Information about Neologisms

For the Wikipedia guideline, see Wikipedia:Avoid neologisms.

A neologism is a word, term, or phrase which has been recently created ("coined") — often to apply to new concepts, to synthesize pre-existing concepts, or to make older terminology sound more contemporary. Neologisms are especially useful in identifying inventions, new phenomena, or old ideas which have taken on a new cultural context. The term "e-mail", as used today, is an example of a neologism.

Etymology: Greek νεολογισμός [neologismos], from νέος [neos] new + λόγος [logos] word, speech, discourse + suffix -ισμός [-ismos] -ism

Neologisms are by definition "new", and as such are often directly attributable to a specific individual, publication, period or event. The term "neologism" was itself coined around 1800; so for some time in the early 19th century, the word "neologism" was itself a neologism.

Neologisms can also refer to an existing word or phrase which has been assigned a new meaning.

In psychiatry, the term is used to describe the creation of words which only have meaning to the person who uses them, independent of its common use meaning. It is considered normal in children, but a symptom of thought disorder indicative of a psychotic mental illness such as schizophrenia in adults. Usage of neologisms may also be related to aphasia acquired after brain damage resulting from a stroke or head injury. People with autism may also use neologisms.

In theology, a neologism is a relatively new doctrine (for example, rationalism). In this sense, a neologist is an innovator in the area of a doctrine or belief system, and is often considered heretical or subversive by the mainstream clergy or religious institution(s).

Changing culture

Neologisms tend to occur more often in cultures which are rapidly changing, and also in situations where there is easy and fast propagation of information. They are often created by combining existing words (see compound noun and adjective) or by giving words new and unique suffixes or prefixes. Those which are portmanteaux are shortened. Neologisms can also be created through abbreviation or acronym, by intentionally rhyming with existing words, or simply through playing with sounds.

Neologisms often become popular through memetics – by way of mass media, the Internet, word of mouth (including academic discourse, renowned for its jargon, with recent coinages such as Fordism, Taylorism, Disneyfication and McDonaldization now in everyday use). (See also Wiktionary's Neologisms:unstable or Protologism pages for a wiki venue of popularizing newly coined words). Every word in a language was, at some time, a neologism, ceasing to be such through time and acceptance.

Neologisms often become accepted parts of the language. Other times, however, they disappear from common usage. Whether a neologism continues as part of the language depends on many factors, probably the most important of which is acceptance by the public. Acceptance by linguistic experts and incorporation into dictionaries also plays a part, as does whether the phenomenon described by a neologism remains current, thus continuing to need a descriptor. It is unusual, however, for a word to enter common use if it does not resemble another word or words in an identifiable way. (In some cases, however, strange new words succeed because the idea behind them is especially memorable or exciting.) When a word or phrase is no longer "new," it is no longer a neologism. Neologisms may take decades to become "old," however. Opinions differ on exactly how old a word must be to no longer be considered a neologism; cultural acceptance probably plays a more important role than time in this regard.

Cultural acceptance

After being coined, neologisms invariably undergo scrutiny by the public and by language prescriptivists to determine their suitability to the language. Many are accepted very quickly; others attract opposition. Grammarians (as distinct from linguists) sometimes object to a neologism on the grounds that a suitable term for the thing described already exists in the language. Critics who dislike the neologism will use this argument, deriding the neologism as abuse and ignorance of the language.

Some neologisms, especially those dealing with sensitive subjects, are often objected to on the grounds that they obscure the issue being discussed, and that such a word's novelty often leads a discussion away from the root issue and onto a sidetrack about the meaning of the neologism itself.

Proponents of a neologism may see it as being useful, as helping the language to grow and change, as expressive, and/or as being a fun and creative way to play with a language. Also, the semantic precision of most neologisms, along with what is usually a straightforward syntax, often makes them easier to grasp by people who are not native speakers of the language.

The outcome of these debates, when they occur, has a great deal of influence on whether a neologism eventually becomes an accepted part of the language. Linguists may sometimes delay acceptance, for instance by refusing to include the neologism in dictionaries; this can sometimes cause a neologism to die out over time. Nevertheless if the public continues to use the term, it eventually sheds its status as a neologism and enters the language even over the objections of language experts.

Evolution of neologisms

Newly created words entering a language tend to pass through stages that can be described as:

• Unstable - Extremely new, being proposed, or being used only by a small subculture (also known as protologisms).
• Diffused - Having reached a significant audience, but not yet having gained widespread acceptance.
• Stable - Having gained recognizable and probably lasting acceptance.
• Dated - The point where the word has ceased holding novelty and has passed into cliché, formal linguistic acceptance, or become culturally dated in its use

Sources of neologism

For a list of topically arranged protologisms (very-recently-coined terms), see Wiktionary:List of protologisms by topic.

