January 24, 2013 by Angela Tung - 3 Comments

Lewis Carroll: Through the Looking-Glass, and What Words We Found There

Alice Through the Looking-Glass (1871)

This Sunday is the birthday of Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known as Lewis Carroll, the English mathematician and writer whose most famous works include Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, Through the Looking-Glass, and The Hunting of the Snark.

Such works featured Carroll’s specialty: coining blends and nonce words. We take a look at 10 of our favorites here.

boojum

“But oh, beamish nephew, beware of the day,
If your Snark be a Boojum! For then
You will softly and suddenly vanish away,
And never be met with again!”

Lewis Carroll, The Hunting of the Snark, 1876

The boojum is “a particularly dangerous variety of ‘snark,’” an imaginary creature of Carroll’s invention. The word boojum has inspired the naming of everything from “a species of tree. . .native to Baja California, Mexico” (found in 1922 by plant explorer Godfrey Sykes, who proclaimed, “It must be a boojum!”); to a supersonic cruise missile that “was determined to be too ambitious a project. . .and was canceled in 1951”; to “a geometric pattern sometimes observed on the surface of superfluid helium-3,” as named by physicist David Mermin in 1976.

chortle

“He chortled in his joy.”

Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, 1871

To chortle means “to exclaim exultingly, with a noisy chuckle.” According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), Carroll coined the word as a blend of chuckle and snort.

frabjous

“‘O frabjous day!’ rejoiced Emma Dean, using her bath towel as a scarf and performing a weird dance about the room.”

Jessie Graham Flower, Grace Harlowe’s Return to Overton Campus, 1915

Frabjous means “great, wonderful, fabulous,” and is a blend of either fabulous and joyous, or fair and joyous. “O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!” cries the narrator of The Jabberwocky upon learning that the Jabberwock has been slain.

galumph

“I struggle to keep up on an particularly cold winter evening as I galumph my way across rough downland in pursuit of a tour guide.”

Ian Vince, “Stonehenge Landscape Can Still Surprise with Its Stunning Vistas,” The Telegraph, January 14, 2010

Galumph means “to move heavily and clumsily,” and is a blend of gallop and triumph.

jabberwocky

“In theory, the pledge could do most of the same work if we had children say it in Anglo-Saxon or Arapaho, or if we replaced it with the lyrics to ‘Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.’ They’re going to turn the words into jabberwocky anyway.”

Geoff Nunberg, “I Pledge Allegiance to Linguistic Obfuscation,” NPR, March 30, 2010

The Jabberwocky is “a nonsensical poem that appears in Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll,” while the Jabberwock is “a fantastical dreaded monster with flaming eyes who is depicted” in the poem. Regarding the word itself, according to Carroll:

The Anglo-Saxon word ‘wocer’ or ‘wocor’ signifies ‘offspring’ or ‘fruit’. Taking ‘jabber’ in its ordinary acceptation of ‘excited and voluble discussion.’

Jabberwocky came to mean “nonsensical speech or writing” around 1908, says the OED.

mimsy

“I mean, their hair looks like it was designed on a Spirograph in the dark, then carelessly flopped on to them from atop a rickety step ladder, while their fans are all exactly the kind of mimsy mugginses who ‘Instagram’ pictures of wheelie bins to stick on their Tumblr, because, you know, it’s properly, like, photography, yeah?”

Gareth Aveyard, “This Week’s New Singles,” The Guardian, January 6, 2012

Mimsy was coined by Lewis Carroll in 1855 as a blend of miserable and flimsy. According to the OED, by 1880 mimsy also came to mean, in British English, “prim; careful; affected; feeble, weak, lightweight.” Mim is a much older word meaning “primly silent,” either imitative of the pursing up of the mouth, or coming from the Scottish Gaelic min, “delicate, meek.”

portmanteau word

“Portmanteau words are now a staple of the magazine competition, and amid the waste of failed invention, every so often one meets a need: smog, stagflation, chocoholic. I don’t know how we ever did without ‘metrosexual’, coined by my friend Mark Simpson.”

Philip Hensher, “Sarah Palin’s Struggle with the English Language,” The Telegraph, July 21, 2010

A portmanteau word is “a word formed by merging the sounds and meanings of two different words.” A portmanteau is “a case used in journeying for containing clothing,” and comes from the French porter, “to carry,” plus manteau, “cloak.”

