LAS LENGUAS INGLESA Y ESPAÑOLA de Delfín Carbonell

The Internet, AI, and related technologies have brought about advances that would once have seemed unimaginable. They can now generate lifelike figures—faces that blink, smile, and even flirt with the viewer—voices that appear, at first hearing, entirely real. One watches and listens with a mixture of admiration and unease: the simulation is astonishing, and yet something is off. The unease becomes clearer in the language itself. Whether in English or Spanish, what we hear is not incorrect, but curiously flattened. The intonation lacks the natural variability of real speech; the rhythm feels over-regularized; the voice seems to belong nowhere in particular. The Spanish, especially, often fails to correspond to any identifiable speech community. It is presented as “neutral,” yet comes across as disembodied—competent, but unreal. The visual element only heightens the effect. The language coach looks flawless, even coquettish, and behaves as if she were fully alive; yet her voice betray...

  Spanish has a wonderfully vivid way of calling out empty talk: cacarear y no poner huevo —literally, “to cluck and not lay an egg.” The image says it all: plenty of noise, no result. Closely related are mucho ruido y pocas nueces and írsele la fuerza a uno por la boca , both pointing to effort wasted in talk rather than action. English matches this idea with equally colorful expressions. A personal favorite is to be all hat and no cattle , evoking someone who looks the part but delivers nothing. Other equivalents include much ado about nothing , much cry and little wool , much smoke, little fire , and the blunt all mouth and no trousers . Example: David es un fanfarrón que cacarea y no pone huevo. David is a braggart— all hat and no cattle. As Fray Francisco Alvarado neatly put it in 1811: “Esto se llama en mi tierra cacarear y no poner huevo.” Different languages, same timeless observation: talk is cheap.

  I have always held that if the first 50 pages of a novel are tough going, toss it into the wastepaper basket or give it away to a friend you do not care much for. I have often heard it said that "the first 50 pages of this thriller are very complicated to read, but after that, the novel is wonderful, the best."  And who has the grit, endurance, and resilience to put up with fifty boring pages of a book, hoping that the best is yet to come. Once a bore, always a bore, I say. All this comes because my daughter, Laura Lynn, has gifted me with Barbara Kingsolver's Demon Copperhead. So far, I have read 20 pages of the autobiography of a boy in Appalachia, Demon, who is "a voice for the ages - akin to Huck Finn or Holden Caulfield," according to Beth Macy, author of Dopesick . Having read both masterpieces years ago, I see no reason to tackle a new youngster's ravings and commonplaces about his childhood and hard times. Also, having read Tobacco Road  when it wa...

In my opinion, a word that sometimes describes Spaniards linguistically is hubris : excessive confidence in one’s own abilities. Why do I say this? Because it is not uncommon to hear claims of “perfect English” that do not quite withstand scrutiny. Many people will say, in all seriousness, that they speak flawless English—or that their children do—based on rather limited experience. One hears statements such as: “My daughter speaks perfect English; she spent a month in London washing dishes,” or that someone’s command of the language is impeccable because he works as a translator at a certain firm. Yet, when the chips are down, this supposed perfection often proves less solid than advertised. The gap between confidence and actual performance can be striking. This is not to say that Spaniards are uniquely guilty of such overconfidence, but there does seem to be a tendency, at times, to equate familiarity with mastery. In that sense, “hubris” may not be entirely misplaced. Spaniards spea...

  Homophones are the terror of poor spellers: words that have the same pronunciation but different meanings and spellings. ‘David is rite when he says Peter is rich’ sounds the same as ‘David is write when he says Peter is rich,’ but our sight tells us that the correct form is ‘David is right when he says…’. The sounds are identical, but the meanings and spellings are different. Here/hear; hair/hare; week/weak; pair/pare/pear… and many more. In Spanish, examples include hecho/echo; hola/ola; vello/bello; haber/a ver… and, for those who do not pronounce the Castilian /θ/ sound, caza/casa; cocer/coser. This is not a trivial matter of grammar or spelling; it signals to others that we belong to the intellectually below-the-salt type of people. 

