A portmanteau, for those unfamiliar with the term, is a new word that is obtained by smashing two familiar words together so that their meanings get combined. Many portmanteaus have now passed into regular usage and we no longer think of them as such. Examples are spork (spoon+fork), brunch (breakfast+lunch), motel (motor+hotel), malware (malicious+software), and frenemy (friend+enemy). For more examples, see here.
‘Portmanteau’ (meaning a large suitcase that opens up into two halves) is itself a portmanteau made up of two French words ‘porter’ (to carry) and ‘manteau’ (a cloak).
Some portmanteaus have an ephemeral existence because their lifetimes are clearly limited. Examples are Brangelina and Bennifer that have been coined for celebrity couples.
Journalists tend to try to insert portmanteaus into usage to liven their reporting and they sometimes seem forced because the combined meaning is not obvious. For example, I recently heard on the news someone using the word ‘vibecession‘. This is a portmanteau of the words ‘vibes’ and ‘recession’ and “refers to a disconnect between the economy of a country and the general public’s negative perception of it, which is mostly pessimistic.”
I find other portmanteaus to be too cute or ugly or unnecessary. Examples are ‘snowmageddon’ (snow+Armageddon to denote a massive snowstorm), ‘staycation’ (stay+vacation to denote spending your vacation at home), and the one I hate the most ‘bleisure’ (business+leisure to denote travel that is done for both business and leisure)
Language is dynamic and grows with the addition of new words and giving new meaning to old ones. The staying power of any new word or phrase is determined by how many people find it appealing and start using it. No single person’s opinions matter but there are some portmanteaus that I find grating and hope will disappear.
“Portmanteau” is a portmanteau I hope will disappear — at least from the English language. It’s clumsy and a little hard to pronounce, which kinda contradicts the reason such words are created. (And why is the creation of such new words equated with “carrying a cloak?” That just sounds weirdly pretentious.)
I hadn’t previously encountered “bleisure” which is indeed awful, but it hasn’t displaced the top offender on my list: “glamping,” meaning “glamorous camping” with luxury tents, or even cabins (which makes it no longer camping at all in my book), and catered cuisine. Glamping sounds like some strange surgical procedure to my ears.
@2 Ridana, I’m not a fan of “glamping” as a word either, and agree if you’re in a cabin with catered food, it’s no longer camping.
I saw a story recently on the national news about Gen Z and their slang, which has a lot of that kind of thing.
Raging Bee @1: It’s been around for more than 150 years, at least since Lewis Carroll used it to describe some of his invented words, like slithy (from slimy and lithe), and chortle (from chuckle and snort). I find it quite frabjous.
I wonder what you think of the celebrity portmanteaus then e.g. Bennifer and Brangelina (I know the answer is you dont!)
I’m using the internet to post this comment on your blog:
There’s utility in such portmanteaus. One favourite of mine is “travelator” which is far more specific than a people-carrying conveyor belt.
Stanislaw Lem wrote a rather good book called The Futurological Congress where he played around with linguistic conceits.
A character there (Professor Trottelreiner) proposes a method of exploring the future through language. Futurolinguistics, as he refers to it.
Literally, going overboard with portmanteaus and exploring the resulting concepts that come to mind.
Most amusing.
He did love his neologisms, did Stanislaw.
On psychotropics:
“I finally learned how to come into possession of an encyclopedia. I already own one now—the whole thing contained in three glass vials. Bought them in a science psychedeli. Books are no longer read but eaten, not made of paper but of some informational substance, fully digestible, sugar-coated. I also did a little browsing in a psychem supermarket. Self-service. Arranged on the shelves are beautifully packaged low-calorie opinionates, gullibloons—credibility beans?—abstract extract in antique gallon jugs, and iffies, argumunchies, puritands and dysecstasy chips. A pity I don’t have an interpreter. Psychedeli must be from psychedelicatessen. And the theoapotheteria on Sixth Avenue has to be a theological apothecary cafeteria, judging from the items on display.”
