English is not really generating new forms of words through this process actively
because now so much of our language is written.
The question that comes up with a word like this though,
as in so many cases, is can language be prescribed?
Can the tide of language of semantic drift, can it be stopped?
Coming up on Word Matters,
a bunch of words formed by way of a particular kind of error and one word that hugely annoys some people.
I'm Emily Brewster and Word Matters is produced by Merriam-Webster in collaboration with New England Public Media.
On each episode, Merriam-Webster editors Neil Servin, Amon Shea,
Peter Sokolowski and I explore some aspect of the English language from the dictionary's vantage point.
Words come to English in all sorts of ways.
Some are borrowed from other languages, some are invented for a purpose,
some slip in through a side door and no one really knows where they came from.
Today we're talking about words that come from a different source, a specific kind of mistake.
Next up, I'll look at the times English made a bit of an error and decided to say,
I meant to do that.
Sometimes a word is created or is modified,
has a new version because of a misunderstanding of the borders between existing words.
This process is called meta-analysis.
The definition is a reanalysis of the division between sounds or words resulting in different constituents.