BY DR ALEX BARATTA As George Bernard Shaw famously said, “It is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making some other Englishman hate or despise him”. In 2026, this quote still has arguable validity, though it’s perhaps not about hatred per se. Rather, accent bias is more to do with believing that certain accents are a bad fit for specific professions and … Continue reading Accent – The Last Taboo in Britain
BY ALEXIA JAMES “Popinjay”—a word so charmingly obsolete. I propose that this gloriously colourful term merits a revival. In an age where “selfie” and “raw dogging” are seemingly integral to our vernacular, surely we can find room for a bit of old-school pizzazz? In 2018 Boris Johnson attempted a revival but the word has slipped back onto the linguistic scrapheap where it does not deserve … Continue reading Popinjay
BY ROGER WATSON My fourteen-year-old grandson is a prolific writer. He blogs regularly on his favourite football team and has graced the pages of this esteemed organ. Progressively, he needs less and less of my editorial input. But in his final blog of the football season he referred to his ‘most favourite’ moment and I smugly pulled him up on that, informing him that he … Continue reading Something What I Learned