  Rhyming phraseology occurs in both English and Spanish, as in “una y no más, Santo Tomás” or “date el piro, vampiro,” expressions that are distinctly colloquial and largely ornamental. English likewise abounds in rhyming pairs such as “itsy-bitsy,” “okey-dokey,” “hanky-panky,” and “super-duper,” among many others. As these forms are part of the language, their use cannot be prescribed; however, they are best confined to informal contexts rather than formal speech, and still less to formal writing.

  While reading the article “The people at the center of the war” by Parin Behrooz in The New York Times (April 10), I came across a sentence that contains two very small slips—of the sort that occasionally appear in even the best-edited publications. The sentence reads: “That war began with explicit encouragement for Iranians to rise up and ended with U.S. threats to bomb the country back to the ‘Stone Ages’ has not been lost on the people living through it.” Two details may be noted in passing. First, the familiar English expression is “the Stone Age,” not “the Stone Ages.” Second, the grammatical subject of the sentence is the compound statement introduced by that (“that war began … and ended …”), which would normally take a plural verb: have not been lost rather than has not been lost. These are, of course, minor points that do not affect the sense of the passage. They simply remind us how demanding careful copy-editing can be. Readers of a certain generation may recall a...

  Nature has laws we cannot escape. Life is a struggle for survival among living beings driven to thrive and reproduce. In that struggle, we fall prey to countless enemies, many microscopic. What we call disease consists of tiny organisms that do not intend to harm us, yet must use our bodies to thrive. If we overcome them, they lose; if they prevail, we die. That is neither good nor bad—simply a fact. I have fought my share of such battles and, so far, prevailed: ear infections, measles, chickenpox, kidney stones, two severe bouts of flu, endless colds, gastritis, headaches, a heart attack, cancer. The usual fare, if one lives long enough. Add to this the wear and tear of time on body and mind. I am 87 and still pushing on. Time allows no pause. Despite everything, I have lived a largely healthy, active, and mostly pain-free life. I was born before penicillin came into common use, which says something about the stamina of my body. I am, by any measure, a survivor—fortunate, and ...

  Of late, I have been noticing a tendency to employ "firstly", "secondly" instead of "first, second", as in "Firstly I wish to thank..." instead of "First I wish to thank..." It is not wrong, of course, and the adverb has been in use this way for centuries; even Fowler ,  however, tended to prefer first, second , etc., rather than firstly, secondly , and expressions such as “last but not least” would sound odd if turned into “lastly but not least.  I simply wanted to point this out in case someone like me was wondering. 

  I have always said it as "codo con codo", shoulder to shoulder, meaning side by side, but I read in a journal "codo a codo" and I rushed to my dictionaries to double-check. Was it a mistake? Nope, it wasn't. María Moliner uses the preposition "con", and Seco registers the idiom with "a".  Finally, the Diccionario de la Real Academia accepts both prepositions. Live and learn! So you can say: "Petra y yo trabajamos codo con codo", and "Petra y yo trabajamos codo a codo." 

Toda la obra Crítica efímera , es un dechado de buen escribir, acertada crítica, buen humor y correcciones lingüísticas. A propósito del lenguaje, me arriesgo a entresacar la siguiente cita, escrita en 1919, por si puede servir de algo a alguien o como recordatorio de épocas lejanas.   "... por defectuosa organización de la enseñanza oficial, y hasta por carencia de obras racionales que faciliten el conocimiento práctico del idioma, nuestros literatos, salvo honrosas excepciones, se arrojan a llenar cuartillas sin haber aprendido a manejar el instrumento de su arte, y, naturalmente, desafinan. De aquí que entre nosotros sea más necesaria, y también más eficaz, la policía del lenguaje." Julio Casares, Crítica efímera , "Una fábula de aduaneros y matuteros", Espasa-Calpe, 1962. (Publicado originalmente en 1919.)

 People no longer seem to care as much about how they dress, but there was a time when being elegant, dapper, smart, well-groomed, and stylish was the ideal everyone aspired to. Men and women dressed to kill, to the nines, and took pride in being well-dressed at all times. The Spanish language, too, bears witness to this former obsession with dress, with expressions such as ir hecho un pincel ( hecho un brazo de mar ) ir de tiros largos or maqueado.  If this increasingly casual approach to dress persists, such expressions may survive only in dictionaries. Juan vino a la fiesta hecho un pincel John came to the party dressed to the nines — “… se ponía hecho un pincel aunque solo fuera a ir al mercado.” Antonio Muñoz Molina, Sefarad , 2001. Esp. || “… lo mandé planchar, hice almidonar la camisa y…hecho un brazo de mar, bajé al comedor.” Manuel Leguineche, El camino más corto , 1995. Esp. 

