Blending/Portmanteau Words

There are several and nearly fixed ways, which give new words a chance to live along with old ones in every language. One of these ways is "blending". In blending, two or more function words blend to form a new word. The new word, thus, is called a portmanteau.

I have chosen this topic intentionally because I want to share some new and somehow odd blending examples with you. If you try to memorize them, you can add some new pieces of information to your wordrobe. What does "wordrobe" mean? It means a person's vocabulary [blend of word and wardrobe].

My next example is "fantabulous" [Blend of fantastic and fabulous]. The idea of creating and developing podcats was fantabulous.

To me, "carjacking" is as dangerous as hijacking. "Carjacking" is a noun describing an incident by which a usually armed individual coerces the driver of an automobile to give up his vehicle or drive it and the assailant to some specified location.

I hate "baggravation". I do not want to feel it my life. Never ever. Baggravation [Blend of bag and aggravation] is a feeling of annoyance and anger one endures at the airport when his/her bags have not arrived at the baggage carousel but everyone else's bags have.

When something is extremely large, it is "ginormous". This word is the blend form of gigantic and enormous.

Remember when you hear an accident occur and later give a report on what you heard; you are an "earwitness" not an eyewitness.

Finally, I like to add that portmanteaux or portmanteaus are the plural forms of portmanteau.