On robots:
“And therefore we have the malingerants, fudgerators and drudge-dodgers, not to mention the special phenomenon of simulimbecility or mimicretinism. A mimicretin is a computer that plays stupid in order, once and for all, to be left in peace. And I found out what dissimulators are: they simply pretend that they’re not pretending to be defective. Or perhaps it’s the other way around. The whole thing is very complicated. A probot is a robot on probation, while a servo is one still serving time. A robotch may or may not be a sabot.”
#1 RB
The word does not equate joined words to cloak-carrying, it equates them to a particular type of suitcase: the type that opens into two halves. The etymology of the word for that type of suitcase is incidental.
John @7: Are those neologisms translations from Polish?
I believe so, Rob.
Quite remarkable.
There are many portmanteaus that I find useful that were invented before my time: alphanumeric, anklet, breathalyser, cyborg, dumbfounded, electrocute, smog. Even many created in my lifetime have become very familiar: carjack, cosplay, email, emoticon, hazmat, podcast. I empathise with your annoyance at the new tryhardish compositions Mano, but most won’t last. But there is no shortage of things to be annoyed about in the English language.
-- Acroynms that have become words. Automated teller machine machine anyone? “I always enter my PIN number on the ATM machine”.
-- And don’t you hate it when people say “lol” like it’s a word? “I lolled”. Ugh.
-- First you chop down a tree. And then you chop it up!
-- Plurals: what’s up with that? Why must we have a suffix for a number greater than one? Why does “five apple” sound so wrong?
Spacetime.
Electromagnetism.
Parsec?
file thirteen -- what’s your problem with lol? Very pronounceable. Often literally true. My son prefers LMAO as a word (pronounced l’eh mao) Shrug.
I am not sure that ‘retronym’ is a portmanteau word, as ‘nym’ is a common suffix. But it is a perfect word to describe a word that has been modified due to changing technology. The classic example is the guitar.
Before the invention of the electric guitar there were only guitars. But once the electric guitar became common the retronym ‘acoustic guitar’ sprang into use.
@anat #15:
1) There is already a word “loll” with a different meaning
2) If you say “I lol’d” then you’ve effectively said “I laughed out loud.” Of which the “out loud” part is clearly redundant. You could have just said “I laughed.”
3) Worse still is when someone says “Lol!” Not only is the “out loud” redundant then, but it’s akin to saying “Laugh!” instead of actually laughing.
LOL is either an acronym or an initialism, depending on pronunciation.
But it’s not a portmanteau.
(The emoticon for it is truly a tic for a certain commenter here: X-D)
You don’t say. X-D
For an extra level of meta “blog” (as in FTB) is a portmanteau of Web + log (book).
I do say that all portmanteaus are neologisms, but not all neologisms are portmanteaus.
Of course, it’s a thing that I’ve seen happen in real time.
Begins as a locution.
(e.g.) The turn table.
Becomes common, becomes a compound term.
The turn-table.
Then becomes obvious (turntable) and lo!
Another entry in the lexicon.
—
Silentbob:
Almost. A proper portmanteau would ‘weblog’. It’s an implicit one due to that elision.
weblog.More to the point, the ‘log’ is a record — the book is just a medium for it.
Football.
Skydiving.
Submariner?
@ Morales
I remember when you used to preface almost every comment with idiosyncratic “mark up” so I don’t think you can shame me for using 3 characters to signify laughing.
You don’t do it so much these days -- but on the other hand I seem to inspire you. X-D
https://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2024/02/20/how-much-do-you-hate-the-gays/#comment-2212952
(Very weird persecution complex. I don’t know who are, don’t care, and you never cross my mind unless your latest daft comment is right in front of my eyes. At which time I may respond. But usually not.)
Moonlight.
Flutterby.
Oh, wait. No.
It’s ‘butterfly’, right?
(Well, they sure got that wrong; obs, butterflies flutterby)
Butter-flies.
Heh.
Sorta. Remember, been almost 20 years since I began commenting at PZ’s place.
What you remember is a phase when I would routinely distinguish between regular comments (like #7) and comments about the conversation itself ([meta] — for a while, Slymepitters called me ‘Meta Morales’) and comments that were neither related to the convo or to the topic ([OT]).
It was not well received, so I became more judicious about their employment.
People like simplicity, I suppose, and normal types don’t care to have metatags mark up their intent.
More than one channel of communication? Inconceivable!