These alternatives in English  Either...or: "Either pay or go to jail." Neither... nor: "I neither love you nor need you." have their parallel equals in Spanish: O... o: "O me pagas o te parto la cara." Ni... ni: "Ni quiero ir ni puedo ir."

I regularly receive the Modern Language Association newsletter The Source from the MLA Style Center, which I peruse diligently. In the issue of 29 January 2026, an article titled “A Common Mistake: Should of in Place of Should Have” caught my attention. It opens with the statement: “You may have seen people write should of , but that is grammatically incorrect.” I do not generally encounter such usage, nor do I associate with people who write in that manner. Indeed, contrary to the claim, I cannot recall ever hearing anyone say should of in place of should have . I may be living on the fringes of present-day English, but I find the assertion surprising nonetheless. The author, Laura Kiernan, suggests that “the mistake probably comes from the fact that should’ve sounds similar to should of when spoken.” Try as I might, however, I cannot hear should’ve as resembling should of . While the explanation is plausible, pointing out this “mistake” strikes me as somewhat unnecessary for ...

     There was a time when manners , politeness , and etiquette were not just words, but living principles. Today, they risk becoming old-fashioned vocabulary, their meanings fading in the minds of the young. In their place, other expressions are gaining currency—often reflecting a rather different social reality.      One such expression is “to take French leave.” Traditionally, it meant departing without saying goodbye, without asking permission, without so much as a word of notice—a small but unmistakable social offense. In earlier times, such behavior would have been considered a breach of decorum, if not outright rudeness. Now, it passes almost unnoticed.    The phrase itself is a curious example of linguistic blame-shifting across cultures. The French, returning the compliment, say “filer à l’anglaise,” placing the blame squarely on the English. Spanish follows suit with “despedirse a la francesa,” suggesting, perhaps with a faint smil...

  There are words proscribed by society as improper and unacceptable, taboo, and which, nevertheless, we have to name and refer to. Such is the case of the word syphilis, a venereal disease that, it seems, is making a comeback. In former times, it was referred to in polite society as The French Disease , morbo gallico .  As the French had also stigmatized the word, they blamed Italians and called it le mal de Naples . Italians retaliated with il mal francese . Spaniards blamed the French also: el mal francés . It was a curse that ravaged Europe for centuries. In his book The World of Yesterday , Stephen Zweig explains its impact upon the youth of his time. 

 Ya he tratado en este Blog sobre la pronunciación de nombres y apellidos en inglés y he hecho hincapié en su dificultad. No debemos bajar la guardia nunca y cerciorarnos siempre. Leyendo el New York Times (28 de marzo, 2026), veo que llevamos casi dos siglos pronunciando mal el apellido del escritor y filósofo estadounidense Henry David Thoreau. En su artículo "Rethinking Thoreau...", Sarah Lyall nos cuenta que la pronunciación no es /Zoró/, sino /Zóro/,  /THO-reau, y que el acento recae en la primera sílaba. Todo esto a propósito de un programa en ciernes de la PBS sobre el escritor, narrado por actores como George Clooney y Meryl Streep, donde, al parecer, han tenido que enseñarles la nueva -y correcta- pronunciación del apellido francés. Si los mismos nativos tienen problemas fonéticos con nombres y apellidos, recomiendo ejercer cautela siempre. 

  Quiero recordarles a ustedes, estudiosos del idioma, dos citas de Julio Casares (1877-1964), extraídas de su Cosas del lenguaje (Espasa-Calpe, 1961), que, en mi modestísima opinión, hay que tener en cuenta al tratar esta cuestión: "... de un orden infinitamente más complejo y sutil es la lógica del lenguaje; ya que éste, como todo hecho social, como todo producto de cultura, es una obra colectiva, inestable, en cuya evolución intervienen, influyéndose recíprocamente, factores materiales, fisiológicos y psíquicos de muy diversa índole, no siempre fáciles de aislar."   "No intentemos... reformar arbitrariamente el idioma. Tal como está -sin que esto sea desconocer su calidad de perfectible- resulta un instrumento muy superior a la capacidad de casi todos los que lo empleamos; por lo cual, no estaría de más que dedicásemos a estudiar nuestra lengua la mitad del empeño que ponemos en criticarla." 

