Greetings: Here are some words that need to be added.
Aquadextrous - adj. Possessing the ability to turn the bathtub faucet on and off with your toes.
Backspackle (bak' spak uhl) - n. Markings on the back of one's shirt from riding a fenderless bicycle.
Bowlikinetics (boh lih kih neh' tiks) - n. The act of trying to control a released bowling ball by twisting one's body in the direction one wants it to go.
Burgacide - n. What you call the desperate action of a hamburger leaping to its death through the holes in the Bar-B-Q grill.
Caffidget (ka fij' it) - v. To break up a Styrofoam coffee cup into several hundred pieces after consuming its contents.
Cheedle (chee' dul) - n. The residue left on one's fingertips after consuming a bag of Cheetos.
Detruncus (de trunk' us) - n. The embarrassing phenomenon of losing one's bathing shorts while diving into a swimming pool
Mittsquinter - n. A ballplayer who looks into his glove after missing the ball, as if, somehow, the cause of the error lies there.
Rignition (rig ni' shun) - n. The embarrassing action of trying to start one's car with the engine already running.
Slackjam (slak' jam) - n. The condition of being trapped in one's own trousers while trying to pull them on without first removing shoes

Shakespeare would be right at home in our brave new world. It's estimated that he created many, many new words. Perhaps DreadPirateRoberts, our resident Shakespeare scholar will know....

This year I've found myself "twittering" (with La Donna) and "texting" with another friend. If you had asked me last year what texting and twittering were I would have given you a blank stare.

When I email and write the word "texting" it always comes up in "spellcheck". Of course, sometimes I "snailmail". (That also comes up in "spellcheck".) I've even "youtubed" (listening to music videos).

And, when it comes to texting and emailing I found an online dictionary that has "emoticons" for different emotions and abbreviations for common words and phrases.

I still haven't allowed myself to be near illiterate in my emails and texting and twittering.....although I understand that's acceptable.

Language and symbols are fascinating. English is not fixed in stone. It's history of words has evolved and changed dramatically over the centuries. Consider "Old English" and modern English....they look like different languages. English has taken on many new words from other cultures, so I'm not surprised at all the "new" jargon that's entered the language. It's a living language, lets celebrate it.

I vote for English as being "alive". Latin is dead, there are no new Latin words.
I've heard the French don't like new words...perhaps French is also dead. So long "live" English!

I just got back from England and they blame the Americans for corrupting the language.

A few expressions I'd like to see go...At the end of the day...
raising the bar (Should only be used in the high jump, or a saloon)...
very unique. Unique is unique, there are no shades. Anyone who begins a sentence with "I've got to be honest with you..." We can just assume they're lying everywhere else.

Comedian, Rich Hall, used to have a segment on the hilarious show "Not Necessarily the News" called "Sniglets". A "sniglet" is, in Hall's words, "any word that should be in the dictionary but isn't". The good Captain Neptune has provided us with a charming list of sniglets up above.

Hall had mentioned:

Optigoop -- n. The goopy stuff you find in the corner of your eyes when you wake up in the morning.

Chrondentations -- n. The marks left on your wrist by a watchband.

Snackmosphere -- n. The large pocket of air in between the top of a sealed potato chip bag and the top layer of chips.

I'm sorry to say I can't help much on the issue of Shakespeare and the invention of words. There may be more than I know but, when I think of Shakespeare's language, I think of the invention of phrases. Even basic phrases like "I will see what I can do" have their roots in Shakespeare and give rise to the old joke that his plays are simply full of quotations.

I CAN give some credit to Lewis Carroll for inventing the word, "chortle". In his poem, "Jabberwocky", he writes "Oh frabjous day! Calloo callay! he chortled in his joy." Alledgedly, the idea was to sound like something in between a chuckle and a snort. Hence, chortle.
Diagonerd -- n. The annoying guy who parks the wrong way on a diagonal parking space, thus taking up two spaces.

Destinesia -- n. That feeling you suffer from when you walk into a room and can't for the life of you remember why you went there.

I wish I had some sniglets of my own to add to the hysterical list here. Bowlikinetics! Love it! After the many, many democratic debates I found myself occasionally using Obama as a verb--as in: "I was really annoyed at the way she treated me, but I'm going to be obama about it and try to move on."

