Ask Lemmy

My favorite lately: "you don't want to get two birds stoned at once"

Part of what makes Klein’s Don’t Starve game so quirky and fun is the rampant use of creatures that are portmanteau’s of other creatures.

Beefalo

Deerclops

Koalephant

Catcoon

That's a new one. I didn't know about malapropisms. There is a daily wordle style game I cannot think of what it is called for portmanteaus.

Tim Apple.

Relevant xkcd.

My favorites are Dr. Richard Chopp (a urologist) and Les McBurney (a fire chief).

You would like german. The word "umfahren" can mean to drive around something or it can mean to run something over, depending on how you pronounce it.

I wonder if there's a word for when a whole phrase has two opposite meanings without one of the words in it being a contronym (or using sarcasm, etc)

The example that made me think of this is a song lyric:

And she's dancing like she's never danced before!

There's the intended meaning of better than ever... But if I were to dance it would also be like I've never danced before.

Also known as autoantonym (antonym of itself). e.g. "Because of my oversight, my project is finished."

Did the person make an oversight, i.e. a mistake, and now his project is done for?

Or did the person's well-adjusted oversight, i.e. management, help complete his project on time?

Are they called shelled peanuts because they have their shells? or are they called shelled peanuts because they've been shelled, unshelling them? It's literally ironic...

Lol Shakespeare the OG rapper:

From Family Guy: I'm not saying she's a gold digger, but she ain't messing with any.....who isn't she messing with?

The Sphinx : Your temper is very quick, my friend. But until you learn to master your rage...

Mr. Furious : ...your rage will become your master? That's what you were going to say. Right? Right?

The Sphinx : Not necessarily.

And lisp having an S in it or rhotacism having an R. Ironic: yes, cruel: definitely!

Totally! Like aipohphobia is the fear of palindromes.

I love that the term glottal stop is a perfect example of a glottal stop.

I once did something sort of like this.

Back in the early days of the internet, I was on IRC playing trivia. Often people would talk about wag or wagging. I didn't know exactly what it meant but I'm pretty good at inferring from context clues... usually.

They asked a Star Wars question and of course I knew it right away. I realized in the moment I was practically wagging in anticipation of being correct and I announced it as my first wag.

Of course, wag stood for wild ass guess so I had gotten the meaning completely backward. It still haunts me to this day, some 35+ years later, even though no one but me probably knew about my mistake.

Reminds me of [email protected]

Say it with me, boys:

Squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel squirrel.

In linguistics this is called expletive infixation. It's a good example of the inherent grammar of language that we are never directly taught but know anyway. For example, we know fanfuckingtastic is correct but fantafuckingstic is wrong.

I had an Austin Powers shirt with lines similar to: 'fanf*ckingtastic' all over it , lol. There is a word for everything.

Cool. Similar to anglicism. also, cognate comes to mind here since talking about words between languages.

The infamous Handy that I'm typing this on.

I always knew it as transposing the beginning sounds of two words like: fons of tun instead of tons of fun.

“She wrote me one of those John Deere letters…”

Found some spoonerisms for folk that don't know what it is -

Three cheers for our queer old dean!" (while giving a toast at a dinner, which Queen Victoria was also attending)[15]

"Is it kisstomary to cuss the bride?" (as opposed to "customary to kiss")[15]

"The Lord is a shoving leopard." (instead of "a loving shepherd")[15]

"A blushing crow." ("crushing blow")[15]

"A well-boiled icicle" ("well-oiled bicycle")[15]

"You were fighting a liar in the quadrangle." ("lighting a fire")[15]

"Is the bean dizzy?" ("Dean busy")[15]

"Someone is occupewing my pie. Please sew me to another sheet." ("Someone is occupying my pew. Please show me to another seat.")[15]

"You have hissed all my mystery lectures. You have tasted a whole worm. Please leave Oxford on the next town drain." ("You have missed all my history lectures. You have wasted a whole term. Please leave Oxford on the next down train.")[15]

No, he calls it an Emordnilap. I did see it but I knew of Semordnilaps for awhile now. I DO like Micheal Steven's take on all of his linguistic subjects. Dude is a genius educator.

Edit: lmao I chuckled at your username.

Cancan and gogo?