Words:

Logoman at Work

The world needs new words (debate). It needs new phrases, fables, reference points. It is in a condition of logotropia.

Many of us are lone inventors, and there is a big marketing industry at work seeking to industrialise the process. In The Futurological Conference, the esteemed Stanislaw Lem speculated that the invention of new words implied the envisioning of new worlds, and that this could be a tool of social forecasting. Fuelled by puns, snatched moments at lengthy meetings, and too many cups of coffeee, I offer some of my personal contributions to the following genres:

§ "Useful" neologisms

§ Slogans to describe activities and artefacts

§ Warped phrases and sayings

While the material here stems from my own verbal doodlings, the processes of parallel invention mean that other people may have been here first, recently or otherwise. (For instance, I have seen a book with the title Newszak or something similar, and very parallel to my own notion.)

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