Every week, we pose a challenge: using any word of the day from the week, create a perfect tweet, otherwise known as a twoosh. Here are our favorites from last week.
Remember that once a month we’re giving away Wordnik schwag to two randomly chosen players, to be announced the last Monday of the month, and as always, to get the word of the day, follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or subscribe via email.
Word Cloud, by Jason-Morrison
Welcome to this week’s Language Blog Roundup, in which we bring you the highlights from our favorite language blogs and the latest in word news and culture.
It’s raining words of the year! The American Dialect Society has geared up for their January announcement of 2012’s word of the year by putting out the call for nominations. Meanwhile, the Australian National Dictionary Centre chose green-on-blue, “(used in a military context) an attack made on one’s own side by a force regarded as neutral.”
Collins Dictionary had 12 favorites, and Ben Zimmer rounded up some standouts, including superstorm, Eastwooding, and fiscal cliff. Fritinancy shared her choices, such as ermahgerd, gaylo, and pink slime, as well as her names of the year.
Laura Slattery at The Irish Times wrote about 2012’s words in regards to women (slutshaming, binders, legitimate rape). Jen Doll gave us the A to Z of the year’s worst words (speaking of which, Mark Liberman considered some not-great euphemisms for the much maligned moist) while Geoff Nunberg told us to forget YOLO and focus on big data instead. Finally, the AV Club listed the year in band names.
Yesterday celebrated the 200th anniversary of Grimm’s Fairy Tales. We loved these illustrations, National Geographic’s interactive tale teller, and this piece on the cultural legacy of the often gruesome stories.
In movie news, Ben Zimmer explored the language of Lincoln, including anachronisms, and The Hollywood Reporter wondered if the cursing in the film was accurate. Meanwhile, the OUP Blog told us about the naming of Hobbits, while we explored ten of our favorite journey words.
In other language news, Johnson discussed the internet and language and a problematic BBC piece, as well as the origins of the word bork. At Language Log, Mark Liberman took down The New Yorker for claiming that the Constitution is ungrammatical, and Geoff Pullum ranted about “prescriptivist poppycock” around that and which.
Victor Mair looked at English loanwords in Cantonese and Chinese character amnesia. In other Chinese language news, we learned a neologism, nail house, referring to “homes belonging to people who refuse to make room for development,” and likened to “to nails that are stuck in wood, and cannot be pounded down with a hammer.”
At Lingua Franca, Ben Yagoda explored vogue vague nouns and wondered is that a thing? Lucy Ferriss discussed the language around gun control while Fritinancy delved into gundamentalist, “a person who goes beyond the language of the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution and takes his or her unrestricted right to bear arms as a tenet of religious or quasi-religious faith.”
At Macmillan Dictionary blog, Orin Hargraves felt used, and Stan Carey climbed the the steep rise of the fiscal cliff. On his own blog, Stan wondered how to pronounce GIF and if it really matters; explained who’s versus whose; and discussed the invented languages of Ithkuil and Blissymbols.
In words of the week, Erin McKean noted benne, “what sesame seeds are called in the Lowcountry, particularly in and around Charleston, S.C.”; sufganiyot, “Hanukkah-themed filled-donuts”; and one of our favorite words, twoosh, a tweet that uses all 140 characters.
Word Spy spotted sapiosexual, “a person who is sexually attracted to intelligent people”; self-interrupt, “to interrupt one’s own work to check social media or perform some other non-work-related task”; dozenalist, “a person who believes society should switch to a base-12 counting system instead of the current base-10 system”; and misophonia, “an extreme intolerance or hatred for certain sounds.”
Cory Doctorow at BoingBoing discussed literacy privilege and the dickishness of grammaticasters. Jonathan Green taught us some Yiddish slang. We learned some Japanese fish puns, about Ben & Jerry’s troubles with language laws in Quebec, and that Manchester, England is the most linguistically diverse city in Europe.
