On necessary neologisms

[gominokouhai]

This crazy fast-paced 21st century world can be a confusing place, what with its technologically-mediated interactions and 3D plasma tele-visual apparati. Hell, I'm still getting used to the concept of hot and cold running water. You just turn the tap on and there it is. And as soon as you've grown accustomed to this modern miracle, you need to learn how to deal with the sense of impotent outrage that occurs that one time when you turn the tap and running water does not, as expected, simply ensue. We need a word for that.

That's far too specific, pajh, you say. Balls, say I, and also bollocks, testicles, gonads, cods, tallywhackers and stones. This is exactly what English is good at, and my new best friend Mark Forsyth agrees with me.

[T]he English language is ready for anything. If you were to surprise a Frenchman in the act of putting a conger up a mare’s bottom he would probably have to splutter his way through several sentences of explanation, filled with circumlocutory verbocinations. However, ask an English-speaker why they are sodomising a horse with a creature from the deep and they can simply raise a casual eyebrow and ask: Can’t you see I’m feaguing?

The ability to explain why you’re putting an eel up a horse with such holophrastic precision is the birthright of every English-speaking man and woman, and we must reclaim it.

Likewise, we need words for the following newly discovered emotions. Some of these you may recognize:

• The mild but nonetheless tangible sense of disappointment one gets upon using a public toilet and noticing that the hand dryer is of a make other than a Dyson Airblade™. Srsly guyz. Those things are amazing.
• The rueful smile and shake of the head, directed at someone whom you otherwise respect, upon seeing them retweet their own #followfriday mentions. Oh dear.
• The involuntary twitch when your phone beeped a notification but you have your hands full for the next few minutes. Worse if you're currently having sex.
• The gradually dawning realization that a person you follow on the Twitters is actually turning out to be a big old racist.
• Combined delight and despair at the expensive new headphones you've bought, because they're so good that you'll have to re-rip everything you own as FLACs.
• Wildly seesawing confusion at the nationality of a blogger based on subtle clues in his writing style. Is he English with a hint of internationalization due to being on Internet, or is he one of those highly-educated Americans who simply sounds English? Or is that just a convoluted way of saying Canadian? And why does this seem to matter to you anyway? Maybe you're the big old racist. But it's perfectly acceptable to be curious about the origins of a writer who interests you. Or is that what a big old racist would say?
• Vague sense of unease that you just typed srsly guyz up there in a half-ironic fashion, but intent never comes across well in textual media and you're not sure if the reader won't just assume that you talk that way.

I don't have the benefits of a classical education necessary to retrofabrefact etymologically-plausible morphemes in this manner, except possibly just then, with retrofabrefaction. But I can drop Die Hard references into paragraphs that you wouldn't expect.

Vaguely related, Circumlocutory Verbocinations is going to be the name of my next band. Or possibly Holophrastic Precision.

Comments

[brucec]

The Airblade is apparently an inferior rip-off of the Jet Towel (http://jettowel.mitsubishielectric.co.uk/)

[gominokouhai]

Inferior? That's a matter of opinion.

[davegodfrey]

Clearly I haven't worked out how to use an airblade properly then. Whenever I do I end up with dry palms, but damp wrists and fingertips. And it takes a lot longer than 30 seconds.

[momentsmusicaux]

I rather like the airblade, though I've yet to work out exactly how to get my hands completely dry.

My main problem with it though is that like just about all hairdryers, toddlers are a) too low down and b) terrified of it.

[miss_s_b]

This is nspired by what is happening right now, but:

Frustration at nail varnsh that takes five coats to cover your nails when you're used to ones that take (at the most) two coats.
Frustration at inability to roll cigarette due to wet nail varnish.
Frustration at own stupidity for not rolling cigareetes before applying nail varnish.

[gominokouhai]

Clearly, you need a Dyson Airblade™.

I need a word for the frustration one feels on constructing a complex blog post about society and language, when all the comments are about a minor throwaway remark you made about hand dryers.

[miss_s_b]

I was too busy thinking about how desperately I want a fag o consider hand dryers TBH.

[gominokouhai]

Well, in your case, maybe you should have been thinking about hand dryers. Or smoking tailormades. Or both.

Am an intrigued now as to the effects of the application of a Dyson Airblade™ to undried nail varnish. We could be onto something here.

[miss_s_b]

Suspect it'd depend on the nail varnish. In some of them it might cause rippling - hair dryers can.

We must experiment!

[highlyeccentric]

I'm pretty sure these definitions-without-nouns should be provided with nouns following the example of Douglas Adams' 'The Meaning of Liff' and 'The Deeper Meaning of Liff'. There must be many place names out there which would service. For instance, I proffer a place name local to my parents: 'Girrawheen'. I think it might suit the involuntary twitch suffered when one's phone beeps a notification which one cannot read immediately.

[gominokouhai]

YES. We can't have an awesome word like 'Girrawheen' just hanging about on signs pointing to places. Especially not when it lends itself so admirably to a verb form, too.

What's the matter, darling? You seem distracted. Is there something wrong with all this sex we're having?
You must forgive me, my dear. The sexing is entirely within acceptable boundaries. I'm merely girrawhending.

[zz]

- The uncertainty and mild frustration caused by wondering whether you've missed a pun or cultural reference, or that it's just not there.

re: #6

[daf]

anyone unable to think about asking uncle google about the differences between british spelling & american [mis]spelling or even think to do a comparison based upon the lexicon being used yet sufficiently confident in their knowledge of language to try and work out the nationality of an author based upon the stylistic mannerisms of a text does not deserve to have their subsequent uncertainty about their conclusion ascribed a nomenclature.

i refuse to be baited on the matter of racism vs xenophobia.

Re: #6

[gominokouhai]

Easy, tiger. Who mentioned xenophobia? I said, and I stand by it, that it's perfectly acceptable to be curious about the origins of a writer who interests you.

Further, I'm perfectly familiar with the variations in spelling between UK English and American English. I refer above to ambiguous cases, otherwise wildly seesawing confusion wouldn't have been appropriate. This much really ought to have been obvious to anyone with the reading comprehension skills necessary to get as far as item #6 in TFA.