Innovative Usage Thread

[Travis B.]

it could be an alteration of boink.

Of course, boink itself has fuck as one meaning.

[Raphael]

I learned recently that for my Mom, a Schnecke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnecken

is a type of Kuchen (cake), while I would never classify it as such.

[Travis B.]

I learned recently that for my Mom, a Schnecke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnecken

is a type of Kuchen (cake), while I would never classify it as such.

Even though I am an American, those look familiar to me; if I had to classify it, I would classify it as a doughnut.

[Linguoboy]

I learned recently that for my Mom, a Schnecke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnecken

is a type of Kuchen (cake), while I would never classify it as such.

Even though I am an American, those look familiar to me; if I had to classify it, I would classify it as a doughnut.

Do you consider cinnamon rolls and stick buns "doughnuts"?

(For me, a "doughnut" has to be fried, so Apfelschnecken [roughly like our apple fritters] are the only Schnecken which qualify.)

[Travis B.]

I learned recently that for my Mom, a Schnecke

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schnecken

is a type of Kuchen (cake), while I would never classify it as such.

Even though I am an American, those look familiar to me; if I had to classify it, I would classify it as a doughnut.

Do you consider cinnamon rolls and stick buns "doughnuts"?

(For me, a "doughnut" has to be fried, so Apfelschnecken [roughly like our apple fritters] are the only Schnecken which qualify.)

Yes, if I had to somehow classify a cinnamon roll, I probably would classify it as a doughnut. (Similarly to Raphael, I would never classify a cinnamon roll as a cake.)

[linguistcat]

Even though I am an American, those look familiar to me; if I had to classify it, I would classify it as a doughnut.

Do you consider cinnamon rolls and stick buns "doughnuts"?

(For me, a "doughnut" has to be fried, so Apfelschnecken [roughly like our apple fritters] are the only Schnecken which qualify.)

Yes, if I had to somehow classify a cinnamon roll, I probably would classify it as a doughnut. (Similarly to Raphael, I would never classify a cinnamon roll as a cake.)

I'm also in the "doughnuts are fried" party. I would say cinnamon rolls are their own thing, but closer to cakes. From what I've seen of Schnecken, they seem like cinnamon rolls, including Apfelschnecken. ETA: My German is about as minimal as possible while still being able to say I know some. But I do at least agree they aren't cakes.

[Qwynegold]

• Yesterday a coworker gave a presentation via Zoom and I'd never heard so clearly how heavily he aspirates certain stops. Word-initial /k/ before back vowels consistently sounded like [kˣ], and his initial /h/ even tended toward [x]. /t/ and /p/ were fairly heavily aspirated, too, but not to the point of affrication. (He's from Michigan originally and visits often.)

Something that annoys me about the YouTube channel Geography Now is that the guy often uses something like [q͡χ] for /k/. Especially before /l/. And also the word "anxient".

[Travis B.]

I sometimes pronounce stressed/initial /kl/ as [kxʰʟ̥] myself. (Note that I mark aspiration here because I distinguish aspirated and aspirated affricates.)

[Hominid]

Cinnamon rolls are definitely not doughnuts or cakes for me. The only category I'd put them in would be "pastries", but doughnuts and (some) cakes would also fit into that category (although cinnamon rolls are more of an archetypal example of a pastry than doughnuts or most cakes are).

[alynnidalar]

I would not call an isolated cinnamon roll a donut, but if I went to a donut shop and requested a dozen assorted donuts, I wouldn’t be surprised or upset if they put a cinnamon roll in there. They’re sort of donut adjacent, at least enough to be commonly sold together here.

If I had to classify cinnamon rolls, I think I’d have to put them in a category of their own, also including pecan rolls (which IMO are the same thing just with pecans and more of a syrupy glaze than cinnamon-sugar and icing)

[Travis B.]

I would not call an isolated cinnamon roll a donut, but if I went to a donut shop and requested a dozen assorted donuts, I wouldn’t be surprised or upset if they put a cinnamon roll in there. They’re sort of donut adjacent, at least enough to be commonly sold together here.

If I had to classify cinnamon rolls, I think I’d have to put them in a category of their own, also including pecan rolls (which IMO are the same thing just with pecans and more of a syrupy glaze than cinnamon-sugar and icing)

From further thought, I am inclined to agree - cinnamon rolls are not doughnuts per se, but they commonly are associated with them.

[Ares Land]

Caught on French Survivor, a pile of three reflexives: 'on s'est auto privé nous-mêmes de nourriture'.

(I think the use of auto in popular French is pretty cool. How often do language borrow reflexive pronouns from dead languages?)

