PODCAST

Cognate Cognizance Podcast

Tammy Marshall

Knowing cognates can strengthen your vocabulary skills. cognatecognizance.substack.com

education language learning

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2:35

Apogee

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/12/03

Zenith, peak, culmination, apex, pinnacle — these are all considered synonyms for “apogee,” and they are all words that are very familiar to me, but I don’t see “apogee” used very frequently. I do, however, see its Spanish cognate used.apogee — the farthest or highest point; in space usage, it refers to the point in the orbit of an object (such as a satellite) orbiting the earth that is at the greatest distance from the center of the earthapogeo — the Spanish cognate of the same meaning/sThis word

4:21

Etymology

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/11/19

Back when I was teaching, I had the good fortune of being able to create a couple classes. One of those was Linguistics, and in that class I required my students to do a mini-report each week about a word of their choosing. In the report, they needed to share the word’s “etymology” and in doing that, the students soon came to realize that the bulk of the English words that aren’t true descendants of Old or Middle English come to us from Latin and/or Greek.The word “etymology” comes to us from Greek,

4:50

Popinjay

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/11/03

In Chapter 6 of “The Sword in the Stone” by T. H. White, young Arthur, known in this story as the Wart, is practicing and learning archery with Sir Ector’s son, Kay, and there is this passage:“They left the targets and had several shots at the popinjay — which was a large, bright-coloured artificial bird stuck on the top of a stick, like a parrot — and Kay missed these also.”Prior to reading this book, I’d heard of the word “popinjay” and known it only by its now-standard meaning of “a strutting

4:14

Prairie

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/09/02

Since the very first time I visited the Prado museum in Madrid, Spain, I knew its name translated to “meadow” in English and that it had been named that due to the meadow that was there when it was first being built in 1785 — it is now surrounded by the city. It was going to be called something else, but everyone called it “el prado,” for “the meadow,” and the name stuck.Recently, I’ve been on a number of long drives across parts of Nebraska, and the wild sunflowers are in splendid bloom, especially

4:39

Kindergarten

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/08/04

School is about to start. When I was young, my first year of school was “kindergarten.” I’ve long known that we got the word from German where it’s a combination of the words “kinder” for “children” and “garten” for “garden.” Spanish uses the very same word. I’m not going to define the word this week because we all know what “kindergarten” is.Instead, I want to point out something that you may or may not have noticed in all these “Cognate Cognizance” posts — the letter K is rarely used in Spanish

5:50

Anatomy

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/06/30

I’ve been making my way through all the seasons of “Grey’s Anatomy” on Netflix these past few months, and while I always look away during the gruesome parts, watching it often reminds me of my teaching years. When some of my advanced Spanish students would opt to take the Anatomy and Physiology (A&P) class, they’d often come to my class exclaiming about the useful overlap of the two subjects because so much of the terminology in that science class is comprised of cognates of words they’d already

4:59

Volcano

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/06/02

Italy’s Mount Etna, a famous volcano situated in Sicily, is in the news today because it has been shooting a large amount of ash and lava into the air. Perhaps it’s no wonder that the Romans, who lived in that part of the world, created a god of fire and made his home under a volcano.His name was Vulcan, also written as Volcanus, and from that name came the Italian word for volcano.volcano — I doubt I need to define this, but the dictionary definition is this: a vent in the crust of the earth or

4:15

Salutary

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/05/05

After being diagnosed with Type 2 Diabetes, my boyfriend has discovered the “salutary” effects of a very strict diet that is keeping his blood sugar numbers low without insulin injections. salutary — an adjective to describe something that promotes health or is curativesaludable — the Spanish adjective cognate of the same meaning that typically simply translates to “healthy”Our word of “health” and its adjective “healthy” come to us from Old English, so we tend to use these words instead of those

5:10

Easter

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/04/07

Later this month is Easter, so this month’s free post and cognate duo pertain to that holy day, and I’m adding a second duo about the name of the month. Pascha — a lesser-known word meaning “Easter” or “Passover”Pascua — the Spanish cognate of the same meaning/sThese words entered Latin from Greek which got its word from Hebrew’s pesach, which translates to “skipping” or “passing over.” These words go back to the story of the Israelites who marked their doors with the blood of lambs so that the

3:39

Nidus

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/03/12

In George Eliot’s wonderful second novel, “The Mill on the Floss,” there is this sentence: “Certain seeds which are required to find a nidus for themselves under unfavorable circumstances have been supplied by nature with an apparatus of hooks, so that they will get a hold on very unreceptive surfaces.”The book isn’t about farming; the sentence is metaphorically describing the spiritual seed that had been scattered over an obstinate, grumpy character. Within that sentence, however, is the word

