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Was that a witty take on “home in on”, Keith?
From: The English Place-Name List <[log in to unmask]>
On Behalf Of Keith Briggs
Sent: 13 October 2023 10:36
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [EPNL] Terminological questions
Let me hone in on the second point - this looks like simple folk-etymology (OED: 'usually, the popular perversion of the form of words in order to render it apparently significant').
On the first point, OED has nominalize, v. 'to convert into a noun or (in later use) a nominal'.
Keith
From: The English Place-Name List <[log in to unmask]>
on behalf of John Hudswell <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: 13 October 2023 10:25
To:
[log in to unmask] <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Terminological questions
Hello,
I’ve been looking for suitable terms for a couple of linguistic phenomena observed in place-names and am hoping members of the list might be able to suggest something.
The first is where an adjective becomes a noun. For example, people say ‘mobile’ to mean ‘mobile phone’ where the original noun is dropped and over time becomes lost. I’m not sure that the linguistic term ‘adjective nominalisation’ is strictly appropriate given that that refers to the active creation of a noun from an adjective.
The second is where an unfamiliar word is replaced by a familiar one. This is quite common in speech, for example people often say ‘tender hooks’ instead of ‘tenter hooks’.
I look forward to your thoughts.
John.
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