[Multilingual Monday] With your powers combined ...
Yay, super late MMs!
Today's topic: portmanteaux! What is a portmanteau, you might ask? It's a new word made from the blending of the sounds of two words and providing a "fused" meaning. English is full of these words -- "brunch" (breakfast + lunch), "smog" (smoke + fog), "spork" (spoon + fork), etc. Several of these are place names ("Texarkana" = Texas + Arkansas) or brand names ("Amtrak" = America + track). Several of these words, despite (or due to!) their common usage, have become less than welcome additions among several to the English language ("guesstimate" is an immediate one I can think of that causes people to cringe).
Of coruse these exist in other languages. See: paraguas ("umbrella" -- para, "stop" and aguas, "waters", Spanish); toujours ("always" -- tous, "all" and jours, "days", French); Datei ("data file" -- Daten, "data" and Kartei, "file, index", German); カラオケ (karaoke, "karaoke" -- 空っぽ, karappo, "empty" and オーケストラ, ookesutora, "orchestra", Japanese); Хрюкотать (Xryukotat', "a grunty laugh", хрюкать, xryukat', "grunt" and хохотать, xoxotat', "laugh", Russian); מַחֲזֶמֶר (maxazemer, "musical" -- מחזה, mexaze, "a play" and זמר, zemer, "singing", Hebrew); პატრინოტი (patrinoti, a musical song contest in Georgia -- პატრიოტი, patrioti, "patroit" and ნოტი, noti, "note"; Georgian).
It's easy to write this off as a recent invention, but word combinations have been going on for centuries. Not only does modern Chinese have a few of these (兩個, liǎng gè, "two of something", combines to make 倆, liǎ, "both"), but Old Chinese features a few "combined" words. For example, 盍, hé, is a combo of 何不, hé bù, "why not". 焉, yān is a fusion of 於 and 之, yú zhī , which is "to him," "towards her", etc. Most of these fell out of usage even before Middle Chinese, meaning that these characters were frequently misunderstood by those speaking Late Han Chinese, since these weren't recognized as portmanteaux.
So, here's where you come in. Have a story about portmanteaux? I'd love to hear it.
Today's topic: portmanteaux! What is a portmanteau, you might ask? It's a new word made from the blending of the sounds of two words and providing a "fused" meaning. English is full of these words -- "brunch" (breakfast + lunch), "smog" (smoke + fog), "spork" (spoon + fork), etc. Several of these are place names ("Texarkana" = Texas + Arkansas) or brand names ("Amtrak" = America + track). Several of these words, despite (or due to!) their common usage, have become less than welcome additions among several to the English language ("guesstimate" is an immediate one I can think of that causes people to cringe).
Of coruse these exist in other languages. See: paraguas ("umbrella" -- para, "stop" and aguas, "waters", Spanish); toujours ("always" -- tous, "all" and jours, "days", French); Datei ("data file" -- Daten, "data" and Kartei, "file, index", German); カラオケ (karaoke, "karaoke" -- 空っぽ, karappo, "empty" and オーケストラ, ookesutora, "orchestra", Japanese); Хрюкотать (Xryukotat', "a grunty laugh", хрюкать, xryukat', "grunt" and хохотать, xoxotat', "laugh", Russian); מַחֲזֶמֶר (maxazemer, "musical" -- מחזה, mexaze, "a play" and זמר, zemer, "singing", Hebrew); პატრინოტი (patrinoti, a musical song contest in Georgia -- პატრიოტი, patrioti, "patroit" and ნოტი, noti, "note"; Georgian).
It's easy to write this off as a recent invention, but word combinations have been going on for centuries. Not only does modern Chinese have a few of these (兩個, liǎng gè, "two of something", combines to make 倆, liǎ, "both"), but Old Chinese features a few "combined" words. For example, 盍, hé, is a combo of 何不, hé bù, "why not". 焉, yān is a fusion of 於 and 之, yú zhī , which is "to him," "towards her", etc. Most of these fell out of usage even before Middle Chinese, meaning that these characters were frequently misunderstood by those speaking Late Han Chinese, since these weren't recognized as portmanteaux.
So, here's where you come in. Have a story about portmanteaux? I'd love to hear it.