= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
Word of the Day:
OUTLIVER (n. pl. -S)
Definition(s):
- (n.) one who outlives another; a survivor
Useful info for word game players:
- Front hooks: (none)
- Back hooks: -S
- Anagrams: (none)
- Longer extensions: (none)
- Wraparounds: (none)
- Other Spellings: (none)
- Related Forms: (none)
Current theme:
Words born in America
Epilogue:
The only current definition for OUTLIVER is the straightforward and expected one: one who survives or lives longer than another. However, the word also has a particular connection to early United States history. In seventeenth and eighteenth century colonial America, an “outliver” was one who moved to the frontier, far from a town center; that is, one who lived out away from others. Sometimes outlivers ended up forming new towns; other times they simply sought adventure, freedom from city life, or independence and solitude.
The word OUTLIVER is also an example of an early American propensity to adapt familiar words to new uses or to combine old words to form new concepts. CORN, for example, was a very old English word with a variety of meanings that Americans adopted to refer specifically to MAIZE, or “Indian corn.” The term FRONTIER, a word originally referring to the front side of something, became an Americanism for the vast lands at or beyond the border of a region. The sense of BLUFF meaning “a steep headland or riverbank” was originally an Americanism, while compounds such as CATFISH, GROUNDHOG, and RATTLESNAKE combined familiar old words in new ways. Such words, along with a gallimaufry of words borrowed from native and European languages, gradually gave American English a distinct flavor that helped set it apart from English spoken in Britian or other parts of the world.
= = = = = = = = = = = = = = = = =
No comments:
Post a Comment