The universal language

"OK" is the most frequently spoken word on the planet, and these 9 follow

Learning languages is hard. But, fortunately, some terms rooted in daily universal experiences don't change much when crossing borders. If you say "mama, "papa," "taxi," or "banana," anywhere in the world, they’ll recognize those nouns immediately —even if the context provided is entirely blurry. The question is: Why did these words barely change over time and across different languages? Let’s explore the stories behind the most spoken words on the planet.

"OK" is the most spoken word on the planet. And it started as a typo joke. In 1839, the initials "O.K." were first published in the Boston Morning Post, meant as an abbreviation for "oll korrect" — a popular slang misspelling of "all correct."

Following that gag, politics intervened. In 1840, President Martin Van Buren's reelection supporters formed "O.K. Clubs" across the country, since Van Buren was nicknamed "Old Kinderhook" after his hometown in upstate New York. From there, telegraphs carried it coast to coast, and eventually it spread from North America all the way to the Moon, where Buzz Aldrin spoke it after the Apollo 11 landing.

Is it a real word? According to science, it is. In 2013, researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics investigated "huh?" in naturally occurring conversations across ten languages and presented evidence for two claims. One, the term is universal. Two, it is genuinely a word.

They later expanded the study to 31 spoken languages from around the world and found that all of them have a word with a nearly identical sound and function as the English "huh?" With all its nuances and differences, most human languages on Earth independently arrived at similar rising syllables for not understanding something in conversation.

Why do unrelated languages, spoken by people who never met, use almost identical words for "mother" and "father"? In Swahili: mama. In Polish: mama. In Mandarin Chinese: māma. In Quechua, spoken in the Andes of South America: mama. This mystery puzzled linguists for generations.

This isn’t a case of cognates (words borrowed from one language to another). The answer here lies in babies: "mama" and "papa" are among the easiest sounds to produce, because they combine bilabial consonants and open vowels. "Mmm" is often the first consonant babies experiment with.

The term "hello" had floated around English since the 1820s, mainly as a shout to get someone’s attention, like "hey" or "oi." But it was barely more than that before telephones existed.

Then, in 1876, Alexander Graham Bell invented the telephone, and it was time to decide what callers should say when they picked up. Bell himself suggested the traditional nautical hail, "Ahoy." It was Thomas Edison who suggested "Hello!" in a letter dated 1877. By 1889, telephone operators had become widely known as "hello-girls." By then, the greeting had jumped to everyday conversation, and eventually every language on Earth picked up a version of it.

It is said that "Coca-Cola" is one of the most recognizable terms on the entire planet, much like the word "OK." This makes sense: the soft drink is sold in more than 200 countries. The name wasn’t the result of a marketing team or a focus group. It was coined in 1886 by the company’s bookkeeper, Frank M. Robinson, who derived it from the drink's two original ingredients: coca leaf and kola nut.

The drink was invented in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1886 by Dr. John S. Pemberton, who originally marketed it as a medicinal tonic. Today, approximately 1.9 billion servings of Coca-Cola beverages are consumed each day, so wherever in the world you are, the brand needs absolutely no introduction.

The word "coffee" has traveled far. Its story starts in the Ethiopian highlands with a by-now popular legend that depicts a 9th-century goat herder who noticed his goats wouldn’t sleep after eating berries from a certain bush. Thus, the idea of the drink made from those berries spread in Ethiopia.

From there, it moved to Yemen, where it was documented in a 15th-century text as a drink made from roasted coffee beans. It was assigned the Arabic word qahwa, which traveled with the drink. The product was traded by the Ottomans, who influenced several other languages, and from it derived the Italian caffè, the Dutch koffie, and the French café. So, the term has mutated slightly in each language, but it remains similar enough to identify it easily all over the world.

Every night, hundreds of millions of people all over the world put on a Persian garment with a Persian name. The word "pajamas" comes from the Persian pay-jāma, a compound of pay (foot or leg) and jāma (garment). In 15th-century Persia, it referred to loose trousers worn by men and women for comfort, and the term entered English in the 18th century when British colonists encountered the garment in India.

But the original pajamas were not sleepwear for a long time. Victorian high society adopted them as fashionable, exotic loungewear, and it was by the early 20th century that the two-piece sleeping suit had spread across the Western world. Today, most countries in the world have very similar names for this garment.

"Safari" is the name for a very specific activity. For many tongues in the world, the word itself conjures jeeps, binoculars, lions, and zebras.

But its original meaning was distant from the current one. It comes from the Arabic safara, which means "to travel." In Swahili, safari simply means any kind of journey, not just a wildlife expedition. For the English language, it was first recorded by explorer Sir Richard Francis Burton in the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society in 1859. British colonists in East Africa understood the word to apply to hunting expeditions, and, by the middle of the 20th century, Hollywood had cemented its modern image with films romanticizing the African bush.

Today, Apple’s decision to name its search engine "Safari" brings the term closer to its original meaning than to the one related to wildlife exploration.

Banana is one of the most consumed fruits on Earth, and its name has traveled with it. The word "banana" first appeared in English in the 1590s, borrowed by Spanish or Portuguese explorers from a West African word, possibly from the Wolof language, spoken in what is today Senegal and Gambia.

Most historians sustain that Africans began harvesting the fruit at least 4,500 years ago. When Portuguese and Spanish ships began trading across the world in the 15th and 16th centuries, they encountered the fruit, borrowed its African name, and carried both across the Atlantic. Today, the word sounds remarkably similar in many languages: banana in English, Spanish, Italian, and German; banane in French; 바나나 (banana) in Korean.