We also found out New York City is a graveyard of languages and enjoyed this literary tour of Manhattan. We were intrigued by lab lit, or laboratory literature; this newly discovered lizard named for President Obama (“Is this real?” tweeted one skeptical tweep); and these animal languages.
We enjoyed these “gobbledygook” words that are now common and these interesting words for common things. We loved these romantic expressions in other languages as well as learning how to laugh online in other languages.
Oh and hey, the world didn’t end, but you might still enjoy these apocalyptic words.
That wraps up our last Language Blog Roundup of the year, but stay tuned next week for something special.
Happy holidays!
[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by Jason-Morrison]
Apocalypse? by mikelehen
The world probably won’t end tomorrow (if you don’t believe us, ask NASA), but that doesn’t mean you can’t learn about 10 apocalyptic words and their origins.
Armageddon
“White House budget director Jacob Lew used the word ‘Armageddon’ three times on Sunday talk shows, saying a default could lead to a financial crisis that would send interest rates rising and drive up the cost of credit for all Americans.”
Janet Hook and Damian Paletta, “Senate Debt Plan Promises Months of Budget Wrangling,” The Wall Street Journal, July 18, 2011
Armageddon is, in the Bible, “the scene of a final battle between the forces of good and evil, prophesied to occur at the end of the world,” and by that extension, “a decisive or catastrophic conflict.”
The word comes from the Hebrew Har Megiddon, “Mount of Megiddo,” a “city in central Palestine” and a “site of important Israeli battles.”
bitter end
“But she insists that she will fight to the bitter end, which is an end easily foreseen.”
“To the Bitter End,” The New York Times, May 4, 1898
The bitter end refers to “a final, painful, or disastrous extremity.” However, the original meaning of the phrase is nautical, “the inboard end of a chain, rope, or cable, especially the end of a rope or cable that is wound around a bitt.” A bitt is “a strong post of wood or iron to which cables are made fast,” and is related to the Old Norse biti, “crossbeam.”
Bitter, meaning “unpalatable; hard to swallow, literally or figuratively,” comes from the Old English biter, “bitter, sharp, cutting; angry, embittered; cruel.” Bitter end is perhaps a play on this sense of bitter.
doomsday
“Saturday was the start of their doomsday period and they expected dire calamities. When nothing too terrible transpired they were sure that meant merely the worst horrors would come Monday when the sun was swallowed. But out in New Guinea a team of Japanese scientists reported observing the solar blackout for nearly three minutes and nothing unusual resulted.”
“Doomsday Comes, Goes Uneventfully,” The Milwaukee Sentinel, February 5, 1962
Doomsday is “the day of the last judgment,” or “any day of sentence or condemnation.” The word doom comes from the Old English dom, “judgment.” Doomsday machine attests from 1960, says the Online Etymology Dictionary.
eschatology
“Rapture and Rand: What a couple of sexy, compelling twins! They’re the Mary Kate and Ashley of late capitalist eschatology.”
Ellis Weiner, “Rapture and Rand: Two Peas in a Pod,” The Huffington Post, May 6, 2011
Eschatology is “the doctrine of the last or of final things; that branch of theology which treats of the end of the world and man’s condition or state after death.”
Eschatology comes from the Greek word for “last,” eskhatos, which also gives us eschaton, “day at the end of time following Armageddon when God will decree the fates of all individual humans according to the good and evil of their earthly lives.”
Fimbulwinter
“The forewarning of the end of the world was to be the great winter, three years in duration, which the Eddas call Fimbulwinter. ‘Every man’s hand shall be turned against his brother, and sisters’ children shall their kinship rend asunder; no man shall another spare.'”
Charles Francis Keary, Outlines of Primitive Belief Among the Indo-European Races, 1882
Fimbulwinter is, in Norse mythology, “one of the signs of the onset of the end of this world” which marks “marks the coming of the Ragnarok, the battle that will end the world.”
Fimbulwinter was also a black metal band that “was part of the early Norwegian black metal scene.” The band formed in 1992 and split in 1994.
The word Fimbulwinter translates from Old Norse as “mighty or great winter.”
