Category Archives: Etymology

May 30, 2026 · 10:00 AM

Etymology Undusted: German Borrowings

As English and German are offshoots of the same branch of the language tree, we share many words in common, but because I speak both English and German (High German, as well as the Zürich dialect of Swiss German), it’s difficult for me to know how many German borrowings are widely used in the English-speaking regions of the world. There are more such borrowings, for instance, in American English (because of the German-speaking immigrants that brought their mother-tongue along with them) than in British English, which was more heavily influenced by French (up until the French Revolution, when Francomania fell out of fashion in Britain for fear that the spark of revolution would ignite revolt in their own peasant classes. But that’s another story!).

Perhaps another complication for me personally in deciphering what German words are used elsewhere is that I grew up in a region with Amish communities who spoke a language similar to German (known as Pennsylvania Dutch or Pennsylvania German – a dialect of German imported around 300 years ago) – so we used words like Gesundheit (when someone sneezed) rather than the more common “bless you”.

With all of that in mind, here are a few words that English has nicked directly from German:

Gesundheit, kindergarten, angst, dachshund, hamster, pretzel, sauerkraut, delicatessen, hamburger, gummy bear, zeitgeist, kitsch, fife, uber (über), neanderthal, doppelgänger, ersatz, zeppelin, rucksack, knapsack, kaput, quartz, schadenfreude, bagel, blitz, fest, glitch, muesli, noodle, schnapps, strudel, poltergeist, waltz, carabiner, cobalt, echt, edelweiss, eiderdown, einkorn, gestalt, verboten, wanderlust, wunderkind, finger, glass, übermensch, leitmotif, bratwurst, kaffeeklatsch, diesel, and the list goes on and on!

Some words in English have been borrowed, especially in America, from what is known as Yinglish – New York Yiddish mixed with English (mainly from the Ashkenazi Jewish community). A few examples are: Mensch, klutz, schmuck, dreck, spiel, schmooze, shlep, kosher, mazel tov, putz, tush/tuchus and yenta.

Are any of these words new to you? Which ones do you use? Which ones are used in your region?

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May 16, 2026 · 10:00 AM

Etymology Undusted: Latin Borrowings

Believe it or not, the language second only to French in English borrowings is Latin. In all, it is estimated that up to 56% of English borrowings come from French and Latin (and since many French words come from Latin, it could be argued that Latin has had the greatest impact on the English language).

The Germanic tribes that fought the Roman Empire eventually moved west into what we know today as the British Isles; before they came, they’d already packed their linguistic bags with Latin terms, such as candle (candelabrum), cheese (caseum), camp (castra – from which we also derive castle), mile (mille passus, from which we also get [geographical] pass), mint (menta – for coins), pound (libra – for a weight unit, and from which the British pound sign £ is derived), and street (via strata), to name a few (many more were added during the period of Roman Britain, 55 BC – AD 410). The language of these ancient settlers was the ancestor of what would become English, but these tribes wrote in runes, and the language they spoke would be unintelligible to us today, as it had complex genders/noun cases and distinct vowel shifts.

Ancient Latin often borrowed words from Greek and then passed them on through the Romance languages to English, often through French. Some examples from Greek via Latin are school, anatomy, philosophy, music, machine, olive, bacteria, lamp, topic, idea, and place.

When Christian missionaries arrived in Britain in the 6th and 7th centuries, they brought Latin terms with them to describe new concepts. At that time, Latin was the Lingua Franca of medieval Europe. Sometimes, both the Old English and the Latin terms survived, such as OE Gospel (gödspell) and Latin evangelium (which comes from the Greek for “good news”; this is still the word used in German today). During that period, Latin terms tended to be used only in a religious context, with Old English being used in everyday life.

Latin moved beyond cathedral walls via science and technology; the era of scientific discovery required new words to describe new areas of knowledge and understanding. Words like carnivorous, apparatus, data, experiment, incubate, organic, structure, vertebra, and component entered the vocabulary during that time.

Other words borrowed from Latin include:

Absent, alter, amble, acceptable, agriculture, amiable, animal, appear, announce, aviary, barbarian, beatitude, benefit, campus, candidate, circumspect, civic, conspicuous, council, custody, deity, dictionary, digital, dragon, edible, extra, figure, focus, genus, habitat, imperial, invent, labour, legacy, library, marine, mediocre, medium, perfect, port, respect, ridicule, scholar, science, serpent, serve, superb, and so many more… ad infinitum!

