eggcorn?

[Arnold Zwicky]

On Aug 11, 2009, at 7:52 AM, i wrote:

> On Aug 11, 2009, at 6:06 AM, James A. Landau wrote:
>
>> Vanity Fair July 2008 article "How the Web Was Won: An Oral History
>> of the Internet" page 100 column 2:
>>
>> ... Senator Edward M. Kennedy
>> referred to I.M.P.'s as "interfaith" message processors.
>
> certainly some kind of malapropism (perhaps based on a mishearing in
> which the unfamiliar (to EMK) "interface" was heard as the more
> familiar (to EMK) "interfaith"), but "interfaith message processor"
> doesn't make much sense; it just has familiar parts.
>
> here's what i said on the matter on Language Log on 8/8/07 ["pails
> and flounders"]: ...

expanded discussion of "demi-eggcorns" (including pails) here:

     http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/005026.html

arnold

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