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It's our annual end of year parade of all the extra good stuff this year's podguests talked about, including a mythical disappearing island, geese, human dictionaries, the dubious history of the Body Mass Index, Victorian death department stores, and much more.
In order of appearance, we hear from:
Translator and author Caetano Galindo describes how the countril Brazil got its name; he appeared on the Brief History of Brazilian Portuguese episode.
Lexicographer and Countdown's Dictionary Corner-er Susie Dent brings us some pleasing words; she provided more joyful etymologies on the Siblings of Chaos episode.
Academic and author of Women and Dictionary-Making Lindsay Rose Russell explains the terms ‘walking dictionary’ and ‘sleeping dictionary’; she discussed the undersung roles of women in dictionary-making in the Cairns episode.
Writer, documentary star and Maintenance Phase cohost Aubrey Gordon notes the origins and misuse of the BMI and body positivity movement; she talked about how people talk about fat in Fat part 1 and part 2.
Historian Dean Vuletic explains why we say "Nul points!" about Eurovision Song Contest losers; he dug into Eurovision’s linguistic complications and controversies in Eurovision part 1 and part 2.
Council funeral officer and author of the book Ashes To Admin Evie King on alternatives to cremation; in the Death episode she talked about her job arranging funerals for people who have nobody else to do it.
Griefcast's Cariad Lloyd describes Victorian Brits' strict rules for grief, and the misuse of the concept of five stages of grief; in the Death episode she considered how we could talk about death better.
Plus! Renaming updates, movie-named knitwear, and my portmanteaus and portmantNOs of the year.
Content notes: this episode contains discussions of death, grief, anti-fat bias, eugenics and racism; I've included warnings in the audio before each section where relevant, so you know which specific parts to skip if you need to.
EXTRA MATERIALS:
Hy-Brasil, the disappearing island.
Jay’s Mourning Warehouse, leaning into “the perceived necessity of expensive and elaborate clothes, jewellery and public performance. In showing their prevalence through time, Jays could adapt them to the contemporary masses.”
ctrl+F for the word ‘mourning’ - there’s a whole section about Jay’s, as well as a bunch of other grief shopping options of yore.
AMA BMI update and its impact.
“Richmond’s public school system has maintained a steady pace of renaming schools from Confederate leaders to historical figures from the city. With these latest changes, Richmond became the city with the most name changes. This decision has also made Virginia the state with the most name changes in the nation.”
Aubrey Gordon’s documentary Your Fat Friend has several screenings coming up in early 2024, as well as an online watchparty next week.
Support the show at theallusionist.org/donate and as well as keeping this independent podcast going, you also get behind-the-scenes glimpses about every episode, fortnightly livestreams with me and my dictionaries, and the Allusioverse Discord community - where I post all my latest, vilest portmantNOs. And we watch things together: on 27 December join us for a medley of festive specials, including Pottery Throwdown, Bake Off and Veronica Mars.
YOUR RANDOMLY SELECTED WORD FROM THE DICTIONARY:
pavage, noun, historical: a tax or toll to cover the paving of streets.
Origin Middle English: from Old French, from paver ‘to pave’.
CREDITS:
This episode was written, edited, produced etc etc etc by me, Helen Zaltzman.
The original Allusionist music is by Martin Austwick. Download his songs at palebirdmusic.com and listen to his podcasts Song By Song and Neutrino Watch.
Find the Allusionist at youtube.com/allusionistshow, twitter.com/allusionistshow, facebook.com/allusionistshow, @allusionistshow.bsky.social and instagram.com/allusionistshow
