Just wondering ("billfold" vs. "wallet")

[Charles Doyle]

>From time to time during the past decade or two, younger friends and kinsmen have derided me for using the word "billfold" for what they call a "wallet."

I had never bothered to wonder whether my usage was deemed risable on account of its Southernness or rusticity or old-fashionedness.

DARE defines "billfold" as "a pocketbook [sic!] to carry folded money; a wallet," noting that the word is "widespread, but least freq in NEast, Pacific." A very dotty map follows.

May I plausibly suspect that "billfold" is coming to be considered archaic--used least freq by the young and hep?

--Charlie
_________________________________________

---- Original message ----

>Date: Tue, 2 Jan 2007 14:48:46 -0800
>From: Jonathan Lighter <wuxxmupp2000 at YAHOO.COM>
>Subject: Re: Just wondering

>
>No he-man in NYC would ever admit to carrying a "purse" under any circumstances, regardless of definition.  You had a "billfold" or a "wallet." >

>  JL

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org