re: A Kind Request For English Nonce-Words Made By Prefixes!? page 2

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re: A Kind Request For English Nonce-Words Made By Prefixes!? page 2

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Guys, I'm writing my MA thesis about novel formations (so-called nonce words) in both Polish and English, and since I'm Polish I cannot come up with English examples just as freely as I 'produce' Polish words. What I am exactly looking for are words which are possible in English, yet they do not appear in dictionaries and are limited to only creative language users, or they do not appear at all.

So, all ye dear native speakers of the English language wherever you roam, please, use your imagination and create me a few words so I can handle my share, finish the studies and enter the real world.

I'm not looking for compound as I can find thousands of them while sailing the Internet. I need words made by affixation, preferably prefixation as they are harder to think of. I have words like: regoogle or overspammed, which are not established words, yet they can be produced and understood by other speakers and they are produce by productive affixes of English, -re and -over respectively.

I need also words made by suffixes but not that badly as I need prefixed ones. My suffixed words are for example: onlyness, rainlessness, gamblinest, cutesiest.

I'm sure that you can think of or have heard some interesting words, and possibly some that don't have much to do with computers

If need be, I will update the post so it doesn't go down unnoticed.

I'll be most grateful for any examples you give me!!!

Thank you,
Michal

Feb 20 2009 12:45:44

Comments (Page 2)

Just came across another one in a post on a political blog:
Now that I think of it, Senator Shelby, I haven't seen your birth certificate. Is natural-bornedness and citizenship a requirement for your office?[italics mine]

It seems to me that these words, at least in English, are usually created in a somewhat mocking spirit. Sometimes playful mockery, and sometimes more biting. I'll have to check the books on my shelf, but Tom Wolfe springs to mind as a writer who is given to this kind of thing.

No need to thank me -this is really fun. Like a language scavenger hunt. And yes, the piano is my daughter's major instrument, but she also plays in a percussion ensemble and plays French horn well enough to march in the school band, if no better. This summer she wants to take viola lessons

Feb 22 2009 18:42:38

I think I've found another nonce word - it's not in Webster's, at any rate. "Anonymised," meaning to make anonymous.

A new nationwide study (pdf) of anonymised credit-card receipts from a major online adult entertainment provider finds little variation in consumption between states.

Link

Feb 27 2009 23:33:59

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That'll do nicely, thanks

I got a question concerning non-resembling. Supposing you were not linguistically creative, how would you paraphrase this? Is not resembling used then or do you normally use resemble as a verb, as in "The boys don't resemble each other".

And btw: would that be okay to say: these not resembling boys instead of non-resembling boys?
Because the first option sounds kind of weird to my unnative (is there such a word?

) ear, just as ifnon-resembling had hidden "each other" in itself which not resembling lacks. So: these not resembling each other boys = these non-resembling boys.... If I'm talking nonsense, just say it.

Thanks

Feb 28 2009 08:34:39

I don't think "not resembling" is technically ungrammatical, but the use of resemble as a verb is certainly more common and sounds much more natural.
"Non-resembling" doesn't imply "each other." You'd still need a noun.

There is a contest for cakes resembling important landmarks. Gina is entering a creation that resembles the Eiffel Tower.
Gosh, I just baked Jim's birthday cake. Maybe I could enter that.
What does his cake resemble?
It's a non-resembling cake, I'm afraid. Just an ordinary round one. It has six layers with dark chocolate filling. Maybe I could stick a toy dinosaur in it and say it's supposed to resemble the La Brea tar pits.

Feb 28 2009 19:06:51

Okay, here I am again. We had another couple to dinner last night and I noted two nonce-words, one from me and one from a guest.
First - I was talking about a man who had broken up with his long-time girlfriend and describing how he'd told us about it. I said, "And then he said - I can't remember the exact phrase he used, but something assholey."
Another noun + y formation I thought of just now is a term you hear a lot on fashion and home decorating TV shows, "matchy-matchy ." ("If we use the plaid for the curtains, we should use something else for the bedspread and then yet another fabric for the chair. We don't want it to be too matchy-matchy.")
Second from last night - I asked the guests, who live fairly nearby, if they'd walked or driven to our house. I said, "When I saw you coming up the front walk, you were walking with so much verve." The husband of the other couple replied, "If we'd walked all the way from our house, we would have been pretty verveless by the time we got here, believe me."