Anyway, it was most certainly (go ahead and pore over dusty old archives) not the case that it was “almost every comment”. More than now, fewer than none.
I don’t consider swatting mosquitoes to be inspirational.
And you only make the noise, you don’t actually sting.
Trust me on this: what you may or may not do is irrelevant to how I comment.
<snicker>
Sure, bob.
Oh also,
<snicker>
is three times (at least) the keystrokes of
X-D
Just sayin’
<smirk>
You want to pretend you are not obsessed and trying to play the remora to my shark, go for it.
Bob.
Polyester. Underfloor.
Pterodactylus.
Ecosphere.
In passing, I reckon Mano was having his own little chuckle: “Going overboard with portmanteaus”.
But perhaps it’s merely apophenia. 🙂
‘Manhole’ does not mean what one might naively think it means.
[Silentbob most certainly does not mean a bob that is Silent]
Is it possible we could introduce a comment limit on this blog?
Not necessarily a hard number, but a certain percentage?
Because this guy thinks it’s hilarious to use Mano’s blog as his own private soapbox and comment hog every thread. I think this makes the blog much less enjoyable for everyone else.
I don’t actually know what plugins are available, but allowing this one idiot to post unlimited stupid comments in every thread makes it nearly unbearable for everyone else to participate. :-/
This one troll has (not atypically) posted more than half the comments. Can’t something be done? At least a half measure like was done with Holms? (Which seems to have worked well.)
(sigh)
” I don’t know who are, don’t care, and you never cross my mind unless your latest daft comment is right in front of my eyes.”
and also
“Can’t something be done? At least a half measure like was done with Holms?”
heh.
—
You know what could be done?
You could stop pestering me.
Quite simple, really.
Already told you, what I post in response to your provocations is in addition to (not instead of) my normal commenting. Over and above the baseline. The background level.
And you keep provoking. And here we are.
Enjoy the fruits of your obsession.
Bob.
I’m suggesting something like Morales has three comments in which to make his argument (such as it is).
If he can’t express it in three comments it can be dismissed.
It’s just very annoying for everyone else to have every otherwise productive thread derailled by his incessant trolling.
Um, Mano can see how it is.
So can PZ.
So can Adam.
So can Ashes.
—
Just stop pestering me, problem solved.
Simple as.
Bob.
And what about those threads where the stupidity is initiated by you and not Bob? This one for example.
Holms, grok this:
If you ask me a question, you expect me to answer your question.
So.
You want a comment from me.
You seek a comment from me.
Or do you dispute that?
Here, let me be hyper-literal, as my other pestiferating pestiferous perstiferator holds it to be:
“Oh, no!”, you exclaim, innocence pendant on your visate; “No, no!, ’tis but a rhetorical question”.
“A statement!”
“Just another jibe!”
—
Meh, quoth I.
—
Really, you two could not be more transparent.
Carry on.
So, Holms.
Nevermind (!) portmanteaus, are you genuinely asking a question of me or are you merely making a statement about me?
Don’t be coy!
—
You know it’s about me. Definitely not you.
You are a concerned bystander.
I notice you avoided answering the question. After all, asking someone to “just stop pestering me” is a bit dumb when the interaction started with you doing being the pest.
[by stander]
I notice you eliciting yet more retorts from me.
Bob, meanwhile, is furiously um, “updating his database” so he can provide statistics.
(You’re not a stranger to that particular delectation, I know)
—
Now, had you any memory other than short-term, you would be aware that we have been interacting on an ongoing and mutual basis for, um, I dunno, a day or two.
You would remember that, less than a day ago, I told you that your provocations would be met with volubility, and pointed out how your ostensible goal (the boggarticator’s too) of getting me banned or making me post less has, for a year or two so far, proven entirely counter-productive.
Or, as we say nowadays, ‘counterproductive’.
Heh.
Carry on.
Chilly climate, supposedly. Refractive, I.
Terrible person to be commenting, so that I elicit comments about how terrible I am.
Gnomic, sometimes, also.
There are two types of amnesia: retrograde amnesia (loss of memories that were formed shortly before the injury) and anterograde amnesia (problems with creating new memories after the injury has taken place).
