Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
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Chris -- 2018-04-11
To a certain extent this reshaping may be the result of a back formation from “compulsion†– given the form of the noun, you might well expect the verb to be “compul.†(My last example is interesting in that regard.) But I think eggcornish thinking is probably also involved for some speakers: compulsions do exert an irresistible pull on a person. And the spellings with double L would seem to support this idea.
This is another very regional form – most of the writers appear to be from South Asia or the Middle East. Examples:
You are not compulled to follow this method.
http://houstonvijai.sulekha.com/blog/po … d-blog.htm
It compulls the man to fulfill the needs of women in sex.
http://www.karuthu.com/forum/forum_post … =3132&PN=8
I was working in Delhi some years back, and whenver I travel from Delhi to Chennai, in Nagpur I used to see some of the thirunangaigal. Then, I used to afraid, but still wanted to chat with them. Though they dont compull or force any one for money, people used to tease them.
http://livingsmile.blogspot.com/2007/08 … st_16.html
Convey only the good things to others and if you are compulled to convey
negatives,then try to convey the positives hiden in the negatives
http://www.indianofficer.com/forums/chi … erson.html
I think anyone who can indulge in his desires, rather than being compulled to desire, can see clealy what George Bernard Shaw really means!
http://zeidspex.blogspot.com/2006/05/in … ation.html
I have a Supercard SD and I downloaded DSLinux, when I boot it it says FlashMe v1 detected, am I compulled to run FlashMe then?
http://www.ndshb.com/modules.php?name=F … opic&p=876
Due to heavy noise pollution, nowadays every one is compulled to know about
hearing protection(http://sonomax.com/).
http://data.getafreelancer.com/pmb/4674 … onomax.txt
It’s a compulsion, I’m compulled to do it. It’s an addiction, a horrible, horrible craving to help a buddy out.”
http://www.funhouserock.com/funhouse/bl … 2&page=120
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Good one. It should make the 2009 top ten. (Speaking of the top ten, where are our “best of 2008” posts?)
And this would be a flounder eggcorn, yes?
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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Kem wrote
Good one. It should make the 2009 top ten.
Thanks—I was happy to find this one because I’m a fan of back formations.
Kem also wrote
And this would be a flounder eggcorn, yes?
I’d say “compull” is just a plain eggcorn because (like “eggcorn” itself) it replaces part (”-pel”) of a whole (“compel”) with something new (”-pull”).
And Kem kept on writing:
Speaking of the top ten, where are our “best of 2008†posts?
I’ve made up my own list but it’s too long—I’m trying to keep it to no more than 20. And I want to write some comments, so it’ll have to wait until I’ve got the current batch of work done. I’m hoping by Sunday or Monday. Do you want to take the lead, Kem? If anyone else posts in the meantime, I’m going to avoid looking at them until I’ve got mine up—it’d be interesting to know how much of an aesthetic consensus we can reach without comparing notes.
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I’d say “compull†is just a plain eggcorn because (like “eggcorn†itself) it replaces part (â€-pelâ€) of a whole (“compelâ€) with something new (â€-pullâ€).
As you said in the 2008 thread (http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/forum/view … hp?id=2859), the line between a flounder eggcorn and an eggcorn is somewhat murky. “Eggcorn” itself is flounderish because it has no required phrasal context. But the word itself is a compact phrase (egg+corn), so I don’t think we’re in any trouble that our flagship will sink before the rest of the fleet. Presumably the flounder/founder confusion can continue stand as a true flounder because the substitution has no phrasal context and what is left after the confused phonemes are extracted (”-ounder”) is not a discrete lexeme.
Another issue may enter in to the eggcorn/flounder call. In his original Language Log post about flounders (http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/language … 04805.html), Zwicky says that a flounder is “a simple confusion of phonologically and semantically similar words.” Notice the word “words.” In all of his examples the correct word and the flounder are both legitimate English words. If we add this dictionary requirement to the definition for flounders, then we can safely exclude “acorn/eggcorn” from the category. This would also help us with the intifada/infantada mixup we discussed in that earlier post and with the confusion between “compull” and “compel.” Neither of these substitutions would be flounders because only one word in each pair is an accepted English word.
Last edited by kem (2009-01-02 15:56:29)
Hatching new language, one eggcorn at a time.
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