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Word of the Day Archive
Thursday March 8, 2007

malapropism \mal-uh-PROP-iz-uhm\ , noun:
1. An act or habit of misusing words ridiculously, esp. by the confusion of words that are similar in sound.
2. An example of such misuse.

At 15, Rachel, the whiny would-be beauty queen who "cares for naught but appearances," can think only of what she misses: the five-day deodorant pads she forgot to bring, flush toilets, machine-washed clothes and other things, as she says with her willful gift for malapropism, that she has taken "for granite."
-- Michiko Kakutani, "The Poisonwood Bible': A Family a Heart of Darkness", New York Times, October 16, 1998

He also had, as a former colleague puts it, "a photogenic memory"--a malapropism that captures his gift for the social side of life, his Clintonian ability to remember names of countless people he has met only briefly.
-- Eric Pooley and S.C. Gwynne, "How George Got His Groove", Time, June 21, 1999

The final 15 miles featured narrow and sinuous roads made even tighter by huge crowds lining the sides. Crashes seemed inevitable.
-- Jan Freeman, "CYCLING; Crashes Jolt the Standings, And Oust a Tour Favorite", Boston Globe, April 13, 2008

A malapropism is so called after Mrs. Malaprop, a character noted for her amusing misuse of words in Richard Brinsley Sheridan's comedy The Rivals.

Dictionary.com Entry and Pronunciation for malapropism