What do you reckon, Holms? Bob the not silent?
Portmanteaus, those terms?
Ostensibly forgetting the varied and multiple exchanges we have had of course means you supposedly have no idea that they may have affected those additional comments you have perceived in this very thread. Too abstruse, too elliptical.
Mate.
What part of ‘voluble’ is confusing for you?
You and the boobler provoke, I respond.
—
Now, you have an answer.
TL;DR: I exhibit reactance. I take bullies on.
—
Again: Mano and other blog hosts know damn well what’s going on.
I sail serenely because I know they know I am a genuine commenter.
I try to gauge how much might be tolerated, but take guidance from how much those hosts tolerate from my pestiferators.
I have, for quite literally years now, made it clear to those very people (“Silent”bog and Holms) that jibes and criticisms and other such malignant expressions of inimity will be met with retorts.
I made it damn fucking clear that, this particular season of those years’ worth of needling (no actual harm, just popping in to harass me best as you can) I am essaying volubility.
Basically, releasing some of the circumspection that I would otherwise employ, were it not for your prodding.
—
Poing being: Mano knows how it is.
Guidance I have none of the overt variety, but I find it significant that I get to be as honest and as vehement as I am by nature and… well, I sail serenely.
It’s not religious faith, but it sustains me nonetheless.
—
But yes, best that I at least add something, instead of placating your need to interact with me.
So.
Shoutout to Ashes; https://freethoughtblogs.com/ashes/2024/05/29/check-out-this-sign-at-my-work/
Currently at 26 out of 46 comments for those keeping score at home. (Wouldn’t it be nice if this blog was not for the benefit of a single troll?)
Bobbicle: “Currently at 26 out of 46 comments for those keeping score at home.”
Me (earlier): “Bob, meanwhile, is furiously um, “updating his database” so he can provide statistics.”
<snicker>
You are the troll, bob who is not silent.
—
Also, for years now, quite literally, you have called for my banning and so forth.
I have never, ever called for anyone’s banning.
You have tried to manipulate and affect and influence the blog hosts (plural) to exercise your antipathy and malevolence towards me, for as long.
You are doing it right now.
—
Again: stop provoking, you’ll stop getting responses to your provocation.
Quite simple, really.
@silentbob #35:
Is “dickhead” a portmanteau?
F13, depending on the bobiferant’s knowledge, the “plugin” could be an allusion to the son of the imaginary character who uses a comment-blocker (not yet a portmanteau) to avoid exposure to comments from certain people. Is very happy with the sense of relief he feels by blinkering his inputs. Censoring his feed.
Anyway.
No. There is no plug-in (ooh, portmanetau!) that substitutes for a blog owner’s discretion.
—
Mano has stated (and I believe him) that he reads all the comments here.
(Not like it’s a subtle dynamic, is it?)
—
Also, yes. Yes, phallocephalus is a portmanteau.
<innoc>
If it is your belief that you cannot but retort, sure. But if so, then likewise you from me. Fair’s fair, right? If applied fairly, each comment would necessarily beget the next in an endless cycle. But. As usual, you only make this point only in one direction. Every comment from another to you is a choice they made and a provocation to you, but every comment from you to that other is not. You are constantly committing the fundamental attribution error.
As for me, I told you multiple times going back years ago that I respond to dumb comments by pointing out their deficiencies. I have also pointed out that you are the primary supplier of dumb comments, naturally making you the primary recipient of my corrections. Given the bragging about your powers of memory as compared to mine, I’m not sure how you forgot that.
If you are inclined towards treating these comment sections as part of a continuous conversation (a habit you share with Bob, by the way) then make that ten years or more.
That’s quite the persecution complex you have there. Again, despite you talking up your memory, you seem to forget what I have actually stated on the subject: my goal is to point out dumbshittery. If there is a desirable consequence to be sought re. your post frequency, I have stated that it would be nice if you made fewer bad faith posts. A distinction you seem unable to grasp; if you think ‘make fewer bad faith posts’ is equivalent to ‘make fewer posts’, then you indicate that posting and posting in bad faith are one and the same to you.
Aww, the blog network’s chief dispenser of venom and scorn is feewing bullied.
