retronymとは 意味・読み方・使い方

名詞

retronym (複数形 retronyms)

1. (linguistics) 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, or which did not originally have a specific name. [from 1980s]

   Coordinate term: anachronym

   • 1982 December 26, William Safire, “On Language: Watch what you say”, in New York Times‎^[4]:

     The phrase is a retronym, the term Frank Mankiewicz has coined to describe names of familiar objects or events that need a modifier to catch up to more modern objects: day baseball and natural turf are in the same category as analog watch.

   • 2004, Geoff Nunberg, Going Nucular: Language, Politics, and Culture in Confrontational Times, →ISBN, page 239:

     You can get a good sense of the pace of change over the past century just by looking at the retronyms we've accumulated. New technologies have forced us to come up with terms like steam locomotive, silent movie […]

派生語

参考

• avant la lettre
• anachronism
• Category:English retronyms

参照

Further reading

• retronym on Wikipedia.