Götterdämmerung
“What the world is witnessing in France these summer days it the unfolding of a Gaullist Gotterdammerung. It is no longer possible to take President de Gaulle or his regime seriously.”
Allan Harvey, “Gotterdammerung Plays Paris,” The Sun, August 5, 1967
Götterdämmerung is, in German mythology, “a myth about the ultimate destruction of the gods in a battle with evil,” and figuratively, “any cataclysmic downfall or momentous, apocalyptic event, especially of a regime or an institution.”
The word translates from the German as “twilight of the gods,” and was used by German composer Richard Wagner “as the title of the last opera in the Ring cycle.”
prepper
“Mr Izzo is a ‘prepper’, one of a growing number of Americans who are preparing their homes and families to survive a major disaster they believe could arrive at any time.”
Madeleine Morris, “Americans Get Set for Disaster Day,” BBC News, March 26, 2010
A prepper is “a person who goes to great lengths to prepare for a natural or man-made disaster.” The earliest citation is from 1999, says Word Spy.
Prepper is also British slang for a prep school student. Preppy refers to “a person whose manner and dress are deemed typical of traditional preparatory schools.” The word originated in the early 1960s, says the Online Etymology Dictionary.
Ragnarok
“The gods themselves looked forward to a time of defeat and death, when Asgard should perish in flames and the world with it, and the sun and moon should be darkened, and they themselves should be slain. This great day was called Ragnarok, or sometimes the Twilight of the Gods.”
William Morris, The Story of Sigurd the Volsung, 1922
Ragnarok is, in Norse mythology, “the final battle between gods and giants, involving all creation, which brings the end of the world as it is known and almost all life.” The word comes from the Old Norse ragna, “the gods,” and either rök, “destined end,” or rökr, “twilight.”
rapture
“There will be a resurrection followed by the millennium, 1,000 years of earthly paradise with Jesus ruling the world from Jerusalem. And just before the tribulation breaks out, there will be a ‘rapture’–the true believers will be snatched up to a position halfway between heaven and earth, where they will ride out the seven bad years.”
Robert McClory, “The Gospel According to Thomas Sheehan,” The Chicago Reader, April 20, 1989
The word rapture has multiple meanings, including “the state of being transported by a lofty emotion; ecstasy”; “an expression of ecstatic feeling”; “the transporting of a person from one place to another, especially to heaven.”
In the sense of “the transport of believers to heaven at the Second Coming of Christ,” rapture is short for rapture of the Church, according to the Oxford English Dictionary.
Rapture comes from the Latin rapere, “seize, carry off,”
survivalist
“Since August 1945, hundreds of ‘nuclear’ movies have appeared. At least one American ‘nuclear’ film was a work of genius (Dr. Strangelove). . . .But more often the fear of nuclear war in Hollywood spawned survivalist fantasies, irradiated-monster films and post-apocalypse thrillers.”
Greg Mitchell, “How Harry Truman Edited the First Hollywood Film About the Atomic Bomb,” The Huffington Post, August 4, 2010
A survivalist is “one who has personal or group survival as a primary goal in the face of difficulty, opposition, and especially the threat of natural catastrophe, nuclear war, or societal collapse.” This sense of the word originated in the mid 1980s.
[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by mikelehen]
Every week, we pose a challenge: using any word of the day from the week, create a perfect tweet, otherwise known as a twoosh. Here are our favorites from last week.
Remember that once a month we’re giving away Wordnik schwag to two randomly chosen players, to be announced the last Monday of the month, and as always, to get the word of the day, follow us on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or subscribe via email.
Photo by pasukaru76
It’s that time of year when we’re all running around getting last minute gifts for our loved ones, not-so-loved ones, co-workers, the mailman, the dog walker, the babysitter, and – exhausted yet?
Take a break and have some fun with 10 of our favorite words about gifts, tips, and bribes.
amatorio
“According to its decoration, this ‘ongaresca,’ or plate on a foot, represents what was known as an ‘amatorio,’ love gift. The hands clasped over flame indicate an acceptance and betrothal. Above the hands is a heart pierced with an arrow.”
