Conversate and basically

[Mark Odegard]

It would seem almost a rule in English that any noun in -ation can backform
a verb in -ate. To the point, perhaps, that it supplants the original verb
stem which formed the noun. Orient, orientation > orientate.

One can also carry it in other directions. Converse, conversation,
conversational, conversationalistical conversationalize,
conversationalisticalization, conversationalizationism, etc.

It's easy to noun verbs and verb nouns, with various parts of speech
inbetween: it can be done to quite nearly *any* word, whatever the word's
origin. It's my opinion this is the ultimate explanation for English's huge
vocabulary.


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