3:12

Levitation

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/03/03

levitation — a noun meaning “a rising or lifting in the air” — especially when it involves lifting someone in the air by supernatural meanslevitaciόn — the Spanish cognate of the same meaningWhen learning Spanish, one of the common verbs you will encounter is the verb “levantar,” which means “to lift.” The expression “levantar pesas” is “to lift weights,” and it comes up fairly early in vocabulary units centered on exercise. Later on, when learning about reflexive verbs, you’ll come upon

3:50

Belvedere

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/02/03

As a child of the 80’s, I watched and enjoyed the TV sitcom called “Mr. Belvedere” about a stodgy English butler who comes to live with an American family. Until recently, I’d always associated the word “belvedere” with that English butler, but then I came upon this passage in Calvino Italo’s masterpiece, “If on a winter’s night a traveler:”Today I reached the belvedere from which you can glimpse, down below, a little stretch of beach, deserted, facing the gray sea.As soon as I saw the word, I

13:21

A Reminder and Recap

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2025/01/27

I’ve been writing “Cognate Cognizance” for three and a half years now. Initially, I wrote it twice a week before settling into the weekly rhythm, so I’ve now written well over 200 entries, and I’ve gained subscribers along the way. Many of you were not with me when I started this project, so I thought I’d take today to reshare the first three word entries as well as the initial explanatory post to help remind everyone why I do this and what I hope you’ll take from it. If you’d like to be able to

3:21

Commence

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/12/31

commence — a verb that simply means “to begin” or “to start”comenzar — the Spanish verb cognate of the same meaningsThe French verb is “commencer,” and that’s where we took our word from. Strangely enough, these words go back to Latin’s initiare which clearly means “to initiate,” which also means “to start” or “to begin” something. I say “strangely enough” because “commence” doesn’t look like it’s a relative of “initiate,” but it is.When I was teaching Spanish for 30 years, I would try to point out

3:20

Medusa

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/12/02

medusa — when not capitalized, it’s another word for “jellyfish”medusa — the Spanish, Italian, and Portuguese word for “jellyfish”The French word is quite similar, too, and all these words come from the mythological Gorgon who had snakes for her hair. Since jellyfish have a part that resembles a head and then tentacles hanging from it that resemble snakes, they were given the name “medusa” in many languages. English speakers tend to use the word “jellyfish,” however, so when the word “medusa” shows

4:15

Antipathetic

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/11/04

Today I’m discussing another cognate duo that never came up as such in all the 30 years in which I taught Spanish because the English word is rarely used.antipathetic — an adjective meaning “arousing antipathy, which is a strong feeling of dislike”; essentially it describes someone who is unfriendly or an unpleasant thingantipático — the masculine Spanish cognate that is always translated as “unfriendly” but that means the same thing as antipatheticantipática — the feminine Spanish cognateThe noun

5:18

Sally

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/10/28

Let us sally forth into the undiscovered realm of cognates that Tammy (me) didn’t know until recently. I’ve long used and been aware of the word “sally,” but until recently, while reading “Don Quixote de la Mancha” in both Spanish and its English translation, I hadn’t given any thought to “sally” having a very obvious cognate in Spanish. Now, however, my own cognate cognizance has grown. Take a “sally” with me.sally — while this word has a variety of meanings, we are going to look at one of its

3:29

Cascade

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/10/01

The above photo was taken many years ago in Spearfish Canyon, South Dakota, by my beloved uncle, Paul Filsinger. He loved the Black Hills, and he loved photography. Sadly, he passed away four years ago today at the age of 60. He was one of my favorite people, and I continue to honor his memory and his photographic talent whenever I can — three of his photos grace the covers of three of my six novels, and I hope to use more on future book covers.This week’s cognate duo is special to me for a variety

6:10

Forte

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/08/05

Some people’s strength is visible on the outside. When I see a well-muscled person, I assume that he or she is physically strong, but that visible muscle may not show his her true strength — the thing that he or she is best at, or has the strongest ability in. Whatever that skill, whether it’s something physical, mental, artistic, academic, philanthropic, etc., that skill can be called a person’s “forte.”forte — a noun meaning “one’s strong point” or the thing in which one excelsfuerte — the Spanish

4:12

Somnolent

Cognate Cognizance Podcast ·

2024/07/02

Here we are in July already. July is a month when many people go to the beach for vacation. I won’t be one of them this year, but I’ve spent my share of time soaking up the rays on warm, tropical beaches — and falling asleep in the process because lying on a beach makes me “somnolent.”somnolent — an adjective used to describe something that makes you sleepy or that simply means “sleepy” or “drowsy”somnoliento/somnolienta — the masculine and feminine Spanish cognates of the same meanings.The root of

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