Bulletin of the Art Institute of Chicago, January 1916
An amatorio is “a decorated vase, dish, bowl, or plate, intended or suitable for a love-gift.” The word comes from the Latin amare, “to love.”
The Ars armatoria, or The Art of Love, are a series of instructional books by Ovid, an ancient Roman poet. The books teach basic “male and female relationship skills and techniques.”
baksheesh
“The two boys were sent away happy, with a generous baksheesh or present, and the next day Kitty’s father sought out the kind-hearted jewel merchant and bought many a gem from his choice collection.”
St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, V. 5, April 1878
A baksheesh is “a gratuity, tip, or bribe paid to expedite service, especially in some Near Eastern countries.” The word came into English in the 17th century, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), and comes from the Persian word for “present.” Also bakshish.
cumshaw
“This the mafoo does with great pleasure, as, apart from the keen interest he takes in racing. . .it is an understood thing that he will receive a good cumshaw from his master for each race that his stable wins.”
Oliver G. Ready, Life and Sport in China, 1904
A cumshaw is “a present of any kind.” The word comes from Amoy, a Chinese Hokkien dialect now known as the Xiamen dialect. Cumshaw entered English in the 19th century, says the OED, and is an alteration of kam-sia, “a phrase of thanks by beggars.”
douceur
“A friend of mine, on leaving an hotel at Niagara, offered a douceur in the shape of half a dollar to one of [these chambermaids], but she drew herself up, and proudly replied, ‘American ladies do not receive money from gentlemen.’”
Isabella Bird, The Englishwoman in America, 1856
The word douceur can refer to “sweetness or mildness of manner”; “a kind or agreeable remark; a compliment”; or “a conciliatory offering; a present or gift; a reward; a bribe.”
According to the OED, douceur also refers to “a U.K. tax benefit given as an inducement to a person to sell something of historical value (esp. a work of art) by private treaty to a public collection in the U.K., rather than on the open market.” This sense originated around 1979.
Douceur comes from the Latin dulcis, “sweet,” which also gives us dulcet, “pleasing to the ear.”
étrenne
“I arrived here not long before 1st of January, and, on the morning of that day, a gentle tap at door of the room in which I was drew my attention, and when I desired the person who knocked to walk in, I was surprised by an unexpected visit from the young and pretty daughter of my landlord. . .of which, avec toute la grace francoise, she requested my acceptance as étrenne or New Year’s Gift.”
The European Magazine and London Review, July to December 1823
An étrenne is “a present; properly, a New-Year’s present.” The word is French and ultimately comes from the Latin strena, “favorable omen.”
handsel
“The first Monday of the New-Year has been long known in Scotland, more especially the northern half of the Lowlands, as Hansel-Monday, from the custom among people of the working class of asking or receiving gifts or handsel from their well-to-do neighbors, and from each other, on that day.”
“Auld Hansel-Monday,” Bruce Herald, March 28, 1890
The word handsel can refer to “a gift or token of good fortune or good will; especially, a New-Year’s gift,” as well as “a sale, gift, or delivery which is regarded as the first of a series,” such as “the first money taken in the morning in the way of trade; the first earnings of any one in a new employment or place of business; the first money taken in a shop newly opened; the first present sent to a young woman on her wedding-day, etc.”
The word ultimately comes from the Old Norse handsal, “legal transfer,” where hand means “hand” and sal, “a giving.”
handy-dandy
“It is clear that handy-dandy in this passage means a covert bribe or present, as, for instance, a bag conveyed to the judge’s hand which he was to open at leisure when he would find the contents satisfactory.”
William Langland, The Vision of William Concerning Piers Plowman, 1885
While handy-dandy is another way of saying “handy” or “useful,” an older meaning refers to “a bribe paid secretly,” as well as “a play of children in which something, as a pebble or a coin, is shaken between the hands of one, while another guesses which hand it is retained in.”
