coinages

coinages

are words and meanings used for the first time. Words created for the physical sciences (such as gas and radar) are often publicly coined (for example, in a journal), so that the moment and sources of their creation are recorded; but this is rarely the case with more general vocabulary unless this too is invented for a special purpose (as with charisma and robot) and still less so with slang and colloquial English, even when these are phrase-based. Coinages tend to be based on analogy with existing words (e.g. software from hardware, and then shareware and malware and others from software), on compounding (e.g. lunatic fringe, smart card, double whammy), on blending words (e.g. motel from motor and hotel, edutainment from education and entertainment, podcast from iPod [personal audio player] and broadcast), on use of prefixes and suffixes (e.g. reflagging, deskill, productize), on phrases, real or notional (e.g. gobsmacked, me-too, plugged-in). See also new words.