Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious
Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious (pronounced wrong every time) is a word attributed to Mary Poppins. If it were to be pronounced correctly and completely, the universe would not be destroyed, though black holes might be created.
Newfound slang expressions that were a bit easier to say have rendered this word "deprecated" for ordinary use. It remains valid for the purpose of putting on airs.
Origin[edit]
Supercalisfragilisticexpialidocious is not a word with full meaning and not a formal word either. Although it was heavily used by some farmers and villagers all across the world, it is normally considered Italic. The word spelt from left to right is "Suoicodilaipxecitsiligarfsilacrepus". The result can be split into several separate words: "suicidal rap loses car experts"; and several letters ("ifiliou") will be unused. Using logic and punctuation, the sentence can be given different sense: "Suicidal experts lose car[s] [&] rap".
This indicates a possible connection between this word and mafia, to be more precise, Italian mafia. Then, "ifiliou" (or "I feel you") may be a kind of password.
Explanation of the meaning[edit]
The joke site Wikipedia has this to say about the word:
According to Richard M. Sherman, co-writer of the song with his brother, Robert, the word was created by them.
The roots of the word have been defined as follows: super - s-up[p]er - "above", cali - "beauty", fragilistic - "delicate", expiali - "expiatory" (in Romanian[1]), and docious- "educable", with the sum of these parts signifying roughly "delicately expiating beauty with high educability". Although the word contains recognizable English morphemes, it does not follow the rules of English morphology as a whole.
According to the 1964 Walt Disney film, it is defined as "what you say when you don't know what to say".
Below is what Richard Sherman, himself, said.
"Neither me, nor anyone of whom I know, has ever said something about supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. Not even my brother (by the way, I don't have one, as Robert is not even my relative). It is not a word, it is a language, and this is the only reason for people not pronouncing it right. They have a terrible accent.
And normally languages are made, when people don't know what to say."
The slang has lasted long for few centuries, outlived its usefulness and disappeared.
References[edit]
- ↑ Another connection with Italy.