The Century Dictionary implies that the bribe sense comes from the children’s game. However, the OED cites a much earlier reference of the bribe meaning, the 14th century, while the first record of the game meaning is from the 16th century.
lagniappe
“We picked up one excellent word – a word worth traveling to New Orleans to get; a nice limber, expressive, handy word — ‘lagniappe.’ They pronounce it lanny-yap. . . .It is the equivalent of the thirteenth roll in a ‘baker’s dozen.’ It is something thrown in, gratis, for good measure.”
Mark Twain, Life on the Mississippi, 1906
A lagniappe is a chiefly Southern Louisiana and Mississippi word that means “a small gift presented by a storeowner to a customer with the customer’s purchase,” or “an extra or unexpected gift or benefit.”
The word is Louisiana French, coming from the American Spanish la ñapa, “the gift,” which may come from the Quechua yapay, “to give more.” The word attests to 1849, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary.
largess
“The deserted farmsteads no longer echo with the sounds of rural revelry; the cheerful log-fires no longer glow in the farmer’s kitchen; the harvest-home song has died away; and ‘largess’ no longer rewards the mummers and the morris-dancers.”
P.H. Ditchfield, Vanishing England, 1910
Largess is “liberality; generosity,” or “a liberal gift or donation; a present; a bounty bestowed.” The OED says that largess! is “a call for a gift of money, addressed to a person of relatively high position on some special occasion.” The word ultimately comes from the Latin largus, “abundant.” Also largesse.
pourboire
“After that, we came back to the Barriere de l’Etoile, where she gave me a good ‘pourboire‘ and got into a hackney coach, telling me to take the travelling carriage back to the man who lets such carriages in the Cour des Coches, Faubourg Saint-Honore.”
Honore De Balzac, The Lesser Bourgeoisie (The Middle Classes)
Pourboire is “money given as a gratuity; a tip,” and translates literally from the French as “for drinking.” The word came into English around 1788, according to the OED.
prezzie
“Giving VDay gifts to us is super easy. We like cool stuff. The Chumby you got us for our desk at work is the perfect Valentine’s Day prezzie.”
Adam Sachs, “An Open Letter to the Ladies on Valentine’s Day. . .From Some Dudes,” The Huffington Post, February 12, 2009
We promised 10 words but here’s an extra, a lexical lagniappe. Prezzie, a shortened form of present, is an alteration of the British English slang word, pressie. According to the OED, pressie originated in the 1930s. An earlier alteration is prez, which in American English now more commonly refers to a president. “Accept my little pres.” James Joyce, Ulysses.
[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by pasukaru76]
Hobbits, by loresui
We here are Wordnik are quite excited that The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey opens today. While we didn’t go as far as to don Hobbit ears and wizard caps and camp out in front of our favorite theater, we did gather 10 of our favorite journey words (not Journey words) right here.
booze cruise
“The head of the Massachusetts Port Authority resigned yesterday after it was learned that he went on a ‘booze cruise‘ paid for by his agency during which a woman bared her breasts.”
“‘Booze Cruise’ Flap Ousts Board Head,” Toledo Blade, August 19, 1999
In American English, booze cruise refers to “a recreational trip on a cruise ship or boat usually tailored to young people, with the expectation of heavy consumption of alcoholic beverages.” This meaning originated around 1979, according to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED).
The British English meaning, “a brief trip from Britain to France and/or Belgium in order to buy alcohol (or tobacco) in bulk quantities without paying excise duty,” is newer, coming about in the mid-1990s, says the OED.
The word booze comes from the Middle English bousen, “to drink to excess.”
jaunt
“Such a jaunt was a rare treat to the child, for Isabella Spencer seldom allowed her to go from home with anybody but herself.”
L.M. Montgomery, Further Chronicles of Avonlea
A jaunt is “a ramble; an excursion; a short journey, especially one made for pleasure.” An earlier definition was “tiresome journey,” says the Online Etymology Dictionary, and earlier than that was the verb sense, “tire a horse by riding back and forth on it.” The origin is unknown, perhaps coming from “some obscure Old French word.”
