Tuesday 18 December 2012

Intrasyllabic Expletive Insertion - Absobloodylutely!

Yes, no, absolutely! No, honestly, I really did hear somebody on the Tube (ok, subway, if you must, US followers) say, without apparent humour, "Abso-f***ing-lutely". Well, ok, not with the arguably mealy-mouthed asteriskification.

I wonder if there is a proper linguist-approved term for this? I felt I was flirting with trouble in an email to an expert a while back by facetiously inventing a journal called Isis Review. I thought at first it might just have been an Oxford student cabaret. But it seemed more convincing the more I googled "is is / double is / double copula". And the spoof name, Dr Nawat Amin, is perfectly possible. No offence intended to any real person. It was invented, indeed, to suggest a very distinguished academic whose research might not be appreciated by the world at large.

Hence, to post or not to post?

Amin (2011): "Intrasyllabic and Intramorphemic Expletive Additions" by Dr Nawat Amin, in Journal of Metropolitan Dialectology, Jan-Jun 2011 (vol. xx, iv).

No, this is only a joke  - just  a link at most. Need to relaunch Joke and Irony Alert?

4 comments:

  1. It's an expletive infixation.

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  2. Fan-***ing-tastic! Thanks for your comment, Dr A. Regards.

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  3. This is great! It supports my personal sense of what sounds right in my head. Thanks!

    ReplyDelete