'False friends' are words in one language that look like words in another language, but which have very different meanings. There are a number of false friends in German, where the words look ...

Meghan Walbert is Lifehacker's Managing Editor. She has a degree in journalism and has worked at Lifehacker as a writer and editor since 2018, covering parenting, foster care, online child safety, and ...

Compound words are made up of two parts of speech. For example, the compound noun handkerchief is made up of two nouns: hand + kerchief. Semantically, compound words are very interesting, since their ...

Do hyphens really matter? Can the omission of a hyphen in compound words that should be hyphenated change the intended meaning? What are the functions of a hyphen? What are the rules for hyphenating ...

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In an essay describing the loathing that Ted Cruz’s face seems to inspire, the neurologist Richard Cytowic resorts to the German colloquial expression Backpfeifengesicht. It’s a combination of two ...

Health care, healthcare or health-care? Make up, makeup or make-up? Water ski, water-ski or waterski? Cell phone, cellphone or cell-phone? A lot of questions posed in this column elicit the answer: ...

Mark Twain said they were not words, but "alphabetic processions … marching majestically across the page": the compound words the German language uses to capture precise or complex meanings, which are ...

English in a Minute: 3 ways to use 'appropriate' Homophones English in a Minute: 3 ways to use 'consider' Weather words English in a Minute: 4 things about the word 'paint' Male and female job words ...