37.849, Calls: Lexis - Journal in English Lexicology - "Special Issue: Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance and Innovation in Neology" (Jrnl)

Tue Mar 3 13:05:02 UTC 2026

LINGUIST List: Vol-37-849. Tue Mar 03 2026. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 37.849, Calls: Lexis - Journal in English Lexicology - "Special Issue: Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance and Innovation in Neology" (Jrnl)

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Team: Helen Aristar-Dry, Mara Baccaro, Daniel Swanson
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Editor for this issue: Valeriia Vyshnevetska <valeriia at linguistlist.org>

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Date: 28-Feb-2026
From: Denis Jamet-Coupé [denis.jamet-coupe at univ-lyon3.fr]
Subject: Lexis - Journal in English Lexicology - "Special Issue: Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance and Innovation in Neology" (Jrnl)

Journal: Lexis - Journal in English Lexicology
Issue: Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance and Innovation in
Neology
Call Deadline: 30-Oct-2026

Lexis – Journal in English Lexicology – will publish its 29th issue in
2027. It will be edited by Cécile Poix (Lumière Lyon 2 University,
France) and Gordana Lalić-Krstin (University of Novi Sad, Serbia) and
will deal with the topic “Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance
and Innovation in Neology”.
Full CFP available at https://journals.openedition.org/lexis/10458
Lexical Strangeness – Creativity, Deviance and Innovation in Neology
This issue of Lexis invites contributions that explore lexical
strangeness in English – a variety of phenomena characterized by
morphological creativity, deviance, and innovation that lies beyond
conventional criteria of well-formedness. We welcome papers that
investigate how speakers playfully subvert or extend lexicogenic norms
to create novel lexical or phraseological items that demand attention,
serve social functions, or push the boundaries of conventional lexical
innovation.
While research on lexical creativity (Munat [2007], [2016];
Lalić-Krstin, Silaški & Renner [2025]) and extra-grammatical
word-formation processes (Dressler [2000]; Mattiello [2013], [2017])
has provided frameworks for understanding non-standard word-formation,
this issue of Lexis aims to open new discussions around the interface
of morphological innovation and rhetorical strategies. We are
particularly interested in diverse phenomena ranging from coded speech
to punning, from internet innovations to anti-languages as “special
forms of language generated by some kind of anti-society” (Halliday
[1976]), and from playful formations to emergent morphological
patterns. We welcome investigations of what Dressler [1981] has called
“poetic audacity” and what, following Haspelmath [1999], Schmid
[2020], and Eitelmann & Haumann [2022] describe as “linguistic
extravagance”. Through their departure from expected patterns, these
formations can serve as devices to seek attention (Lipka [1987]), or
can result in salience, foregrounding or expressivity (Schmid [2020]).
We invite submissions addressing (but not limited to) the following
thematic areas:
1. Socially marked lexicogenesis
This strand explores morphological innovation in contexts where
strangeness serves identity construction (e.g., neopronouns and
non-binary personal identifications), group boundary maintenance
(e.g., orthographic alterations in Gen Z slang), or deliberate
obscuration (e.g., character substitutions to avoid censorship).
Morphological deviance in these contexts is not merely playful but
functionally motivated, serving to create in-group solidarity, exclude
outsiders, or evade surveillance and detection. The systematic nature
of many coded formations raises questions about the boundary between
creative violation and rule-governed pattern extension.
Topics may include:
 - Anti-languages and argots: morphological strategies in prison
slang, criminal codes and subcultural registers (following Halliday
[1976]), examining how these varieties systematically manipulate
standard morphological processes to create opacity;
 - Algospeak: lexical formations designed to evade content moderation
and algorithmic detection (unaliving, le dollar bean, seggs, corn,
etc.), investigating the morphological, orthographic and typographical
strategies employed and their diffusion across platforms;
 - l33T speak and gaming languages: systematic letter-number
substitutions and their morphological extensions (1312, pwned, n00b,
teh, etc.), exploring how initially orthographic play develops into
productive morphological patterns;
 - Youth languages and peer group codes: ephemeral formations that
mark generational or subcultural belonging, examining how
morphological innovation functions as a marker of group membership and
the life cycle of such innovations (e.g., rizz, delulu, -maxxing,
etc.);
 - Digital platform-specific formations and their evolution across
communities, tracking how morphological innovations migrate and
transform as they move between different online spaces (e.g., -core in
cottagecore, normiecore, darkcore, which started in early-2010s Tumblr
communities and subsequently diffused to other platforms and
mainstream use).
2. Playful and aesthetic formations
This strand examines morphological innovation motivated by
playfulness, creativity, and the pursuit of various rhetorical
effects. We invite papers exploring wordplay ranging from classical
figures (paronomasia, spoonerisms) to phenomena like intentional
malapropisms, portmanteau coinages, and punning neologisms. Topics may
include creative formations in literature, advertising, journalism,
social media, stand-up comedy, political satire, meme culture or other
comedy practices such as roasting, playing the dozens or insult
comedy, but also in everyday communication, examining how
morphological strangeness achieves these diverse communicative goals.
Strangeness in these contexts may serve multiple functions:
