ret·ro·nym [re-truh-nim]
–noun
a term, as acoustic guitar, coined in modification of the original referent that was used alone, as guitar, to distinguish it from a later contrastive development, as electric guitar.
]| Dictionary.com Unabridged (v 1.1) Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2006. |
A retronym is a type of neologism coined for an old object or concept whose original name has come to be used for something else, is no longer unique, or is otherwise inappropriate or misleading. The term was coined by Frank Mankiewicz [1] and popularized by William Safire [2] in 1980 in the New York Times. Many of these are created by advances in technology. However, a retronym itself is a neological word coinage consisting of the original noun with a different adjective added, which emphasises the distinction to be made from the original form.
From Wikipedia.org
I like this word not only for it’s self-referential quality (like the ultimate: ‘sesquipedalian‘), but also because it is about the exacting nature of language itself. The need to coin neolgisms with the arrival of new technologies and make new distinctions so we can at least attempt to have our language describe an occurrent reality.
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