[Ads-l] P.S. on "Fargone" vs. "Fargoed"

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Mon Jan 16 21:02:01 UTC 2017


I wonder if there might be a transitive verb “to moonlight” (not the lexicalized intransitive, “to moonlight (as)” = ‘work typically illegally at a second job') inspired by the current excellent if depressing movie, and if so whether its preterite and passive participle would be “to be moonlighted” or “to be moonlit”.  I’d guess the former.  The main problem is that it’s not clear what, exactly, the verb would signify—'to perform a violent act that causes [someone] to move to another city and work selling drugs’? 

LH

> On Jan 16, 2017, at 3:25 PM, Ben Zimmer <bgzimmer at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> See my Jan. 2013 columns for the Boston Globe and Vocabulary.com, comparing
> "catfishing" to "gaslighting."
> 
> http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2013/01/27/catfish-how-manti-imaginary-romance-got-its-name/inqu9zV8RQ7j19BRGQkH7H/story.html
> https://www.vocabulary.com/articles/wordroutes/when-life-imitates-the-movies-from-gaslighting-to-catfishing/
> 
> In the latter, I quote Larry Horn asking on ADS-L about other verbs from
> movie titles:
> 
> http://listserv.linguistlist.org/pipermail/ads-l/2013-January/124742.html
> 
> I give "Shawshank(ed)" and "Stepford(ed)" as other possible cinematic
> verbs, and in the comments Orin Hargraves mentions "Forrest Gump(ed)." None
> of these are as common as "gaslight" and "catfish," of course.
> 
> 
> On Mon, Jan 16, 2017 at 9:17 AM, Yagoda, Ben <byagoda at udel.edu> wrote:
> 
>> And speaking of which, what are other examples, if any, of movie titles
>> that have become fairly widespread verbs? A 2014 Mental Floss article, “11
>> Movie Titles That Became Part of the Lexicon” has only two--“Gaslight” and
>> the 2010 “Catfish,” which an Urban Dictionary poster defines as: "To give
>> the impression of being an attractive person in order to attract someone
>> online while being a complete or near opposite of that portrayed.”
>> 
>> Off the top of my head, “All About Eve” and  “The Manchurian Candidate”
>> (which has been referred to a fair amount lately) might have had shots if
>> they were one word instead of three.
>> 
>> http://mentalfloss.com/article/57860/11-movie-titles-became-part-lexicon
>> 
>> Ben
>> 
>> 
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------------
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