Have you ever encountered a bloat of hippos or a charm of finches? This entertaining website, created by researcher and educator Melissa Kaplan, provides various descriptive terms for an extensive list of animals. Part 1 of the site contains plurals, collective nouns, and words for sounds, gender, and offspring. For example, a female kangaroo is a flyer, and a young swan is cygnet. Part 2 offers...

Literature enthusiasts will appreciate this lighthearted podcast discussing the etymology of words, appropriately named Lexitecture. Hosts Ryan (a Canadian former journalist) and Amy (a Scottish former English teacher) each choose a word to bring to the table every episode, and together they trace the roots of the word back to its origin. The words featured on the podcast are often uncommon (e.g....

In the tradition of that great lover of words, Samuel Johnson, Douglas Harper (an amateur etymologist) has compiled one of the first free online etymology dictionaries. The etymologies are compiled in alphabetical order and parsed into smaller sections for easy viewing. As Mr. Harper notes in the introduction to the dictionary, "Think of it like looking at pictures of your friends' parents when...

The Allusionist is a delightful podcast dedicated to "small adventures in language." Hosted by British broadcaster and podcaster Helen Zaltzman, the Allusionist covers a single issue related to the English language in each twenty minute podcast. Zaltzman is especially interested in issues of how language and society inform one another. One recent episode features an interview with Isaac Siemens on...

Edited by Ian Lancashire of the Department of English at the University of Toronto this online database offers access to 127,000 word-entries from eleven dictionaries from 1530 to 1657. Several search options are available and users may select individual dictionaries or all of them. Additional resources at the site include a helpful overview of EMEDD, a short piece on Renaissance word-meaning, a...

The Straight Dope: What Does "OK" stand for? http://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/503/what-does-ok-stand-for Linguistically, America is A-OK http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/10/29/AR2010102907644.html The 'O' Word http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/21/books/review/Blount-t.html?src=me American Languages: Our Nation's Many...

Created by Michael Quinion, a freelance wordsmith and researcher into new words for Oxford Dictionaries, this site focuses on the history of the English language and the development of new words. Each week, users will find definitions and histories of words and phrases both old and new. This week's offerings include "upskilling," "abracadabra," "wormwood," and "wassail." In addition, the site...