from Married to the Sea

This morning, as part of the GEL 2007 conference, I led nearly sixty new recruits to neologism through the harrowing mental and physical challenge of creating new words (the physical part was sitting in the uncomfortable conference room chairs for nearly three hours).

After some introduction to how words become English words (mainly, for those words that haven't "always" been English: by being stolen from other languages, or by being created, Frankensteinianly, as mashups of other words or word parts) the attendees were freed to create their own words.

We reviewed everyone's creations, and the entire group then voted for their favorite new word of the session (and for two runners-up). The creator of the favorite word will receive a copy of the New Oxford American Dictionary, and the runners-up will get some other book TBD (but probably copies of Totally Weird and Wonderful Words, since I happen to know the author).

The winning word? It was crappyjack 'any kind of empty, snacky junk food', created by Karen Watts. The two runners-up were drunch 'to consume alcoholic beverages with like-minded individuals between the hours of 10 a.m. and 5 p.m. on Sunday', coined by Lizzy Klein, and mispronoonce 'a jocular way of saying 'mispronounce', to be used in the first person after a particularly embarrassing mispronunciation: Oh, gosh, I mispronoonced that, didn't I?' which was coined by Nick Baum.

Please keep in mind that I didn't have folks look these words up in dictionaries, search for them online, or otherwise try to verify in any systematic way that these words did not already exist (not that there's any good way to prove that a word doesn't already exist, anyhow). So there is a possibility that more than a few of these words have already been coined by other people. If this bothers you greatly, feel free to credit any previous coiner in the comments. Here's the list:



adolesic acting like a teenager, or neurally impaired [Margot Slade]
allopetal tending or moving elsewhere [Jim Hoekema]
antemeridinalacaffeinationalistic behavior of a person lacking pre-morning coffee [Al Chang]
archeoandrous possessing the male parts of the ancients [Anonymous] (we didn't know whether this meant 'being hung like a Greek statue' or actually having a dessicated organ in a box—EMM)
biobaric something that puts pressure on someone's life [Sam Parker]
blogdrama (no definition given; I think we can figure it out) [Toni Pashley]
bouncicity the joy of bouncing; the velocity of a bounce; the possibility of a bounce without the bounce being executed or the bounce being executed in the future [Henning Rübsam]
calligenic do-gooding [Nancy Galles]
chronocide (also chronocidal) a wasteful means of spending time [Cynthia Collins]
confuseday any of day of the week that feels like a Tuesday (esp. when not Tuesday) [Joshua Keay]
coprorole of or relating to a shitty job or corporate position [Dan Faricy]
creative licensing giving people permission to make things up [Theresa Quintanilla]
cyanandrogogy Blue Man Group training [Owen Roberts]
cybrification the increase in reliance on electronic forms of communication and information [Kara Cruoglio]
dancical/dancicality an individual who shows talent or promise as a ancer; a situation or music that inspires dancing; different from 'danceable' in that only makes it okay to dance, but does not inspire [Henning Rübsam]
demovis a vision for a product or service that is based entirely on the needs of the people for whom it is intended [David Cortwright]
digicandy self-indulgent electronic gadgets [Anonymous]
domainization buying multiple domain names to claim a monopoly [June Sung]
eduxperience making learning a good experience [Robert Fox]
electrography the style of writing used in electronic media [Tammy Gur]
evandrocitrafaction to squeeze my lemon until the juice runs down my leg [Matt Gardner]
fearregardless the irrational fear that lexicographers have against making heavily used non-standard words like 'irregardless' standard [David Sarda]
feedivore subsisting entirely on RSS feeds [Toni Pashley]
gastrotastic (of a food or restaurant) great [Jen Wilcox]
geleuphrenic when many minds work together or fit so as to create an interesting and stimulating communal experience [Victoria Dalmas]
googlicious appearing at the top of search results; most highly searched; something optimized for search [Scott Goldstein]
gravitent having qualities or properties that attract others [Chad Hessoun]
groovimonious agreeable in a manner that is in harmony with the circumstances [Lisa Morgan]
Heeb-hop Jewish hip-hop; Jewish people influenced by hip-hop culture [Scott Goldstein]
innoficiate purposefully engaging in a creative process [Jeff Neidorfler]
intracalonogist someone who studies inner beauty [Julie Kravetz]
jobadoo a task or chore [Gaylene Meyer]
Krzyzewskian something that makes no sense to the uninitiated [David Sarda]
ladher hermaphrodite [Nancy Galles]
lapi (from labiopia) a really bad kisser [Rachel Fisher]
linguaplasty act of making language prettier [Beth-Ellen Keyes]
logomotion words in action [Nancy Galles]
macaca moment very brief career-ending or career-damaging speech that is recorded and spread through electronic media [Mark Chackerian] (This word was actually in the running for the American Dialect Society's word of the year last year)
melanocracy an evil form of government [Lisa Morgan]
meology the study of narcissism by a narcissist [Beth Temple]
micromortific orgasmic; very fun or pleasurable (this word is close to a calque; the French for orgasm being la petit mort 'the little death'—EMM) [Brett Lider]
microneuropia when you think everyone is dumber than you are [Matt Gardner]
negatory (exclamation) nope, never, not on your life [Karen Watts]
neolographer someone who makes new words (the word for this is usually 'neologist' but hey, always room for one more—EMM) [Yih Leh Huang]
parentship money for education provided by the parents (on model of scholarship) [Margot Slade]
Pinglish combination of Persian and English [Kelly Shephard]
pseudox one who leads others astray [Erroll Rhodes]
rackology the study of boobs [Paul Smethers]
schmuckometer device for gauging how much of an asshole someone is [Beth-Ellen Keyes]
sclerobrow frozen forehead from over-botoxing [Marie Tahir]
seize-a-breeze inhale deeply [Diane Smethers]
smunchy soft, melty and crunchy [TJ Sarda]
snick an obnoxiously self-satisfied person, a know-it-all [Karen Watts]
somnophagy sleepeating [Erroll Rhodes]
spensitize make aware of financial consequences [Anonymous]
stuckified to be trapped in a meeting waiting for someone who's late and can't be contacted [Mike Katz]
surrealience to have an experience that seems surreal; as if it were in a movie, or if someone created it for you [Courtney Lind]
teledating maintaining a long-distance relationship with the help of telecommunications equipment [Dan Entin]
ubiquitinpotaqueous the state of water in which it is everywhere, and yet there is not a drop of it to drink [David Yee]
VAteched causing indiscriminate psychic or physical damage to people in a constrained place [Anonymous]
xylodox a wooden leader [Erroll Rhodes]

If any of these words strikes your fancy, go ahead and use them! That's what they're here for. I know I will use at least a couple ... I certainly have motive, all I need now is opportunity.

[I promised to put up some of the technical terms I used today; that will go up tomorrow or Sunday; also, if I misspelled your name please email me & I'll fix it.]

Thanks again to all who came out this morning!

Labels: conferences, lexical_change, neologism