You can lead a horse to water but you can’t teach him new tricks: The Joy of Hybridioms
I’d like to propose a new word in today’s post, one that I think would greatly benefit the language-loving populace: Hybridiom
This word was born only yesterday as I noticed this post on a support forum that I read frequently:
… Piffle! Forgive me my cynicism but this lack of support thing is really getting on my goat!
When I read this, I burst out laughing. This poster has merged two English idioms, combining “to get my goat” and “to get on my nerves”, into “getting on my goat”. So, instead of either of two parent idioms, we get a cross between the two, a “hybridiom”, if you will.
Now, in this case, it is a somewhat understandable error, as both of the original idioms have a similar meaning (to annoy somebody) and they both begin with the verb “get”. Interestingly, though, the meaning is completely lost when the two are merged. “To get on my goat” would literally refer to the act of climbing up onto my goat. If we were to merge them in the opposite fashion, it still wouldn’t make sense. “To get my nerves” wouldn’t really mean anything in that context (unless it’s physically removing the poster’s nerve cells).
These hybridioms aren’t unheard of elsewhere in the world, and they don’t necessarily need to be idioms at all. In the movie Boondock Saints, there’s a running joke at one point after a bartender (suffering from Tourette’s Syndrome) mixes up two proverbs. Here’s a transcript:
Bartender: So you guys keep your traps shut. ya know what they say; People in glass houses sink ships.
Rocco: Y’know Doc, I gotta get you a, a, like a proverb book or something. This mix and match shit’s gotta go.
Connor: (Imitating the Bartender) A p-penny saved is worth two in the bush.
Murphy: Don’t c-cross the road if ya can’t get out of the kitchen.
(…)
Bartender: Why don’t you make like a tree and get the fuck outta here!
Here, the Hybridioms are flying fast and furious. We have mixing of a number of different expressions, and (with the possible exception of the last one), the meaning is destroyed in the final form, unless you know the two expressions being mixed.
What’s interesting in this example is that the parent proverbs were related only peripherally. Take the first example. “Loose lips sink ships” refers to a wartime saying explaining that careless talk can easily be costly to the troops. “People in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones” isn’t so much of an idiom as a proverb, basically stating that if you’re vulnerable, don’t start trouble. When merged, the result carries no meaning in and of itself.
So, have you heard any good hybridioms or hybrid proverbs? Do you enjoy merging idioms, proverbs or expressions in your free time? If so, let me know, and I’ll post some of them up.
Hopefully I won’t get swamped in submissions though. You know, be careful what you wish for, you just might count your chickens before they hatch.
March 1st, 2007 at 12:53 pm
I enjoyed the post, and I too have noticed such things more often recently.
I would like to suggest, however, that the majority of “hybridioms” are created unknowingly by “hybridiots”: people who are unread and uneducated enough to not know or understand the meaning of either idiom, and, worse still, don’t think enough about what they are saying to realize that they are not making sense, just noise.
Although I agree that a thoughtful person could conceivably create hybridioms that actually use the combination of the two to create a discernible and understandable new thought, above and beyond either or both of the sources (and would love to see examples of such), I suspect that most hybridioms result from the thoughtless ignorance that destroys meaning. (Such people must be the bane of the linguist, as they won’t/don’t/can’t use such rules or customs as do exist.)
March 1st, 2007 at 1:52 pm
You’re quite right, the reason they may be happening could be that some people aren’t really sure what the actual form is. One other thing to keep in mind, though, is that especially in cases like “gets on my goat”, it’s quite possible that it’s just the written equivalent of a speech error. Perhaps the person began by saying “getting on my nerves”, but then, due to some strange cognitive crossfire, switched over to “gets my goat”. In this case, I think the worst we could accuse him/her of in that case would be inattention to typos and the lack of proofreading.
Regarding errors as the “bane” of linguists, I think it’s quite to the contrary, speech and language errors are truly fascinating and interesting to Linguists, because they tell us about the language, even when used incorrectly. When people make a spoonerism (switching “deer for chennis” when they mean “Cheer for Dennis”), it tells us what people consider to be independent sounds within a language (in this example, the fact that its’ “chennis” and not “dsheer for tennis” shows us that the T and SH sounds making up the CH are considered one in English). We don’t particularly mind when people change the language, even if that means that rules are lost, because it’s just more interesting stuff for us to describe. Besides, linguists trying to stop language change based on our own aesthetics is like a gardener trying to stop continental drift to keep the yard level.
Thanks for the comment, though, and I’m glad you enjoy reading my site.
March 1st, 2007 at 7:39 pm
In his explanation of Jabberwocky, Lewis Carroll talked of portmanteau words, saying that they emerged when a perfectly balanced mind had to choose between two words at the same moment, eg “frumious” - fuming and furious. However, the hybridiom seems to go with a rather unbalanced mind.
I think William is correct that they are coined by “hybridiots” who use expressions that they’ve heard in similar contexts but whose meaning and construction they don’t really understand. It seems to me an evolution of the “cut the mustard” bit - taking expressive inarticulateness to a whole new level. But done deliberately, they can be fun: if you’ve seen six of one, you’ve seen a half dozen of the other…
Incidentally, the “Induhvidual Quotes” in the Dilbert Newsletter (at dilbert.com) often feature hybridioms in the “Induhvidual Quotes” section. The last newsletter included:
“Well that really throws a wrench in the ointment.”
“They should lock him up and throw away the book.”
March 1st, 2007 at 7:41 pm
… Incidentally, the “Induhvidual Quotes” in the Dilbert Newsletter (at dilbert.com) often feature hybridioms in the “Induhvidual Quotes” section…
speaking of expressive inarticulateness…
March 1st, 2007 at 7:48 pm
Great Examples, Geoff, and thanks for reading and responding!
Also, don’t worry, it happens to the best of us :p
November 12th, 2007 at 9:10 am
Will Great article. I enjoyed it.
If your Dad is Trey, your Grandma was Meryl and you have a
sister who is a giant plant named Victoria, I,m your
Grandfathers cousin. Just writing to say I,m glad you,re
alive.