Retronym?

[Laurence Horn]

At 5:00 PM -0400 8/21/10, David Metevia wrote:
>I was at the grocery store and noticed that they now offer for sale *seeded*
>watermelon and seedless watermelon.  In the past I thought the alternatives
>were watermelon and seedless watermelon.

Right, but when the seedless ones capture the market, you need those
retronyms.  Of course it doesn't help that "seeded" can be either
with seeds in (whether or not some mortal inserted them, as you note)
or seeds out.  My favorite disambiguator was the packages at our
local supermarket of "Prunes No Pits", which reminded me of those
signs warning "Post No Bills".

>
>Just wondering who they get to put the seeds in these....
>
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>The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org

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