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The Allusionist

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A PODCAST ABOUT LANGUAGE
BY HELEN ZALTZMAN

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The Allusionist

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Allusionist 213. Four Letter Words: Dino transcript

July 22, 2025 The Allusionist

lot of dinosaur names as well are just being factual about size, like ‘mega’ - and actually a lot of the names are being factual about other things, like triceratops and pentaceratops: that's descriptive. Three horns; five horns. 

HANNAH McGREGOR: Five horns. We're always telling you about the number of horns. And then a lot of them are just like, “We found this in this place.” 

HZ: Yeah. The albertosaurus - 

HANNAH McGREGOR: Albertosaurus!

HZ: - in Alberta. And, mastodon is meant nipple tooth, or nipple teeth. 

HANNAH McGREGOR: …Sorry? 

HZ: You look a little perturbed, 

HANNAH McGREGOR: Perturbed and delighted. Vagina dentata is a sort of recurring theme -

HZ: It's a passion of yours.

HANNAH McGREGOR: It’s a passion of mine! Ha ha ha. Yeah, yeah, you know what? You're not wrong. It's a recurring theme in the book and my life. and so I'm really, I am intrigued by the idea of adding nipple teeth into the equation. 

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In transcript Tags etymology, lexicon, society, culture, words, language, history, vocabulary, four letter words, dino, dinosaurs, palaeontology, fossils, Jurassic Park, Michael Crichton, films, movies, 19th century, awe, Crystal Palace, parks, Victorians, museums, Latin, Greek, T-rex, sublime, taxonomy, semantics, terrible, nature, natural history, ancient, extinct, bones, creatures, animals, reptiles, lizards, plesiosaur, geology, zoos, safaris, spectacle, spectacular, discomfort, Richard Owen, Benjamin Waterhouse Hawkins, Henry Fairfield Osborn, Bone Wars, Othniel Charles Marsh, Edward Drinker Cope, categories, categorising, apatosaurus, athanor, brontosaurus, deinonychus, dinosaur, mastodon, megalosaurus, tyrannosaurus, tyrant, velociraptor, dynamoterror, lizard, naming, names, nipples, teeth, nipple teeth, claws, pentaceratops, triceratops, Oedipus, eugenics, Alberta, Canada, Prince Albert, Queen Victoria, Princess Louise, vagina dentata

Allusionist 190 Craters - transcript

March 7, 2024 The Allusionist

ANNIE LENNOX: It really all came to light when I got the opportunity to name my first feature on Mercury - which was, side note, one of the most exciting things. To find something that is scientifically significant and then to get the chance to name it on another planet: super cool. 

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In transcript Tags history, Annie Lennox, International Astronomical Union, IAU, space, planets, craters, Mercury, Mars, Moon, Europa, mythical characters, myth, snake, Ceres, Venus, solar system, names, naming, renaming, eponyms, problematic eponyms, geology, Pablo Neruda, sexism, astronomers, astronomy, Giovanni Battista Riccioli, Sea of Tranquillity, representation, Sheila Stewart, Mary Brooksbank, Carolina Nairn, Disney, Freddie Mercury, Boaty McBoatface, regulus

Allusionist 34: Continental - transcript

April 17, 2016 The Allusionist
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If a continent is a continuous land, are all islands continents? Even tiny ones like Guernsey? No offence to Guernsey, but I don’t think Guernsey would call itself a continent for fear of being laughed out of the Channel.

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In transcript Tags continent, continents, continental, geology, geography, Ancient Greek, rowel, please, thank you, manners
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Allusionist 213. Four Letter Words: Dino
Allusionist 213. Four Letter Words: Dino
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The Allusionist by Helen Zaltzman is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.