Science

Words or phrases created to describe new scientific hypotheses, discoveries, or inventions. Examples:

• beetle bank (early 1990s)
• black hole (1968)
• laser (1960)
• meme (1976)
• prion (1982)
• radar (1941)

Science fiction

Concepts created to describe new, futuristic ideas. Examples:

• ansible (1966)
• Dyson sphere (circa 1960)
• hyperspace (1934)
• phaser (1966)
• metaverse (1992)
• replicant (1982)
• ringworld (1971)
• robotics (1941)

Literature more generally

See "Neologisms in literature" topic below.

Politics

Words or phrases created to make some kind of political or rhetorical point, sometimes perhaps with an eye to the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis. Examples:

• blue state/red state/swing state (c. 2000)
• Californication (1970s)
• Chindia (2004)
• corporatocracy
• Dixiecrat (1948)
• dog-whistle politics (1990)
• fauxtography (2005)
• genocide (1943)
• heterosexism (1979)
• homophobia (1969)
• Islamophobia (1991)
• meritocracy (1958)
• NASCAR dad (2004)
• political correctness (1970)
• pro-choice (1975)
• pro-life (1961)
• Republicrat (1985)
• sie and hir (pronouns)
• soccer mom (1992)
• Islamofascism (2001)
• glocalisation

Pop-culture

Words or phrases evolved from mass media content or used to describe popular culture phenomena (these may be considered a variety of slang as well as neologisms). Examples:

• badonkadonk
• blog
• jumping the shark
• plus-size
• posterized (Note, however, that this word has also existed for some time as a term for an image-editing technique; its neologistic sports usage is completely unrelated.)
• prequel
• queercore
• wardrobe malfunction
• Internet
• webinar (web-based seminar)
• From "d'oh" to "cromulent" - many culturally-significant phrases from The Simpsons are now in common use.

Commerce and advertising

Genericised trademarks. Examples:

• aspirin
• crock pot
• laundromat
• linoleum
• kleenex
• etc.

Linguistics

Words or phrases created to describe new language constructs. Examples:

• aptronym (2003; popularized by Franklin Pierce Adams)
• backronym (1983)
• protologism (2005)
• retronym (popularized in 1980)
• snowclone (2004)

Other

Miscellaneous sources. Examples:

• nonce words — words coined and used only for a particular occasion, usually for a special literary effect.

A note about paleologisms

By contrast, a paleologism is (in this context) a word or phrase that is alleged to be a neologism but turns out to be a long-used (if obscure) term. An example is "truthiness" (which was "re-coined" as an ironic usage by Stephen Colbert).

Neologisms in literature

Many neologisms have come from popular literature, and tend to appear in different forms. Most commonly, they are simply taken from a word used in the narrative of a book; a few representative examples are: "grok" (to achieve complete intuitive understanding), from Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein; "McJob", from by Douglas Coupland; "cyberspace", from Neuromancer by William Gibson. Sometimes the title of the book will become the neologism, for instance, Catch-22 (from the title of Joseph Heller's novel). Also worthy of note is the case in which the author's name becomes the neologism, although the term is sometimes based on only one work of that author. This includes such words as "Orwellian" (from George Orwell, referring to his novel Nineteen Eighty-Four) and "Ballardesque" (from J.G. Ballard, author of Crash). Kurt Vonnegut's Cat's Cradle was the container of the Bokononism family of nonce words. Another category is words derived from famous characters in literature, such as "quixotic" (referring to the titular character in Don Quixote de la Mancha by Cervantes), a "scrooge" (from the main character in Dickens's A Christmas Carol), or a "pollyanna" (from Eleanor H. Porter's book of the same name).

Lewis Carroll's poem "Jabberwocky" has been called "the king of neologistic poems" as it incorporated some dozens of invented words. The early modern English prose writings of Sir Thomas Browne are the source of many neologisms as recorded by the OED.

Quotation

"Yesterday's neologisms, like yesterday's jargon, are often today's essential vocabulary."

– Academic Instincts, 2001[1]

See also

Buzzword Daffynition Doublespeak Dr. Seuss, author and renowned creator of neologisms Dysphemism Eponym Etymology Euphemism Jargon Newspeak

Malapropism Neologistic aesthetics Nonce word Onomatopoeia Portmanteau Propaganda Retronym Siamese twins (English language) Sniglet Word formation

References

External links

English

• Fowler, H.W., "The King's English," Chapter I. Vocabulary, Neologism, 2nd ed. 1908.

Information

• Root knowledge : The need for neologisms
• Neologism History & Evaluation
• International Dictionary of Literary Terms : Neologisms
• The Urban Dictionary : http://urbandictionary.com
• .

Wiktionary

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Indices

• The Rice University Neologisms Database 1998-2005
• The Internalational Dictionary of Neologisms
• Neologisms in Journalistic Text
• Lexicon of Neologism
• Internet Neologisms
• Neologisms in the Dictionaries of All-Consonant and All-Vowel Words
• wordspy.com
• Wordmint Blog
• unwords.com
• Collected by Rice University linguistics class, 2003
• It Figures-Figures of Speech
• Word Central a neologism project for children
• poor mallows An international single-purpose neologism project
• Coin your own word a German neologism project