106: Is a hotdog a sandwich? The problem with definitions

Lingthusiasm - A podcast that's enthusiastic about linguistics

Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne

Science

4.8 • 743 Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2025

⏱️ 34 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

We asked you if a burrito was a sandwich, and you said 'no'. We asked you if ravioli was a sandwich and you said 'heck no'. We asked you if an ice cream sandwich was a sandwich and things...started to get a little murky. This isn't just a sandwich problem: you can also have similar arguments about what counts as a cup, a bird, a fish, furniture, art, and more! So wait...does any word mean anything anymore? Have we just broken language?? It's okay, linguistics has a solution! In this episode, your hosts Gretchen McCulloch and Lauren Gawne get enthusiastic about why deciding what's in and what's out of the definition of a word is so dang tricky, why people love to argue about it, and how prototype theory solves all the "is X a Y" arguments once and for all. Note that this episode originally aired as Bonus 9: Is X a sandwich? Solving the word-meaning argument once and for all. We’ve added an updated announcements section to the top and a few new things about prototypes and meaning to the end. We’re excited to share one of our favourite bonus episodes from Patreon with a broader audience, while at the same time giving everyone who works on the show a bit of a break. Click here for a link to this episode in your podcast player of choice: https://episodes.fm/1186056137/episode/dGFnOnNvdW5kY2xvdWQsMjAxMDp0cmFja3MvMjEzMjEwMjkwNw Read the transcript here: https://lingthusiasm.com/post/789370350172602368/transcript-episode-106-is-x-a-sandwich-bonus Announcements: In this month’s bonus episode we get enthusiastic about fictional gestures with Eric Molinsky, host of Imaginary Worlds, a podcast about sci-fi, fantasy and other genres of speculative fiction! We talk about the Vulcan salute from Star Trek, the Wakanda Forever salute from Black Panther, and the three-finger Hunger Games salute, and how all three have crossed over with additional symbolism into the real world. We also talk about gestures that have crossed over in the other direction, from the real-world origins of the Vulcan salute in a Jewish blessing, the two-finger blessing in the Foundation tv series from classical Latin and Greek oratory via Christian traditions, as well as religious gesture in the Penric and Desdemona series, smiles and shrugs in A Memory Called Empire, and more. Join us on Patreon now to get access to this and 100+ other bonus episodes. You’ll also get access to the Lingthusiasm Discord server where you can chat with other language nerds: https://www.patreon.com/posts/133185606 For links to things mentioned in this episode: https://lingthusiasm.com/post/789369946731937792/episode-106-is-a-hotdog-a-sandwich-the-problem

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Lingthusiasm, a podcast that's enthusiastic about linguistics.
0:21.7	I'm Gretchen McCallick.
0:23.0	And I'm Lauren Gorn, and today we're getting enthusiastic about what even is a sandwich,
0:27.6	and how does meaning even work anyway?
0:30.5	This episode totally blew our minds when we were researching the classic internet debate.
0:35.1	But first, this episode was originally posted as our ninth bonus
0:39.2	episode in November 2017. Oh my gosh, it's from our first year. We have been doing
0:45.1	monthly bonus episodes since 2017 for people who support us at the link-thusia's level or above.
0:50.5	The support of patrons is literally the way the show keeps running and helps us not have to think about running ads or exposing you to other things you don't want to listen to.
0:59.5	We now have over 100 bonus episodes in the Patreon bonus feed for you to listen to right now and new ones that come out every month.
1:08.3	Our bonus episodes are often a little bit more playful and less likely to be used in a
1:13.4	linguistics classroom, like our several swearing bonus episodes. Or the whole bonus episode on the
1:19.5	linguistics of kissing. But overall, we have as much fun with bonus episodes as our mains, and
1:24.5	we love them so much we wanted to share one from the archive on the main feed.
1:28.7	It also gives us a chance to catch a bit of a break between preparing new episodes.
1:33.2	This is something we did last year as well, and it really helps us during a busy period.
1:36.5	Indeed, there are multiple reasons to love this tradition that we've started,
1:41.6	and we're going to play the original episode.
1:44.0	We are going to skip the
1:45.4	intro with updates from 2017. Ooh, what was the hot news in 2017? We were heading towards
1:52.7	full-length bonus episodes, a thing we have been doing for almost eight years now.
1:58.6	I had almost forgotten that these bonus episodes weren't full length to start.
	...

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