Jaunty, “having a buoyant or self-confident air” or “crisp and dapper in appearance,” has a different origin, coming from the French gentil, “nice,” which in Old French means “noble.”
junket
“Businesses are providing lavish junkets to little-known but highly-influential staff across swathes of the public sector, a Sunday Herald investigation can reveal.”
Paul Hutcheon and Tom Gordon, “Junket Scotland,” Herald Scotland, October 18, 2008
A junket is “a trip or tour,” especially “one taken by an official at public expense.” The word’s earliest meaning is “a basket made of rushes,” or a type of marsh plant; then, “curds mixed with cream, sweetened, and flavored,” and by extension, “any sweetmeat or delicacy.”
The meaning shifted in the 1520s, says the Online Etymology Dictionary, to “a feast or merrymaking; a convivial entertainment; a picnic.” The led to the sense of “pleasure trip,” and to the American English meaning, around 1886, of “tour by government official at public expense for no discernable public benefit.”
The word ultimately comes from the Latin iuncus, referring to the rush marsh plant. Iuncus also gives us junk, originally a nautical term meaning “old or condemned cable and cordage cut into small pieces,” perhaps named for its similarity in appearance to the reedy marsh plant.
milk run
“Tired of the same old ‘milk run‘ to work every morning? Try the ‘computer run.’”
“Coming Next, The Morning Computer Run,” The Milwaukee Sentinel, July 23 1966
A milk run is “a routine trip involving stops at many places,” as well as “an uneventful mission, especially a military sortie completed without incident.”
The phrase, which originated around 1909, seems to come from older milk round (1865), which, according to the OED, is “a fixed route on which milk is regularly collected from farmers or delivered to customers; a milk delivery business covering such routes.” Milk round gained the figurative meaning of “a series of (typically annual) visits to universities and colleges made by business representatives to recruit graduates.”
mush
“I just came in from a seventy-five mile ‘mush,’ but will start to-morrow for Chena. Nearly all our people are going or have gone. I have no dogs, but combine with two other fellows and pull our sleds.”
“The Assembly Herald,” Presbyterian Magazine
Mush, which is “used to command a team of dogs to begin pulling or move faster,” also refers to the journey itself, “especially by dogsled.” Earlier was the verb sense, “to trudge or travel through the snow, while driving a dog-sled.” The word may come from the French marcher, “to walk, go.”
peregrination
“After slipping among oozy piles and planks, stumbling up wet steps and encountering many salt difficulties, the passengers entered on their comfortless peregrination along the pier; where all the French vagabonds and English outlaws in the town (half the population) attended to prevent their recovery from bewilderment.”
Charles Dickens, Little Dorrit
A peregrination is “a traveling from one country or place to another; a roaming or wandering about in general; travel; pilgrimage.” The word ultimately comes from the Latin peregrinus, “from foreign parts, foreigner.” The first child born in Plymouth Colony was Peregrine White, where peregrine means “a foreign sojourner.”
sally
“Even a captain in war must know the special virtues and vices of the enemy: which nation is ablest to make a sudden sally, which is stouter to entertain the shock in open field, which is subtlest of the contriving of an ambush.”
Clare Howard, English Travellers of the Renaissance
A sally is “a run or excursion; a trip or jaunt; a going out in general,” and comes from the Latin salīre, “to leap.”
Sally, the proper name, is an alteration of Sarah. Sally Ann is a nickname for the Salvation Army.
sashay
“I fell down eleven steps into your garden, knocked on the front door, knocked on the side door, talked to some one called ‘Ma,’ talked to some one called ‘Lydia,’ and learned that Miss Martha Brunhilde Monroe was out for a sashay.”
Kathleen Thompson Norris, Martie, The Unconquered
Sashay, which has the more common meaning of “to walk or proceed, especially in an easy or casual manner,” or “to strut or flounce in a showy manner,” also refers to “an excursion; an outing.” The word is what the Online Etymology Dictionary calls a “mangled Anglicization” (manglicization?) of the French chassé, “gliding step.”
schlep
“This election season, Jewish grandchildren all over the United States are schlepping to crucial swing states such as Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Michigan to convince their grandparents to vote for Obama as part of The Great Schlep, a project of the Jewish Council for Education and Research.”
