English Has a Bee in Its Bonnet Lexicon Valley from Booksmart Studios

Welcome to the new Lexicon Valley from Booksmart Studios! On today’s episode: What is a spelling bee, anyway? Why do spelling bees pair particularly well with the English language? And we’ll explore the tempting but complex prospect of spelling reform. Plus: A special subscriber-only bonus segment, to show you what you can get if you become a paying subscriber to Booksmart Studios.
* FULL TRANSCRIPT *
JOHN McWHORTER: From Booksmart Studios, this is Lexicon Valley, I'm John McWhorter.
Earlier this month, a 14-year-old, Zaila Avant-garde from Louisiana, became champion of the 93rd annual, mostly annual, spelling bee — it went on hiatus for three years during World War Two and then again last year because of you know what — the mostly annual Scripps National Spelling Bee.
AVANT-GARDE: Wait, what is the language of origin?
MODERATOR: It's formed in Latin from a Swedish name.
AVANT-GARDE: Murraya. M-U-R-R-A-Y-A.
MODERATOR: That is correct.
Avant-garde beat out the second-place finisher, Chaitra Thummala. She got tripped up by this compound word: neroli oil.
THUMMALA: Neroli oil?
MODERATOR: Yes, it's a fragrant, pale yellow essential oil that darkens on standing, is obtained from the flowers, especially of the sour orange, and that is used chiefly in cologne and other perfumes and as a flavoring material.
THUMMALA: Neroli oil?
MODERATOR: Neroli oil.
THUMMALA: Are there any alternate pronunciations?
MODERATOR: I see just the one.
THUMMALA: Neroli oil. Um, language of origin?
MODERATOR: The first part of the entry contains, consists of a French element derived from an Italian geographical name. The second part went from Greek to Latin to French to English.
THUMMALA: Neroli oil. N-E-R-E-L-I O-I-L. Neroli oil.
MODERATOR: Neroli oil is spelled N-E-R-O-L-I O-I-L.
THUMMALA: Thank you.
This 12-year-old Chaitra was composed up there on stage. But when you flub a word, when you're that close, that's gotta sting. And I know it does because the only spelling bee I was ever in when I was six or seven years old was one where I was so confident and frankly, I was a good speller. They asked me how to spell cement and I just rattled off S-E-M-E-N-T. It was just a mistake. I knew it was C and that took care of me and I never got to go again and I had frankly never gotten over it. Come to think of it, have you ever seen an Italian spelling bee? Have you ever heard of Russians doing spelling bees? I doubt it because there's something peculiar about English that makes it particularly bee-worthy.
Today on Lexicon Valley, English Has a Bee in Its Bonnet.
WHY IS IT CALLED A SPELLING BEE?
The spelling bee, the National Spelling Bee, has been in the news in particular because Zaila Avant-garde, the winner, is a Black young woman. We have a historic win by someone who seems to be in a great many regards a superhuman. So to spell, where does that come from? Well, originally, what the word spell meant was to tell, the idea being that by doing this spelling, we're making the words tell us what they mean. And so to spell was to recount, to explain, to tell, at a time when the word tell did exist, but tell originally meant to count. And so that's why we say to tell the time, and that's why a bank teller is a teller. The idea is that this person is counting money.
And then there's also bee. We're used to hearing about spelling bees and you kind of let it go by. But think about what an odd word that is. It's a spelling bee and it doesn't seem to have anything to do with the insects bees. So why is it a bee? And the fact is, you might know that you can extend that usage. Spelling bee is the most common, especially with modern life. But you can have a quilting bee where a bunch of people got together and made a quilt or a logging bee where people would, well I guess the idea was to gather the logs there on the river or something like that. You can see that I'm a city boy, but there used to be a logging bee where a bunch of, I presume, men would get together