Carroll coined portmanteau word in 1882 based on the idea of “two meanings packed up into one word,” says the Online Etymology Dictionary.

slithy

“Hearing these slithy and suggestive movements, I declined to remain any longer ignorant of their meaning.”

Ernest Raymond, Tell England: A Study in Generation, 1922

In 1855, Carroll combined slimy and lithe to form this nonce word. However, slithy as a variation of sleathy, “slovenly, careless,” has been around since 1622, says the OED.

snark

“The Snark was one of that strange man’s imaginary animals, but when novelist Heidi Julavitz used the word to describe unpleasantly critical book reviewers in her indifferently researched 2005 McSweeney’s magazine article, the word gained, as they say, ‘traction.’”

Bob Hoover, “Hunting Snarks with a Pop Gun,” Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, January 18, 2009

Snark referring to “an imaginary animal” was coined by Carroll in 1876 in his poem, The Hunting of the Snark, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary. In the 1950s, snark was the “name of a type of U.S. cruise missile and in 1980s of a type of sailboat.”

The word snark also has the meaning of “to snore; to snort,” which originated about 10 years before Carroll’s imaginary animal, according to the OED. This gave rise to snarky, “rudely sarcastic or disrespectful; snide,” or “irritable or short-tempered; irascible,” around 1906, which gives us snark‘s modern meaning of “snide remarks.”

vorpal

“Because, really, there’s nothing more grandiose and theatrical than the vorpal blade. It’s the weapon of dueling gentlemen and swashbuckling adventurers, of knights in armor and the horse lords of Rohan.”

Daniel Engber, “Nerd Violence,” Slate, January 3, 2011

Vorpal meaning “sharp or deadly” was coined by Carroll in 1871. In the role-playing game Dungeons and Dragons, the vorpal sword is a sword “capable of decapitation, specifically through magical means,” which aligns with the plot of The Jabberwocky:

One, two! One, two! And through and through
The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!
He left it dead, and with its head
He went galumphing back.

[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by Cea.]

January 17, 2013 by Angela Tung

To Catch Some Thief Words

Fullerton Patrolman Ernest E. Garner with bank robbers, Fullerton, 1927

A recent New Yorker piece, A Pickpocket’s Tale, gives a fascinating portrait of Apollo Robbins, an expert in “theatrical pickpocketing.” The article is also chock-full of equaling fascinating pickpocket lingo, such as skinning the poke (“removing the cash from a stolen wallet and wiping it off before tossing it”), kissing the dog (“the mistake of letting a victim see your face”), and working single o (working without a pickpocket crew).

After reading the article, we were so ~~obsessed~~ inspired, we decided to take a closer look at even more thief words. Here are our favorites.

Adam Tiler

“Why, an autem diver is a pickpocket who practises in a church, and an Adam tiler his associate, who receives his booty, and runs off with it.”

Tales of My Father, and My Friends, 1823

An Adam Tiler is “a pickpocket’s accomplice, who takes the stolen goods and leaves with them.” According to the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), the term originated in the 1660s and comes from Adam, “the name of the first man,” and tiler, slang for “pickpocket.”

busk

“We would all have 36 hours to blag, beg and busk our way around the globe.”

“Taking liberties: a jailbreak to San Diego,” The Guardian, April 15, 2011

Busk meaning “to earn a livelihood by going about singing, playing, and selling ballads” may come from another meaning of the word, “to cruise as a pirate.” The word itself may come from the obsolete French busquer, “to prowl.”

ferret

“McCain employs a staffer known as the ‘ferret’ to find and expose pork-barrel provisions tucked away in major legislation.”

Evan Thomas, “Senator Hothead,” Newsweek, February 20, 2000

The word ferret has multiple meanings, the earliest of which is “a weasellike, usually albino mammal (Mustela putorius furo) related to the polecat and often trained to hunt rats or rabbits.” The word comes from the Vulgar Latin fūrittus, diminutive of Latin fūr, “thief.”

