The Word Snoop (20 page)

Some people like to put in a hyphen for the nose.

Okay, turn your head back the right way now.

The smiley started off in e-mails, to show that something was a joke (or at least not meant to be taken too seriously). Some people find that it’s hard to express emotions in written words alone, and so a smiley can take the place of tone of voice or the look on a face. If you got a message like this, for example:

you might think the person was saying crossly, ‘“Get here at once!” whereas what they really wanted to say was:

In other words, “Pretty please, I really really want you to come over now, pleeeeeease.”

The happy face was just the beginning—very quickly dozens of other symbols started appearing, like:

They’re all generally called smileys (or sometimes
emoticons
), even if they’re not smiling. Look on the Internet—you’ll find hundreds of them, as many as there are human feelings. There are different ones for different languages, and new ones being made up all the time. You’ve probably made up a few yourselves!

Half the fun is making them up, and the other half is trying to interpret them, to understand what they mean. Here, have a quick smiley test—what do you think these could mean?

Well, now that we’ve come to the end of the book, I suppose it could mean that I’m
surprised,
or want to
kiss
you, or that I’m very very
angry,
but really I’m just:
crying
because the time has come to say . . .

 

 

Adieu! from the Word Snoop . . .

Acronym
—a word formed by using the beginning letters of other words. For example, CD for Compact Disc, or SCUBA for Self-Contained Underwater Breathing Apparatus.

 

Alphabet
—letters or signs of a language that represent sounds

 

Anagram
—a word formed by mixing up the letters of another word. For example, tale is an anagram of late.

 

Backronym
—when the letters of a well-known word are used to make up a sentence. Sometimes this sentence reflects what the word actually means. For example, FEAR—Forget Everything And Run!

 

Circumlocution
—using so many words to say something, it can be hard to work out what is actually being said

 

Cliché
—a well-known expression that has been used so often that it no longer carries as much meaning as it did originally. For example, quiet as a mouse.

 

Doublespeak
—using vague words and indirect expressions to hide the truth

 

Eponym
—a word that is based on the name of a person. For example,
braille
after the French teacher Louis Braille, who invented the system.

 

Etymology
—the study of the history of words and their meanings

 

Euphemism
—indirect words and expressions used for things that are embarrassing or unpleasant to say. For example,
the ladies’ room
for “toilet” and
kick the bucket
for “die.”

 

Homophones
—two words that sound the same but have different meanings and often different spellings. For example,
rows
and
rose
.

 

Leet
—(short for
elite
) a kind of Internet and gaming slang that uses a lot of numbers

 

Lipogram
—a piece of writing in which the author deliberately leaves out a specific letter of the alphabet

 

LOL
—(short for Laugh Out Loud) an Internet slang language that uses many of the features found in texting. For example, using acronyms and numbers instead of letters, and deliberate misspellings such as woz for was.

 

Malapropism
—misusing words or expressions in a way that is funny. For example, Aunt Artica for
Antarctica
.

 

Mnemonics
—tricks and techniques that people use to help them remember things. For example, the sentence Every Good Boy Deserves Fruit helps people remember the order of the notes on a music stave: EGBDF.

 

Mondegreen
—a word or phrase that is misheard, usually from song lyrics. For example, “When a man loves a walnut” instead of “When a man loves a woman.”

 

Nickname
—an extra name for someone or something, which is usually affectionate and often funny