Portmanteau Words Essay

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Portmanteau Words are the one that blend the sounds and the meanings of two words. The word Portmanteau is derived from the French word portmanteau, combined fromporter (to carry) and manteau(mantle). While these Words originated in 16th century, Lewis Carroll is credited with coining this word (in Through the Looking Glass) based on the fact that portmanteau bag is one that opens into two equal parts. However, many such Words catch on and latch on to the lexicon. Others do not and simply fade away into silent sunsets, having enjoyed their 15 minutes of glory. Here is the complete list of Portmanteau words that the visitors could use in their communication. The visitors are welcome to send in the Portmanteau words that they come across to us so that we will add those words in this list and acknowledging the sender. The meanings of all such words are apparent from the combination. Most of these words will not be found in standard dictionaries. But, the visitors can use their grey cells in putting the meanings of the two and two together to deduce the meaning of these words. Portmanteau Words are also called Centaur Words. Definition of Portmanteau Portmanteau is a literary device in which two or more words are joined together to coin a new word. A portmanteau word is formed by blending parts of two or more words but it always refers to a single concept. The coinage of portmanteau involves the linking and blending of two or more words and the new word formed in the process shares the same meanings as the original words. It is different from a compound word in that it could have a completely different meaning from the words that it was coined from. Portmanteau, on the other hand, shares the same semantic features. For example, the word “brunch” is formed by splicing two words “breakfast” and “lunch”. The spliced parts “br-” and “-unch” are blended

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