Linguist Answers Word Origin Questions | Tech Support | WIRED

Linguist Gareth Roberts joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the etymologies of English words. How did the first languages first form? Was there once a single common language that all the others evolved from? When were swear words invented? Have words like "dude" and "bro" become gender neutral? Who came up with the word poop? Is "unalived" a real word now? Answers to all of these questions and plenty more await on Etymology Support.

0:00 Etymology Support
0:14 Etymologies rock
1:05 Gender neutral dude bros
2:50 Silent letters: Why?
3:47 “Unalived”
4:55 Grimm's Law
5:57 %^*&*%!!!
6:47 Making up new words
8:41 How did each language form?
12:05 What was there before we had language?
14:06 Orange
14:47 💩
15:09 Fall into Autumn
15:54 Did we ruin demure?
16:35 New Slang
18:00 NO
18:34 The Great Vowel Shift
19:51 Shakespeare!
20:34 Why did we stop saying 'thee' and ‘thou?’
21:57 …..word?
22:21 Pregnant: Origins
23:25 Doggos

Director: Anna O'Donohue
Director of Photography: Caleb Weiss
Editor: Richard Trammell
Expert: Gareth Roberts
Line Producer: Joseph Buscemi
Associate Producer: Brandon White
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Casting Producer: Nicholas Sawyer
Camera Operator: Christopher Eustache
Sound Mixer: Sean Paulsen
Production Assistant: Sonia Butt
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Post Production Coordinator: Ian Bryant
Supervising Editor: Doug Larsen
Additional Editor: Paul Tael; Jason Malizia
Assistant Editor: Andy Morell


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[lukegodsey]

Dr. Roberts is my Professor and he genuinely is the kindest and most intelligent dude ever. It's awesome to see him on Wired.

[utsavmaheshwari]

As a language/linguistics nerd, I find it to be the one of the few fields that everybody is lowkey interested in since everybody is a participant in language. I'm very happy to see non-language nerds here as well!

[lightandtheheat]

15:53 It's refreshing to see a scientist so passionate about his craft that he keeps on top of even the most recent of trends in his field, while also acknowledging those trends with a spark of humor. Very mindful.

[ytuioper]

As someone who randomly looks up etymologies of words all the time, I very much enjoyed this :D

[crispychrissy]

What a cunning linguist. He’s so intelligent and enthusiastic, please bring him back!

[nozrep]

this comments section is fire because it’s mostly people who are interested in this type of thing and would be likely to click on this sort of video and so they did and so we altogether each try and offer our own little clever linguistical quip or historical factoid. Love you guys love love love you!

[sydkvistarn]

In Swedish there’s a great example of using words to avoid invoking the horror of something and that is for the wolf.
In Swedish the word for wolf is “varg”, but in the older days you wouldn’t say varg precisely for the aforementioned reason. People would instead call the wolf Gråben (Grayleg), Den Grå (The Gray one) or Tasse (an old word for wasteland or wilderness).

[MC]

If Michael from Vsauce and Babish from Binging with Babish had a kid.

[SeanKL]

This is like a university-level crash course here for everyone to watch for free

[dragonfx]

Where are my language nerds at? I'm a technical/creative writer by trade and I never clicked on a video so fast.

[davidh]

Another banger of an episode. You guys seriously get some great folks for these.

[zhargidabeoulve]

Regarding gender neutral terms changing over the years: I've always been fascinated by the word, 'fellow'. In America at least, it refers to a group of men (hey fellas). But that always confused me, as it doesn't imply gender. You could call a group of women 'fellows', as in 'fellow people'. Maybe it has something to do with the notion that fellows in the context of a university always meant men, as men were the only ones there?

[PeterPaoliello]

People who can't distinguish between etymology and entomology bug me in ways I cannot put into words.

[stephanie]

As a language lover, this was a real treat! 😊
Would love to see one on proverbs and their origins…

[Tadas_rackauskas]

All the linguistics are going CRAZY rn, the minute we see people talking about linguistics, we are hooked in

[thawhiteazn]

“How very dare you”

I am 100% commandeering this phrase

[TasteOfButterflies]

4:10 my mother used to call her small dog "the brown creature", so the story about European peoples referring to bears as "brown ones" out of fear and awe is very funny.

[lauratictoc]

finally, Tech Support in my field. I love lingustics, philology, etymology... I'm just a language nerd.

[AndrewJohnson-oyoj]

I'm just as fascinated by how words DON'T change. Apl is the Babylonian word for apple and has changed little in pronounciation over thousands of years.

[RedCanidae]

When he explained the word "wer" i knew exactly it came from "vir", which is the most common word for "man" in classical Latin. Etymology is so freaking interesting, wanting or not, learning a new language should never be strained to learning the technicallities of the language itself, but its culture and history as well, not saying everybody should be forced to learn a languages history, it will by all means make you a better speaker and definetly motivate you more