Talk:Kangaroo word

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Articles for deletion This article was nominated for deletion on 13:24, 14 November 2007 (UTC). The result of the discussion was No consensus.

Contents

[edit] Examples section too large

There are currently 122 words on the list of "Examples of kangaroo words". I do not think that this list belongs here. Note:

See also Wikipedia:Listcruft. I recommend having approximately four examples from English and approximately one each from approximately two other languages (see WP:BIAS), just to show how it's done. if there is, somewhere on the Web, a list of kangaroo words (as I suspect there is), then by all means link to it in an external links section.

Just my two cents.—msh210℠ 21:29, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I have extensively edited the list to leave at least 3 examples for each set of criteria. Cricketgirl 23:08, 1 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] large but couldn't possibly grow much larger

The examples list is large but couldn't possibly grow that much larger! I challenge you to add 10 more legitimate kangaroo words in there. Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate collection of information, but it can be quite comprehensive, especially when kangaroo words are rare and hard to come by. Also see Palindromic_phrases (10/4/06)Powerslide

It would help greatly if these words were in alphabetical order. It's not helpful to number this list - bullet points would be more appropriate. — Paul G 15:23, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
I've changed numbering to bullet points and alphabetised the list; there were several duplicates.
The challenge has been met. I've added several dozen new examples. I've been conservative and omitted words that have common roots (such as AIDe-de-camp, DEBiT and CORSEleT, although I couldn't resist CLEANsE(R) and DESIdeRatE). More arise if you allow phrases: AdvancinG yEars, CHew the fAT. These were obtained by browsing a thesaurus (Collins) from A to D, suggesting that there are probably a hundred or so more that could be added to the list, and that the list is far too long for Wikipedia. — Paul G 15:47, 21 October 2006 (UTC)
Nice work! Paul G. The challenge still remains to anyone who contests that we shouldn't list down kangaroo words here. I still contend that they're rare and difficult to find -- and they deserve a place in wikipedia. We can add a section for kangaroo phrases. You can do that if you want. We can also add a section for parasitic words (words that contain their antonyms) e.g. OVERT and COVERT, EFFETE and EFFECTIVE, AMITY and ANIMOSITY, EVOLUTION and REVOLUTION )Powerslide
Thank you. I might have a go at E to Z at some time. Surely parasitic words should have their own page, though? — Paul G 15:36, 20 November 2006 (UTC) Another one to 'conTaINer'
Even if we somehow managed to archive every single kangaroo word in the English language, it would still be inappropriate to list them. "Long and sprawling lists of statistics may be confusing to readers and reduce the readability and neatness of our articles", and the same goes for a sprawling list of words - it's better to explain with a few good, illustrative examples, than to overwhelm the reader with an exhaustive directory. --McGeddon (talk) 16:57, 29 February 2008 (UTC)
I completely disagree. Surely there is a place in the internet to archive a wiki collection of known kangaroo words. They are rare and deserve to be listed. I have separated them into a different page/entry so that it doesn't confuse the readability/neatness of the article already. The sprawling list of words is outside of the main entry. In fact, they are not sprawling, but an archive of rare objects. By your logic, we should also delete List of palindromic places. Sorry for the flame, but people have spent a lot of time to collect all-known kangaroo words for you to just delete them. I challenge you to come up with 10 new legitimage kangaroo words! If you can do that, then you can delete this list. Powerslide —Preceding comment was added at 22:34, 31 March 2008 (UTC)
There is a place on the Internet to archive a collection of known kangaroo words, but that place is not Wikipedia. If you want to start a list on a separate site, you could give a link to it from this article.
Palindromic places are borderline, but kangaroo words (where the writer decides whether two words "mean the same thing") are too subjective and indiscriminate, even if they're quite difficult to think of. Whether or not I can think of ten more has no bearing on this issue. --McGeddon (talk) 10:53, 1 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] List rewritten to be more readable

I've just done a reformat on the list, to remove MiXEd cAsE, SIncE iT SlOwS dOwN rEaDiNg. The list now uses colors and typographic emphasis to mark parasite words. A "side-effect" of this change is that it is now possible to properly handle grand kangaroo words (such as frangible). Unfortunately this had another side effect of making the code (but not the rendered list) less readable, as the new list uses Wikiformatting extensively. Please post your opinions.--NetRolller 3D 11:04, 29 April 2007 (UTC)

great work on the revision!! Powerslide 05:41, 4 May 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Wikipedia is not

Wikipedia is not an indiscriminate list of information. Sorry if you have done a lot of work sorting this list, but it belongs somewhere else. This should be limited to an encyclopedic article, with three or four examples to illustrate the concept.

See also WP:LIST and WP:SAL. —Michael Z. 2007-08-02 19:37 Z

Oops, I see the point has already been better made months ago, in #Examples section too large, above. —Michael Z. 2007-08-02 19:38 Z

[edit] Definition

A Word A Day [1] had this definition of a kangaroo word:

Rather these are marsupial words that carry smaller versions of themselves within their spellings. So "respite" has "rest", "splotch" has "spot", "instructor" has "tutor", and "curtail" has "cut". Sometimes a kangaroo word has two joeys: "feasted" has a pair, "fed" and "ate". Finally, two qualifications: the joey word has to have its letters in order within the parent kangaroo word, but if all the letters are adjacent, e.g. enjoy/joy, it doesn't qualify.

It appears that this last criterion has been lost in translation somewhere along the line. Somebody else came up with this explanation of the term [2]:

"My 8th grade English teacher called them kangaroo words because by jumping on some letters and skipping others, in the order they appear in the word."

I can see three possibilities:

  1. AWAD's definition is the correct one, and the criterion of non-consecutive letters has been dropped somewhere
  2. the original definition was to the effect of "not necessarily consecutive", but the "necessarily" got lost somewhere to produce the definition AWAD used (and I've ever since believed to be correct)
  3. the term was coined independently by two different people with these slightly different meanings

Can anybody give a clue as to which has happened? The article certainly should at least address the more specific definition. -- Smjg 13:26, 17 October 2007 (UTC)

According to The Dictionary of Wordplay, the condition of the extraneous letter is accurate, as well as the requirement that the kangaroo and joey words be etymologically unrelated. However, LinguaPhile, the letters "do not necessarily have to be consecutive". I think the article will have to express this ambiguity and I will edit it to reflect this - separating the words which may or may not qualify. Cricketgirl 21:59, 1 December 2007 (UTC)