Ep. 431: The magic mystery, and power of words

Guest: Jonathan Berkowitz, author

Words are magical things.

Words, when spoken out loud in performance, can be and often are like music. When rhythm, timber, pitch and pace are spoken aloud, they are like notes of music. Words – whether spoken, read or thought – ignite a complex series of neural circuits that bring meaning to words.

Words can be and are fun unto themselves. Pulling together a combination of words – like “cantankerous old curmudgeon” – oddly and in a contradictory way, is fun to do. Just ask Jonathan Berkowitz, the author of “The Whirl of Words and Tales from the Word Guy,” who says, “Oh yes, they are!” His love of words, he says, “comes from a home where “life was salted with stories and peppered with puns, each delivered with relish.”

He goes on to say, “Words are a part of every language.” For the purposes of this piece, the focus is on English, a global and welcoming language. Berkowitz, in a chapter of his book, called “The Birds and The Bees: Where do words come from?”, said the answer is, “English words come from everywhere, they are created, emerge, are adopted and liberated.”

We invited Jonathan Berkowitz to join us for a Conversation That Matters about the magic, the mystery, and power of words.