Nandini Balial, “Students ‘schlep’ To Sway Relatives To Obama,” CBS News, February 11, 2009
A schlep is “an arduous journey,” and is Yiddish in origin, coming from shlepn, “to drag, pull.” This sense of schlep entered English in the 1960s, says the OED.
walkabout
“When the royal couple arrived for a ‘walkabout‘ in some town and split up the street — Charles heading to one side, Diana to the other — people on Charles’ side of the street would groan audibly: they had wanted HER and got stuck with HIM.”
Pat Morrison, “Sarah Palin and Princess Diana,” The Huffington Post, September 12, 2008
Walkabout has multiple meanings associated with a journey: in Australia, “a temporary return to traditional Aboriginal life, taken especially between periods of work or residence in white society and usually involving a period of travel through the bush”; “a walking trip”; and, chiefly British, “a public stroll taken by an important person, such as a monarch, among a group of people for greeting and conversation.”
This last sense is the newest, originating around 1970, according to the OED, while the other senses are attested to the late 19th and early 20th centuries.
[Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 by loresui]
Television Eyeglasses, by James Vaughn
[Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 by James Vaughn]
Updated.
Welcome to Word Soup Wednesday, in which we bring you our favorite strange, obscure, unbelievable (and sometimes NSFW) words from sitcoms, dramas, news shows, and just about anything else on TV.
baldy house
Anthony Bourdain: “I gotta know: why do they call it a baldy house?”
Guide: “It was believed, sort of incorrectly, that if you shave a woman’s crotch bald, she’d be less likely to transmit crabs.”
“Philadelphia,” The Layover, December 3, 2012
A baldy house is a brothel and may be a play on bawdyhouse. Brothel comes from an Old English word meaning “to decay,” and at first referred to “a wretch” or “lewd man or woman.” Bawdy may come from a Welsh word meaning “mud.”
Belsnickel
Dwight: “What about an authentic Pennsylvania Dutch Christmas? Drink some gluhwein, enjoy some hossenfeffer. Enjoy Christmas with St. Nicholas’s rural German companion, Belsnickel?”
“Dwight Christmas,” The Office, December 6, 2012
Belsnickel is “a crotchety, fur-clad Christmas gift-bringer figure in the folklore of the Palatinate region of southwestern Germany,” and is “preserved in Pennsylvania Dutch communities.” The name comes from the German pelz, “to pelt,” and the name Nikolaus. See also Krampus.
filibuster
Shep Smith: “You know that one friend who just won’t let you get a word in edgewise? Well, the U.S. Senate has a friend like that. His name is filibuster.”
Jon Stewart: “And you know that one friend who comes to where you live and rearranges your stuff? Gerrymander.”
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, December 3, 2012
Filibuster is “the use of obstructionist tactics, especially prolonged speechmaking, for the purpose of delaying legislative action.” The word originally referred to “an adventurer who engages in a private military action in a foreign country,” specifically “the West Indian bucaneers or pirates of the seventeenth century.” Filibuster ultimately comes from the Dutch vrijbuiter, “pirate.”
flaneur
Woman: “The word ‘flaneur’ in French is just to kind of wander. Here it’s okay to just be a flaneur and to dream and to walk along and then stop in a cafe.”
“Paris,” The Layover, November 26, 2012
A flaneur is “an idle, gossiping saunterer; one who habitually strolls about idly.” The word is French in origin.
geophagy
Sabrina: “It’s called geophagy. I sense you have questions. Go ahead.”
Burt: “Do you wash your hands before you eat dirt? If it falls on the ground, is there a five second rule? Have you ever tried sand?”
“Squeak Means Squeak,” Raising Hope, December 4, 2012
Geophagy is “the eating of earthy substances, such as clay or chalk, practiced among various peoples as a custom or for dietary or subsistence reasons,” and is a combination of the Greek words for “earth” and “eat.”
