neologism

noun

ne·ol·o·gism | \ nē-ˈä-lə-ˌji-zəm

Definition of neologism

1 : a new word, usage, or expression technological neologisms

2 psychology : a new word that is coined especially by a person affected with schizophrenia and is meaningless except to the coiner, and is typically a combination of two existing words or a shortening or distortion of an existing word

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Did You Know?

The English language is constantly picking up neologisms. Recently, for example, computer technology has added a number of new terms to the language. "Webinar," "malware," "netroots," and "blogosphere" are just a few examples of modern-day neologisms that have been integrated into American English. The word neologism was itself a brand-new coinage at the beginning of the 19th century, when English speakers first borrowed it from the French nèologisme. Its roots, however, are quite old. Ultimately, "neologism" comes from Greek neos (meaning "new") and "logos" (meaning "word").

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The Savage neologism later made news in the runup to the 2012 presidential election. — Kyle Peterson, WSJ, "A House Majority by ‘Any Means Necessary’," 19 Oct. 2018 Unfortunately, not all neologisms are as adorkable as, well, adorkable. — Mark Ellwood, Condé Nast Traveler, "The Made-Up Travel Words We Love to Hate," 18 July 2018 Allusions, dramatic asides, neologisms and flamboyant punctuation became the hallmarks of his style. — Thomas Curwen, sacbee, "Tom Wolfe, novelist and pioneer of New Journalism, dies at 88 | The Sacramento Bee," 15 May 2018 To Walker's amusement, his book sometimes appeared in the art instruction section of bookstores, and his neologisms would pop up in discussions about the art of cartooning. — Ali Bahrampour, chicagotribune.com, "Mort Walker, whose 'Beetle Bailey' was a comic-page staple for decades, dies at 94," 27 Jan. 2018 Coining neologisms was and still is one of Coupland’s things. — Laura Miller, Slate Magazine, "It’s hard to be the voice of a generation when your generation doesn’t need you anymore.," 15 May 2017 The millennial neologism for an age-old conundrum, ‘‘ — Maya Binyam, New York Times, "Letter of Recommendation: Ghosting," 3 Aug. 2017 Fake news — a neologism to describe stories that are just not true, like Pizzagate, and a term now co-opted to characterize unfavorable news — has given new urgency to the teaching of media literacy. — Interview By Sydney Ember, New York Times, "This Is Not Fake News (but Don’t Go by the Headline)," 3 Apr. 2017 Unaware of any word that could describe her situation, Webster saw an opportunity for neologism. — Michelle Nijhuis, The New Yorker, "What Do You Call the Last of a Species?," 2 Mar. 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'neologism.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

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The first known use of neologism was in 1772

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More Definitions for neologism

neologism

noun

English Language Learners Definition of neologism

: a new word or expression or a new meaning of a word

See the full definition for neologism in the English Language Learners Dictionary

neologism

noun

ne·ol·o·gism | \ nē-ˈäl-ə-ˌjiz-əm

Medical Definition of neologism

: a new word that is coined especially by a person affected with schizophrenia, is meaningless except to the coiner, and is typically a combination of two existing words or a shortening or distortion of an existing word