English Language FAQ

Why does being ' born with a silver spoon in your mouth ' suggest inherited wealth and privilege? Apostle spoons were a symbol of wealth

There are two main candidates for the shortest sentence in the English language. 

Photo by  freestocks.org  on  Unsplash Halloween or All-Hallows-Eve takes place on the night of 31 October in anticipation of All-Hallows-Day (1st November) . It has emerged from a combination of Christian and pagan traditions. Etymology Hallow is the old English word for saint. Halloween is a Scottish variation dating back to the 1700s. The 'een' suffix is a contraction of 'evening'. 'Hallowed evening' or 'holy evening' was later understood to mean eve or 'night before' as with Christmas Eve  All Hallows Day is now called All-Saints-Day in the Catholic calendar. It commemorates Christian martyrs   All Souls Day follows on 2 November. On All Souls Day Catholics pray for the 'souls of the (faithful) departed'. Photo by  Tony J  on  Unsplash Halloween FAQ - brief history of Halloween customs - free 3 min read Halloween often features in Victorian ghost stories. Read and/or listen to E. Nesbit’s ‘Man-Made-in

In US politics to 'move the needle' is to significantly change the opinion polls in the direction of your candidate.  An alternative - more recent - origin to the one above comes from seismology. The movement of the Richter Scale indicates the strength of an earthquake. The expression “moving the needle” first appeared in England during the industrial revolution in relation to gauges on steam engines.  During World War II, it referred to aviation gauges.  In business today it can be used generically to describe making progress.  

The American political system has three centres of power. These are the President and the two chambers in the American Congress the -  Senate  and the  House of Representatives .  'The House' - also sometimes known simply as Congress - is the bigger body. This is because multiple congressmen are elected at a local level while the Senate is restricted to a hundred members. Two senators are elected from each of the fifty US states.  Though individual states vary substantially in population size, each has equal representation. The intention of the founders was to ensure that the larger states did not dominate the legislature. Who makes the law? All laws must originate in Congress. They the must pass up through the Senate and then be approved by the President. This is to ensure that legislation comes directly from local representatives, though the increasing use of presidential 'executive orders'  has been controversial in this regard. The legality of any legislation is ul

FLOTUS is an acronym for ‘First Lady of the United States’.

The electoral college system ensures that even though US presidential elections are national, the vote is decided by counting the number of delegates from each state.

What is the electoral college? US presidential elections are not decided by  the  popular vote  (counting the number of votes obtained nationally for each candidate).  Each voter  votes for a state representative to allocate a vote for the president and vice president in what is called an  electoral college . Delegates States send delegates to the electoral college according to the state vote - with 48 out of 50 using a 'winner takes all system'. Only in Maine and Nebraska are the delegates allocated proportionally. The number of delegates sent to the electoral college is allocated according to the population of the state. Thus the largest delegations come from the most populous states: New York, California and Texas. What is a swing state?

The conventions of using upper and lower case letters evolved over centuries. The terms themselves relate to printing and typesetting.

58 countries have English as an official language. Surprisingly, the list does not include either  the UK  or the USA. In the United States this was a conscious decision of the Founding Fathers . They believed that an official language would be divisive and undemocratic in a multilingual country.  Around 30% of the 18th century population of the USA was German or Dutch speaking. There were also many other linguistic minorities: 18 languages were spoken on Manhattan Island [New York City] as early as 1646. The Dutch, Flemish, Walloons, French, Danes, Norwegians, Swedes, English, Scots, Irish, Germans, Poles, Bohemians, Portuguese, and Italians were among the settlement’s early inhabitants .  Vincent N. Parrillo, Diversity in America , 2008 US states where English is an official language.  Light blue is where there are two official languages (Louisiana - French & English, New Mexico - Spanish & English, Hawaii - Hawaiian & English) Extended version of this post  here  (2 minu