Word to the Wise: Lingua Franca

"Lingua franca" (LING-gwuh FRANG-kuh) - from the Italian for "Frankish tongue" - is a medium of communication between people who speak different languages. It was originally a combination of Italian, Spanish, French, Greek, Arabic, and Turkish spoken in eastern Mediterranean ports.

Example (as used by John McWhorter in a New York Times review of The Word of the Lord Is Upon Me by Jonathan Rieder): "It was Martin Luther King who made the black preacher’s cadence a lingua franca… ."

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