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There's a phenomenon I've encountered occasionally of splitting a word for emphasis:

Do I want to get a kebab? Abso-bloomin'-lutely!

Being "absolutely" given the enhancement of the insertion of "bloomin'" to convey enthusiasm for the proposed course. Occasionally "bloomin'" would find itself ousted in favour of "bloody" or something of a more Anglo-Saxon favour.

Then today this (fictionalised for ease) occurred on the radio:

Yes, It's as if I was here in a past life. I feel like I walked this way in different carnations.

This seems more of an insertion of "different" as it fit with the flow of the sentence more than for any emphasis.

Question:

Is there a name for this class of phenomenon, are the two instances described together or distinguished in some way?

Jiminy Cricket.
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  • I accidentally searched for duplicates on ELL instead of ELU. Not finding a suitable candidate, I posted an answer here. But checking again I see it obviously it *is* a duplicate (OP's *incarnation* example above is effectively meaningless). – FumbleFingers Sep 15 '22 at 15:22
  • Thanks for answering and pointing it out. I searched for a dupe here but obviously didn't specify the correct terms to unearth this question. @FumbleFingers Closing as duplicate. – Jiminy Cricket. Sep 15 '22 at 16:55
  • I've only just noticed your *(fictionalised for ease)* disclaimer before the second example. I'm guessing either you misheard something or you've mistranscribed it. I suppose it's feasible a native speaker might discard the first syllable from *incarnation* by way of "wordplay" in some unusual context, but I doubt there's anything useful for you to learn in that area. – FumbleFingers Sep 15 '22 at 17:08
  • I'm in the position that I can check as i-Player should have it. I'll not report back unless there's something remarkable. @FumbleFingers – Jiminy Cricket. Sep 15 '22 at 17:48
  • I can perhaps imagine *in different carnations* being used facetiously. Compare with That's a* whole 'nother ball game* - which is syntactic garbage (it should be *other* or *different, not a contraction of another*). But that type of wordplay is probably best avoided by most learners. – FumbleFingers Sep 15 '22 at 17:55

1 Answers1

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It's called...

Expletive infixation (Wikipedia)
a process by which an expletive or profanity is inserted into a word, usually for intensification.

The OP's cited usage in different carnations doesn't really have a name. It's just a "mistake". Or maybe malapropism (the speaker/writer should have used in different incarnations).

FumbleFingers
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