A story in The News & Observer's Sunday edition might be interesting to language buffs and fans of regional accents. Robin Dodsworth, an associate linguistics professor at N.C. State University, says that the Raleigh accent is gradually disappearing.

She's also looking for natives of Raleigh to participate in her study. If you grew up in Raleigh -- as far south as Garner or as far north as Wake Forest -- and want to contribute your voice to Dodsworth's data, e-mail her at robin_dodsworth@ncsu.edu.

I have used the word awesome a few times lately to describe something that I found terrific or impressive. This surprised me because my husband and I have a running eyeroll over the word that we consider today's most overused and least understood. Many of our young friends and colleagues of the Millennial generation use the word the way we baby boomers are prone to using cool. It is the default word for something that is impressive or pleasing.

Some have long lamented that English has no gender-neutral pronoun to use in a construction such as this: Everyone needs his or her breakfast. In regular, everyday speech, we might say "their" instead of "his or her." But "everyone" is singular, so the pronoun following it should be singular."His or her" is rather clunky, though. Back in the olden days (my youth) we'd just use "his." But feminism helped us see the problem with that approach. 

This pronoun problem is arousing interest among Twitter users, according to this CNN story. Apparently, people are calling for a new gender-neutral pronoun. But, as the story notes, linguists know that language is very resistant to change in pronouns. When you go to the story, take particular note of the quotes from linguist Steven Pinker.

By the way, CNN.com has a collection of stories about language and linguistics. 

National Grammar Day is Wednesday, March 4.

Recent letters to the editor refer to "bread and circuses," a phrase that refers to choosing short-term diversions over more important matters. It comes from the Latin phrase panem et circenses, and the English version is a literal translation.

Such loan translations are called "claques," which derived from a French word for "to trace," as in making a copy. English is full of calques. A "marriage of convenience" is a translation from French mariage de convenance. "Worldview" is a translation from German Weltanschauung. "Brainwashing" is a loan translation of a Chinese term.