Erin McKean: Go ahead, make up new words!
Erin McKean: Samo naprijed, smislite nove riječi!
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
Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.
into the dictionary.
u rječnik.
to je vaš posao.
that is your job.
decides together
who agree to understand each other.
dogovara o međusobnom razumijevanju.
to decide whether a word is good or bad,
je li riječ dobra ili loša,
"Because grammar!"
"Zbog gramatike!"
too much -- don't tell anybody.
-- nemojte nikome ovo reći.
there are two kinds of grammar.
postoje dvije vrste gramatike.
that lives inside your brain,
vašoj glavi
speaker of a language
when you speak that language.
kada govorite taj jezik.
you learn a language as a child.
kada učite jezik kao dijete.
how to make the plural of wug.
napraviti plural od vag.
vi ga jednostavno razumijete.
you just understand it.
by a professor at [Boston University]
profesorica na [Bostonskom Sveučilištu]
for a long time.
that exist in your brain,
koja postoje u vašoj glavi
they're more like laws of nature.
već su više kao prirodni zakoni.
a law of nature, right?
da poštujete prirodni zakon, zar ne?
your mom doesn't say,
mama vam ne kaže
it's going to be cold, take a hoodie,
uzmi jaknu,
about manners than they are about nature.
na manire, nego su povezana s prirodom.
kako funkcionira šešir,
"Don't wear hats on your feet."
"Ne nosi šešir na nogama."
"Can you wear hats inside?
"Možete li šešire nositi unutra?
you get to wear?"
of grammar,
as opposed to grammar.
kao suprotnost gramatici.
rules-based grammar
ove gramatike zasnovane na pravilima
da izmišljaju riječi.
people are always telling you,
invent things, science and technology."
bavi se umjetnošću, znanošću i tehnologijom."
words, they're like,
whippersnappers. Give it a rest."
Prestani s tim."
We should have more of them.
Trebali bismo ih imati više.
as many new words as possible.
što je moguće više novih riječi.
you can use to make new words in English.
za stvaranje novih riječi u engleskom.
languages.
(Laughter)
(Smijeh)
so I'm just going to be honest
tako da ću biti iskrena
volimo, kao na primjer, ukusnu hranu.
that we like, like delicious food.
we took "caramel" from French.
uzeli smo 'karamel' iz francuskog.
fora stvari, poput 'nindža', zar ne?
for cool things like "ninja," right?
ninjas are hard to steal from.
teško bilo što ukrasti.
can make words in English
u engleskom
other English words together.
u jednu.
you can put any two of them together.
možete spojiti bilo koje dvije.
"sandcastle" all are compounds.
'knjiškog moljca',
"duckface," just don't make duckface.
'duckface', samo ga ne pravite.
in English is kind of like compounding,
u engleskom, je sličan slaganju,
when you squish the words together
prilikom spajanja dvije riječi,
of "breakfast" and "lunch."
'breakfast' i 'lunch'.
'motor' i 'hotel'.
was a blend word?
mješavina?
there are parts missing.
koji su izostavljeni.
of "education" and "entertainment."
od 'education' i 'entertainment'.
blend of "electric" and "execute."
mješavina od 'electric' i 'execute'.
by changing how they operate.
mijenjajući način na koji funkcioniraju.
as one part of speech,
kao jedna vrsta riječi
part of speech.
hasn't always been a verb?
(sprijateljiti se) nije uvijek bio glagol?
and then we verbed it.
i onda smo je 'poglagoljili'.
'poglagoljena'.
and make them into nouns.
pretvoriti u imenice.
and now it's a noun.
a sada je imenica.
in English is back-formation.
u engleskom je tvorba unazad.
kind of squish it down a little bit.
"editor" before we had the word "edit."
'editor' prije riječi 'edit'.
sound a little silly:
and burglers burgle.
a provalnici provaljuju.
na engleskom
and squish them together.
i spojiti ih.
Administration becomes NASA.
Space Administration' postaje NASA.
with anything, OMG!
(op. prev. akronim od Oh My God).
the words are.
blesave te riječi.
good word of English.
engleska riječ.
good word of English.
engleska riječ.
normal, they can sound really silly.
mogu zvučati i blesavo.
jer je svaka riječ
your meaning across.
i prenesete njezin smisao.
you're saying
na ono što govorite
your meaning across.
da objasnite smisao.
on this stage today have said,
help us explore, you can help us invent."
u istraživanju i pronalaženju."
riječi danas,
in my online dictionary, Wordnik.
u svoj rječnik na Internetu, 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