(no subject)

[naath]

Ridiculously irritating thing of the day:

People who treat the word Halloween as Hallo-ween rather than Hallow-een and then proceed to make up words like "Jesus-ween" or "sexy-ween" or "Howl-o-ween" (this is a selection of things I've actually seen; I'm not intending to comment on the content intended).

It is All Hallows Eve(ning); the 'w' is part of "hallows" not "evening".

I just... don't understand why people do this.


(Also I've decided I'm going to try to post one thing that's been bugging me/on my mind/happens to sound interesting every day in November; instead of trying to write a novel which clearly would not work).

Comments

[gerald_duck]

Um. Isn't it "helico-pter"? So "foopter" rather than "foöopter"?

In any case, we've already joined "zo" with "-ology" to make "zöology", so there's precedent for doing that with words, even if people then spoil the effect by abbreviating "zöological gardens" to "zoo", ignoring the diaeresis.

That "Jesusween" is etymologically bankrupt whereas "Jesuseen" sounds odd might be a clue that people are trying to make a stupid word for a stupid concept. (-8

[simont]

Fair enough. Counter-pedantry, though: haven't you got your diaereses in the wrong places? Normally they mark the second of two separate vowels, not the first (e.g. Chloë). So that you'd have fooöpter and zoölogy/zoölogical.

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

Is counter-pedantry different to pedantry? </irony> :)