Can José López Pinillos (Pármeno), 1875–1922, be considered a forgotten writer in Spain? I believe so. Yet he is far from alone. Countless writers have fallen by the wayside of notoriety and now rest on the soft, dusty shoulders of oblivion. A glance at his Cómo se conquista la notoriedad: Los favoritos de la multitud (Editorial Pueyo, calle Arenal, 6) confirms his mastery as a journalist. In this volume, López Pinillos interviews leading figures of his time: Alejandro Lerroux , General Valeriano Weyler ,  Álvaro de Figueroa y Torres , José Francos Rodríguez , Ramón del Valle-Inclán , Carlos Arniches , and others now less remembered. Together, they illuminate the intellectual world of Spain a hundred years ago. It is well worth opening these pages to discover how they saw their world—and, perhaps, how much of it still lingers in ours.

     Did you know that in some places Spaniards are occasionally teased for pronouncing /θ/ instead of /s/? It is curious, because that very distinction can actually enhance clarity.      Consider this: if I say me voy a cazar , pronouncing ka θ ar rather than casar , there is no doubt about my intention. If, on the contrary, I say me voy a casar , I may well be congratulated and asked about the bride.      In varieties of Spanish where both words are pronounced the same, context usually resolves the ambiguity—but the phonetic distinction available in standard Peninsular Spanish removes it altogether.      Language, after all, is a tool for communication, and every feature that contributes to clarity deserves some appreciation. This is not “lisping” (a different phenomenon altogether), but simply one way—among others—of giving the language its full expressive range.

  Yesterday, Telemadrid did it again. Truth be told, this should not surprise me, because Spanish television in general shows a low regard for the official language of Spain. In the program “120 minutos” we read: “Anboto, exdirigente de ETA condenada por participar en quince asesinatos, sale de prisión entre la indignación de las víctimas.” “Entre” for “ante.” And “las víctimas” should more properly be “los allegados de las víctimas.” Let them kick grammar and usage around as much as they like—Spain is, after all, still a democracy—but we should try our darndest to speak and write well. Right?

  Every language has its own native mistakes—errors foreigners rarely make—which reveal a speaker’s social and cultural standing. These mistakes serve as useful clues, helping us judge whether someone belongs to our circle or not. In this sense, we should be grateful for them. Editors, constantly exposed to poor writing, are in a privileged position. Awkward sentences, faulty grammar, and ill-formed expressions not only betray weak education but also make it easy to dismiss a piece. One might even argue that institutions failing to teach proper language deserve to be held accountable. Common errors abound—misused pronouns, redundant expressions, incorrect agreements, and illogical constructions. Such mistakes should never appear in serious writing. And yet, these very errors are oddly comforting. They allow us to feel competent, even superior. Spotting “everybody in the room were drunk” can bring a quiet satisfaction: we know better. In a way, other people’s mistakes boost our ...

     Polonius, in Hamlet (Act 1, Scene 3), advises us: “neither a borrower nor a lender be.” Getting into debt is one of the worst mistakes we can make, and I have tried to avoid it all my life. I am poor, but I owe nothing. What a relief. And as for lending, my poverty has kept borrowers at a safe distance!      Keep away from mortgages, credit cards, and installment buying, and you will sleep soundly.      In Spanish, prestar means ‘to lend’, whereas ‘to borrow’ is tomar prestado or pedir prestado .      I have listed the following in my Phraseological Dictionary : He who lends loses his friend  (he that doeth lend loseth money and friend)   Quien presta no cobra, y si cobra, no todo, y si todo, no tal, y si tal, enemigo mortal “…he who lendeth money unto his friend, looseth both money and friend.” Richard Younge, The Prevention of Poverty , 1655, UK.  Quien presta no cobra, y si cobra, no todo, y si todo,...

