada - education
27/09/2025#23🇬🇧 Great Britain - education
27/09/2025#59🇨🇦 Canada - education
26/09/2025#26🇬🇧 Great Britain - education
26/09/2025#43
Spotify
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See allRSS feed quality and score
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See allScore global : 73%
Publication history
Monthly episode publishing history over the past years.
An Interview with John Morse, Part 3
Episode 103
mardi 15 juillet 2025 • Duration 48:00
Part three of a three-part interview with John Morse, former president and publisher of Merriam-Webster
Hosted by Emily Brewster and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media, with much gratitude to John Voci.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
An Interview with John Morse, Part 2
Episode 102
vendredi 11 juillet 2025 • Duration 47:20
Part two of a three-part interview with John Morse, former president and publisher of Merriam-Webster
Hosted by Emily Brewster and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media, with much gratitude to John Voci.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
When Dictionaries Drop Words
Episode 93
mercredi 15 juin 2022 • Duration 25:38
We’ve discussed how words come to be entered in our dictionaries before, but today we’re going to talk about removing words from dictionaries. Which words get dropped? And why?
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
How do you even pronounce 'antennae' anyway?
Episode 4
mercredi 19 août 2020 • Duration 25:11
After a job well done, you might receive kudos. But today we ask: can you ever receive just one? Or is it just the sound of one hand clapping? Then, we explore a topic that loves to make even the most seasoned English speakers second-guess themselves: Latin plurals.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
A Collection of Obscure Words That You Might Find Useful
Episode 3
vendredi 14 août 2020 • Duration 10:00
Few parts of the English language fascinate its users more than obscure and obsolete words. Today, our in-house collector of errant words Ammon Shea brings us a few words that may have been lost to history, but perhaps might be worth picking up and dusting off.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Ice Tea and Semantic Drift
Episode 2
jeudi 13 août 2020 • Duration 26:37
Terrific. Fantastic. Wonderful. Can we properly use these words without referring to terror, fantasy, or wonder? Today our editors look at one of the most dependable sources of language change: semantic drift. Then, we cool down with a discussion of how ‘ice’ and ‘iced’ function to describe various refreshing beverages.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
'Irregardless': You Don't Have to Like It
Episode 1
mercredi 12 août 2020 • Duration 24:11
Welcome to Word Matters! In our first episode, we ask a simple but surprisingly complex question: when is a meal supper and when is it dinner? Is there even a difference? Then, we navigate one of English’s most fraught topics. That’s right, we’re talking about the word (yes, WORD) irregardless.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Introducing Word Matters
Episode 1
mardi 4 août 2020 • Duration 02:33
From the editors at Merriam-Webster, Word Matters is a show for readers, writers, and anyone who ever loved their English class.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Neil Serven, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
Wordle Does Not Make Us Nauseous
Episode 92
mercredi 8 juin 2022 • Duration 17:39
Some listeners want to know if working with words professionally makes a dictionary editor better, or worse, at Wordle, and another listener wants us to weigh in on the difference between 'nauseated' and 'nauseous'—which doesn’t turn our stomachs in the least.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
The Invention of the Modern Dictionary
Episode 91
mercredi 1 juin 2022 • Duration 33:40
The earliest dictionaries were the fruit of one person’s labor, but the 1864 Webster's Unabridged changed all of that.
Hosted by Emily Brewster, Ammon Shea, and Peter Sokolowski.
Produced in collaboration with New England Public Media.
Transcript available here.
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
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