Ferret took on a figurative meaning around 1600, according to the OED, “to hunt after; to worry,” with the earliest recorded usage in Shakespeare’s Henry V: ” Ile Fer him, and ferit him, and ferke him.“ Ferret also means “to drive out, as from a hiding place”; “to uncover and bring to light by searching”; or “to search intensively.”

furuncle

“The word carbuncle, in Latin means live coal, and in Greek, anthrax signifies the same thing. While furuncle in Latin stands for thief or knave, pathologically it is synonymous with the term boil, which is too well known to require a definition.”

The Medical Summary, March 1915

Furuncle, “a circumscribed inflammation of the skin, forming a necrotic central core, and suppurating and discharging the core; a boil,” comes from the Latin fūrunculus, “knob on a vine that ‘steals’ the sap. Fūrunculus is diminutive of fūr, “thief.”

grift

“Like junkies, they’re hooked on the grift–it gives them an almost sexual rush–but they keep telling themselves they can pull out whenever they want and go straight.”

David Ansen, “Con-Artist Classic,” Newsweek, February 3, 1997

Grift refers to “money made dishonestly, as in a swindle”; “a swindle or confidence game”; or “to engage in swindling or cheating.” The word originated around 1906, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary, and may be a corruption of graft, “dishonest gain acquired by private or secret practices or corrupt agreement or connivance,” or “a business, process, place of concourse, or office, in or at which dishonest gain, by corruption or direct thieving, may be acquired.”

gun moll

“‘A dip—pickpocket—and his girl, or gun-moll, as they call them,’ translated Kennedy. ‘One of their number has evidently been picked up by a detective and he looks to them for a good lawyer, or mouth-piece.’”

Arthur B. Reever, The Dream Doctor, 1914

A gun moll is “the girlfriend of a gangster.” Gun here doesn’t refer to the weapon but is from gonif, slang for “thief.” Gonif is Yiddish in origin, coming from the Hebrew gannabh, “thief.” Moll comes from the “nickname of Mary, used of disreputable females since early 1600s.”

keister

“President Reagan has apologized to a freshman congressman for using the word ‘keister‘ to describe the human posterior.”

“President apologizes for ‘keister,'” The Pittsburgh Press, September 13, 1983

Keister became slang for “buttocks” in the 1930s, says the OED. The earliest meaning of the word is “suitcase, satchel” (1882), and in 1913 came to mean “a strong-box in a safe.” The Online Etymology Dictionary says that the word may come from the “British dialect kist (northern form of chest) or its German cognate Kiste ‘chest, box,” and the connection to “buttocks” may be via the “pickpocket slang sense of ‘rear trouser pocket’ (1930s).”

prat

“Topping a poke: If the wallet is hidden in a rear pocket, the pickpocket pushes it up from the bottom of the prat until it is visible, then either ‘pinches,’ ‘forks,’ or ‘spears’ it.”

“Know How They Do It So You’re Not ‘Dipped,‘” The News and Courier, September 7, 1987

Prat is another word for “buttocks,” originating in the 1560s as criminal slang. Around 1914 the word entered U.S. criminal slang as “hip pocket,” and around 1968, in British slang as “contemptible person.”

Prat-digging is “the action of stealing for a hip pocket,” says the OED.

smart aleck

“This reminds us of the time a smart-aleck friend told us the word ‘gullible’ wasn’t in the dictionary.”

James Taranto, “Blago-What? Never Heard of Him,” The Wall Street Journal, December 10, 2008

Smart aleck (which is sometimes hyphenated) refers to “a person regarded as obnoxiously self-assertive,” or “an impudent person.” The word may come from Aleck Hoag, a “19th-century American confidence man and thief.”

According to Wordorigins, “Hoag and his wife Melinda operated several confidence games where Melinda would pose as a prostitute and Aleck would rob the johns of their valuables.” Hoag would then pay off police to escape arrest.

velociraptor

“At about this time last year I wrote a column on Mike Novacek, whom I believed was the American Museum of Natural History’s chief dinosaur hunter, expert, velociraptor whisperer—whatever the term of art is for the big buana, the institution’s primo paleontologist.”

Ralph Gardner Jr., “The Coolest Dude Alive,” The Wall Street Journal, June 28, 2011

A velociraptor is “a small active carnivore that probably fed on protoceratops; possibly related more closely to birds than to other dinosaurs.” The word originated around 1924, says the Online Etymology Dictionary, and comes from the Latin velox, “swift,” plus raptor, “robber.”

