Language Expert Answers English Questions

University of Cambridge Research Fellow Dr. Stephen Turton joins WIRED to answer the internet's burning questions about the logic (and many quirks) of the English language. Why are so many English words not pronounced the way they're spelled? Why is the plural of 'child' not 'childs' but 'children?' 'Foot' becomes 'feet' but 'boot' does't pluralize to 'beet?' How do we know what Old English sounded like? Why is the letter R pronounced so different across languages? What does a pineapple have to do with either pines OR apples? Answers to these questions and many more await on Etymology Support.

Director: Lauren Zeitoun
Director of Photography: Davide Bianco
Editor: Alex Mechanik
Expert: Stephen Turton
Line Producer: Jamie Rasmussen
Associate Producer: Paul Gulyas
Production Manager: Peter Brunette
Production Coordinator: Rhyan Lark
Supervising Casting Producer: Thomas Giglio
Camera Operator: Ashley Raim
Gaffer: Jake Newell
Sound Mixer: Mark Hennessey
Production Assistant: Grace OConnor
Post Production Supervisor: Christian Olguin
Supervising Editor: Eduardo Araujo
Additional Editor: Sam DiVito
Assistant Editor: Justin Symonds