From Buenos Aires to Bangkok, you can step off a plane having never spoken a word of the local language, hold out your hand, and say one word: "Taxi." You will get the exact same thing. But the story of this two-syllable word is a tangle of countries and languages.

The original word was "taximeter," coined by German inventor Friedrich W. G. Bruhn in 1891. This was a device that measured the fare by distance. It was the French who shortened taximètre to taxi. A company imported them to New York under the market name "Taxicab" and decided to paint them yellow, since it was the most visible color. From there, both the short name and the iconic color stuck. Today, it is a symbol universally shared that you’ll find in every major city.

THE DOCTOR'S DICTIONARY

Have You Heard These 10 Medical Terms For Common Conditions?

Image: Patty Brito

Medicine is a dynamic field, constantly advancing and evolving. With its continuous progress and complexities, deciphering its mysteries can often feel like a challenge, especially when it comes to interpreting doctors' lexicon.

Terms like "dorsalgia" or "pyrexia" may sound unfamiliar and intimidating, but chances are you've already experienced some of them, as they're closer to everyday experiences than you might think.

Let's open the dictionary to discover these 10 medical terms for the most common conditions. Join us!

Image: Christopher Campbell

While this word sounds like the majestic name of an ancient deity, it actually refers to something much more simple and mundane: a tummy ache.

"Dyspepsia," a medical term for common indigestion, ranks among the most common conditions. It includes the well-known stomach pain, along with sensations of bloating and fullness.

The term has Greek origins, where Dys- can be translated as "bad" or "difficult," and Peptos means "digested."

Image: Sander Sammy

Welcome to the world of headaches. Some mild, others truly unbearable. Depending on their cause and intensity, headaches can become really annoying, disrupting even the simplest tasks. Do you remember your last one? You probably do, as they tend to be a regular condition, with primary, acute headaches being the most typical.

"Cephalalgia" is the medical term that refers to this common pain. Also with Greek roots, the word is a fusion of kephalḗ****, "head," and álgos, "pain."

Image: Towfiqu barbhuiya

While this little word may seem funny, its actual meaning isn't quite as charming. Have you ever had a coughing fit at the movies? People can get irritated, right? Well, we should not forget that coughing can be very annoying and even exhausting for the person experiencing it.

If you want to sound more sophisticated the next time you discuss coughs, you can opt for the medical term "tussis," which denotes this discomfort.

Coughing can occur voluntarily or involuntarily and serves as a natural reflex to clear the throat and airways.

Image: Dmitriy Frantsev

Now that we know the suffix -****algia means "pain," let's find out what's behind the rest of this word.

Dorsum is a Latin term meaning "back." Thus, "Dorsalgia" refers to the notorious and often persistent back pain. Typically, it only denotes the type of back pains originating in nerves, muscles, and joints.

Taking care of your posture throughout the day, also during sleep, and incorporating daily exercise is crucial to prevent or help reduce dorsalgia.

Image: Amanda Dalbjörn

You've probably heard the word "conjunctivitis" before, as it is a bit more widespread than the previous terms (and, of course, it's the official name for a very, very common condition.)

As you might know, in the medical world, the suffix -itis refers to an inflammation. On the other hand, "conjunctiva" is the name for your eye's outer layer. So, conjunctivitis basically refers to a common pink eye, that familiar discomfort marked by redness, inflammation, and an annoying itchiness.

Image: Kelly Sikkema

Whether you're a kid or a grown-up, we all have those days when we're hit with a case of "pyrexia". Sure, it may have given us a few days off from school, but let's be real, dealing with this discomfort can be a true challenge.

Also known as fever, pyrexia is when your body temperature rises above the normal range (100°F or higher for adults). And as if that wasn't enough, it brings some other symptoms like headaches and sensitivity to light.

Fever often acts as our body's defense against infections. But, of course, there are a lot of other non-infectious reasons that can awaken the fever monster.

Image: Mockup Graphics

Did you know that 1 in 3 adults worldwide are diagnosed with this condition? It's called "hypertension" in the medical world, but we all know it better as high blood pressure, a condition where the pressure within your blood vessels climbs to unhealthy levels.

Although it is quite frequent among the population, its commonality doesn't reduce its seriousness. Furthermore, since hypertension often manifests without evident symptoms, many people are unaware they have it. So, always remember to get your medical checkups!

Image: Kelly Sikkema

While it could be a spell pronounced by Harry Potter and his friends, "viral rhinitis" is something much less mystical; it's actually just the fancy term for a common cold.

"Rhinitis" refers to the inflammation and irritation of the mucous membrane inside your nose, while "viral" indicates that it is caused by a virus.

Unfortunately, we've all been there: weak, congested, and sneezing. While it's true that some colds are worse than others, nobody enjoys dealing with one. Bless you!

Image: Enis Yavuz

In today's fast-paced world, stress and anxiety can directly affect your teeth, as "bruxism" is becoming increasingly common among people of all ages worldwide. If you don't know its formal name, you may recognize it by its other identity: teeth grinding.

This is a condition in which you gnash, grind, or clench your teeth, often involuntarily, and can happen both during the day and night, although nocturnal bruxism is more common. This involuntary practice generates other complications, such as headaches and jaw pain or sleep interruptions. If you find yourself nodding along, it might be time to visit the much-feared dentist!

Image: Hush Naidoo Jade Photography

Few things can compete with the pain of this condition called "otitis." Known to all of us as an ear infection, otitis is more common in children than adults, but can strike anyone at any age.

As hinted by its suffix, otitis causes inflammation in the middle ear. This can be a real torture and will certainly keep you awake at night. Fortunately, treatments are usually simple and quick, and this annoying condition often clears up within a few days.