Discussions about eggcorns and related topics
You are not logged in.
Registrations are currently closed because of a technical problem. Please send email to
The forum administrator reserves the right to request users to plausibly demonstrate that they are real people with an interest in the topic of eggcorns. Otherwise they may be removed with no further justification. Likewise, accounts that have not been used for posting may be removed.
Thanks for your understanding.
Chris -- 2018-04-11
In an earlier post my fingers almost got away with typing “peek experience” for “peak experience.” Either would have worked equally well if we’re referring to a fleeting and unexpected glimpse of the infinite. Oddly enough, I think my preference is for the eggcornish “peek”...
Many mystical experiences – satori in Zen, ‘seeing the inner light’ of the quaker, anatman in buddhism, the peek experience in transpersonal psychology …
Events which are often described as “a moment of clarityâ€, “a peek experienceâ€, “an epiphanyâ€, “an awakeningâ€. All describing a sudden and profound …
... capacity for the central or functional “I”, the most centered place of existence, to reach the peek experience of the spiritual or transpersonal Self. ...
o Describe a high point or peek experience in your life or work up to. now. o What do you most value about yourself, your relationships and the …
Offline
As long as the experience is one of insight, this works very well as an eggcorn.
The substitution of peek for peak (and verce visa, also either for pique ) is easy to document in plenty of other contexts, however. Many cases, like “a high mountain peekâ€, are not easily eggcornish, but some are at least candidates for that or for punning:
Giant volcanoes, such as Ascraeus Mons, the central circular feature near the top of the image, were surrounded by large water clouds. Slightly southwest, Pavonis Mons and Arisa Mons also peeked above their water clouds.
he can peek and choose
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
I find 25 uGhits for “pique experience” as well. Most seem to be intentional – either puns or used in poems or titles for other artwork. A few might be eggcornish, though.
Your statement about knitting followed by the CS Lewis quote will be on the front of the fall newsletter. I am in total agreement that friendship and knitting are indeed a pique experience.
http://www.yarnharlot.ca/MT-3.35-en/mt- … ry_id=1139
“When I do my individual best and when the team does its best and at that point there’s sort of a magic to it. It’s almost like things slow down and there’s a rhythm and it’s really almost akin to orgasm if you can believe it. It’s a highly pleasurable, pique experience,†Dr. Shugar said.
http://www.eyeworld.org/article.php?sid=3694
If you’ve ever wanted to try a new art medium but didn’t want to invest in new supplies or classroom hours, the art pique experience is tailor-made for you. No experience is necessary! Two Oregon artists bring the love of their medium to an exciting four day workshop.
http://www.artsactionalliance.org/announcements.htm
That last sounds more like a “peek” than either a “pique” or a “peak”. Maybe an experience to pique interest?
Offline
Have we discussed “peak one’s curiosity” here? That’s a common mistake, and it works pretty well as an eggcorn.
P.S. peak vs. peak was introduced here: http://eggcorns.lascribe.net/forum/view … hp?id=1742
Last edited by JonW719 (2008-11-24 20:04:34)
Feeling quite combobulated.
Offline
Spanish picar is to pick at, like a bird pecks with its peak/beak ( pico = “projecting part” ?). If something te pica it bugs or interests you, or stings you, or burns your mouth like a chile does. The chile, of course, is picante “hot” . Would it be piquant in French? Things can also picarte la curiosidad/el interés/la conciencia “pique your curiosity / interest / conscience”. Are these all (only?) etymological variants? Was something similar to eggcorning a part of the derivational process / semantic extension process that produced this state of affairs?
English spelling changes greatly affect what we perceive as malaprops vs. semantic extensions. When people ask me why Eggcorns are such a whelmingly (to the point of being overly-) English phenomenon, this is my first go-to explanation.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2023-08-13 16:08:33)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
Interesting, thanks for that observation about the dearth of eggcorns in other languages, tocayo. It has been a puzzle to me why I find so few in French. It certainly not because they have a solid command of the language. I explain it to myself as a question of perspective. I’m more an unwitting producer of eggcorns in French than a detective.
By the way, French uses piquer in much the same way as Spanish, except that chilis are ‘piments’ and spicy is ‘épicé’. Épicé looked suspicious to me, but apparently it’s cognate with “species”, as in species of herb from the apothecary. To say something stings or itches, you say ‘ça pique’.
One of these days or years, I will round up the dozen or so juicy poteaux roses gathered from my years reading study exams.
Offline
It may not be so much of a dearth as an ignorance: until you’re looking for it you are likely not to find it.
. Besides the spelling issue is the lack in English of a morphology that consistently distinguishes parts of speech, which leads to easy use of exactly the same word/stem as a noun, a verb, adjective, adverb, even preposition. Then there is the phonology. 16 vowels, who does that? How can the vowels help but run into each other? And there’s no lack of consonants and neutralizations between them. And syllable structures, from the simple, like Oh , to the complex, like strengths . It’s almost like anything goes.
. And word-formation: why do we like one-syllable words so much? And yet we have plenty of medium-sized words and we readily build up long and complex words too, and we constantly (and therefore easily) convert phrases into words. Again, almost anything goes.
. Then there’s the wholesale historical amalgamation of Germanic Anglish-Saxonish with French and (half-)learnèd Latin and Greek, and the constant influx over centuries from other languages as well. (All of which is of course an important source of the spelling mess and the other issues mentioned above.) It is also relevant, of course, that English is distributed all over the globe, spoken by a billion and a half people (i.e. at least 1,000,000.5 individuals), for most of whom it is the second (/3d/4th/…) language, and it has been written/distributed in written form way more than any other language in history.
. It’s also relevant that word-play is a cultural value for many (most native-speaking?) groups, and the results of jokes, puns, etc., are readily adopted and often become standard for sub-populations.
. All those are real factors, I am sure. Together they help us towards explaining why such widely-used languages as French and Spanish (alphabetical order) seem to have fewer eggcorns.
. But I still think there must be some other languages where we’d find more eggcorns than the ones we few are likely to run across.
Nada bit of pork fat in this sausage. It’s all lean venison_
mirad esto que no os cuesta nada bit
I’m coming into this with zero, zip, nada bit of ownership experience.
I know I have some similar ones with Nahuatl-Spanish mixups, but I’m not finding where I put them.
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2023-12-27 08:25:38)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
Somehow failed to mention Sp. pico y pala = “pick and shovel”. Again, the pico ’s central feature, both perceptually and functionally, is the sharply projecting part, and again, I would think of it as an etymological cognate rather than any sort of an eggcorn. Pecking at, picking at, with a pick or a beak … (A toothpick is generally called a palillo , “little stick” , in Mexico at least, though I have heard picadientes “pick-teeth” and limpiadientes “clean-teeth” as well. The Internet gives escarba-dientes “scrapeteeth” and mondadientes “debark-teeth” ? I don’t remember even hearing mondar before.)
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2023-08-20 17:18:50)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
David B, et al.: re the predominance of reported eggcorns coming from English, minutes 9.03-11.15, 18.21-19.47 and 20.23-20.45 from this oldish video (with my daughter Holly, who has a very large number of bilingual followers) are relevant. (The video also includes plugs for this forum and Kem’s eggcorn book.)
Last edited by DavidTuggy (2023-09-25 16:06:12)
*If the human mind were simple enough for us to understand,
we would be too simple-minded to understand it* .
Offline
Great reply, David, thanks for that. I loved that video, not least for the plug for ‘a nominal egg’.
Offline