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April 29, 2026 · 11:40 AM

Etymology Undusted: French Borrowings

Languages are constantly moving, changing their minds on the meanings of words, and taking on new words to fit their needs in a fast-paced world. Today, when we say nice, we mean agreeable, pleasant, or kind; but when it first entered English in the late 13th century, it meant foolish, frivolous, ignorant or senseless. By Jane Austen’s time, the word was disdained as overused, diffused to the point of meaning nothing… a nice day, a nice walk, a nice person. And depending on the tone, it can be sarcastic. A versatile, everyday word that we stole – uh, borrowed – from Old French.

English has borrowed quite a bit from French; in fact, some linguists estimate that up to 45% of English words can trace their origins back to French. Most of the influx into English came after William the Conqueror’s 1066 victory, when the French-speaking ruling class (of what we know today as England) moved in. To communicate with their new tyrants – uh, rulers – the conquered Anglo-Saxons needed to do some rapid assimilation, and ended up expanding their vocabulary by leaps and bounds. In the end, it’s up for debate as to who actually conquered whom, as English is spoken the world over by more than a billion people as a first or second language.

We can be gracious winners, and give the French tongue credit where crédit is due (it’s French, after all). Aside from words stol— borrowed centuries ago and adapted to fit our tongue, we have also assimilated purely French words or phrases that we use regularly:

Rendezvous, RSVP (répondez s’il vous plaît), arrangez-vous, mis en place, café, résumé, faux pas, déjà vu, à la carte, cliché, cuisine, sauté, avant-garde, chic, je ne sais quoi, cul-de-sac, en route, savoir-faire, carte blanche, boutique, lingerie, silhouette, matinée, décor, fiancé, and augment. To scrape the tip of the iceberg.

With up to 40-45% of English being French in origin, chances are that many more of the words I’ve just used to communicate this piece were originally French. Can you spot them? Please comment below!

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April 1, 2026 · 10:00 AM

Etymology Undusted: Things

Probably as long as people have been communicating, mouths have moved faster than brains. When that happens, we’ve come up with some entertaining ways of naming something or someone we can’t immediately recall the precise word or name for. Sometimes a placeholder name or phrase might be inserted until the proper word or name comes to mind or is discovered, such as John Doe or Jane Doe, or Lorem ipsum; sometimes that placeholder name is all that’s needed to give enough context. However, unspecified objects or persons can lead to confusion or can invite the listener/reader to fill in the blank with their own (mis)interpretations or (wrong) conclusions. Official use of such placeholder names can be a dangerous doohinkus, as you can imagine: Naming all as-of-yet unnamed newborns Babygirl or Babyboy could lead to mix-ups, or wrong medications. In 2009, the US Army unfortunately sent out 7,000 letters to families of fallen soldiers in Iraq, addressing them as “John Doe” – you can imagine the backlash and PR nightmare, not to mention the emotional trauma that blunder caused.  So don’t use these words in official correspondence or medical practice, but otherwise, have fun with them!

Doohinkus

Doohickus

Doohickey

Doodinkus

Thingumabob

Wotsit

Whatzit

Thingie

Thingamy

Thingamajig/Thingamajiggy

Dingsboms

Doodad

Doojigger

Gizmo

Frobnitz

Dinglehopper

Flapdoodle

Dingus

Doofer

Whatchamacallit/Whatchamahoozie

Dealy

Whoozit/whosit

Whosiewhatsit

Whatsername/Whatzisname

Rigamajig

Kajigger

Bizzo

Can you think of any others? Please share them in the comments below!

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December 17, 2025 · 10:00 AM

History Undusted: The CB Radio

You know how your brain fires off random thoughts as you fall to sleep, or combines odds-bods into dreams forgotten as soon as you wake up? For some reason, 10-4 popped into my head in those moments last night. It sent me down the rabbit hole I now present: The history of the CB radio.

The often-forgotten or overlooked inventor of the Citizen’s Band (CB) radio system, along with inventions such as a patented version of the walkie-talkie (originally invented by the Englishman Donald Hings), the telephone pager, and the cordless telephone – all precursors to today’s cell phones, was Al Gross (1918-2000): Born in Toronto, Canada, he grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. The son of Romanian-Jewish immigrants, his love for electronics was sparked when, at the age of nine, he was travelling by steamboat on Lake Erie; he explored the ship and ended up in the radio transmissions room, where the operator let him listen in. Eventually, he turned the family’s basement into a radio station built from scraps. During his higher studies, he experimented with ways to use radio frequencies.

