Erin McKean: Go ahead, make up new words!
ארין מק'ין: קדימה, המציאו מילים חדשות!
As the co-founder of Reverb Technologies, the maker of the online dictionary Wordnik, Erin McKean is reshaping how we interact with language itself. Full bio
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into the dictionary.
האפשריות לתוך המילון.
that is your job.
מהי מילה; זה תפקידכם.
decides together
who agree to understand each other.
שמסכימים להבין אחד את השני.
to decide whether a word is good or bad,
אם מילה מסויימת ראויה או לא,
"Because grammar!"
"בגלל הדקדוק!"
too much -- don't tell anybody.
אל תספרו לאף אחד.
there are two kinds of grammar.
בעצם ישנם שני סוגי דקדוק.
that lives inside your brain,
speaker of a language
when you speak that language.
כאשר הוא מדבר את השפה.
you learn a language as a child.
לומדים את השפה כילד.
how to make the plural of wug.
יודעים איך לומר ווג ברבים.
you just understand it.
אתם פשוט מבינים אותו.
by a professor at [Boston University]
פרופסור מאוניברסיטת בוסטון
for a long time.
that exist in your brain,
they're more like laws of nature.
אלא הם יותר כמו חוקי טבע.
a law of nature, right?
לציית לחוק טבע, נכון?
your mom doesn't say,
אמכם אינה אומרת,
it's going to be cold, take a hoodie,
about manners than they are about nature.
להתנהגות יותר מאשר לטבע.
"Don't wear hats on your feet."
"אל תחבוש כובע על הרגליים."
"Can you wear hats inside?
"האם מותר לחבוש כובעים במקום סגור?
you get to wear?"
of grammar,
as opposed to grammar.
שימוש מקובל או נהוג, בניגוד לדקדוק.
rules-based grammar
דקדוק כזה המבוסס על נוהג
מלהמציא מילים חדשות.
people are always telling you,
invent things, science and technology."
תעשו אומנות, תמציאו דברים, מדע וטכנולוגיה."
words, they're like,
whippersnappers. Give it a rest."
יה שחצן. תניח לה."
We should have more of them.
as many new words as possible.
חדשות רבות ככל האפשר.
you can use to make new words in English.
מילים חדשות באנגלית.
languages.
(Laughter)
so I'm just going to be honest
לכן אהיה כנה
that we like, like delicious food.
שאנו אוהבים, כמו אוכל טעים.
we took "caramel" from French.
"קרמל" מצרפתית.
for cool things like "ninja," right?
מגניבים כמו "נינג'ה".
ninjas are hard to steal from.
קשה לגנוב מהנינג'ות.
can make words in English
other English words together.
you can put any two of them together.
ניתן להצמיד כל שתי מילים ביחד.
"sandcastle" all are compounds.
"ארמון חול", כולן הרכבות.
"duckface," just don't make duckface.
רק אל תעשו פני-ברווז.
in English is kind of like compounding,
באנגלית דומה להרכבה,
when you squish the words together
כח כדי להצמיד מילים ביחד
of "breakfast" and "lunch."
של "ארוחת בוקר" ו"ארוחת צהריים".
תערובת של "מכונית" ו"מלון".
was a blend word?
there are parts missing.
יודעים שחסרים בה חלקים.
of "education" and "entertainment."
"חינוך" ו"בידור".
blend of "electric" and "execute."
"חשמל" ו"להוציא לפועל".
by changing how they operate.
שינוי בתיפקודן.
as one part of speech,
part of speech.
hasn't always been a verb?
and then we verbed it.
and make them into nouns.
and now it's a noun.
וכיום היא שם-עצם.
in English is back-formation.
kind of squish it down a little bit.
"editor" before we had the word "edit."
לפני שהיתה המילה "edit".
sound a little silly:
and burglers burgle.
ו-burglers burgle.
and squish them together.
הראשונות ולהצמידן ביחד.
Administration becomes NASA.
הפך ל-NASA.
with anything, OMG!
כמו-OMG (אוי אלוהים)!
the words are.
הן יכולות להיות
good word of English.
היא בהחלט מילה טובה באנגלית.
good word of English.
גם היא מילה טובה באנגלית.
normal, they can sound really silly.
הן עשויות להישמע מוזר.
your meaning across.
you're saying
your meaning across.
on this stage today have said,
help us explore, you can help us invent."
להמציא דברים חדשים".
in my online dictionary, Wordnik.
המילון המקוון שלי, ה-Wordnik.
ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Erin McKean - Dictionary editorAs the co-founder of Reverb Technologies, the maker of the online dictionary Wordnik, Erin McKean is reshaping how we interact with language itself.
Why you should listen
Erin McKean's job as a lexicographer involves living in a constant state of research. She searches high and low -- from books to blogs, newspapers to cocktail parties -- for new words, new meanings for old words, or signs that old words have fallen out of use. In June of this year, she involved us all in the search by launching Wordnik, an online dictionary that houses all the traditionally accepted words and definitions, but also asks users to contribute new words and new uses for old words. Wordnik pulls real-time examples of word usage from Twitter, image representations from Flickr along with many more non-traditional, and highly useful, features.
Before Wordnik, McKean was one of the youngest editors of the New Oxford American Dictionary. She continues to serve as the editor of the language quarterly Verbatim ("language and linguistics for the layperson since 1974") and is the author of multiple books, including That's Amore and the entire Weird and Wonderful Words series. All that, and she maintains multiple blogs, too: McKean is the keen observationalist behind A Dress a Day and Dictionary Evangelist. Is there anything she can't do? Surprisingly, she is notoriously bad at Scrabble.
Erin McKean | Speaker | TED.com