I have brother who communicates exclusively via text and, while this is not exactly the same discussion, my pet peeve is that you never know when the conversation is over! He once texted me no fewer than 10 times when he was in Bed, Bath & Beyond trying to buy knives and pots and pans! I finally texted him that I was about to call him and I talked him through it...I think we settled on wustof and all clad and I insisted he buy one of those fabulous braun stick blenders.

Gotta add one more thing...As I write this I'm on the phone with my step-mother-in-law and she just used the word "funtastic."

I agree in a way with Expats declaraton that English is a living Lanagauge & we should celebrate it.

I'm all for new words & phrases that tend to fit into our current lifestyles.

Then there's the arguement of too many words beign used ~ I am totally guilty of doing so daily ~ But I will admit what one of my BIGGEST PET PEEVES is when the news anchors say "Mr Pckerings died when he was allegedly shot to death & even though the suspects were found with the smoking guns....

I know why the media has to phrase it that way but it still drives me crazy to hear it. It's just to many redundit words in one phrase.

I love the English Lanagauge (of course I may be biased its really the only one I know) I think it has an interesting & evergrowing hisotry that many people don't even think about while speaking or writing it.

Of course on of my favorite books about the English language is "Eats, Shoots & Leaves" by Lynne Truss.

I heard a good one myself from one of our esteemed anchors....Miss Jones just turned up missing. Does that mean they turned up and were declared missing?

Of course literally is literally misused all the time. If you were literally at the end of your rope you wouldn't be here. Or using it when you can leave it out. "it's literally a ten minute walk to the train station." I believe you. Literally.

I like what Heiress said in a previous discussion, that "languages keep cultures alive".

If we have had to create new words simply to describe the ever evolving way we communicate with each other, of course the language must evolve with it. As long as technology, science and medicine continue to enable us to do that which could not even be imagined by science fiction writers less than half a century ago, creative new words will always be needed.

As far as my personal pet peeve concerning what I perceive as the abuse of the English language is the way large corporations have developed “buzzwords”, “corporate speak” and jargon to describe “new” management strategies and initiatives just to give something that has already been done a new spin. In other words, “smoke and mirrors”.

I worked in OD (Organizational Development, formerly known as Management Education and Training) and HR (Human Resources, formerly know as Personnel) which along with Software Engineering, managed to make the creation of superfluous three-letter acronyms an art form. By the time I retired, words had almost become obsolete, used only as filler in a vain attempt to speak in complete sentences.

My friends and I [being the hip whippersnappers we are] don't really invent new words [unless you count recoculous, which means the same thing as rediculous, it's just more funny]...[that was my first time ever typing out our word] as much as we take preexisting words and phrases and assign them new meanings [much like 'plate' above. Makes you wonder how most words like that came to be].

Some examples:

lamp-- noun, a sleepover [e. g. "Hey, you want to have a lamp at Lizzy's house this weekend?"]
to hem one's pants-- to smoke marijuana [e. g. "Me and John are going over to Colin's to hem our pants later."]
caskets-- has no meaning, a word you say when you have nothing better to talk about [see also: grapefruit]
josephine-- noun, coffee and in some cases water [but only from a water fountain] [e. g. "We're going to grab a cup of Josephine after school."]
orgy-- noun, an outdoors party.
to run to the jewlry store-- to give one a call [e. g. "Oh snap, I have to leave, but run to the jewlry store for me later, 'kay?"]

If I'm reminded of more I'll post them.

Actually, and that's another pet peeve starting a sentence with actually...

This was a classic during a preliminary court hearing for the car boss John Z De Lorean. On the steps of the Los Angeles court house, live on television, one of his lawyers said to the awaiting press, "Not only does my client deny the allegations but we demand to know who the alligators are".

It used to be that new words were not added to the dictionary until they withstood the "test of time", however long that was deemed to be. I think the criteria may be "the pop-quiz of time" today and that's OK too.

I used to be such an introvert, yet here I am, thinking out loud again. I think that by having a very agile, flexible language, it helps to keep us all on our toes and mentally active in our day-to-day communications. It really forces us to be better listeners if we let it, and that ain't bad.