  José Ortega y Gasset has a delightful article entitled “Pío Baroja tropieza en Coria con la gramática” ( El espectador , VII), apropos of prepositions. I warmly recommend the piece to all lovers of language. Unfortunately, it is not only Pío Baroja who stumbles in matters grammatical. One observes, with some concern, that many Spanish speakers show a certain uncertainty in the handling of their own language, particularly in the use of prepositions. Take a simple but telling example: a la mesa and en la mesa . To say estar sentados a la mesa is to be “at the table,” participating in the shared act of eating; sentados en la mesa , by contrast, places one physically “on the table.” The distinction is neither trivial nor pedantic—it is semantic. In recent times, the more permissive stance of the Real Academia Española has tended to accept such looseness as part of evolving usage. Yet not all change is gain. When distinctions that carry meaning are blurred or lost, the language its...

  I have the bad habit of watching the news on TV while I breakfast. Aside from the apocalyptic information dished out so early in the morning, I must endure the appalling handling of the Spanish language. This morning, as it happens, I heard that "Podemos hace aguas y se agarra al salvavidas de Rufián." (Tele5, programa AR, March 20, 2026.) This means that Podemos (a communist party in Spain) is urinating and holding on to Rufián, a two-bit left-wing politician, for dear life." Urinating? Yes, "hacer aguas" means just that. The correct expression is "hacer agua", meaning to founder and sink. Of course, Spanish politicians are not what they used to be, and their overall cultural baggage today leaves a lot to be desired. Please remember: to fail, to sink, to founder, is "hacer agua (singular)." To urinate is "hacer aguas (plural)." 

      Every day we hear about “new technologies,” nuevas tecnologías —e-mail, mobile phones, AI, instant communication. I use them gratefully.      From Madrid, I can consult the Library of Congress, read an 1890 newspaper, send a manuscript in seconds, or access media from across the ocean. Everything is at my fingertips.      Yet technology is nothing new. Fire, the wheel, writing, the printing press—humanity has always advanced through it. Only the speed has changed.      One tool, however, remains supreme: Language.      It lets us communicate, preserve knowledge, persuade, sell, and connect. It is the technology behind all technologies.      You cannot buy it or download it. You must build it. Success depends on it: vocabulary, pronunciation, grammar, comprehension.      What is the best English or Spanish? The one that is understood. Nothing more.      Those...

  José Luis López Pinillos entrevistó a D. José Francos Rodríguez, 1862-1931, médico y ministro de instrucción pública, que llegó a mucho desde muy poco. D. José se sinceró con López Pinillos: "Lo que más me enorgullece de mi vida es la humildad de mi origen. Soy hijo de un pobre; pero no de un pobre de americana, de un burgués pobre, sino de un pobre de blusa, de un pobre de verdad: de un jornalero." Y se lamenta de que "en el mundo no hay igualdad ni para repartir besos entre los chiquitines." La entrevista completa "El viaje de Francos Rodríguez" se encuentra en el libro de Pinillos Cómo se conquista la notoriedad , de 1920, repleto de entrevistas interesantísimas, que demuestra que la gente antes estaba hecha de otra pasta, y se quejaba menos.

  En español decimos ignorar la realidad o negar la evidencia cuando alguien se obstina en no aceptar hechos evidentes. En inglés encontramos una imagen muy gráfica: to pretend (o claim) that black is white , es decir, “pretender que lo negro sea blanco”. No puedes siempre ignorar la realidad. You cannot pretend that black is white all the time. La idea aparece con frecuencia en ambos idiomas para denunciar razonamientos absurdos o posturas ideológicas que fuerzan los hechos. “…consiste en negar la evidencia e ignorar la realidad.” — Joaquín Garrigues Walker, Una política para España , 1976. “We have entered the bizarre world where black is white…” — David Rosenfelt, Unleashed , 2013. “You are claiming that up is down and black is white.” — Themoneyillusion.com , 2012. La expresión inglesa pertenece a la amplia familia de giros que denuncian la inversión de la realidad: llamar blanco a lo negro, o sostener que lo evidente no lo es. En ambos idiomas la lección es la misma: se pued...

