Innovative Usage Thread

[Vijay]

I've never heard of Halloween being celebrated in India. We have plenty of holidays already, trust me.

[Vijay]

I'm not sure whether this is innovative usage or something else, but as a co-worker once said (I may not be remembering the exact phrasing), can someone translate from English to English for me? From Time magazine (September 20):

"Juul executives have been working for months to keep up with an ever changing regulatory environment, and among the hundreds of open jobs on its website is a dedicated FDA regulatory counsel. There's no question that the White House's crackdown on flavors will hit Juul where it hurts. More than 80% of the pods the company sells are flavored, so pulling those from the market will result in a huge revenue hit. But a company source calls the potential result of the government's actions 'short-term pain, but potentially long-term what the category needs,' since driving down youth use is pivotal to securing FDA authorization and keeping Juuls on the market."

What does the bolded phrase long-term what the category needs mean here? Maybe it's just the use of the word "category" that's confusing me.

[Travis B.]

Just in case, I would like to mention that Halloween has been celebrated in Scotland and Ireland for at least a few centuries before immigrants from these countries modified it in the US. The pumpkins were originally turnips/rutabaga (neeps) and changed to pumpkin in the New World precisely because turnips weren't available.

Also, pumpkins are much easier to carve than turnips.

[Kuchigakatai]

What does the bolded phrase long-term what the category needs mean here? Maybe it's just the use of the word "category" that's confusing me.

There's no verb in the quote from the company source, so if you supply "to be" in both parts, I think it makes sense, although perhaps I'd reword it as:

"The potential result of the government's actions is a short-term pain, but in the long term, it is potentially what the category does need."

Maybe "category" refers to the type of industry or market the FDA is regulating more strictly now. I'd need to actually read the article...

[Travis B.]

I think being taken aback by "pumpkin spice" but not by "bonfire spice" is the most British thing Sal has ever said. At least pumpkin is a food! What is bonfire spice, anyway? Spilled whiskey and soot?

I myself wonder what "bonfire spice" is - is a "bonfire spice latte" a latte with ashes put in it in celebration of Guy Fawkes Night?

[Vijay]

I'd need to actually read the article...

It's available online: https://time.com/5680988/juul-vaping-health-crisis/.

[alynnidalar]

I'm not sure whether this is innovative usage or something else, but as a co-worker once said (I may not be remembering the exact phrasing), can someone translate from English to English for me? From Time magazine (September 20):

"Juul executives have been working for months to keep up with an ever changing regulatory environment, and among the hundreds of open jobs on its website is a dedicated FDA regulatory counsel. There's no question that the White House's crackdown on flavors will hit Juul where it hurts. More than 80% of the pods the company sells are flavored, so pulling those from the market will result in a huge revenue hit. But a company source calls the potential result of the government's actions 'short-term pain, but potentially long-term what the category needs,' since driving down youth use is pivotal to securing FDA authorization and keeping Juuls on the market."

What does the bolded phrase long-term what the category needs mean here? Maybe it's just the use of the word "category" that's confusing me.

"Category" appears to mean "the vape industry", thus:

The government's actions [that is, cracking down on flavored vapes] will potentially result in short-term pain, but in the long term will be beneficial to the vape industry ["what the category needs"] because if the vape industry can no longer be accused of marketing to minors, it will be easier to secure FDA authorization of vapes.

[Vijay]

Thanks, alynnidalar and Ser!

[quinterbeck]

Another one has taken to selling (in theory - the staff warn people not to order it because it's disgusting) "bonfire spice" flavour, which at least makes a little more sense but is still a pretty weird concept...

Apparently 'bonfire spice' has "a rich caramel toffee flavour, a sprinkle of cinnamon, cloves, cardamom and ginger, all topped with a dash of caramel and cinnamon." Source

If it wasn't for the cardamom I'd say it sounds pretty good

[Linguoboy]

If it wasn't for the cardamom I'd say it sounds pretty good

cardamom > cinnamon

I thought I'd found an innovative usage in my reading today but it turns out that using pommel to mean "beat; pound" is legit (though using it to describe the action of a heart seems to be rare to nonexistent).

[Raphael]

I've heard about "pummeling" someone in the sense of beating or pounding that person, but not about a pommeling heart.

[Linguoboy]

I've heard about "pummeling" someone in the sense of beating or pounding that person, but not about a pommeling heart.

Yeah, at first I thought it was a malapropism for pummel, which like you I've only ever heard with the sense of "give a beating to" (often in the fixed phrase "pummel into submission").

