A Word of Your Own

Souris has written a marvelous post about neologisms and other private uses of language:

i use a lot of words per minute. most of my functioning vocabulary is monosyllabic street slang. if i can't find a word that properly describes what i'm trying to say, i'll make one up on the spot, leaving some people confused. i have no problem defining my own world.

The personal etymology she provides is also a brief history of her travels and the languages she has encountered, which in Souris's case are impressively varied. Here are a few of my own:

joder—pronounced "ho-DER." In certain contexts, this word means "to fuck over," "to fuck," or just plain "fuck" in Spanish and I loooove using it under my breath. When I got to Israel in 1998, I added the Hebrew "chet" to "joder." The resulting "cho-DER" is powerfully obscene, imo.

Suki—SOO-kee—circa 1992—A pet name used only between my sister and me. I thought we had made it up but then I actually met a Japanese woman named Suki. "Sushi suki?," apparently, means "Do you like sushi?" (though Ari tells me the pronunciation differs).

Brother—circa 2000—My pet name for my younger brother. Growing up, I used to have a Korean friend who called her older brother "Brother." He, on the other hand, called her "Stupid." This memory stayed with me. I haven't seen Takeshi Kitano's Brother but the title inspired me to use it as a term of endearment.

Want to share your words with the world? Put them in the Dicshunary: "a home for all the small, endangered werds that might only exist in the language of one neighbourhood, one family or even one person."