On 18 November 2011 11:01, John Gilmore <johnwgilmore0...@gmail.com> wrote: > This 'Shebang'---There is of course another one--- is not just a > verbal slurring of 'Hash Bang'. It has a much more elegant name. It > is a conflation. > > Consider, just in English, to which they are not confined, > > o Edmund Spenser: wrizzled (wrinkled + frizzled) > > o Shakespeare: glaze (glare + gaze) > > o· Lewis Carroll: slithy (slimy, lithe), chortle (chuckle, snort), > snark (snake, shark), galumph (gallop, triumph) > > They have a long, much (even too much) discussed literary history > under this rubric, and Carroll talks about them repeatedly in his > letters to Ellen Terry.
I am surprised at conflation being used this way. I understand conflation to carry implication of at least some degree of error or confusion, intentional or otherwise. This etymology of "Shebang" may well involve conflation, but the word itself is surely better called by Carroll's now quite standard term portmanteau. Tony H. ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to lists...@bama.ua.edu with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