For anyone who's been within 10 miles of a university these past two decades... how about "discourse" as a verb? As in, "discoursing on gender politics," etc.

In France we like to turn English verbs into nouns:

un parking = a parking lot
un camping = a campground

Now let's talk about devolution of the English language...
What drives me crazy is when native speakers of English do not even understand the words they are using, or the commonest expressions... such as:

"butt naked" (!) - no, "buck naked"
"I could care less" - well, that means you care somewhat. The real expression is: "I couldn't care less."

The one that gets me the worst among Americans is misuse of "nationality." They ask me what nationality I am, and I respond "American and French," knowing full well they mean "ethnicity." ;)

I could go on an on... so I'll save the rest of the ranting for someone else.

You know what the fun part of today's conversation is? We can take all the words and "Google" them.

I never know whether I should laugh, cry, or just nod knowingly, when an associate tells me to "just google it". I've been sitting here all morning trying to solve a problem, and all I had to do was "google it". So I annonced I'm googling it....and everyone nodded knowingly. I know someone was laughing...I'll have my revenge later......and someone was crying (me!)

Now I'm waiting for someone to tell me to "wiki it".

If you can "google" and "wiki" (and chew gum at the same time) you will be one of the "Masters of the Universe" (another phrase that bothers, mostly because I'm not yet a master of the universe).

And don't forget "Do you Yahoo?" Well not lately, but that's another story for another time.

Today, I'm chillaxin!

I live in a hip beach town (whatever that means). Folks use the word "WORD" to agree with ones thoughts (I think). For Ex: "I sure hope that hurricane doesn't get any closer". Response: "word".
(2): "The Braves sure are struggling this year". "word up".
I don't get it. What the heck are these people saying and where did it come from?

To Mr. P: I came across and interesting quote from Mark Twain today and thought of you (and Donald Duck). "Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society."

"Peace out dudes...."

Sorry... I am late today and this starts a real rant for me. Yes, we add new words to English. How many of us had to memorize the intro to the Canterbury Tales in H.S. English? How many could tell you what it was saying? But the big thing that I find as I grow older is the intolerance I have for poor grammar!!! Lovey, don't take this personally, but it is a sign of your generation that you used the phrase, "Me and John are going..." Mz Orr, my H.S. English teacher, would have had a fit! Take the "and John" out. Would you say "Me is going"? And you hear that sort of thing all the time on TV. The script went through the writer, the producer, the director, and the actor. Doesn't anybody know their subjective from their objective cases any more? Even the camera man should have caught it. And forget split infinitives, they are meant to be split now, I am sure. And the idea of using the subjunctive verb form when expressing doubt or something contrary to fact, is definitely out now. How many of you would say, "I wish it was?" And how many would say, "I wish it were?"

And then there is punctuation! You will note that in the last sentence, I placed the ? inside of the quote, even though the whole sentence was a question, not the quote. That has definitely changed since we were in H.S. because my husband had to go through his book manuscript and change that every time it occurred. The editorial edict came down that that little rule was now different. There is also a comma placed before an "and" when it is used at the end of a list. EX: the flowers were red, yellow, purple, and black. "In our day" that was definitely a no-no. The and was in lieu of the comma.

So as we grow old, we have to accept the changes and learn to go with the flow ): But I now understand why our parents complained that the language was deteriorating so badly. It was simply changing.

Spinner: "Me and John" was purposeful to show the words in their natural... habitat. ;) Did you not notice the "Oh snap"?

"Of fustian he wered a gipoun"...yes, I too remember the horrors of Chaucer.

Neologisms have always been part of our language. (They are also part of the French language but it upsets the Academie.) They arise because language is a living thing. As our habits change, our language changes. It's all good.

Grammar and punctuation are another matter. I see rules of grammar and punctuation as aids in understanding. Sloppy grammar and punctuation can bring communication to a grinding halt. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have a hard time understanding what someone is saying to me if they end their sentences with 'you know what I mean?' (BTW, if you haven't read Lynne Truss', "Eats, Shoots, and Leaves', you have a treat in store.)

I think new words are great...well most of them at least. (I do hate the word gift as a verb. I don't know why, it just gets the mustard up my nose.) I'm very much less amused by sloppy grammar although I'm in the minority on that one.