 - Aesthetic purposes: creating pleasure through phonological,
orthographic, or morphological patterning (Poix [2021]);
 - Rhetorical ends: enhancing memorability, impact, or persuasiveness
in advertising, political discourse, and social commentary (e.g., the
Heinz Beanz campaign);
 - Affective and emotional expression: intensifying sentiment,
creating humor, or conveying attitude through morphological
manipulation (Zwicky & Pullum [1987]);
 - Metalinguistic comments: using deviant formations to comment on
language itself, linguistic norms, or contemporary usage (e.g., the
use of frankenword to denote lexical blends or hybrid formations or
truthiness to subvert the meaning of truth).
3. Emergent morphological patterns
This strand focuses on formations that occupy the space between
lexical innovations with no clear morphological features (e.g., guap
for money) and fully conventionalized morphological processes. We are
particularly interested in tracking how initially deviant or playful
formations may undergo routinization, developing into productive
patterns that speakers can recognize and replicate while still
retaining elements of their original strangeness.
Topics may include but are not limited to:
 - Libfixes and morphemized splinters: formations where parts of words
(-tastic, -gate, -athon, -pocalypse, -splaining, -licious, -zilla,
etc.) develop quasi-affixal status, examining the gradual emergence of
productivity and the semantic-pragmatic constraints on these elements
(Lehrer [1998], Marty [2022]);
 - Multimodal morphology: combinations involving emojis, special
characters, or typographical elements that function morphologically
(formations with @, #, etc.), investigating how non-alphabetic
elements participate in word-formation processes (Storment [2024]);
 - Blending families and productive schemas: examining when individual
blends spawn analogical formations (Brexit → Grexit, Megxit, etc.),
exploring the conditions under which blending templates become
generative (Mattiello [2023]).
References:
Dressler, Wolfgang U. 1981. General principles of poetic license in
word formation. In H. Weydt (ed.), Logos Semantikos, vol. II Berlin:
De Gruyter. 423–431.
Eitelmann, Mathias & Dagmar Haumann (eds.) 2022. Extravagant
morphology: Studies in rule-bending, pattern-extending and
theory-challenging morphology. Amsterdam & Philadelphia: John
Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/slcs.223
Halliday, M. A. K. (1976). Anti-languages. American Anthropologist
78(3). 570-584.
Haspelmath, Martin. (1999). Why is grammaticalization irreversible?
Linguistics 37(6). 1043–1068. https://doi.org/10.1515/ling.37.6.1043
Lalić-Krstin, Gordana, Nadežda Silaški & Vincent Renner. 2024.
Language creativity. In Constant Leung & Jo Lewkowicz (eds.), The
Routledge companion to English studies. 2nd edn, 95–106. London & New
York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003221265-9
Lehrer, Adrienne. 1998. Scapes, holics, and thons: The semantics of
combining forms. American Speech 73. 3-28.
Lipka, Leonhard. 1987. Word-formation and text in English and German.
In B. Asbach-Schnittker & J. Roggenhofer (eds.), Neuere Forschungen
zur Wortbildung und Historiographie der Linguistik. Tübingen: Gunter
Narr. 59–67.
Marty, Caroline. 2022. Caractérisation et délimitation de la catégorie
des libfixes en anglais. Anglophonia. French Journal of English
Linguistics 33.
Mattiello, Elisa. 2013. Extra-grammatical morphology in English.
Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110295399
Mattiello, Elisa. 2017. Analogy in word-formation: A study of English
neologisms and occasionalisms. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110551419
Mattiello, Elisa. 2023. Transitional morphology: Combining forms in
Modern English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781009168274
Munat, Judith (ed.). 2007. Lexical creativity, texts and contexts.
Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/sfsl.58
Poix, Cécile. 2021. Deviance in children’s literature as a form of
creativity with a humorous effect. Lexis 17.
https://doi.org/10.4000/lexis.5253
Schmid, Hans-Jörg. 2020. The dynamics of the linguistic system: Usage,
conventionalization, and entrenchment. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Storment, John David. 2024. Going✈️ lexicon? The linguistic status of
pro-text emojis. Glossa: a journal of general linguistics 9.1.
https://doi.org/10.16995/glossa.10449
Zwicky, Arnold M. & Geoffrey K. Pullum. 1987. Plain morphology and
expressive morphology. Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics
Society.
How to submit
Please clearly indicate the title of the paper and include an abstract
between 3,000 and 6,000 characters (including spaces) as well as a
list of relevant keywords and references. All abstract and paper
submissions will be anonymously peer-reviewed (double-blind peer
reviewing) by an international scientific committee composed of
specialists in their fields. Papers will be written preferably in
English or occasionally in French.
Manuscripts may be rejected, accepted subject to revision, or accepted
as such. There is no limit to the number of pages.
Submissions (abstracts and articles, in Word document) will be
submitted via the journal’s submission platform. If you encounter any
problem, please send a message to Lexis.
Deadlines:
 - March 2026: Call for papers
 - October 30 2026: Deadline for submitting abstracts to Lexis via the
journal’s submission platform
 - January 2027: Evaluation Committee’s decisions notified to authors
 - May 30 2027: Deadline for submitting papers via the journal’s
submission platform (Guidelines for submitting articles:
https://journals.openedition.org/lexis/1000
 - June and July 2027: Proofreading of papers by the Evaluation
committee
 - August 1 to September 2027: Authors’ corrections
 - September 30 2027: Deadline for sending in final versions of papers

Linguistic Field(s): Morphology
                     Pragmatics
                     Semantics

Subject Language(s): English (eng)

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