ETYMOLOGY [ĕt"ə-mŏl'ə-jē] 1. The derivation of a word. 2. A chronologicalaccountofthebirthanddevelopmentofaparticularwordorelementofaword,oftendelineatingitsspreadfromonelanguagetoanotheranditsevolvingchangesinformandmeaning. 3. thestudyofhistoricallinguisticchange,asmanifestedinindividualwords. Origin: 1350-1400;MiddleEnglish< Latinetymologia< Greeketymología -Dictionary.com
MY ADVENTURES WITH WORDS My first encounter with etymology was a chance occurrence in a British bookstore in the ninth grade. It was a particularly busy day, and, trying to get away from the more crowded part of the store, I stumbled across a section full of linguistics books that turned out to be really interesting. That moment proved to be very important in my life, and I quickly became obsessed with word origins, which perfectly combined my interests in history, language, and geography.
After doing a bit more research for fun, I decided to undertake a project to teach both myself and others more about linguistics. I created this website on November 2, 2016, eventually expanding it to make infographics and videos. My hope is to make linguistics more accessible to a wide audience.
In May 2023, I graduated from Harvard cum laude in Government and Linguistics. There, I served as president of the Harvard Undergraduate Linguistics Society and wrote a senior thesis on language identity in former Yugoslavia.
Since then, I've been continuing this journey on TikTok, where I post daily videos on linguistics.