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A PODCAST ABOUT LANGUAGE
BY HELEN ZALTZMAN

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The Allusionist

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Allusionist 124 Nightmare transcript

October 25, 2020 The Allusionist
A124 Nightmare logo.jpeg

Around 700 years ago, the word ‘haunt’ first appeared in written English, at least 200 years before it took on the meaning of a ghost frequenting a place.

HZ: It just meant that way where someone haunts a bar, as in they go to it a lot, but they're not an actual ghost. But it also meant to have sex with. And I could not do enough Googling safely to find out why it had that sense, because it just came up with a lot of websites about people having sex with ghosts. So I cannot find the etymology of this middle English use of 'haunt' in the sexual sense.
PAUL BAE: You've just screwed up your Google ads logarithm by looking up succubus, haunting, "Why sex haunting?"
HZ: The things I do for this show.
PAUL BAE: Exactly.

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In transcript Tags words, language, linguistics, education, comedy, entertainment, society & culture, arts, literature, etymology, lexicon, vocabulary, Paul Bae, Chelsey Weber-Smith, sex, demons, sleep, bogeyman, boggart, bugaboo, bugbear, cobalt, devil, demon, haunt, horror, incubus, jack-o’-lantern lemur, nickel, nightmare, satan, succubus, bristling, hair, scary, adjectives, adverbs, Korea, Korean, myths, legends, folklore, hell, heaven, spirits, bears, fear, mining, miners, goblins, animals, elements, satanic, satanic panic, bible, Ancient Greek, slander, gods, turnips, kobold, copper, kupfernickel, Hebrew, adversary, Old Testament

Allusionist 15: Step Away - transcript

July 29, 2015 The Allusionist

Since 'step-' indicates the biological and possibly emotional distance between relations, I had assumed that etymologically, that was where the term originated - the idea of someone being a step away from the family. But step the family word, and step as in to tread, have totally different roots - and very different meanings.

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In transcript Tags words, etymology, history, children, fairy tales, fiction, Aaron Mahnke, Lore, folklore, women, misogyny, family, families, step, stepchildren, stepmother, stepfather, infant mortality
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