The best part of English is neologisms. This basically means that you are allowed to make up new words, or make new meanings for existing words up. There’s only one catch: people have to start using them … a lot.
Unless you are making up new words in a specialist field, where you are probably making up or discovering a new thing that needs a new word, general neologists have to contend with something called ‘common usage’. Yes, this is a formidable as it sounds; your word must be used, by a lot of people, a lot.
There is a heinous flipside to this, and this is that if a lot of really dumb people start using a word incorrectly, it also counts as common usage. The saddest example of this the word ‘myriad’. You don’t need a myriad of anything, things can just be myriad!
So yes, this is as horrible as it sounds, but hey, if you love English in all its malleable glory, then you have to accept common usage too.
The word Neologism comes from the ancient Greek ‘neo’ (new) & ‘logos’ (word). There are lots of ways you can make new words. Typos are one of the best (and worst). Like when you ‘beat the carp out of someone’ or ‘have a date with density’, these are not technically neologisms because they are not new words. Technically, they are malapropisms, which means you have used the incorrect word in the place of another similar word; but if the phrase comes into common usage, then you’ve neologised a saying.
Interestingly, you can have a verbal typo, the most famous of which is the Spoonerism which is where you swap the beginnings of two words around. By far the best spoonerism is the mythical creature; the flutterby.
This should not be confused with mixed metaphors, which most people hate but are awesome: rocket surgery anyone?
Then you have portmanteau words, this is where you bung two old words together to make a new one. This is only creepy because, in the case of the Labradoodle, you can also bung two dogs together to make a, completely new, portmanteau dog.
More scientifically, if you find a meaning or a creature, or observed effect that has no word, you can snoop around for some old Latin or Greek to come up with something. This is not very romantic; for example, neologism. Heck, you can even just bung your name on the thing, for example: the Doppler effect which, as you might have guessed, is an effect, that was discovered by a guy called Doppler. Weeeeeeeeeee.
Then you have just plain old dumb luck; were people’s mouths fire out words that are similar to the thoughts going on in their heads. Most often, these are lame; every once in a while. They. Are. Fabulous.
This is not to be confused with a malapropism, which is where you use one word instead of another word because you are ignorant; saying ‘for all intensive purposes’ instead of ‘for all intents and purposes’, for example.
One of the most famous purveyors of accidental neologisms was the 43rd president of the USA, George H.W. Bush. He was so prolific that the term ‘Bushism’ is now used to describe verbal errors. Yes, he neologised himself into becoming a neologism. ‘Bushism’ is an ‘eponym’ by the way.
Arguably HW’s best is the term ‘mis-underestimated’. What it lacks in precision it makes up for in nuance and misdirection. Prey-tell, how much have I mis-underestimated you … and in which direction …
Definitely his worst is the term ‘irregardless,’ which is a portmanteau word of ‘irrespective’ and ‘regardless’, which both mean the same thing. When you don’t smoosh two words that mean the same thing together, it’s called a ‘tautology, for example: close proximity or ‘deja vu all over again’.
A related phenomenon is the ‘oxymoron’. For example, the term ‘unbiased opinion’, because you know what they say about opinions! Oxymoron is a lovely word that comes from the Greek ‘oxy’ (sharp) & ‘moron’ (foolish). As in pointedly foolish, as in specifically dumb. The most heinous example of an oxymoron is: ‘possibly imminent’.
Sometimes a neologism comes at us the old-fashioned way. Someone describes something specific in writing, and that word then starts to mean the general version of that thing, For example ‘free-lancer’ which now means anyone who works for themselves and is therefore free to hire their skills out, but back in the day meant someone who fought for themselves and was free to hire their lance out – also known as mercenaries.Then you can just straight up make up words that sound cool and hope they stick. For example: froody, grok, hinky, yahoo, twitter and nerd.
A related sub-domain of neological invention is the realm of the ‘irregular verb’. In this war zone lie many casualties to the baser habits the conservative word police who want to stardardise verb endings. Yes, while this might make English easier to learn, it also chips away at the endless possibilities of life, because doing is, is as doing says.
The usual title given to the purveyor of neologisms is ‘wordsmith’, but this is too general, because they are also very good a stringing a sentence together. The specific, technical terms, is wordmonger, so named because these words all already exist, out there, in the wonderful, undiscovered jungle that lives outside the confines of the English lexicon.
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