More for the "bro-" files: "brony"

[Neal Whitman]

Wow, I must not have been paying attention, because I missed all these! (Although it seems to have been edited out of the Boston Globe column.)

Neal

On Dec 20, 2011, at 1:50 AM, Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       Arnold Zwicky <zwicky at STANFORD.EDU>
> Subject:      Re: More for the "bro-" files: "brony"
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>
> On Dec 19, 2011, at 10:30 PM, Ben Zimmer wrote:
>>
>> On Tue, Dec 20, 2011 at 12:02 AM, Neal Whitman wrote:
>>>
>>> My son told me about "bronies", i.e. grown male fans of My Little Pony. More
>>> information at:
>>> http://www.wired.com/underwire/2011/06/bronies-my-little-ponys/
>>> http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bronies
>>> http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203707504577012141105109140.html
>>
>> Noted by Larry back in September:
>>
>> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/cgi-bin/wa?A2=ind1109C&L=ADS-L&P=R8190
>>
>> ...who suggested it was a "a viable 'least likely to succeed'
>> candidate" for ADS WOTY. I included it on my WOTY nominee list for its
>> sheer oddity:
>>
>> http://www.visualthesaurus.com/cm/wordroutes/3066/
>> http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2011/12/18/what-talked-about/a3UP8sPAFziCmRnLIOjtcJ/story.html
>>
>> See also Erin McKean on brofixing:
>>
>> http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2011/12/02/the-secret-language-bros/kd1q6tKQxO15hxMYWQSirO/story.html
>>
>>> I find the portmanteau "brony" interesting because in words like "bromance"
>>> (and in most other portmanteau and compound nouns) the second element is the
>>> head: A bromance is a kind of romance; a motel is a kind of hotel. In
>>> contrast, a brony is not a kind of pony, but a kind of bro.
>
> and briefly noted here:
>
> http://arnoldzwicky.wordpress.com/2011/09/20/dubious-bromanteau/
>
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