Grammar Girl: For Writers and Language Lovers.
QuickAndDirtyTips.com
Five-time winner of Best Education Podcast in the Podcast Awards. Grammar Girl provides short, friendly tips to improve your writing and feed your love of the English language. Whether English is your first language or your second language, these grammar, punctuation, style, and business tips will make you a better and more successful writer. Grammar Girl is a Quick and Dirty Tips podcast. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Episodes
Mentioned books
8 snips
May 12, 2026 • 15min
How the Crusades gave us 'lingua franca.' 'That' or 'who' for animals? Doot doot doot
A lively dive into the history of lingua francas, from the Crusades' mixed Mediterranean speech to modern global English. Short explanations of pidgins, creoles, and constructed languages appear. Clear, bite-size guidance on using that, who, and whose with people, animals, and things. A quirky family term about small dogs ties into AI image mix-ups.
11 snips
May 7, 2026 • 24min
Meeting the new editor, with AP Stylebook's Anna Jo Bratton
Anna Jo Bratton, editor of the AP Stylebook and longtime AP reporter, discusses running the committee that sets journalism style. She explains how rules are pressure-tested and why decisions are not a pure democracy. Major 2026 updates include a new AI chapter and the switch to "healthcare" as one word.
May 5, 2026 • 17min
Decoding the colon: AP vs. MLA style. Plus, words with no known origin.
Clear comparisons of AP, Chicago, and MLA rules for capitalizing after a colon. A look at how different styles handle colons introducing lists and dialogue. A playful tour of common words with mysterious, shadowy origins like dog, quiz, nerd, and Yankee. Short segments on language oddities and a quirky familect superstition.
22 snips
Apr 30, 2026 • 27min
The hidden superpower of verbs, with Sarah L. Kaufman
Sarah L. Kaufman, a Pulitzer Prize–winning dance critic turned author and writing teacher, shares why verbs are a hidden superpower. She explores English’s knack for manner verbs. Short, vivid verbs can shape memory, speed emergency action, and bring interior life to writing. The conversation also touches on child language patterns and when adverbs still matter.
Apr 28, 2026 • 16min
Why English creates so many words spelled the same. Why we say 'ye olde' instead of 'the old.'
They explore vanished Old English letters like thorn, eth, and yogh and how their loss shaped modern spellings. They explain why words with different origins now share identical spellings. They trace stress and suffix changes that create noun/verb pairs and accidental homographs. They reveal quirky historical spellings that survive in names and signage.
20 snips
Apr 23, 2026 • 33min
'Why We Talk Funny.' The reasons behind our accents, with Valerie Fridland
Valerie Fridland, a linguist and professor who studies the history and social power of speech, discusses how American accents formed from colonial settlement patterns. She explores the decline of regional accents, how sounds like L and R work, and the role of accent bias in hiring and identity. The conversation also covers substrate influences and why some accents persist while others fade.
Apr 21, 2026 • 18min
Should you start a sentence with 'hopefully'? Why we might not recognize alien language.
They dig into the long debate over starting a sentence with "hopefully," tracing its history, style-guide battles, and when people still judge it. They also explore xenolinguistics, what human languages share, alternative communication channels like chemicals and light, and why truly alien languages might be unrecognizable or, sometimes, surprisingly similar.
18 snips
Apr 16, 2026 • 31min
Inside the life of a curator (and the myth of white gloves), with John Overholt.
John Overholt, curator at Harvard’s Houghton Library who cares for pre-1800 and Samuel Johnson collections. He reveals why 18th-century paper is tougher than you’d think. He recounts escorting George Washington’s annotated book under heavy security. He debunks the white-gloves myth and explains real reading-room practices.
Apr 14, 2026 • 15min
Why 'stressed' spelled backwards reveals a delicious truth. 'Me' versus 'myself'
Playful word oddities take center stage, from words that spell other words backward to terms that describe themselves. Puzzling self-reference and language paradoxes get a lively unpacking. Clear, practical rules for using me versus myself arrive with notes on reflexive forms and charming dialectal variants.
Apr 9, 2026 • 12min
Losing clients to AI, and how to gain them back, with Suzanne Bowness
Suzanne Bowness, freelance writer, educator, and author of The Feisty Freelancer, teaches freelancers how to adapt to change. She talks about experimenting with AI tools during slow periods. She covers client reactions to AI, practical contract clauses and safety with proprietary content. She shares both wins and mishaps using AI for editing, admin tasks, and business planning.