Me acaba de llegar noticia de la expresión «de cuatro suelas» , que significa coloquialmente «muy» o «en extremo» e intensifica un sustantivo. En 1613, Góngora emplea la expresión «melindre de cuatro suelas» en su Comedia del doctor Carlino . Indagando y rebuscando —que es lo mío— observo que las suelas pueden ser tres, cuatro y hasta siete. Y yo en Babia, a pesar de haber bastante documentación: —“… han logrado demostrar su fascismo de siete suelas.” Proceso , 27/10/1996 (Méx.). —“… un pícaro de siete suelas como Llort.” La Hora , 10/06/2002 (Guat.). —“¡Adamski era un embustero de siete suelas!” César Vidal, Historia del ocultismo , 1995 (Esp.). —“… necio de cuatro púas, o de tres suelas, necio perdurable.” Época , 06/04/1998 (Esp.). En inglés podríamos recurrir a intensificadores como downright , utter , out-and-out , true-blue o a real . David es un mujeriego de siete suelas : David is a downright (or a real) womanizer.

  Con intención On purpose, deliberately Ha roto el jarrón con intención He has broken the vase on purpose — “… no lo hemos hecho con intención de molestar.” La Nueva Provincia, 08/03/1997. Arg. Con la mejor intención (voluntad) del mundo With the best of motives (will), in the world Te he prestado el dinero con la mejor intención del mundo I have lent you the money with the best of motives — “… palabras de esas que a veces uno suelta con la mejor intención del mundo…” Alfredo Bryce Echenique, El huerto de mi amada , 2002. Perú. Con las mejores intenciones With the best (of) motives Lo he hecho con las mejores intenciones I’ve done it with the best motives — “… seguramente lo hace con las mejores intenciones.” El Tiempo, 07/04/1997. Colom. Con mala intención In a bad way, with ill intent, mean ill (bad) No lo he hecho con mala intención I haven’t done it in a bad way — “No lo hacen con mala intención, sólo que están muy borrachos.” El País, 10/01/2003. Esp...

  A cada instante Every passing minute Me hace preguntas a cada instante She asks me questions at every passing minute — “Se nace y se desnace simultáneamente, a cada instante.” La Prensa Literaria, 01/05/2004. Nica. Al instante Right away Lo haré al instante I’ll do it right away — “… y la información puede actualizarse al instante.” La Vanguardia, 17/04/1995. Esp. En aquel  (ese, este) preciso instante Just then, this (that) very minute Me pidió en matrimonio y en aquel preciso instante me desmayé He asked me to marry him and just then I passed out — “En ese preciso instante circulaba en dirección contraria otro convoy.” El País, 01/12/1084. Esp. En todo instante All the time Está al ordenador en todo instante He’s at the computer all the time “… y asegura en todo instante que es inocente.” Excélsior, 07/08/1996. Méx. En un instante In a jiffy, right away, in an instant (moment) Juana estará aquí en un instante Jane will be here right away — ...

Hay palabras que, a fuerza de usarse, pierden su lustre y su frescura e incluso su significado original. El idioma inglés ha arrastrado el verbo to hate , a fuerza de emplearlo mal, hasta hundirlo en un verdadero lodazal lingüístico. “I hate getting up in the morning” es ahora un uso normal. “I hate to admit I like to drink”, en lugar del más sobrio “I don't like to admit that I like drinking”. Ahora el hablante nativo hates everything . “I hate coffee with cream. I prefer it black.” Lo mismo ocurre con to love : we love to dance, to eat, money, travelling , con una hipérbole digna de mejor causa. El castellano, menos mal, no ha llegado a esos extremos degradantes y todavía nos gusta dormir en vez de amar dormir. No terminamos las cartas con un “Love, your friend Richard”. Tampoco odiamos tanto nuestros quehaceres monótonos ( chores ); simplemente nos disgustan o nos aburren. En castellano no emplearemos la frase falsa de we are happy to inform you... y reservaremos esa feli...

