Patterns for Making Portmanteaus

What is a portmanteau?

A portmanteau is a blend of two words that combines their meanings and pronunciations to capture a new concept. For example, brunch combines the words breakfast and lunch to create a name of the meal that is the combination of breakfast and lunch.

How are portmanteaus useful?

Portmanteaus are useful for creating words for new concepts like motel and frenemy. They are used to create a shorthand way to refer to celebrity couples like Brangelina. They name modern problems like smog and workaholics. They are fun and memorable monikers for emerging genres of art like mockumentary. All of them are a combination of two familiar words into one new one.

What makes a good portmanteau?

In a good portmanteau, the two original words are both (1) individually identifiable and (2) sound integrated into the new blended word. In the example below, guess and estimate combine to form guesstimate. In the new word, guess is identifiable as the first syllable and estimate is identifiable by the last two syllables (timate), and they sound integrated into one word because they share the ess sound in the middle.

How can we create good portmanteaus?

Given two words, how can we make a portmanteau where both words are (1) identifiable and (2) sound integrated into the new blended word?

To investigate this problem, we used a set of 86 of the best portmanteaus. We focused only on portmanteaus that are formed from two words and start with the beginning of one word and end with the ending of the other word, leaving us with 74 portmanteaus.

We analyzed these portmanteaus and found 3 distinct ways in which portmanteaus are created from two words so that both words are identifiable.

3 patterns of combination:

1: Syllable replacement: 27.0%

In the syllable replacement pattern, the first syllable of one word replaces the first syllable of the other word. In the example below, the first syllables of both words are highlighted in yellow. The first syllable of chocolate (cho) replaces the first syllable of alcoholic (al), to create chocoholic. This pattern makes up 20 (27.0%) of the 74 portmanteaus.

2: Sound replacement: 20.2%

In the sound replacement pattern, the first sound of one word replaces the first sound of the other word. In the example below, the first sounds are highlighted in orange. The first sound of spoon (sp) replaces the first sound of fork (f) to create spork. This pattern makes up 15 (20.2%) of the 74 portmanteaus.

3: Sound addition 4.0%

In the sound addition pattern, the first sound of one word is added in front of a complete word. In the example below, the first sound of friend (fr, highlighted in orange) is added in front of the complete word enemy to create frenemy. This pattern makes up 3 (4.0%) of the 74 portmanteaus.

These are three patterns of combining two words into a portmanteau so that both words are identifiable. We also analyzed two aspects of integration: replacement and overlap. We identified 3 patterns of replacement integration and 3 patterns of overlap integration.

3 Patterns of Replacement:

When two words are combined to create a portmanteau, the beginning of one word often replaces the beginning of the other word. Replacement is a concept of how similar these beginnings, or replacement parts, are. Within the first pattern of portmanteau combination (syllable replacement), we found 3 patterns of replacement:

1: Rhyme replacement: 30.0%

In the rhyme replacement pattern, the replacement parts of the two words sound similar to each other because they rhyme. In the example below, the replacement part of guess (guess) rhymes with the replacement part of estimate (es). This pattern makes up 6 (30.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

2: Vowel similarity replacement: 50.0%

In the vowel similarity replacement pattern, the replacement parts of the two words are similar to each other because they share similar vowels. In the example below, the replacement part of giant (gi) shares a similar vowel with the replacement part of enormous (e). This pattern makes up 10 (50.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

3: No similarity in replacement: 20.0%

In the no similarity in replacement pattern, the replacement parts of the two words are not similar to each other. In the example below, the replacement part of chocolate (cho) is not similar to the replacement part of alcoholic (al). This pattern makes up 4 (20.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

Although chocoholic has no similarity in replacement, it still sounds integrated because it has similarity in overlap. We explain the concept of overlap below.

3 Patterns of Overlap:

When two words are combined to create a portmanteau, the end of one word is lost, while the end of the other word becomes part of the portmanteau. Overlap is a concept of how similar these endings, or overlapping parts, are. Within the first pattern of portmanteau combination (first syllable replacement), we found 3 patterns of overlap, which are shown below:

1: Exact overlap: 10.0%

In the exact overlap pattern, the beginning of the overlapping parts of the two words are exactly the same. In the example below, the overlapping part of chocolate (colate) begins in the same way (co) as the overlapping part of alcoholic (coholic). These overlapping parts make the two words sound integrated. This pattern makes up 2 (10.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

2: Consonant-vowel similarity overlap: 30.0%

In the consonant-vowel similarity overlap pattern, the beginning of the overlapping parts of the two words have the same consonant-vowel pattern. In the example below, the overlapping part of pregnancy (nancy) begins with nan, which contains a consonant (n), a vowel (a), and a consonant (n). The overlapping part of amnesia (nesia) begins with nes, which has the same consonant-vowel pattern, as it contains a consonant (n), a vowel (e), and a consonant (s). Although the similarity is not as strong as exact overlap, it still provides enough commonality to sound integrated into one word. This pattern makes up 6 (30.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

3: No overlap: 60.0%

In the no similarity in overlap pattern, the overlapping parts of the two words are not similar to each other. In the example below, car does not have an overlapping part because all of car is included in carjack. Because of this, there is no similarity between the overlapping parts. This pattern makes up 12 (60.0%) of the 20 syllable replacement portmanteaus.

Other patterns for making portmanteaus:

The 3 patterns for portmanteau combination that we discussed are simple and common, yet there are more complex patterns for portmanteau combination:

1: Two-Syllable Replacement: 6.8%

In the two-syllable replacement pattern, the first 2 syllables of one word replace the first 2 syllables of the other word. In the example below, the first 2 syllables of both words are highlighted in yellow. The first 2 syllables of television (tele) replace the first 2 syllables of marathon (mara), to create telethon. This pattern makes up 5 (6.8%) of the 74 portmanteaus.

Additionally, television and marathon sound integrated into telethon because they have vowel similarity replacement, as tele (from telethon) replaces mara (from marathon). Tele and mara have similar vowels: e in tele (2nd and 4th letters) and a in mara (also the 2nd and 4th letters).

2: Last-Syllable Replacement: 8.1%

In the last-syllable replacement pattern, the last syllable of one word replaces the last syllable of the other word. In the example below, the last syllable of both words are highlighted in yellow. The last syllable of food (food) replaces the last syllable of frankenstein (stein), to create frankenfood. This pattern makes up 6 (8.1%) of the 74 portmanteaus.

Conclusion and Next Steps:

We think that this breakdown is a good representation of the problem of portmanteau generation. Our next steps are to complete more analysis of portmanteaus and create programs that create and rank portmanteaus.