Главная страница «Первого сентября»Главная страница журнала «Английский язык»Содержание №17/2009

Erin Bouma's Recommended

WORD PLAY

http://www.fun-with-words.com

This site catalogs amusing peculiarities/oddities of English. Entertaining and educational. Over 500 pages of word puzzles, games, amazing lists, and fun facts. Funny (real) signs from around the world of mangled English. Subscribe to their free newsletter.

http://www.wordplays.com/p/index

Many online word games and puzzles. Register for free to play anagrams, words in a word, Boogle, Scrabble, etc. against the clock and keep your scores. In 7 languages (but not Russian yet).

http://www.jimwegryn.com/Words/Words.php

A Barrelful of Words. A collection of over 2,500 American English words and phrases in humorous context. I would say that you can learn a lot about English here and have a good laugh at the same time.

http://www.ojohaven.com/collectives

Humorous (and real) collective nouns. ex: “an absence of waiters”, “a calendar of saints”, “a nag of grandparents”, etc.

http://www.sarangworld.com/WORDMORPH

Word morphing. Changing words, one letter at a time, into another/contrasting word. Ex: “cat” to “dog” or “Venus” to “Earth.”

http://www.wordies.ca

Here you need to translate the arrangement of letters, numbers and/or symbols into a familiar phrase, saying or cliché. Problem solving. ex: “R/E/A/D/I/N/G” – “Reading between the lines”.

http://www.hoadworks.com/gamesindex.htm

“Vocabaret”. Mostly advanced word play and games. Requires some hard thinking but answers provided. Also Children’s Games with Lit and Bio Quizes, challenging crosswords and assorted games.

http://music.yeucahat.com/song/English/9755-Word-Play~Jason-Mraz.html

Contemporary song (with music and lyrics) about word play.

http://www.drmardy.com/chiasmus/definition/definition1.shtml

Chiasmus means switching word order for comic effect: “Eat to live, don’t live to eat.”

http://www.wordspy.com

Fun with newly coined words and phrases.

http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~genepool/amerispeak.htm

Amerispeak: expressions of American ancestors. Collected family and old time everyday expressions (many colorful) by category with a modern “translation”.

http://www.doubletongued.org/index.php/grantbarrett/from_lol_to_lulz_to_lolxxx

Recent catchwords from “A Way with Words” presented by blogger Grant Barrett.

http://www.doubletongued.org/index.php/grantbarrett/comments/the_lore_and_rhymes_of_children

The Lore and Rhymes of Children in English: from “eeny-meany” to “chinny-chin”.

http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/unpaired.htm

English has several interesting words without a “pair”: Countless (but not countful), unruly (but not ruly). Why do they survive?

http://www.owlnet.rice.edu/~ling215/NewWords/index.html

New words/usages collected by students at Rice University (U.S.) in the 1990s.

http://www.cupola.com/wrdplay1.htm

Word Play Gallery, Pictographs Puzzles.

Ex: DOTHEPE – “The inside dope.”

http://www.americansandbox.com

Children’s Mispronounced words.

http://www.aaaugh.com/dictionary/a.html

The Foolish Dictionary. Comic definitions.

Compiled by Erin Bouma