back-formation: lumbar exercises

circumfix: unhealthy fascination with circuses; a cross inside a circle

copula: when two people love each other very much...

dative: adjective describing two people in a relationship

diphthong: not quite skinny dipping, but a thong doesn’t cover that much...

dissimilation: not being truthful

elative case: a joyful attache

high vowel: a vowel used in Bavaria; a vowel with an ancestry

isogloss: shiny cake frosting

linguist: someone who speaks a lot of languages

low vowel: any Dutch vowel; a vowel of dubious background

metathesis: not properly a thesis, but an unprepared grad student will try to convince you it is

minimal pair: me and my shadow

morphology: remedy for insufficient phology

OT: overtime

parataxis: two taxis

parole: when you get out of prison early

progressive assimilation: trying to be like Michael Moore

relativizer: a wedding

rhoticity: the art of roasting chickens

rime: a pretentious poem

rounding: over-indulgence in cashews

tag question: “Who’s ‘It’?”

transcription: US Army’s new policy that allows them to draft citizens of other countries into service

voicing: what you do when you slam the door on your foot