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One hundred facts that are interesting but ultimately useless.

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#907650 added March 26, 2017 at 2:23pm
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Malapropisms
Malapropisms
- linguistics -

​​A "malapropism" is a linguistic effect where a speaker might replace one word in a phrase or sentence with a different word with a similar sound. In a true malapropism, the new word has a vastly different definition than the intended word, resulting in a phrase with no clear meaning. The term "malapropism" derives from "Mrs. Malaprop", a character in a 1775 play by British playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan; the character would frequently utter nonsense phrases like "illiterate him quite from your memory" (instead of the intended "obliterate"). A few recent examples include "lavatories of innovation" (instead of "laboratories") and "electrical votes" (instead of "electoral").

Similar to a malapropism is an "eggcorn", which also features a soundalike replacement. Unlike a malapropism, however, an eggcorn will still make some degree of sense in context. Examples include "feeble position" (instead of "fetal position"), "bold-faced lie" (instead of "bald-faced lie"), and "eggcorn" itself (instead of "acorn").


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