And I've learned yet another term: eggcorn. Watch the video to learn more about these quirky linguistic errors made by well-meaning anglophones everywhere.
The presenter takes a rather charitable and forgiving attitude toward people who use eggcorns. Hear me well: I. Do. Not.
And buck naked came first. Butt naked, I contend, arises from a mishearing.
5 comments:
That video was surprisingly interesting; I made it almost to the fifteen-minute mark looking for an eggcorn I'm guilty of. I didn't see any. Well, I'll occasionally jokingly say something like "old timers disease," knowing full well the proper term.
Of course, now I expect Karma will rear her head and implicate me in an eggcorn scandal on the blog. Oh well, you rip what you sew.
I see a lot of people getting "free rein" wrong. They erroneously write, "free reign," as mentioned in the video.
Given your penchant for pedantry, I have to say I'm surprised that this is the first time you've encountered the term. Welcome to the wonderful world of eggcorns!
Some of my favorites:
"all intensive purposes" (We don't have time for your casual purposes!)
"pass mustard" (Pardon me, do you have any Grey Poupon?)
"card shark" (Land shark's seedier cousin)
My ignorance is boundless.
As for pedantry... well, isn't that the Quacta calling the Stifling slimy.
I never said it was a bad thing. ;)
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