The oviraptor, another type of dinosaur, comes from the Latin for “egg thief,” due to “the fact that the first fossil specimen was discovered atop a pile of what were thought to be Protoceratops eggs.” However, it was found that “the eggs in question probably belonged to Oviraptor itself, and that the specimen was actually brooding its eggs.”

Can’t get enough? Check out our post on Breaking Bad words, Drugs, Thieves, and Special Sauce, and these lists: A Swell Mob, A Whiz Mob, and The Grifters.

[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by Orange County Archives]

January 16, 2013 by Angela Tung

Word Soup Wednesday: BOGO, green fairy, lion’s head

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.

BOGO

Virginia: “I’ll also be using this 20% off store coupon, which I will then combine with a BOGO.”

“The Last Christmas,” Raising Hope, December 11, 2012

BOGO is an acronym that stands for “buy one get one (free).” A synonym is twofer, “a coupon offering two items, especially tickets for a play, for the price of one.”

cliffpocalypsemageddonacaust

Jon Stewart: “Ladies and gentlemen, the fiscal cliff! It’s the subject of tonight’s cliffpocalypsemageddonacaust, our nation’s totally solvable budget problem.”

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, November 29, 2012

Cliffpocalypsemageddonacaust is blend of cliff of fiscal cliff, apocalypse, armageddon, and holocaust. For more end-of-the-world words, check out Arnold Zwicky’s apocalypse posts.

An example of champlevé

[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by John Hritz]

champlevé

Appraiser: “And while I’m on that subject, I want to point out that this is not cloisonné, as a lot of people call it, this is champlevé.”

“Corpus Christi, Texas,” Antiques Roadshow, January 14, 2013

Champlevé refers to enamelware which has “the ground originally cast with depressions, or engraved or cut out, or lowered.” According to the Antiques Roadshow appraiser, to create champlevé, artisans “scooped the brass hollow and melted the enamel into the hollow,” as opposed to to cloisonné, “where they build up the channels and then melt the enamel down into that.”

This word is French in origin, coming from champ, “field,” and levé, “raised.”

Special thanks to @RoadshowPBS for their help with this word.

coddle

Anthony Bourdain: “What is coddle?”
Guide: “It’s like a peasant food, the leftovers, things like bacon and potato and sausage. It’s pretty much mixed it all together in a stew.”

“Dublin,” The Layover, January 7, 2013

Coddle is “an Irish dish consisting of layers of roughly sliced pork sausages and rashers (thinly sliced, somewhat fatty back bacon) with sliced potatoes and onions.” The name comes from the verb meaning of coddle, “to boil gently; seethe; stew, as fruit.”

disco nap

Gloria [who was falling asleep at dinner]: “Just a little disco nap.”

“New Year’s Eve,” Modern Family, January 9, 2012

A disco nap is “a nap you take before going to a party or going out dancing.” We couldn’t find the origin of disco nap. If anyone has any information, let us know!

ghillie suit

Stephen Colbert: “I’m getting ready for that dark tomorrow when jack-booted government thugs come for our guns. That’s where this ghillie suit comes in.”

The Colbert Report, January 15, 2013

A ghillie suit is “a type of overall covered in torn cloth sheds, used as camouflage by hunters and military snipers.” Ghillie comes from the Scottish gille, “servant” or a “lad.”

The Green Fairy

[Photo: CC BY-SA 2.0 by James Vaughn]

green fairy

Nick: “That is not creme de menthe. That is the green fairy right there.”
Angie: “It’s absinthe.”

“Cabin,” New Girl, January 8, 2013

Absinthe is nicknamed the green fairy because of its “opaline-green color” and the hallucinations that result from excessive use. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, green fairy is a translation from the French fée verte.

lion’s head

Anthony Bourdain: “Or Mandarin lion’s head with brown sauce, which is not lion by the way. They’re giant pork meatballs.”

“Atlanta,” The Layover, January 14, 2013

Lion’s head is a direct translation from the Chinese, shi zi tou, and is named for the food’s resemblance to “the head of the lion and the cabbage (or other vegetables), which is supposed to resemble the lion’s mane.”

peameal bacon

Anthony Bourdain: “What is peameal [bacon]?”
Guide: “Basically pork loin that’s been rolled in cornmeal.”

