Perhaps it may seem silly to some, but believe it or not I do invent words from time to time. I have been doing this since I was a kid and I rarely or never tell anyone about them, of course. But I have wondered on more that one occasion what other people might think of my creations.
Here is one that relates to the present times: Lananalia–the inability to stop pronouncing a syllable in a word (cf. George W. Bush). This is how I derive my word:
La- from the refrain “La La La La, etc.” in many songs (cf. Deck the Halls).
-anana- from banana. A little silly, I know. But unlike the words google and googleplex, at least it is based on an existing word and not just a random type thing.
-alia from “glossolalia”–not necessarily related to what I am talking about. But hey, its my word. So I think I am entitled to a little poetic license here.
I once asked here if there was a word that was the collective term for nephews and nieces; e.g., siblings means brothers and sisters, parents means mother and father.
Someone responded with the word niblings. He(?) said that his family used it all the time.
Yup… come up with a few. My favorite being ignote. You ignote someone when you tell them something and they become dumber for having heard it.
That’s my word.
Funny thing is, I hear more and more people using it, even tho it’s not a real word. I’m just assuming these people have heard me use it enough and think it is.
My family invented a variant of Scrabble™ (that we imaginatively called UNScrabble®).
You invent words and put them down; they have to be pronouncable and you have to be prepared, if challenged, to provide a detailed and plausible definition. The words must not appear in the dictionary and the other players must reach a consensus as to whether your points for the word should be added to or subtracted from your total score.
Gnarf for an annoying, petty person. It’s a made-up translation of a Finnish word I also made up.
On another board, I’ve tried, to some success, to get people to use the term ‘handmelon’ for American football, as it is played more with hands than feet and the ball is shaped like a melon instead of proper spherical shape that balls should have.
Greebling or to greeble: A word my brother and I used as children. It means to make a whiny, complaining noise, usually by moving only the lower lip. Like Beaker on the Muppet Show.
Catloaf: My word to describe when a cat sits with its paws tucked under its body and its tailed curled close around (so it looks like a loaf of something with a cat’s head). Used in a sentence: “When I got home very late last night, there they were, sitting catloaf by the door and regarding me with severe feline disapproval.”
I made up sackie for the Sacagawea dollar. It turns out that someone on the SDMB posted it before I even registered, but I still came up with it independently.
Kilobuck. I use this one all the time. Obviously, it’s 1,000 dollars. I’ve used “hectobucks” occasionally, but I find it easier to say “half a kilobuck” than “five hectobucks”.
A friend of mine uses sack as a replacement for “dirty” expletives. Sounds dirty when you say it, but isn’t. Get cut off in traffic? “Sack!” Referring to someone you don’t like? “That sackhead.” Freeway slow? “The freeway is really sackin’ today!” It that an idiot? “Look at that meatsack!”
I generally tend to create new words for my English papers. They aren’t in the dictionary, but they sound normal enough to drive my english teacher crazy. latest one: aquaticity and aquataryism
Just a word? Try a whole language! Just one of my geeky hobbies. (That page isn’t mine).
In the realm of English words, I made up cntnugget, and cltwit (my masterpiece).
As for words that don’t include slang words for female genitalia, I recently invented “infoguerrilla”, whose meaning is self explanatory (INFOrmation + GUERRILLA), and “warmosat” for a weird animal I saw with my friend a while ago (Weasel + mARMOSet + cAT). That thing was freaky. It looked like a stretched out weasel-cat with a marmoset’s face.
My friends and I sometimes throw foreign words into our conversations. Like “I’m going to the bibliothèque (French for library).” or “I’m not taking that Scheiße (German for sh*t).” and so forth.
Yut - a despicable cretin, who happens to be my younger brother. It managed to catch on, and when he hasn’t checked in for a long period of time, my dad will usually ask “You heard from The Yut?”
I coined this one when I was ten and he was eight. He did not approve.
<gasp> OMG! I use the word catloaf, too!!! I thought I was the only one in the whole wide world! I also use catue (like ‘staute’) for times when the cats look particularly statuesque.
I also use garbaginous, pronounced ‘gar-BOJ-in-us’ to denote a person or thing possessing many of the same qualities as garbage.
Some other words I have made up:
fighty- desirous of combat snoo- random term of endearment for any small, cute creature GAP Smear- from ‘Pap Smear’, denotes any cluster of persons or establishments catering to persons who are overly concerned with appearance and fashion de-bone- removing the cardboard advertisements from the pages of a magazine to render it readable
I have also been working on my own language for the past four or so years…damn, I hate it when it turns out I’m a lot less creative than I think.