Mar 01 2009 15:10:56

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Thank you for the new bunch of words. I need to ask you a question - what do you make out of bornedness? How come the -ed- is there? Thanks in advance!

Mar 07 2009 14:16:46

I think the -ed is there to make the word sound more awkward and hence funnier. Also, of course the correct word is "born," so "borned" sounds like something an ignorant person would say, again making it a bit funnier.

Mar 08 2009 21:51:14

Thank you, Del!

Mar 09 2009 19:10:06

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Just came across another one in a post on a political blog:
Now that I think of it, Senator Shelby, I haven't seen your birth certificate. Is natural-bornedness and citizenship a requirement for your office?[italics mine]

It seems to me that these words, at least in English, are usually created in a somewhat mocking spirit. Sometimes playful mockery, and sometimes more biting. I'll have to check the books on my shelf, but Tom Wolfe springs to mind as a writer who is given to this kind of thing.

No need to thank me -this is really fun. Like a language scavenger hunt. And yes, the piano is my daughter's major instrument, but she also plays in a percussion ensemble and plays French horn well enough to march in the school band, if no better. This summer she wants to take viola lessons
I think I've found another nonce word - it's not in Webster's, at any rate. "Anonymised," meaning to make anonymous.

A new nationwide study (pdf) of anonymised credit-card receipts from a major online adult entertainment provider finds little variation in consumption between states.

Link
That'll do nicely, thanks

I got a question concerning non-resembling. Supposing you were not linguistically creative, how would you paraphrase this? Is not resembling used then or do you normally use resemble as a verb, as in "The boys don't resemble each other".

And btw: would that be okay to say: these not resembling boys instead of non-resembling boys?
Because the first option sounds kind of weird to my unnative (is there such a word? ) ear, just as ifnon-resembling had hidden "each other" in itself which not resembling lacks. So: these not resembling each other boys = these non-resembling boys.... If I'm talking nonsense, just say it.

Thanks
I don't think "not resembling" is technically ungrammatical, but the use of resemble as a verb is certainly more common and sounds much more natural.
"Non-resembling" doesn't imply "each other." You'd still need a noun.

There is a contest for cakes resembling important landmarks. Gina is entering a creation that resembles the Eiffel Tower.
Gosh, I just baked Jim's birthday cake. Maybe I could enter that.
What does his cake resemble?
It's a non-resembling cake, I'm afraid. Just an ordinary round one. It has six layers with dark chocolate filling. Maybe I could stick a toy dinosaur in it and say it's supposed to resemble the La Brea tar pits.
Okay, here I am again. We had another couple to dinner last night and I noted two nonce-words, one from me and one from a guest.
First - I was talking about a man who had broken up with his long-time girlfriend and describing how he'd told us about it. I said, "And then he said - I can't remember the exact phrase he used, but something assholey."
Another noun + y formation I thought of just now is a term you hear a lot on fashion and home decorating TV shows, "matchy-matchy ." ("If we use the plaid for the curtains, we should use something else for the bedspread and then yet another fabric for the chair. We don't want it to be too matchy-matchy.")
Second from last night - I asked the guests, who live fairly nearby, if they'd walked or driven to our house. I said, "When I saw you coming up the front walk, you were walking with so much verve." The husband of the other couple replied, "If we'd walked all the way from our house, we would have been pretty verveless by the time we got here, believe me."
Thank you for the new bunch of words. I need to ask you a question - what do you make out of bornedness? How come the -ed- is there? Thanks in advance!
I think the -ed is there to make the word sound more awkward and hence funnier. Also, of course the correct word is "born," so "borned" sounds like something an ignorant person would say, again making it a bit funnier.

re: A Kind Request For English Nonce-Words Made By Prefixes!? page 2

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