retronym

See also: Retronym

English

Examples
acoustic guitar dial telephone plain text snail mail silent film steam locomotive Old English film camera book book (reduplicative)

Etymology

From retro- +‎ -onym; coined by Frank Mankiewicz and popularized by William Safire.

Pronunciation

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Noun

retronym (plural retronyms)

1. (linguistics) A new word or phrase coined for an old object or concept whose original name has become used for something else or is no longer unique, or which did not originally have a specific name. [from 1980s]

   Coordinate term: anachronym

   • 1982 December 26, William Safire, “On Language: Watch what you say”, in New York Times‎^[4]:

     The phrase is a retronym, the term Frank Mankiewicz has coined to describe names of familiar objects or events that need a modifier to catch up to more modern objects: day baseball and natural turf are in the same category as analog watch.

   • 2004, Geoff Nunberg, Going Nucular: Language, Politics, and Culture in Confrontational Times, →ISBN, page 239:

     You can get a good sense of the pace of change over the past century just by looking at the retronyms we've accumulated. New technologies have forced us to come up with terms like steam locomotive, silent movie […]

Derived terms

• retronymic
• retronymically
• retronymous

Translations

A new coinage for an old concept

• Armenian: please add this translation if you can
• Bulgarian: ретроним (retronim)
• Catalan: please add this translation if you can
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 返璞詞 / 返璞词

• Czech: please add this translation if you can
• Danish: retronym n
• Estonian: please add this translation if you can
• Finnish: retronyymi
• French: rétronyme (fr) m
• Georgian: please add this translation if you can
• German: Retronym n
• Greek: παλινώνυμο, αναβαπτιστής (palinónymo, anavaptistís)
• Hungarian: please add this translation if you can
• Icelandic: afturvirkt orð n
• Italian: retronimo m
• Japanese: 再命名 (saimeimei), レトロニム (ja) (retoronimu)
• Latvian: please add this translation if you can
• Lithuanian: please add this translation if you can
• Macedonian: please add this translation if you can
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: retronym (no) n

  Nynorsk: retronym n

• Polish: retronim m
• Portuguese: retrónimo m (Portugal), retrônimo m (Brazil)
• Romanian: please add this translation if you can
• Russian: ретро́ним (ru) m (retrónim)
• Slovak: please add this translation if you can
• Spanish: retrónimo m
• Swedish: retronym (sv)
• Ukrainian: please add this translation if you can

See also

• avant la lettre
• anachronism
• Category:English retronyms

Further reading

• retronym on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

Danish

Etymology

(This etymology is missing or incomplete. Please add to it, or discuss it at the Etymology scriptorium.)

Noun

retronym n (singular definite retronymet, plural indefinite retronymer)

1. (linguistics, rare) retronym

Declension

Declension of retronym

neuter gender	singular		plural
	indefinite	definite	indefinite	definite
nominative	retronym	retronymet	retronymer	retronymerne
genitive	retronyms	retronymets	retronymers	retronymernes

Swedish

Etymology

retro- +‎ -onym

Noun

retronym c

1. retronym

Declension

Declension of retronym

		nominative	genitive
singular	indefinite	retronym	retronyms
	definite	retronymen	retronymens
plural	indefinite	retronymer	retronymers
	definite	retronymerna	retronymernas

See also

• akustisk gitarr
• tjock-tv
• vedspis