“Toronto,” The Layover, December 17, 2012

Peameal bacon originated in Canada. The name comes from “the historic practice of rolling the cured and trimmed boneless loin in dried and ground yellow peas, originally for preservation reasons,” but now is “rolled in ground yellow cornmeal.”

souse

Anthony Bourdain: “And souse, something any chef would be proud to have on the menu, especially this good.”

“Atlanta,” The Layover, January 14, 2013

Souse refers to “something kept or steeped in pickle; especially, the head, ears, and feet of swine pickled.” The word comes from the Old French souz, sous, “pickled meat.”

stackable

Virginia: “I have half off from the manufacturer, which is stackable.”
Barney: “That means she can combine them with other coupons.”

“The Last Christmas,” Raising Hope, December 11, 2012

Stackable is coupon lingo, which also includes blinkie, a type of coupon distributed by a machine that blinks a light to catch shoppers’ attention; catalina, a coupon that’s printed with the shopper’s receipt, named for the company that makes the coupons; and peelie, a peel-off coupon.

December 27, 2012 by Angela Tung - 3 Comments

The Words of Rudyard Kipling

Photo by ketrin1407

This Sunday marks the 147th anniversary of the birth of British writer Rudyard Kipling. The author of The Jungle Book was highly prolific, penning numerous short stories and poems, and three novels. Along the way, he coined and popularized quite a few words. Here are 10 of our favorites.

“’Tisn’t beauty, so to speak, nor good talk necessarily. It’s just It. Some women’ll stay in a man’s memory if they once walked down a street.”

Rudyard Kipling, Traffics and Discoveries, 1904

Kipling’s is the earliest recorded use of it meaning “sex appeal (especially in a woman).” The term was later popularized by British novelist and scriptwriter Elinor Glyn in her 1927 novel, It. Glyn went on to help “make a star of actress Clara Bow for whom she coined the sobriquet ‘the It girl’.”

just-so story

“But these days, some of the most frequent and pungent disparagements of Kipling have been delivered not by defenders of political correctness, or even by the gatekeepers of literary greatness, but by, of all people, biologists, for whom ‘just-so story’ has become a phrase of opprobrium.”

David P. Barash and Judith Eve Lipton, “How the Scientist Got His Ideas,” The Chronicle Review, January 3, 2010

A just-so story is “a story that cannot be proven or disproven, used as an explanation of a current state of affairs.” The phrase comes from Kipling’s Just-So Stories, “fictional and deliberately fanciful tales for children, in which the stories pretend to explain animal characteristics, such as the origin of the spots on the leopard.”

kissage

“Ere they hewed the Sphinx’s visage
Favoritism governed kissage,
Even as it does in this age.”

Rudyard Kipling, Departmental Ditties and Barrack Room Ballads, 1922

Kissage, another word for kissing, may have regained popularity from its usage in a 1998 episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer: “It’s like, freeze frame. Willow kissage – but I’m not gonna kiss you.”

grinch

“It’s woe to bend the stubborn back
Above the grinching quern,
It’s woe to hear the leg bar clack
And jingle when I turn!”

Rudyard Kipling, “The Lament of the Border Cattle Thief,” Ballads and Barrack-Room Ballads, 1897

Grinch in this context means “to make a harsh grating noise,” says the Oxford English Dictionary, and may be related to the French grincer, “to grate, creek, screech.”

Related to grincer is grincheux, a cranky person. Some speculate that Theodor Geisel, aka Dr. Seuss, may have been influenced by grincheux when coming up with the name of that ultimate holiday killjoy.

old-school tie

“After which, it is only fair to tell you that I tied up my platoon on parade this morning owing to an exalted mentality which for the moment (I was thinking over the moral significance of Old School ties and the British social fabric) prevented me from distinguishing between my left hand and my right.”

Rudyard Kipling, Limits and Renewals, 1932

Old-school tie refers to “a necktie that has the colors of a British public school”; “the upper-middle-class solidarity and system of mutual assistance attributed to alumni of British public schools”; and “the narrow clannish attitudes characteristic of the members of a clique.”