During World War 2, he had some involvement with developing a two-way VHF air-to-ground communications system for the U.S. Office of Strategic Services, known as the Joan-Eleanor system, and after the war, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) allocated a few frequencies for the Citizens’ Radio Service Frequency Band, in 1946. Gross saw the potential and founded the Gross Electronics Co. to produce two-way communications systems to make use of these frequencies; his firm was the first to receive FCC approval in 1948. For more about his other inventions, just follow the link on his name above. For now, let’s focus on the CB:

The CB radio became an international hit back before cell phones and computers became a thing (despite the prevalence of cell phones, CBs are still around; truckers still communicate about road conditions, etc. Its usage was also revived by the Covid lockdown, when people began reaching out to meet and talk to others outside of their own four walls). It was, and is, a way to communicate with others long-distance from home or on the go.

My dad was always interested in the latest technological gadgets; in the mid-70s, we got a laserdisc player, the precursor of CDs, and DVD/Blu-Ray players. I remember watching films like Logan’s Run and Heaven Can Wait on that format. Laserdiscs never really took off, and only about 2% of US households had one (it became more popular in Japan at the time). Around that time, we also got a CB radio in our VW van. My dad had a chart with all of the CB slang words and codes, and I memorised it, fascinated by the lingo. On long road trips, I would get on the CB and chat with truck drivers. My handle (nickname) was Spider-Fingers, as I liked spiders and had long fingers (long fingers has the connotation of thief, so I didn’t want to use that!). Here is just the tip of the iceberg, a smattering of the codes and slangs used by CB radio enthusiasts, truckers and handymen:

There were dozens of slang terms for law enforcement officers: Bear (police officer); bear trap (speed trap, radar trap) taking pictures, also called a Kojak With A Kodak; bear bait (an erratic or speeding driver); bear with ears (listening to CB traffic); bear in the air/flying doughnut/Spy in the sky (helicopter radar traps), baby bear (rookie), fox in the henhouse/Smokey in a plain wrapper (policemen in unmarked vehicles); honey bear, mamma bear or Miss Piggy (slangs for female police officers); Brush Your Teeth And Comb Your Hair (a law enforcement vehicle is radaring vehicles – as if preparing for an official photo). A Driving Award was a speeding ticket. To wish someone Shiny side up meant that you wished them safe travels (keeping the vehicle upright).

There were slang terms for objects or events, such as Bambi, meaning that there was wildlife near the road and to take precautions; a crotch rocket was a fast motorcycle; double-nickels was a 55-mph speed limit area; a fighter pilot was an erratic driver who switched lanes frequently, while a gear jammer was someone who sped up and slowed down frequently; Alabama chrome was duct tape; an alligator/gator was a piece of blown tire on the highway, as it looked in the distance like a gator sunbathing. Convoys had front doors and back doors – the front or back truck in the group that would keep an eye open for bear traps. Motion lotion was fuel; the hammer lane was the fast lane (hammer was the gas pedal, and to hammer down was to drive full-speed). Break/breaker: Informing other CB users that one wanted to start transmission on a channel; a handle might be introduced, or requested if someone was looking for a CB friend. “Breaker, this is Spider-Fingers, over.” Asking for a comeback meant that you couldn’t hear the last transmission or wanted the other driver to talk. Break check meant traffic congestion ahead, slow down. A Bumper Sticker/hitchhiker is a vehicle that is tailgating another vehicle.

Aside from hundreds of slang terms, there was a whole list of codes (I guess you could say that the codes were the precursors of emojis!):

10-4: Agreed, understood, acknowledged

4-10: The opposite – asking for agreement or if a transmission was received.

10-6: Busy, stand by

10-7: Signing off

10-10: Transmission completed, standing by (you’ll be listening)

10-20: Location – What’s your (10-)20? Home-20 was asking for a driver’s home location/base.

10-33: Emergency traffic, clear the channel. CB code for Mayday for trucks and police cars.

10-42: Accident on the road

3s and 8s: Well wishes to a fellow driver. Borrowed from amateur ham radio codes “73” (best regards) and “88” (hugs and kisses).

