Craptastic newspeak

Portmanteau: a word formed by blending sounds from two or more words and combining their meanings. All the cool kids are doing it now but that doesn’t mean it’s good, right?

Hijacking perfectly good words

Take ‘neutraceuticals’ for example. It combines two perfectly good words into one dismal one.

• Nutrient: a chemical that an organism needs to live and grow.
• Pharmaceutical: chemical substances intended for use in medical diagnosis, cure, treatment, or prevention of disease.
• Neutraceutical: supplements that are “not intended to diagnose, treat, cure, or prevent any disease”, but designed to promote ‘wellness’.

So nutraceuticals are in fact, neither nutri nor ceutical.

More frenemies

1. Bromance: brother, romance – a platonic friendship between two men
2. Frenemy: friend, enemy – an enemy disguised as a friend or to a friend who is also a rival
3. Staycation: stay, vacation – a holiday spent at home
4. Twi-hards : Twilight, Die-hard – used to describe fans of the Twilight series
5. Refudiate: repudiate and refute, coined by Sarah Palin
6. Octodamus: octopus, Nostradamus- used to describe Paul the psychic octopus
7. Insania: insanity, mania – coined by Peter Andre
8. Scandal-gate: (any scandal, Watergate)
9. Gleek: Glee,geek – fans of the TV show Glee
10. Bridezilla: bride, Godzilla- a demanding bride-to-be
11. Brangelina: Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie
12. Mockumentary: mock, documentary
13. Guesstimate: guess, estimate
14. Scrooge: screw, gouge – coined by Charles Dickens
15. Squiggle: squirm, wiggle
16. Chortle: chuckle, snort – coined by Lewis Carroll
17. Portmanteau: from the French porte (carry),manteau (coat) – hence a coat hook
18. Lipsmackinthirstquenchinacetastinmotivatingood
    buzzincooltalkinhighwalkinfastlivinevergivincool
    fizzin Pepsi’s used this 100-letter portmanteau in their 1973 TV and film advertising