eggcorn: "raise cackles"

[Laurence Horn]

At 3:00 PM -0400 6/4/09, Alison Murie wrote:
>On Jun 4, 2009, at 1:58 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
>
>>---------------------- Information from the mail header
>>-----------------------
>>Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>>Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>>Subject:      Re: eggcorn: "raise cackles"
>>-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>>At 1:40 PM -0400 6/4/09, Benjamin Zimmer wrote:
>>>On Thu, Jun 4, 2009 at 1:22 PM, Laurence Horn
>>><laurence.horn at yale.edu> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>And the next step is to process these "cackles" as an all-purpose
>>>>emotive response gauge.  We can already attest "warm the cackles (of
>>>>one's heart)":
>>>[snip]
>>>
>>>Ah, that would help explain this example:
>>>
>>>>>---
>>>>>http://www.quickstopentertainment.com/2005/01/28/trailer-park-happy-birthday-to-me/
>>>>>It's about Deep Throat so you can be sure it's, at the very least,
>>>>>going to raise some cackles in the hearts of bible belters
>>>>>somewhere
>>>>>in this great land.
>>>>>---
>>
>>I saw that one, but concluded it was more likely to be a "hackle"
>>cackle like yours than a "cockle" cackle like mine, especially with
>>"raise" rather than "warm" as the verb.  But I suppose it depends on
>>what your presuppositions are concerning the attitude of Blble
>>Belters toward "Deep Throat"....
>>
>>LH
>>
>>>So that's both an idiom blend and a lexical blend ("hackles" +
>>>"cockles" = "cackles").
>>>
>>>
>>>--Ben Zimmer
>>>
>>>~~~~~~~~~~~
>I wonder what "cackles"-speakers imagine cackles to look like!
>AM
>
Well, I've been a lifetime "hackles" and "cockles" speaker, and I
can't really visualize either one.  (I've always assumed that the
cockles of my heart, whatever they are, don't much resemble the kind
that sweet Molly Malone sells alive from her wheelbarrow, or
wheelbarrel, as the case may be.)

LH

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