Old school, meaning “of the old school; of earlier times; as originally or formerly established, propounded, or professed; old or old-fashioned,” is much older, originating around 1749, according to the Online Etymology Dictionary.

overseas

“All things considered, there are only two kinds of men in the world—those that stay at home and those that do not. The second are the most interesting. Some day a man will bethink himself and write a book about the breed in a book called ‘The Book of the Overseas Club,’ for it is at the clubhouses all the way from Aden to Yokohama that the life of the Outside Men is best seen and their talk is best heard.”

Rudyard Kipling, Letters of Travel, 1920

Kipling’s usage is the earliest recorded of this meaning of overseas: “of, relating to, originating in, or situated in countries across the sea.”

Overseas Chinese refers to “a person or people of Chinese ethnicity, living in a non-Chinese country.” Overseas experience, says the OED, is either “experience of life and culture in an overseas country,” or a New Zealand term for “an overseas working holiday, usually to Britain or Europe, undertaken by young New Zealanders and freq. considered as a virtually obligatory part of an informal education.”

penny-farthing

“Remembering what she had done, it was pleasant to watch her unhappiness, and the penny-farthing attempts she made to hide it from the Station.”

Rudyard Kipling, Plain Tales from the Hills, 1888

Penny-farthing, or pennyfarthing, meaning “ineffective,” was formed by combining penny and farthing, “an English piece of money equal to one fourth of a penny,” says the Online Etymology Dictionary, “the two together making but a small sum.”

Penny-farthing, “an early bicycle having a large front wheel and much smaller rear one” (perhaps named for the different sizes of the coins), came about later in 1927.

slack-jawed

“Look you, I have noticed in my long life that those who eternally break in upon Those Above with complaints and reports and bellowings and weepings are presently sent for in haste, as our Colonel used to send for slack-jawed down-country men who talked too much.”

Rudyard Kipling, Kim, 1901

Slack-jawed means “with the mouth in an open position and the jaw hanging loosely, especially as indicating bewilderment or astonishment,” or “unsophisticated or unthinking; dimwitted in appearance.”

Cletus Spuckler, aka “Cletus the Slack-Jawed Yokel,” is a stereotypical redneck character on the animated TV series, The Simpsons.

squiggly

“The squiggly things on the Parsee’s hat are the rays of the sun reflected in more-than-oriental splendour, because if I had real rays they would have filled up all the picture.”

Rudyard Kipling, Just So Stories, 1907

Squiggly may come from the older squiggle, which originally meant “to work wavy or intricate embroidery,” according to the OED, before it came to mean, more commonly, “to squirm and wriggle,” or “to move about like an eel.”

Svengali

“’I’m glad Zvengali‘s back where he belongs.”

Rudyard Kipling, A Diversity of Creatures, 1917

A Svengali is “a person who, with evil intent, tries to persuade another to do what is desired,” and is named for Svengali, “the hypnotist villain” in the 1894 novel Trilby by George du Maurier.

Kipling’s is the first recorded figurative use of Svengali. In the quote, the speaker is referring to “a dog with a mesmeric stare,” says the OED.

[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by ketrin1407]

December 26, 2012 by Angela Tung

Best of Word Soup 2012: TV Word Love

bob's television dream, by Robert Couse-Baker

Welcome to the first annual Wordnik Word Soup Awards!

All year we’ve been collecting interesting, hilarious, ridiculous, and sometimes NSFW words from TV, and now it’s time to award the best of the best.

Best Use of a Grammar Term on the Comedy Channel

The Daily Show with Jon Stewart, anaphor

“You didn’t build that,” proclaimed President Obama during a campaign speech this July, but that wasn’t all he said. Unfortunately, as Stewart stated, by saying “you didn’t build that,” Obama created confusion by “using the demonstrative singular pronoun, ‘that’ instead of the plural anaphor, ‘those,’ which of course would be referring to the antecedent, ‘roads and bridges’,” all of which promptly gave Stewart a grammar wedgie.

Best Use of a Controversial Word on a Comedy

30 Rock, transvaginal

Some states have tried to make transvaginal ultrasounds required for women having abortions. “You’re being so transvaginal right now,” Liz told Jack regarding his invasiveness about her decision to adopt or remain childless.

Best Made-Up German Word

Perfektenschlage, The Office

Fans of The Office know that Dwight Schrute is of German ancestry, and according to Dunder Mifflin’s top salesman, Perfektenschlage is “when everything in a man’s life comes together perfectly.” The second meaning is “perfect pork anus.”

