Eggcorn Forum

I just noticed this eggcorn on the blog of someone I know to be a native Texan. Like many Southerners, it’s a good bet she neutralizes the distinction between /ɪ/ and /É›/ before nasals; thus, “hints” and “hence” may well be homophonous in her speech. But the fact that she wrote “hints” rather than “hince” seems to make this eggcornish—indeed, “the name” “hints” whatever you’re saying about it. To illustrate:

The original sighting:
(1) Then we went to the Square. The Square is like northgate for san marcos. It is really cute. It is a square (hints the name) and it has bars all around it.
(http://jenlhobbs.blogspot.com/2006/06/you-got-dsls.html)

From a Google search for “hints the name”:
(2) We originaly started out as a anime site and a learn japanese site(hints the name jwords – japanese words)
(http://hiyasmedia.tripod.com/id1.html)
(3) i like movies, because they are art in motion, hints the name “motion” “pictures”
(http://www.rottentomatoes.com/vine/jour … lid=172403)
(4) thumbsucker is the story of a 17 year old boy who still has the habit of sucking his thumb hints the name thumbsucker
(http://www.rottentomatoes.com/vine/jour … iew=public)
(5) [regarding the show “For the People”] Camille doesn’t agree with the death penalty, but she has to do what’s right for the people (hints the name of the show)
(http://german.imdb.com/title/tt0316983/usercomments)
(6) I’m writing because you see I like this boy named Brandan (hints the name of my blog ‘Alyssa+Brandan Forever’). But he doesn’t like me.
(http://blog.funtrivia.com/blogs/entry.c … 7#comments)

...and so on. Google brings up 544 hits, but they aren’t all examples of this eggcorn.

Last edited by Laurel (2006-06-29 18:42:29)