Word submission

As such there are no guidlines to follow, before you submit a word. However, make sure its not aldready included in the "Folkstionary". You can search the entire "Folkstionary" using the search box on the sidebar.

You have to realize that the "Folkstionary" is different from a dictionary in that the history of the word is of importance. It is different from a slang dictionary in that, we are studying the circumstances and forces that lead to the creation of a word. Hopefully it will be an etymologists paradise or nightmare!!.

However, if you want to add or change a word or its meaning or history you can comment below that word.

Effect of pronunciation on spelling

Pronunciation is defined as "The way words are made to sound when spoken". As you would have noticed, most people consider their pronunciation the correct version. Well, the effect of accent, schooling, and many other factors affect the pronunciation of a person. But what hapeens when a person with wrong pronunciation writes that word? In all likelyhood he will write it in the wrong way.

Consider the modified spelling of the word "tomorrow" as "tommorow", When i gave this query to google the first two results i got were Notes of an iraniangirl and tommorow's muslims. Most of the other results were from disscussion forums, which can be ignored as typos. The reasoning here is that Middle eastern pronunciation seems to give this effect of adding another "m", which translates into a spelling difference. It has to be noted here that it is not a mistake, but rather an error of ignorance. This may be a significant factor in the creation of new words. I am in search of some online documentation for the same.

The modified spellings in differrent countries can easily lead to modified meanings as well. So this can be a major factor in the creation of newer words. I call this phenomenon the "tomorrow effect", for the want of a better word to describe the same.

Typos-what we think

The wikitionary defines a typo as

"A typographical error, or typo, is a mistake made during the typing process. The term includes errors due to slips of the hand or finger, subconsciously typing a homophone, and also mechanical failure, but excludes errors of ignorance."

Well they mostly have a good reason to exclude errors of ignorance. But we consider all the other methods of producing a typo as a new word. oreover, I dont know how come they are able to analyse the minds of all those people who made typos due to ignorance.But generally, preference should be to use the shorter word more frequently than the longer counter part, irrespective of which is "correct".

However, both the words are to be retained as they are part of the history. his can be understood by considering an example, consider the word "Interest", this seems a rather ordinary word with a common pronunciation. However, many instances of pronunciation as "Intrest" can also be found. So should it be left as a typo or be considered as error of ignorance?? So we generally keep most words that would generally be considered typos. However, words that such as "cagtogories" can surely be considered as typos, well except for the case in which the author might have though the "g" to be silent. So no word can actually be proved to be a typo by the above definition.

You can also look at the "tomorrow effect" for one of the reasons behind this view of things.

Folktionary-the philosophy behind Folkstionary

Every blogs first post should generally describe the purpose of that blog.Well the purpose of this blog seems to be, to explain the philosophy behind Folkstionary-the peoples dictionary.You might have guessed it, this is a kind of redirection to that blog. It will also serve to store my impressions about it without cluttering up the other.

The folkstionary is different from a coventional dictionary is that, we are more interested in the story behind a word than its meaning. What i mean is that, how that word describes the circumstances and times we happen to live in.