The lists go on and on! I love the dry sense of humour reflected in the slang, and I think our everyday language could be a bit livelier if we included a few phrases that looked at things from a different perspective. Everyone could do with more 3s and 8s, 4-10?

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October 22, 2025 · 10:38 AM

History Undusted: MacGyver and Blue Peter

This week’s topic arose from a conversation with my husband; we were discussing a temporary fix we had made at his mother’s home to make something usable until we could find a permanent solution. I said that we had “MacGyvered” it, and he had never heard the word before. That led me down a rabbit hole to naval flags, a card game, and British tele.

First, MacGyver: Though I knew the term, I had no idea what its origin was. The name comes from the eponymous character in a US television series that ran from 1985 to 1992; Angus MacGyver was a non-violent, resourceful genius, and his favourite tool was, of course, a Swiss Army knife. Though I was living in the States at that time, its running years explain why I didn’t know of the origin: In 1985, I was in college, having finished high school a year early (I took my final two years in one); I was too busy to watch television. In 1986, I moved to Hawaii to do a Discipleship Training School (DTS) with Youth With A Mission (YWAM), and went from there to the Philippines, where we worked in the red-light district of Olongapo. 1987 was a year of multiple jobs, earning money and hanging out with college friends – again, TV was not a priority. In 1988, I emigrated to Scotland.

The traits mentioned above made MacGyver a verb; when something is “MacGyvered“, a simple yet elegant solution to a problem is employed by using existing resources. At my mother-in-law’s home, we needed to level a new microwave that was sitting tilted atop the welded inserts that fit the original one. Our solution was to use an actual leveller, removing the end caps to make it fit inside the metal frame.

Now, down the rabbit hole: In the time of British ships of sail, when a blue flag with a white square or rectangle in the centre flew alone, it served as the sign for imminent departure (signifying P, leaving port); any passengers and crew in port would then return to the ship. The flag came into use in 1777, and by the turn of the century had become known as the blue peter. I have my suspicions that the term may have come from the card game of whist, in which a strategic manoeuvre known as the “blue peter” calls for trumps by throwing away a higher card of a suit while holding a lower one. No one can say for sure which came first, the ship or the card, so to speak, but the connection is likely.

The British children’s television programme, Blue Peter, first aired on 16 October 1958; the name was inspired when Owen Reed, the producer, was inspired by a radio programme for children (produced by Trevor Hill) that began airing on television once a month; it was launched aboard the MV Royal Iris ferry on the River Mersey, Liverpool, with presenter Judith Chalmers standing at the bottom of the gangplank to welcome everyone aboard. Reed was so captivated by the idea, and with the blue peter flag, that he asked to rename the programme (then called the Children’s Television Club) and take it to London.

Blue Peter, catering to younger children, is the longest-running children’s TV programme in the world; over the years it has changed with the times, and its content is wide-ranging, but they still give a nod and a wink to that original blue peter flag by giving out badges in the shape of a shield with a blue ship of sail on a wave. It is awarded to viewers for achievements, efforts, or creative work. There are different levels of badges, with the gold badge being the most prestigious; this is usually given to presenters upon their retirement or to people who have accomplished something extraordinary.

Among other things, the show is famous for its segments of “makes” – demonstrations of how to make useful objects, or how to make something to eat. This is the element that linked the term Blue Peter to MacGyver in my mind, so now ya know!

What is something that you have MacGyvered? And do any of my British followers know if “Blue Peter” is used as a verb in a similar fashion? Please comment below!

Blue Peter Badge

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October 9, 2025 · 12:35 AM

Etymology Undusted: Zarf

To me, the word Zarf sounds like a sci-fi comedy name for an inept villain. But, in fact, it’s a word that entered English in 1836, and is the Arabic word for “vessel”. It describes an object that you’ve seen or have likely had in your hand at some point. I will freely admit that the zarfs we know today have fallen a long way from their original forms: A zarf is the holder of a coffee cup. That sounds fairly straightforward. You may have instantly pictured a highly decorative, precious metal jewelled… no? Are those crickets I hear chirping in the vast silence of confusion? Or maybe you pictured the cardboard contraption around a hot cup of Starbucks coffee. Fallen a long way, indeed. (Camps are divided on whether the latter constitutes a zarf… for good reason: I think they would be better referred to as sleeves, as to put them on par with the bejewelled masterpieces would be an insult to the artisans of bygone days.)

