malapropism
Other forms: malapropisms
A malapropism occurs when you say one word but you mean another, like instead of saying a certain restaurant is prosperous, you say it is preposterous. As you can tell, malapropisms are often humorous, though sometimes the joke is on the speaker.
The word malapropism, pronounced "mah-luh-PRAH-pih-zum," comes from the French phrase mal à propos, which means "ill-suited." Playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan must have been thinking of the French phrase when he created his character Mrs. Malaprop, who made audiences howl with laughter when she used the wrong word. Examples include saying "allegory" instead of "alligator," and "illiterate him from your memory" instead of "obliterate."
-
the unintentional misuse of a word by confusion with one that sounds similarsynonyms: malaproptype of:misstatementa statement that contains a mistake
- MLA
- APA
- Chicago
Vocabulary lists containing malapropism
The words on this list all describe other words: their nature, function, or origin. Learn them and consider yourself a citizen of the word!
In 1963, the Ku Klux Klan bombed a church in Birmingham, Alabama, killing four African-American girls. In this memoir, survivor Carolyn Maull McKinstry recounts the bombing and life in the South under Jim Crow laws.