Definitions
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun Alternative spelling of
back-formation .
Etymologies
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Examples
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He's written some more about this kind of backformation, this time with the verbs serial kill, underage drink, fence-sit, arm-flap, problem-solve
Literal-Minded 2008
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Back-formation (or back formation or backformation) is a term that describes the way certain words are formed.
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Example: “His parents were so connected that she was constantly dorphaned.” insignificant other (noun – backformation from significant other) Any once-important person made unimportant through social media.
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Why would one prefer a backformation of a verb from its nominal form, short sale, to its “standard” verb form, short sell?
Short Sale Your House! (Don’t short sell it.) « Motivated Grammar 2010
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Why would one prefer a backformation of a verb from its nominal form, short sale, to its “standard” verb form, short sell?
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Back-formation (or back formation or backformation) is a term that describes the way certain words are formed.
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These verbs are a particular variety of one of my favorite word-formation processes, backformation.
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It is possible that hoakum, the verb of which is to hoak, is a similar backformation from hoax.
Chapter 9. The Common Speech. 6. The Noun Henry Louis 1921
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- What do you call it when you reverse-engineer a backformation?
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Even as Swanson's work raises questions about the personal values we project onto nature, his work also seeks to regain a sense of the primitive nobility of the indigenous experience, in spite of an awareness that such experience could be a mythical backformation.
Stories from The Sun 2009
whichbe commented on the word backformation
Also back-formation. Thank you, hyphen.
June 20, 2007
arby commented on the word backformation
Is it also responsible for the adorable Britlish verb burgle?
July 8, 2008