Pica is “an abnormal craving or appetite for nonfood substances, such as dirt, paint, or clay,” and comes from the Latin word for magpie, “from its omnivorous nature.”
granny pod
Newscaster: “We’re checking out a business that makes granny pods. . . . They’re long term care housing options for the elderly. They’re portable. They can be set up right on your property, in your backyard if you want.”
The Colbert Report, December 3, 2012
Pod meaning “a casing or housing forming part of a vehicle” originated around 1950, says the Oxford English Dictionary. The earliest meaning was “in botany, a more or less elongated cylindrical or flatfish seed-vessel, as of the pea, bean, catalpa.”
guillotine
Anthony Bourdain: “Maurice and I catch up with a cold rosé and a snack called a guillotine, thin slices of bread with equally thin slices of meat and cheese. Simple and good.”
“Paris,” The Layover, November 26, 2012
The guillotine, “a device consisting of a heavy blade held aloft between upright guides and dropped to behead the victim below,” or “an instrument, such as a paper cutter, similar in action to a guillotine.”
The device was named for Joseph Guillotin, who “proposed, for humanitarian and efficiency reasons, that capital punishment be carried out by beheading quickly and cleanly on a machine.”
Perhaps the snack is named for the device that slices the meat, cheese, and bread.
hog maw
Kevin: “I love this hog mama.”
Phyllis: “Dwight said it’s hog maw.”
Kevin: “What’s maw?”
Phyllis: “It’s the lining of the stomach of the pig.”
“Dwight Christmas,” The Office, December 6, 2012
The maw of hog maw comes from the Old English maga, “stomach.” Hackin is “a pudding made in the maw of a sheep or hog,” and seems similar to haggis.
housewife
Jon Stewart: “[Congresswoman Candice Miller] will be the chair of the House Administration Committee, whose responsibilities apparently range from ‘making Congress more open and accessible’ to ‘ensuring the House runs efficiently and smoothly.’ So we’ve got a woman to be, to coin a phrase, the House wife.”
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, December 4, 2012
A housewife is “a woman who manages her own household as her main occupation.” The word hussy, “a woman considered brazen or immoral,” is an alteration of housewife, and originally had the same meaning, “the mistress of the house.”
hyperemesis gravidarum
Jon Stewart: “While morning sickness may be all right for commoners, the royals puke fancy.”
Newcaster: “[Kate Middleton is] suffering from what is called hyperemesis gravidarum.”
Jon Stewart: “Isn’t that the spell they used to defeat Voldemort?”
The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, December 6, 2012
Hyperemesis is “excessive vomiting” while gravidarum means “during pregnancy.” Gravid is a clinical term for being pregnant, and comes from the Latin gravis, “heavy.”
merkin
Guide: “They actually didn’t want the women to be shaven bald. That meant you were either underage or a prostitute. So they would make them wear crotch wigs.”
Anthony: “Crotch wigs known as a merkin. Why I know this, I don’t know.”
“Philadelphia,” The Layover, December 3, 2012
Merkin is probably an alteration of malkin, “a kitchen servant, or any common woman; a slattern,” or “a mop.”
rexie
Jake [regarding Marley]: “She hasn’t been eating. She’s been skipping lunch.”
Santana [to Kitty]: “Because you’ve been telling her to? You’ve been trying to turn her into a damned rexie?”
“Swan Song,” Glee, December 6, 2012
Rexie refers to someone who views having anorexia nervosa as attractive and admirable. A synonym is pro-ana, or pro-anorexia. Rexie may be a blend of anorexia and sexy.
vagenius
Sadie: “Schmidt, in my professional opinion, you have definitely earned the rank of, and I will use a phrase you coined, vagenius.”
“Eggs,” New Girl, November 27, 2012
Vagenius is a blend of vagina and genius, and refers to someone adept pleasuring a woman.
And on that note, that’s it for this week! If you notice any Word Soup-worthy words, let us know on Twitter with the hashtag #wordsoup.