Today's episode serves as an intro to a series on Arabic loanwords in English. As a Semitic language, Arabic is very foreign to English. We take a look at some of the basic linguistic and cultural features of Arabic that make it stand apart from the rest of the languages discussed on this podcast thus far.
At last, the finale in the Words for Granted series on days of the week! ‘Saturday’ comes from a root that literally means ‘day of Saturn.’ Unlike the rest of the English names for the days of the week, it’s a direct etymological descendent of the original Latin word for Saturday. And Sunday—you guessed it—literally means ‘day of the sun.’ We also compare and contrast these English names with their Romance language equivalents.