Your tongue is the flexible, muscular organ in your mouth that helps you taste food, swallow, and form words when you speak. Without your tongue, eating would be difficult and talking nearly impossible. The surface of your tongue is covered with tiny bumps called taste buds that detect whether something is sweet, salty, sour, bitter, or savory.

Your tongue does remarkable work every day. When you eat, it pushes food around your mouth and helps move it down your throat. When you speak, it shapes sounds by touching different parts of your mouth. Try saying “hello” and notice how your tongue moves to create the “l” sound. Musicians who play wind instruments use their tongues to control notes and rhythms.

The word also describes language itself. When someone speaks French as their native tongue, French is the language they grew up speaking. An ancient tongue means an old language that people once spoke.

People use the word in colorful expressions too. To hold your tongue means to stay quiet when you want to speak. A tongue twister like “she sells seashells by the seashore” is a phrase that's tricky to say quickly. When something is on the tip of your tongue, you know you know it but can't quite remember it. If someone speaks tongue in cheek, they're joking or being playfully ironic.