Obsolete phrases 2809

+--------------- While we're on the topic of new topics, how about those phrases that get corrupted (e.g. by homonym errors) by people who don't know any better. For example, I see more and more instances where someone has written "free reign" (as in ruler), instead of the correct "free rein" (as in horse). +---------------

Such misuses are now often called "eggcorns":

This site collects unusual spellings of a particular kind, which have come to be called EGGCORNS. Typical examples include FREE REIGN (instead of free rein) or HONE IN ON (instead of home in on), and many more or less common reshapings of words and expressions: a word or part of a word is semantically reanalyzed, and the spelling reflects the new interpretation.

... The word eggcorn was coined collectively by the linguists who write at the excellent group blog Language Log. ... ... In September 2003, Mark Liberman reported (Egg corns: folk etymology, malapropism, mondegreen, ???) an incorrect yet particularly suggestive creation: someone had written "egg corn" instead of "acorn". It turned out that there was no established label for this type of non-standard reshaping. Erroneous as it may be, the subsbreastution involved more than just ignorance: an acorn is more or less shaped like an egg; and it is a seed, just like grains of corn. So if you don't know how acorn is spelled, egg corn actually makes sense. ... ...gave his blessing to the term eggcorn and explained that new labels for spontaneous reshapings of known expressions are sorely needed, and listed the aspects under which eggcorns overlap with but yet differ from known clbuttes of lexical creativity: malapropisms, mondegreens, folk etymologies etc.

The ones linked from the first URL that caused me particular belly laughs:

"be who of" behoove "in term" interim "for all intensive purposes" for all intents & purposes "Monday" mundane ("... detail-world") "internally" eternally ("... grateful") "toe" tow ("... the party-company line")

-Rob

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