Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- n. A word or phrase created because an existing term that was once used alone needs to be distinguished from a term referring to a new development, as acoustic guitar in contrast to electric guitar or analog watch in contrast to digital watch.
Wiktionary
- n. A new word or phrase coined for an old object or concept whose original name has become used for something else or is no longer unique (such as acoustic guitar where guitar used to mean this but can now also refer to an electric guitar).
WordNet 3.0
- n. a word introduced because an existing term has become inadequate
Etymologies
- retro- + -onym; coined by Frank Mankiewicz and popularized by William Safire in The New York Times (Wiktionary)
- retr(o)- + -onym. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“Now that cordless drills have become so common, I notice an example of what you call a retronym: corded drills.”
“I’ve heard the term retronym used for neologisms that are coined to refit old words that have since become ambiguous.”
Rambles at starchamber.com » Blog Archive » The word “virtual” is meaningless
“The competition was to for the best "retronym" a term for an old object needing clarification.”
“Then we could have retronym, meaning a word formed by reversing the spelling of another word.”
“The top retronym terms that were submitted for a non-Internet librarian were:”
“It's the Retronymy, Stupid In a 1992 "On Language" column, William Safire of the New York Times explained the concept of a retronym:”
“My uncle not Meta, if KTK is reading coined the term “retronym” to describe the phenomenon of labeling original terms as opposed to derivations thereof.”
“I tend to think of Orthodox Judaism as a retronym, or a new term for an old concept.”
“Because of wireless cell phones, a line now requires a retronym: landline.”
Simon & Schuster: The Right Word in the Right Place at the Right Time
“Is the oldest retronym not-forbidden fruit older than non-circumcised penis and kosher food?”
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘retronym’.
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Word Words
This used to be my nym list, but there are so many words about words, I think it's time to expand and open.
acronym, antonym, aptronym, autoantonym, autonym, bacronym, capitonym, contranym, contronym, eponym, exonym, heteronym and 120 more...
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Open List: Totally -Retro-
A list of terms containing the string -retro-.
Please feel free to help me populate this list!
retrolingual, retroversion, retrocession, retrocessional, retrograde, retrorse, retroflexion, retroflection, retrogradation, retrocede, retrospect, retrospection and 149 more...
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INTERP - terminology management terms
Terms from the fields of terminology, lexicography, lexicology and corpus linguistics
reworder, rewording, parser, parsing, tagger, tagging, aligner, aligning, content analysis, content analyzer, corpus management, glossary and 546 more...
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phrontistery-r
from phrontistery.info
rya, rutilant, ruthful, rutherford, ruth, rusticity, rusticate, Russophobia, Russophile, russet, russel, rushlight and 514 more...
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Wordplay & Pun
wordplay, pound, conceit, clinch, joke, quibble, equivoque, double-entendre, quillet, calembour, carriwitchet, paranomasia and 90 more...
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WF - Word Formation Words
Classes of words and types of word formation
sniglet, protologism, portmanteau word, blend, telescope-word, frankenword, double-entendre, compound, derivative, palindrome, spoonerism, malapropism and 152 more...
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Fictional music genres
fudgepunk, whangboogie, electrogush, jizzbilly, glambient, queasy listening, chip shop, baroque'n'roll, prog folk, chemo, riant grrl, blingfolk and 584 more...
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Names for Names
Source and definitions: http://phrontistery.info/name.html
acronym, allonym, ananym, anonym, antonym, aptronym, autonym, caconym, cohyponym, cryptonym, dionym, eponym and 26 more...
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-onym, -onymous, -onymic
denoting or relating to names
acronym, synonymous, patronymic, antonym, ananym, anonym, aptronym, autonym, caconym, cohyponym, cryptonym, dionym and 29 more...
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Nyms
synonym, antonym, eudonym, retronym, homonym, womonym, ananym, aptronym, autoantonym, bacronym, capitonym, endonym and 16 more...
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WF - all types of word formation
My ambition is to build a list with the names for
1. ALL types of word formation
2. the words put together by 1.
using a strict definition: e.g. "antonym", "aptronym" "palindrom...camel case, incapping, suffixing, capitalization, compound, agglutination, back-formation, blending, acronym, clipping, calque, semantic loan and 56 more...
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whatever1013's Words
chocolate, sesquipedalophobia, discombobulated, callipygian, retronym, squirm, cobalt blue, plethora, onomatopoeia, blowhard, strumpet, shush and 173 more...
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bertilak's Words
antidisestablishm..., feldercarb, wainscoting, eleemosynary, oxymoron, fuliginous, libration, lammergeier, saxifrage, ichor, lambent, smaragdine and 414 more...
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The Collection
A somewhat discriminatory list of words and phrases collected for their euphonic or arcane appeal, interesting etymology, or concise definition of an otherwise unnamed phenomenon or concept.
ziggurat, neophilia, sucker punch, soporific, epoch, tundra, fiat, idiotproof, miscellany, metaphysics, cryptozoology, dysphoria and 850 more...
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phuzzy's Words
entomophagan, corpuscle, mellifluence, haberdasher, milliner, tow, spartan, bdellotomy, trepan, trephine, congenial, courtly and 208 more...
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An Unspecific Gathering
Recently added to be organized (perhaps) later.
metaeuphoria, metaeuphoria, protologism, neologism, contextual, commingling, meta, euphoria, elucidation, disambiguation, hypertextual, kenspeckle and 136 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for retronym.
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