teabonics = tea (party) + ebony + phonics
A big thank you to whoever created this Flickr photostream to collect the "creative" spelling and grammar so often seen on TEA Party protest signs.
Teabonics is intended to sound like ebonics, which is itself a relatively established portmanteau of ebony and phonics.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
prostidude
prostidude = prostitute + dude, i.e., a male prostitute
This word comes to us as America's first legal male prostitute leaves his Nevada brothel, as Language Log reports.
This word comes to us as America's first legal male prostitute leaves his Nevada brothel, as Language Log reports.
Tuesday, March 30, 2010
Attention Editors! Your Online Opiate Has Arrived!
This is why Twitter is so great. I might not have discovered this for ages without Twitter.
On Bite-Size Edits, editors and readers (that is, anyone who visits the site and is interested) are given three consecutive sentences and allowed to edit and leave notes for the second sentence. The sentences all come from texts submitted by members (and anyone can join for free).
Although the process is billed as a game -- you get points for making edits and suggestions, plus more points when your edits are deemed useful, and high point earners can win FREE BOOKS -- this is really an odd and quite enjoyable way to crowdsource the editing process. If nothing else, it can be a good way to exercise your editing chops.
Although this likely won't lead to a well-polished book, Bite-Size Edits can be of great use to striving writers, if only emotionally. Once you've submitted some text, it can feel good to know that work is still being done on your writings even if you have an off-day when you don't write. If you do start to get some good suggestions, it can also encourage you to keep writing so you'll have something new to post and keep the process going. Plus, there's the automatic (and, yes, egotistical) joy of knowing that you actually have an audience.
The site is still in beta, so there may be some bugs to fix and improvements to come. I don't know yet how well it can handle text formatting, for example. But it sounds interesting, and it really is quite fun.
So fun, in fact, that I've submitted one essay that I wrote (and sold!) a few years ago. You can read the original essay here, and if you like, start editing it one random sentence at a time here, though I suggest you you go to the Bite-Size Edits home page and edit the random sentences that it pulls from random submissions.
A warning, though: This is highly addictive. Plan on accidentally spending twice as much time as I think you'll spend there.
On Bite-Size Edits, editors and readers (that is, anyone who visits the site and is interested) are given three consecutive sentences and allowed to edit and leave notes for the second sentence. The sentences all come from texts submitted by members (and anyone can join for free).
Although the process is billed as a game -- you get points for making edits and suggestions, plus more points when your edits are deemed useful, and high point earners can win FREE BOOKS -- this is really an odd and quite enjoyable way to crowdsource the editing process. If nothing else, it can be a good way to exercise your editing chops.
Although this likely won't lead to a well-polished book, Bite-Size Edits can be of great use to striving writers, if only emotionally. Once you've submitted some text, it can feel good to know that work is still being done on your writings even if you have an off-day when you don't write. If you do start to get some good suggestions, it can also encourage you to keep writing so you'll have something new to post and keep the process going. Plus, there's the automatic (and, yes, egotistical) joy of knowing that you actually have an audience.
The site is still in beta, so there may be some bugs to fix and improvements to come. I don't know yet how well it can handle text formatting, for example. But it sounds interesting, and it really is quite fun.
So fun, in fact, that I've submitted one essay that I wrote (and sold!) a few years ago. You can read the original essay here, and if you like, start editing it one random sentence at a time here, though I suggest you you go to the Bite-Size Edits home page and edit the random sentences that it pulls from random submissions.
A warning, though: This is highly addictive. Plan on accidentally spending twice as much time as I think you'll spend there.
Brooke Shields and the Serial Comma
From Twitterer @CommaRules, another good argument for the serial comma:
The bottom left states: "Brooke Shields On Marriage, Her Mom and Michael Jackson."
@CommaRules writes: "Ladies' Home Journal might rethink using the serial comma. Who knew about Brooke's mom and Michael Jackson?"
Not quite as bad as the infamous "To my parents, Ayn Rand and God." Well, it might be, depending on how you feel about Ayn Rand and/or Michael Jackson. Still, this is another example of how horribly confusing life is without the serial comma.
The bottom left states: "Brooke Shields On Marriage, Her Mom and Michael Jackson." @CommaRules writes: "Ladies' Home Journal might rethink using the serial comma. Who knew about Brooke's mom and Michael Jackson?"
Not quite as bad as the infamous "To my parents, Ayn Rand and God." Well, it might be, depending on how you feel about Ayn Rand and/or Michael Jackson. Still, this is another example of how horribly confusing life is without the serial comma.