  What Spain desperately needs is a level-headed Prime Minister who will perform the duties of his office. The current Spanish PM seems to have too much time on his hands, and yesterday he meddled with language once again. In his efforts to control everything, he now wishes to control language—a task well-nigh impossible. Pedro Sánchez has even gone so far as to respell the word odio (“hate”) as “hodio,” a convenient label for whatever criticism may be directed against him. Fancy that! Any criticism, correction, suggestion, or questioning of his policies may now be dismissed as HODIO . One cannot help recalling Nineteen Eighty-Four and its invention of Newspeak. O tempora, o mores!

La @RAEinforma del 11 de marzo, a las 8:28 de la mañana (¡madrugadores ellos!), nos explica que el pleonasmo: «Se trata de secuencias perfectamente válidas y no hay motivo para su censura. Tenga en cuenta que la redundancia o pleonasmo es un fenómeno normal en la lengua y responde la mayoría de las veces a razones de refuerzo expresivo que no cabe censurar». No hay que censurarlo ni criticarlo, pero sí evitarlo, añado yo. No es un fenómeno propio del habla ni de la escritura rigurosos. Yo diría más: suele ser producto de mentes indolentes que muestran desdén hacia el interlocutor o el lector. Decir que «se lo dije yo personalmente ayer» demuestra pereza mental, cuando un simple «se lo dije» bastaría. El ya famoso «totalmente gratis» o «totalmente gratuito» siempre provoca una sonrisa: ¿podría algo ser parcialmente gratis? Y «cita previa» no tiene perdón de Dios, por mucho que la sanidad pública intente darle carta de naturaleza. No todo vale en el idioma, reflejo de nuestro pensamie...

  My Random House Webster’s Dictionary defines “slur” , in its second sense, as: “to pronounce (a syllable, word, etc.) indistinctly by combining, reducing, or omitting sounds, as in hurried or careless utterance.” Collins Bilingual translates it into Spanish as pronunciar mal . I would rather say hablar a trompicones , which suggests a lack of fluency and precision in the articulation of sounds. This kind of slurring makes speech difficult to understand, and lately I have noticed this bad habit becoming more common in both English and Spanish. As I am the sort of person who prefers to understand what is being said before replying, I usually ask for a repeat. Those who slur their words— que hablan a trompicones —often assume, in their hubris, that I am hard of hearing and repeat the same indistinct utterance, only louder. If language is meant to communicate, we should make some effort to pronounce words clearly. When we frequently hear “What?” or “Come again?”, it may be time to...

  El idioma castellano, comparado con el inglés, está más unificado en ambos lados del "charco" ( pond ). El inglés norteamericano y el inglés británico, no sólo difieren en ortografía y pronunciación, sino también en gramática. Un buen ejemplo son las palabras colectivas como family , police , team , group , que para la variante americana son singulares pero que para los hablantes británicos son plurales. Lo importante es ser coherente al hablar o escribir y no mezclar gramáticas.  Inglés americano:  "The police is coming." "Our team has won the game." "Our family is getting together for Christmas." "The group has already come."  Esto no implica que dos hablantes cultos americano-británicos no se entiendan. 

SOUL FOOD.  La comida tradicional de los negros de Norteamérica, basada en la del sur del país. La palabra soul, asociada con la población afroamericana , se originó en los años 60 del siglo pasado. Así tenemos soul music , la música tradicional de esa cultura y raza. Un soul brother es, para un negro, otro negro, como soul man o soul woman . Un old soul es un negro anciano y sabio. Y todos hemos visto en películas cómo aplauden o baten palmas en los cánticos religiosos, lo que se denomina soul clap . ¡Y todos creen que soul es simplemente alma!

 Our vocabulary must be increased constantly if we wish to express ourselves better and more accurately. Since my father gave me the daily task of looking up words in dictionaries when I was about ten, I have been adding new ones to my vocabulary to this day. Not a day goes by that I do not strive to enlarge my stock of words in both English and Spanish. Most additions enter my active vocabulary and become part of my daily discourse. Others fade away and remain only passive elements of my language. That is why I urge you, and myself, to refresh our vocabulary through active reading.  For example, prig is a word I learnt while reading the autobiography of Bertrand Russell. According to him, many of his friends and acquaintances were prigs. Obviously, he did not consider himself one. Yesterday the word popped up again from the page of a book. And the word coy stayed with me while reading Andrew Marvell’s poem To His Coy Mistress . These Anglo-Saxon words, short and to the poin...