[Linguoboy]

I love our tendency to backform verbs from deverbal noun compounds. Two new instances spotted in the wild today:

“The person after me has scuba dived.”
“his boyfriend looks like he will serial kill someone”

[Raphael]

I love our tendency to backform verbs from deverbal noun compounds. Two new instances spotted in the wild today:

“The person after me has scuba dived.”
“his boyfriend looks like he will serial kill someone”

Somehow, the first one makes perfect sense to me, while the second one doesn't.

[Travis B.]

I love our tendency to backform verbs from deverbal noun compounds. Two new instances spotted in the wild today:

“The person after me has scuba dived.”
“his boyfriend looks like he will serial kill someone”

Somehow, the first one makes perfect sense to me, while the second one doesn't.

The first seems grammatical to me while the second does not.

[holbuzvala]

I heard a neat shift today where someone pronounced "monosyllabic" as /mɒnəʊsɪˈlɪbɪk/, which was neat to see the /a/ raised to an /ɪ/ (perhaps thanks to the surrounding /ɪ/s), but it struck me as weird because it was on a stressed syllable.

Monosyllibic.

[Linguoboy]

I love our tendency to backform verbs from deverbal noun compounds. Two new instances spotted in the wild today:

“The person after me has scuba dived.”
“his boyfriend looks like he will serial kill someone”

Somehow, the first one makes perfect sense to me, while the second one doesn't.

I interpreted it as "to kill someone in the manner of a serial killer". The entire phrase is more or less equivalent to "his boyfriend looks like a serial killer" but with a greater sense of urgency; you can have the stereotypical look of a serial killer without actually giving the impression that you would kill someone.

[Whimemsz]

I love our tendency to backform verbs from deverbal noun compounds. Two new instances spotted in the wild today:

“The person after me has scuba dived.”
“his boyfriend looks like he will serial kill someone”

Somehow, the first one makes perfect sense to me, while the second one doesn't.

I interpreted it as "to kill someone in the manner of a serial killer". The entire phrase is more or less equivalent to "his boyfriend looks like a serial killer" but with a greater sense of urgency; you can have the stereotypical look of a serial killer without actually giving the impression that you would kill someone.

That's how I interpret it, and both seem fine and relatively unremarkable (though partially novel) to me: I probably haven't ever heard "serial kill" used as a verb (if so it didn't leave an impression), but I'm pretty confident I have heard "scuba dive" used as one before. There is definitely a sense in which "serial kill someone" feels more...I dunno, slangy or playful or something? I'm not exactly sure what it is...than "someone scuba dives," which just sounds entirely normal and which I'd say in the appropriate situation.

[Estav]

I heard a neat shift today where someone pronounced "monosyllabic" as /mɒnəʊsɪˈlɪbɪk/, which was neat to see the /a/ raised to an /ɪ/ (perhaps thanks to the surrounding /ɪ/s), but it struck me as weird because it was on a stressed syllable.

An alternative explanation I can think of is that, if the person you heard had the weak vowel merger, they might have the phoneme /ɪ/ in their pronunciation of monosyllable (/ˈmɒnəʊˌsɪlɪbl/ or something like that) and have converted it to stressed /ɪ/. I asked a little while ago about people using /ɛnt/ in the stressed syllable of words spelled with -antal, like consonantal and covenantal, which I think could be caused by influence from the pronunciation of unstressed word-final -ant (although in that case there could also be influence from -ental words like elemental and continental, while I can't think of other /ɪbɪk/ adjectives).

[holbuzvala]

I heard a neat shift today where someone pronounced "monosyllabic" as /mɒnəʊsɪˈlɪbɪk/, which was neat to see the /a/ raised to an /ɪ/ (perhaps thanks to the surrounding /ɪ/s), but it struck me as weird because it was on a stressed syllable.

An alternative explanation I can think of is that, if the person you heard had the weak vowel merger, they might have the phoneme /ɪ/ in their pronunciation of monosyllable (/ˈmɒnəʊˌsɪlɪbl/ or something like that) and have converted it to stressed /ɪ/. I asked a little while ago about people using /ɛnt/ in the stressed syllable of words spelled with -antal, like consonantal and covenantal, which I think could be caused by influence from the pronunciation of unstressed word-final -ant (although in that case there could also be influence from -ental words like elemental and continental, while I can't think of other /ɪbɪk/ adjectives).

This seems like a very sound explanation. Cheers