Catastrotea, Tea-pocalypse
catastrotea = catastrophe + tea
Tea-pocalypse = tea + apocalypse
"These Argo Tea baristas are joking about creating 'Catastrotea.' This is how the tea-pocalypse starts."
From Mark Peters via @wordlust.
Tea-pocalypse = tea + apocalypse
"These Argo Tea baristas are joking about creating 'Catastrotea.' This is how the tea-pocalypse starts."
From Mark Peters via @wordlust.
A Programmatic Portmaneau Resource
I happened upon an interesting Web page at ThinkZone. Someone wrote a program to create portmanteau words based on overlapping letters and then listed "the better ones." It's a long list.
Technically, I guess they're portmanteau words, but they lack that certain naturality. They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and so it is with portmanteau words. The words in this list are motherless children looking for a home. Sure, some of them may be used sometime (badvantage and playpenitentiary aren't bad), but when they are used, they'll be reborn naturally -- not pulled from a list created by a program.
Technically, I guess they're portmanteau words, but they lack that certain naturality. They say that necessity is the mother of invention, and so it is with portmanteau words. The words in this list are motherless children looking for a home. Sure, some of them may be used sometime (badvantage and playpenitentiary aren't bad), but when they are used, they'll be reborn naturally -- not pulled from a list created by a program.
Monday, March 29, 2010
Globish
Globish = global + English
Globish was apparently coined in 2007 by French-speaking retired IBM executive Jean-Paul Nerriere. He noticed that a sort of "decaffeinated English" was becoming the lingua franca of international business and politics. It's "decaffeinated" because non-English-speakers have assembled only enough of an understanding of English to use it to communicate with other non-English-speakers, though it isn't as rich as British and American English are.
He noticed in Japan that non-English-speakers were communicating more effectively with other non-English-speakers than with the Americans or the British, even though they (the non-English-speakers) were using a subset of the English language to communicate. Nerriere dubbed this new means of communication Globish.
Robert McCrum will soon be publishing a book called Globish: How the English Language Became the World's Language, which details Nerriere's story and goes into further depth about how English is spreading throughout the world. You can read more about it in his blog post, which also features this wonderful photo that seems to define irony:
Globish was apparently coined in 2007 by French-speaking retired IBM executive Jean-Paul Nerriere. He noticed that a sort of "decaffeinated English" was becoming the lingua franca of international business and politics. It's "decaffeinated" because non-English-speakers have assembled only enough of an understanding of English to use it to communicate with other non-English-speakers, though it isn't as rich as British and American English are.
He noticed in Japan that non-English-speakers were communicating more effectively with other non-English-speakers than with the Americans or the British, even though they (the non-English-speakers) were using a subset of the English language to communicate. Nerriere dubbed this new means of communication Globish.
Robert McCrum will soon be publishing a book called Globish: How the English Language Became the World's Language, which details Nerriere's story and goes into further depth about how English is spreading throughout the world. You can read more about it in his blog post, which also features this wonderful photo that seems to define irony:
Friday, March 26, 2010
touron
touron = tourist + moron
This one was new to me. I just came across it in Bob Fenster's The Big Book of Duh!, which, as the cover indicates, is a great one to keep in the bathroom. Fenster writes this:
If you're out on the ski slopes getting in the way of the good skiers, they might mutter that you're another touron, which means you're both a tourist and a moron. That's slightly better than being called a SPORE -- one of the Stupid People On Rental Equipment.
This might be a new one to me because I've only been skiing twice in my life, both times before I turned 16. I don't remember a whole lot about it except that I had a great time, except for all the falling down.
A quick search for touron reveals that it has been used by a number of people. It may even be near the "established" status of portmanteaus.
Oregonian H.R. Hognblog has posted a nice list of ten ways to tell tourists from tourons. My favorite is #6:
Tourons are everyone on the road NOT driving a Ford or Chevy monster truck, Subaru Outback or Biodiesel Mercedes Benz. Tourists coasted into town on fumes because they spent all their money on weed.
Thursday, March 25, 2010
Twision
Twision = twitter + visión
As TechCrunch reports, rumors of a Twitter-based television show have finally found a solid existence...in Spain. Twision, an hour-long show that premiered in Spain last week, features hosts who respond to tweets labeled #veo7, including showing online video and other links that are talked about.
I'd like to see Larry King try something like this. No, really.
As TechCrunch reports, rumors of a Twitter-based television show have finally found a solid existence...in Spain. Twision, an hour-long show that premiered in Spain last week, features hosts who respond to tweets labeled #veo7, including showing online video and other links that are talked about.
I'd like to see Larry King try something like this. No, really.
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