My love affair with words began in Mrs Batham’s English class when I was 14 and, apart from a brief dalliance with French, German and even Russian words and language, English has always remained my firm favourite.
More years than I care to admit to have passed since those halcyon schooldays, but my love affair with words lives on and perhaps it’s no accident that I now make my living writing copy and press releases for small and rural businesses in East Yorkshire.
When a client dubbed me ‘The Magic Words Lady’, it inspired me to set up an eponymous blog in celebration of words, so here I am. I intend to use the blog to share words of all sorts – good, bad, inspirational, indifferent…and in particular, new ones that set me rushing to the bookcase for the Funk and Wagnalls..
Today’s word is a new one that I came across in Seth Godin’s blog post Hammer Time and it’s MAVENS. The context is “Inveterate community-focused social media mavens often bring that particular hammer to other venues.” (although I urge you to read the whole post – he really is very good) and the dictionary definition (according to my prized 1946 Funk and Wagnalls New ‘Standard’ Dictionary) is….drum roll….not listed – no such word exists! Ok, over to a 1995 Concise Oxford Dictionary and there it is….a colloquial word of North American Yiddish descent meaning ‘expert or connoisseur’. So now I know.
