Grammar Girl here. This week I have a quick and dirty tip about the difference between the

words hearty and hardy. A meeting middle about how English became English and a tidbit about

the term jury rigged. A listener named Cheryl left a comment on the Grammar Girl Facebook

page asking me to write about the difference between hardy and hardy. She wrote, quote,

I'm a writer and I get confused on the usage of these two adjectives. Love your podcast and

appreciate your shows and tips. Unquote. Thanks Cheryl. I'm not surprised you get these words confused

because not only do they sound the same, but they also have overlapping meanings, or at least they

used to. For example, hundreds of years ago one meant courageous and spirited in the other meant

bold and fearless, pretty similar, right? Well, try to put that out of your mind because today

they have different meanings. Hardy, H-A-R-D-Y, is related towards in other languages such as old

French, old Norse, and old German that meant hard. So, associate hardy in your mind with hardness.

A plant that can survive a cold winter is hardy. It's tough. It's hard. People who successfully

endure hardships, physical or emotional can also be described as hardy. Hardy, on the other hand,

H-E-A-R-T-Y, comes from the word heart, with the suffix Y added to the end as suffixes always are.

It has a sense of from the heart and can be used to describe people who are warm and sincere,

or a meal that's nourishing and filling. Whereas something tough and able to endure hard

shape or cold is described as hardy, something that is warm and vigorous like the heart is more

likely to be described as hardy. And that's your quick and dirty tip. Think of hardy things as cold

and hard, such as a plant that can endure the winter or a hiker who can scale a mountain,

and think of hardy things as warm and heartfelt, such as a hardy welcome or a hardy meal.

For the meaty middle today, I have an excerpt from Simon Horobin's new book How English Became

English. The whole book is fascinating, but I especially liked the part about English in Canada,

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