___
I take from your silence that you accept my point regarding the incongruity of you complaining about being pestered in a thread in which you were the first to throw a jibe at another. Fair enough.
We’ve been over this a thousand times (well, literally, maybe only a few dozen).
Again, for the manyeth umpteenth time: I don’t have to retort, but I will.
You know I will.
I know you know I will.
You, quite knowingly, quite evidently, are seeking comments from me.
This is one of them.
Like being whipped with wet toilet paper, is your attempted bullying.
Told you that a thousand times, too.
I take from this jibe that you seek another response from me.
Fair enough.
Oh, right. Remember, Holms.
That was the last comment of yours to which I will respond, on this thread.
Already did the thing where hundreds of comments over days between you and I made Mano close the thread, which for him was cataclysmic action, and I did apologise after, and promise not again.
I know, in multiple other occasions, I’ve given you a countdown, but I was having such fun being piteously bullied (heh) by such as you that I kinda forgot.
Ah well.
Another thread, you can resume your inimical antipathy, and I can respond some more.
Surely the linguistically fastidious would spell it “portmanteaux”.
If it works one way, it works the other.
“We’ve been over this a thousand times (well, literally, maybe only a few dozen).
Again, for the manyeth umpteenth time: I don’t have to point out your bad argumentation, but I will.
You know I will.
I know you know I will.
You, quite knowingly, quite evidently, are seeking comments from me.
This is one of them.”
Though I at least have given the specific trigger that will elicit a retort from me: bad faith and dumbshittery (<== on topic comment!). The proof of this is visible in those more ordinary or constructive comments of yours, such as #7 and your numerous portmanteau examples, all of which occasioned no argument. (Such a shame you then lapsed, poking Sbob with #18, and then it was on.)
By contrast, you will blurt at anything at all. You pretend it's an 'honour culture thing', but not a single person believes that utter load, not even you. And as noted, if your reasoning is applied evenly the end result is comments begetting begetting comments endlessly. No surprise then you only apply it in one direction, excusing your own retorts while talking down to others for theirs. And as I have told you, I point out bad faith where I see it.
Then it isn’t bullying. Unsurprising, as what I am doing is not bullying, and is drastically less haughty than your usual treatment of others.
And yet, you felt it a big enough deal to call it bullying. Again.
@Holms #58:
For what it’s worth, I respect you for the time and effort you must have put in to compose such a well-crafted comment to our resident dickhead (it couldn’t be for anyone else). Pearls to a pig of course, but I appreciate your labour and it deserves a real reply. Personally I gave up a while ago.
If I had continued reading every comment he made I would have left for good. Now regarding him, all I do is drop in the odd snide remark while replying to others, and knowing that his triggered replies will not be read by me gives me great satisfaction.
Is “dickhead” a portmanteau? Hahaha.
Oh God, the Australians are awake again.
F13,
<snicker>
I am too much to cope with. Too imposing.
Much better to read comments made about me, to thus bask in my magnificence at a remove.
Heh heh heh.
Knowing I can write anything about you and you shan’t even be aware of it amuses me greatly.
But fine, you go on gossiping about me.
(Evidently, I matter, which is what matters)
Yeah, you sure got your nose rubbed in it last time you tried to dispute something I wrote.
(There, there!)
[nostalgia]
You know, I miss the old days at Pharyngula when I’d get a dozen or more people simultaneously trying to dogpile (heh) me and bury me in comments and gossip about me. Rapid-fire, I could engage properly and my fingers would fly. Convenient, too — I could address several at a time in each response.
Good times, good times!
Alas, that it has come to this; a bit of desultory sniping and jibing and gossip by mediocre people.
Ah well. Blogs aren’t as popular any more, and I don’t do FB or Twittering or whatever else.
Also, fuck-all clever and imposing people remain here. Down to the Holms and the bobiferaticks, and of course the passive-aggressive F13 -types.
No SGBM, no Walton, hardly any of the old OM-level commenters.
(No truth machine 🙁 )
Characterisations not even you believe. For my part, I enjoy the fact that you will read my replies and and your known urge to reply will do battle with your stated exit from the conversation.
Oh come off it. Obviously, the blockquote was supposed to end after “about me.”