Zarfs arose out of the necessity of protecting one’s hands from a hot cup; before the monster of plastic reared its ugly head, cups were made from metal or glass, often without handles. Further back, they might have been made from plant products such as coconut shells. The oldest known cups were found in Gough’s Cave in Cheddar Gorge, Somerset, England, and dated to 14,700 years ago; they were made of cannibalised human skulls.

During the 16th century, coffee gained popularity throughout the Ottoman Empire. It led to the popularity of coffee paraphernalia and coffee houses, which eventually spread worldwide and remain popular to this day. In Britain, for instance, a coffee-house culture arose in the 17th century; by the end of the century, there were over 3,000. Such venues became known as penny universities, because, for the price of a cup of coffee, men could join in the hubs of intellectual exchange and debate. Artists, journalists, poets and writers gathered to discuss God and the world; the Inklings, a literary group including C.S. Lewis and JRR Tolkien, met regularly at the Eagle and Child in St Giles’, Oxford.

By the 19th century, the goldsmiths of Switzerland had become leaders in the production and export of ornate zarfs, made of precious metals and inlaid with precious stones or small hand-painted medallions. They were often made in fine filigree, with a smaller cup, known as a fincan, made of ceramic or glass, slipped inside to hold the coffee. A modern version of this is still widely used, called a demitasse (French for half cup), in which espresso is often served.

Without further ado, here are a few examples of zarfs and fincans, along with demitasses:

Source: Sothebys.com
A Swiss musical box zarf, ca. 1840 – Metropolitan Museum of Art
Fincans within zarfs
Demitasse set. Source, Wikipedia
Starbucks “zarf”, or sleeve

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September 24, 2025 · 11:25 AM

Obscurities: Mondegreen

The word Mondegreen is an example of what it means: Misheard lyrics in songs. The word was coined by the journalist Sylvia Wright in 1954, when she misheard the lyrics in a Scottish ballad; instead of hearing They have slain the Earl o’ Moray, / And laid him on the green, she heard Lady Mondegreen.

Examples of this happen frequently; when I was a child, I misheard the lyrics from Dashing through the snow in a one-horse open sleigh as a one-hose hope and slay – I had no idea what that was supposed to mean, but I sang it with gusto! A famous mondegreen is Bob Dylan’s The answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind misheard as The ants are my friends. All the whiskey in the sea can be heard in Club Tropica, by Wham!; the actual line is All that’s missing is the sea. From Toto’s song Africa, instead of the line bless the rains down in Africa, some people hear left my brains down in Africa. In Abba’s Dancing Queen, they sing feel the beat from the tambourine, but I hear tangerine. There are likely as many mondegreens as there are songs, as garbled communication, Chinese whispers, accents and the mix of words and music can all lead to different conclusions than those intended by the singers or songwriters.

Have you ever misheard lyrics? Share your mondegreens below!

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September 10, 2025 · 10:00 AM

Obsoletusvocabularium…  Up with Archaism!

English is relatively young, as languages go. Like a sponge, it absorbs words and meanings from other languages, then squeezes them out in a similar (or widely different) form.  In other words, English is a survivor; it has survived the attempts to destroy it by the Danish Vikings, the French (Normans, aka Vikings disguised as French), and the Germans. These historical encounters give me high hopes that it will survive the age of the Cell Phone.  With each skirmish, it has come out stronger, more versatile and more flexible.  When the Pilgrims packed up English and crated it off to the New World, it was locked, as it were, in a time capsule. British English absorbed a few bad habits from the French before they thought better of it and distanced themselves during the French Revolution, but in the meantime, contentious pronunciation differences to that time-capsule relative over the Pond had crept in and persist to this day. One example: The American pronunciation of schedule (/skedju(e)l/) is from the original Greek pronunciation, which was used in Britain for onk-years until they took on the fancier French-ified pronunciation of /shedju(e)l/.  For a fascinating glimpse into how Modern English was formed, William Caxton (~1422-~1491) is your man.