[Kuchigakatai]

(I think the use of auto in popular French is pretty cool. How often do language borrow reflexive pronouns from dead languages?)

I think it's much more likely the prefix auto- becoming more productive than the Ancient Greek pronoun being borrowed. So from auto-évaluation, autodestruction, autoproclamé, you get s'autopriver.

I've noticed it's slightly more common nowadays in Salvadoran Spanish too, but maybe less so than French? Just this morning I came across "auto-alabarse" 'to praise oneself', which I hadn't seen before.

Something that amused me recently was an online rando writing "el güebierno" to insult the government (el gobierno). The first syllable was modified to resemble the Salvadoran colloquial verb "hueviarse algo" /(g)weˈbjaɾ/ 'to steal sth' (derived from "huevo" 'egg', maybe in reference to a farmer taking a hen's eggs away every other day). It made me think a similar portmanteau would be possible in English but in the opposite direction: the lovernment, or better the love'ment (the guv'ment), maybe said sarcastically of a government that speaks of loving its citizens.

[Ares Land]

(I think the use of auto in popular French is pretty cool. How often do language borrow reflexive pronouns from dead languages?)

I think it's much more likely the prefix auto- becoming more productive than the Ancient Greek pronoun being borrowed. So from auto-évaluation, autodestruction, autoproclamé, you get s'autopriver.

I've noticed it's slightly more common nowadays in Salvadoran Spanish too, but maybe less so than French? Just this morning I came across "auto-alabarse" 'to praise oneself', which I hadn't seen before.

Oh, yes, of course! What I meant is that it amounts to borrowing a reflexive pronoun.

I'm sure how common it is. It sounds very wrong to me. I hear it often on TV, not so much in real life.

[Kuchigakatai]

Judging by how I've seen youngsters talk in the past few months, it appears that "af" (as fuck, usually a sentence-final degree adverb, as in "glorious af") and the interjection "mood" and its emphatic variant "phat mood" (both expressing sadness or regret, in reaction to something someone else said, perhaps because the interlocutor reminded them of something) are already well on their way out now.

The interjection "pog", meaning "that's cool/awesome", seems to continue to gain strength though. And anyone who's paid any attention to the Among Us videogame phenomenon going on right now knows about "sus" (suspect, noun).

Meanwhile, English continues to accumulate lowercase acronyms of common pragmatic phrases. Some 2-3 years ago I noticed "ngl" (not gonna lie) gaining strength, and "rn" (right now) a bit before that, and here's new ones I've noticed:
ig = I guess (usually sentence-final)
hru = how are you?
wbu = what about you? (often in a response to the previous one: "good wbu")
ftr = for the record

I vaguely remember seeing wbu in 2017 already though.

There's also something to be said about "ab" as an abbreviation of "about". These people often feel "abt" is old-fashioned even, not too different from YMMV (your mileage may vary) or whassup or "if you will".

The interjection "bruh" (from brother), expressing surprise at something mind-blowing (i.e. the speaker's acceptance of a wildly different point of view) or dismay at something regrettable or painful to hear, as well as the use of the adjective "cursed" (sometimes as a complete sentence), meaning something terrible yet amusing (such as a joke that points out a painful truth underlyingly) were already in use at least two years ago and continue to be common.

[Kuchigakatai]

I heard someone mention that "sick burn" seems to be pretty obsolete now, which strikes me as correct.

And regarding both this post and my last post, this XKCD comic seems pretty relevant:
https://xkcd.com/166/

[Linguoboy]

"Screen shoot" for "take a screenshot". Backformation FTW!

[axolotl]

I don't think this is the most innovative thing in the world, but I've heard "to stay or to go" (as opposed to what I've always expected, "for here or to go") in restaurants several times now, and it's caught me completely off-guard every time. I end up blankly staring before suddenly realizing what it's supposed to mean. I'm wondering about the geographic distribution of this. It seems to be a Utahism (I'm not originally from here). I've never heard it anywhere else.

[Linguoboy]

I don't think this is the most innovative thing in the world, but I've heard "to stay or to go"

I don't think it was this exact expression, but there was some substitution for "for here" I heard recently that baffled me for a minute. If I can recall what it was, I'll post it.

In the meantime, I just learned the Modern Hebrew placeholder term chupchik and I'm now making it my goal to import it into English.

[Raphael]

In the meantime, I just learned the Modern Hebrew placeholder term chupchik and I'm now making it my goal to import it into English.

But with what meaning? Judging from Wiktionary, it seems to colloquial for a feature of the Hebrew alphabet that doesn't exist in the Latin/English alphabet.