Runner-up: Bildenkinder, for landlords, the feeling that building residents are like biological children.

Best Use of a French Swear Word

Mad Men, calice

Megan uttered this Québécois French swear word when her surprise birthday party for Don was spoiled. According to Slate, calice “has its origins in Roman Catholic ritual—it’s the communion chalice.”

Best Eponym

Ferris Buellerian, Community

This was a tough decision. There was 30 Rock’s normal-Al, the opposite of Weird Al, and their equally hilarious reverse-Urkel, to de-nerdify a black nerd. In the end we went with Community’s Ferris Buellerian – “Winger’s critics suggest he merely improvised hot-button patriotic dogma in a Ferris Buellerian attempt to delay school work” – a unique usage of the hooky-playing character.

Best Name for a Made-Up Rebel Movement

Sanguinista, True Blood

We found Sanguinista to be a clever and appropriate name for a faction of rebel vampires. The word is a blend of sanguine, “bloodthirsty; bloody,” and Sandinista of the Sandinista National Liberation Front.

Runner-up: Lauffeuer, Grimm. Lauffeuer translates from the German as “wildfire.”

Best Made-Up Psychological Disorder

accusational opposition disorder, Community

Leave it to psych major Britta to come up a pseudo-psych term for disagreeing or arguing with someone. The runner-up is also from Community: hypernarcissosis, excessive narcissism or love and admiration for oneself, which apparently plagues the vain Jeff Winger.

Most Ridiculous Portmanteau

unwindulax, 30 Rock

“We’re just camping out and unwindulaxing,” says one of Jenna’s fans. In October, we noted that the word is a blend of unwind and relax, but where does that ‘u’ come from? Who knows and who cares? Just unwindulax and enjoy the word.

Best Use of Portmanteaus – TIE

The Colbert Report and The Daily Show with Jon Stewart

The Stewart and Colbert “puninator” was hard at work this year what with generating a proliferation of puns, portmeanteaus, and blends.

There was sanitipsy, a blend of sanitizer and tipsy, based on a report that teens drink hand sanitizer to get drunk; assassitunity, using the assassination of Osama bin Laden as a PR opportunity; gaffestronomist, those who measure political gaffes “using the exact science of gaffestronomy,” according to Stewart; and many more.

Best Show for Eggcorns

Raising Hope

An eggcorn is a malapropism that makes sense to the speaker, and Virginia of Raising Hope is the Queen of the Eggcorn. “I was immediately inquizzical of this mystery,” she has said. What’s the doctor who examines ladyparts? A vaginacologist of course. And that thing that repeats itself by one’s own doing? “A self-refilling prophecy,” says Virginia.

Most Educational Show About Current Events That Wasn’t The Daily Show or The Colbert Report

The Newsroom

Sure, The Newsroom was maddening in a lot of ways (all that yelling, for instance), but we did learn a thing or two. We learned that EKIA stands for “Enemy Killed in Action,” and that RINO isn’t an ungulate but a “Republican in Name Only.” We learned about the Glass-Steagall Act and the story behind the greater fool. Now if only Aaron Sorkin would learn to stop calling women girls.

Best Made-Up Sex Slang

30 Rock

This is the semi-NSFW part. While a nooner for some means sex at lunchtime, for Liz Lemon it means “having pancakes for lunch.” Normalling is a fetish for kinky Jenna and Paul: behaving like a “normal” couple. A sexual walkabout is like a walkabout only while, um, “doing every depraved thing [one] can think of with as many people as [one] can,” according to Jenna.

Bang brothers are men who have slept with the same woman (see also Eskimo brothers). Pokemoning means having a wide variety of lovers, as in the video game in which one must collect “all of the available Pokémon species.” A synonym is Great Escaping. Finally, a sex-idiot is is an intellectually challenged yet attractive person used for the sole purpose of having sex.

What are some of your choices for noteworthy words from TV?

[Photo: CC BY 2.0 by Robert Couse-Baker]

December 20, 2012 by Angela Tung

Words for the Apocalypse Now (Or Later)

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]

December 17, 2012 by Angela Tung

Giving Words: Gifts, Tips, and Bribes

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]