While English pilled through the pockets of invaders stealing loose grammar, we also lost a few words along the way:  Some words are known to us in one form but not the other, while other words have been lost altogether due to a more convenient absorption or form arising.  You know of disgruntled (adj.), but what about gruntle (v.) or disgruntle (v.)?  And dis– in this particular case is not used to form the antonym of gruntle, but means exceedingly gruntled.  And I don’t know about you, but conject as a verb makes more sense than “conjecture” to me.  And shall we vote to bring back “Oliphant,” as J.R.R. Tolkien saved it from extinction through his use of it in Lord of the Rings?  What about pash (n.), contex (v.), or spelunk (n.)?  We know of fiddle-faddle, but what about plain ol’ “faddle” (to trifle)?  Some, admittedly, are not missed; toforan is better served with heretofore, in my humble opinion (IMHO).  Needsways is a Scottish word, obsolete in England and America perhaps, but alive and well north of the Border.  There are some deliciously eccentric words which deserve resuscitation, such as loblolly, bric-a-brac, sulter, pill (v., to plunder, pillage – ought to come in handy, that), quib, bugbear, uptake (as a verb), wist (intent), or sluggy.  If Sir Walter Scott can save words such as doff and don from extinction, so can we.

Oh, and if you’re wondering about the word archaism, it means “retention of what is old and obsolete.”  So twinge your language to include these mobile words and their meanings, and revelate your intelligence! And if you’re curious, yes, Grammarly and spellcheck were going batship crazy with this post!😎

(Comic from xkcd used under a Creative Commons license)

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August 27, 2025 · 10:00 AM

History Undusted: Code Talkers

Navajo code talkers, Cpl. Henry Blake Jr. and PFC George H Kirk, who served with the Marine Signal Unit.
Source: Public Domain

Code talkers were Native Americans from various tribes who were employed by the US military during World War 2 as radio operators; their native tongues were indecipherable to anyone listening in, and as a result, their transmissions of sensitive messages were invaluable in allied victories on every Pacific island, including Iwo Jima, as well as in Europe in decisive battles.

Codes were developed based on the languages of the Assiniboin, Cherokee, Cheyenne, Choctaw, Comanche, Cree, Crow, Fox, Hopi, Kiowa, Menominee, Navajo, Ojibwa, Oneida, Osage, Pawnee, Sauk, Seminole, and Sioux peoples. These men could transmit over open radio channels, knowing that the enemy would be unable to break their code. If a military term did not exist in their languages, a phrase was used in its place: A submarine became an iron fish; a fighter plane became a hummingbird; a squad became a black street. In all, throughout WW2, over 400 terms were developed and needed to be memorised by each code talker.

The code talkers continued to be used after the end of the war, which delayed their recognition by the wider public – until documentaries about their service finally began to emerge in the 1990s. In 2002, the U.S. Congress passed the Code Talkers Recognition Act, followed by a similar act in 2008 to honour the tribes who used their languages in the wartime service of the United States.

The use of code talkers was a socially complex one: The languages that were so invaluable to the US military were the very tools that the US government had been trying to eradicate in the name of cultural assimilation. Between 1880 and 1905, boarding schools were established, in which Native American children were taken from their families and educated; they were taught to reject their Native values, languages, traditions and anything to do with their native culture. They were punished, sometimes severely, for using their native tongues; they were forced to dress like the “white man”, and were not allowed to wear their native garments or have any vestiges of their tribes. Some 100,000 Native Americans were forced to attend such schools. Parents who resisted the kidnapping of their children were imprisoned; several from the Hopi tribe were even imprisoned on Alcatraz Island. Though most of these schools had been closed by the 1930s, the cultural and psychological damage had taken its toll on many native people groups, many of whom still struggle with their cultural identities today. At the time these young warriors were called into military service or chose to join after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, many were not even legal American citizens, yet they fought for their land and their families.

With that background in mind, the dedication and ingenuity of the code talkers are all the more astounding. They were often in the first wave of soldiers deployed as they were needed to pass on messages for the strategic planning and execution of driving back the Japanese from the Pacific islands. In addition to the Pacific arena, the European front also benefited from the code talkers’ ability to communicate directly with each other: Comanche code talkers were assigned to the 4th Infantry Division when it landed at Normandy in June 1944. In this context, some of the Comanche substitutes were turtle for tank, a pregnant bird for bomber, and crazy white man was their term for Adolf Hitler – a more insightful term has never been more aptly applied.

For a fascinating look into a history largely forgotten, please click on the following video recounting code talkers telling their stories firsthand as they return to the Pacific Islands with their families and find peace after decades of PTSD. The video is 1:10, but well worth the time when you can take it: Navajo Code Talkers of World War II (2018) | Documentary

Other sources:

https://eji.org/news/history-racial-injustice-cultural-genocide/

https://www.britannica.com/topic/code-talker

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