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Totes presh

The Word

THIS STORY APPEARED IN

October 16, 2011|By Erin McKean

(iStockphoto/Globe staff…)

Are you totes OK with clipped words such as totes? Does totes sound too cazh, or even inappropes, or do you think it’s just adorbs when people shorten these words?

Totes (short for totally) and cazh (short for casual) are just two of the more recent abbreviated (or clipped) words in English. Many words we use every day are clippings: gas from gasoline; chimp instead of chimpanzee; deli, not delicatessen. In fact, it would be hard to get through a day without clipped words. You’d have to give up carbs and tech, seeing the fam (or at least your sibs); you couldn’t prep for a bio or chem (or, back in the day, a home ec) exam. You couldn’t undergo chemo, join a fan club (from fanatic), play your (violin)cello or piano(forte), or plug your Strat into an amp. No matter how good your intel or how extensive your recon, you couldn’t be sure your info was legit, which could affect your cred and your rep. On the upside, of course, you couldn’t catch the flu.

Familiarity breeds acceptance: Today you’d have a hard time finding someone who sniffs at taxi and prefers to hail a taximeter-cabriolet. But some certainly find totes cutesy and annoying. Why do we love to clip words, and why do newly clipped words nevertheless face such scorn?

English speakers have been cutting words off at the syllabic knees since at least the 16th century, with gent (from gentleman) and coz (for cousin) being two of the earliest words to get the clipping treatment. Some words get a little taken off the back--lab loses –oratory; rep ditches –etition--and some lose their fronts: alli comes off gator; earth detaches from quake. Occasionally, words get shortened at both ends at once, as with in-flu-enza. It makes sense: As things and their associated words become familiar, we treat them familiarly: ad instead of advertisement, cell instead of cellular phone. We’re often tempted to blame the young for clippings, but they crop up wherever people share a natural communicative shorthand: in professional groups, say. Lexicographers, for instance, talk of prons (pronunciations) and etys (etymologies).