en-store, v.
informant: "My daughter is going to have someone enstore the garage door opener."
Interpretation: install
Conflated with restore, instore, enstore
See also
09 January 2009
trinkle
trin-kle, v.
informant: "We got a new mop. I'm not sure how to use it so I'm going to have my husband trinkle with it."
Interpretation: tinker
Conflated with tinkle, tinker, trinket
See also
informant: "We got a new mop. I'm not sure how to use it so I'm going to have my husband trinkle with it."
Interpretation: tinker
Conflated with tinkle, tinker, trinket
See also
- Google Search: trinkle
- Trinkle appears to be widely accepted as a surname
physical year
phys-i-cal year, n.
informant: "This past physical year we spent _____ from our budget."
someone: "So how does that compare to the previous fiscal year?"
informant: "The previous physical year..."
Interpretation: fiscal year
See also
someone: "So how does that compare to the previous fiscal year?"
informant: "The previous physical year..."
Interpretation: fiscal year
See also
extrominal
ex-trom-i-nal, adj.
(No context available. From a staff meeting on 12-11-2008.)
Interpretation: astronimical
See also
(No context available. From a staff meeting on 12-11-2008.)
Interpretation: astronimical
See also
Prologue
I started my job in this office not quite a year ago. The first person I made contact with here was the secretary - naturally so in any office setting. I did notice very quickly that her grammatical stylings were unorthodox and she chose unusual words in her speech. There have been many moments in my time here where I would correct a word for her thinking she may have conflated multiple words, but she would simply continue using that word the way she felt was correct - extremely confidently, I may add. Therefore, I have concluded that our secretary speaks in her own dialect of English, which we will refer to as MEG Vernacular.
A couple points of interest worth noting:
A couple points of interest worth noting:
- Although she uses an unusual vocabulary, all others seem to understand the ideas she tries to convey and can translate MEG Vernacular to the widely used US standard English with ease.
- What is perceived by others as hypercorrection of standard English is, in some cases, correct use of the English language by the secretary. What she intends to express, however, is not articulated as a direct result of her grammatical execution. The verbalized idea and the intended idea are then diametrically opposed.
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