True believers in Ms Marvel should know that a word used by Kamala was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. Here the story.
This is the story of how a word used by Ms Marvel was added to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. After Kamala Khan was exposed to the transformative Earth Mists, she gained the morphogenetic ability to stretch, expand, or compress her body into different shapes and sizes. These abilities introduced her to the world of superheroes, and to something much bigger than herself.
When Kamala decides it’s time to save Jersey City (or the world), she yells her now-famous catchphrase as she activates her morph: “Embiggen!”
In March 2018, it was announced that this informal (or novel) word would be included in the Merriam-Webster dictionary:
A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man.
Also, ’embiggen’ is now a word we enter. https://t.co/3XmkZO0ral pic.twitter.com/wLUDsWIAga
— Merriam-Webster (@MerriamWebster) March 5, 2018
VOCABULARY: EMBIGGEN! 👊🏽
— Marvel Entertainment (@Marvel) March 5, 2018
To belong to these consecrated words, it is required that their use be “broad, sustained and significant.”
We asked the character’s co-creator – and series writer – G. Willow Wilson for her thoughts on the exciting news. “I can’t say that she invented the word ’embiggen,’ but I’m delighted to have been a vector for her current popularity,” says Wilson. “I remember the exact moment she slipped out of me when I was trying to describe Sana [Amanat, cocreadora y editora de la serie] the way he imagined Kamala Khan’s powers. It was such a convenient and cheerful verb. From that day on, she snuck into every Ms Marvel script.”
“I’ve often thought, ‘It’s a shame that’s not a real word, because we don’t really have another verb in English for ‘get big fast.’ And now it’s a real word. The dictionary has spoken. The English language has been embellished today.”
Do not stop reading: Ms. Marvel: Who is Red Dagger, the unexpected heroic companion of Kamala Khan
Knowing “embiggen”
In the definitions that were recorded in the dictionary, the following is read. First, it is defined as an “informal + humorous” word, which is defined as:
“make bigger or wider: ENLARGE, EXPAND”.
And two examples of its use are offered:
“This amazing graphic was the final product. (Click to expand it). – Erik Malinowski.
“There are many painters who rely on computers as an arbitrary tool or trick, but Linda Day’s recent abstract striated paintings translate digital structures into pictorial language in a fluid way that exalts to both. -Doug Harvey.
For its part, the Oxford Dictionary incorporated it as humorous “enlarge” or “expand”, and tells us the true origin of this word that comes from “the end of the 19th century” and means “of great size”. Embiggen was found in an 1884 edition of the British journal Notes and Queries, nearly a century and a half ago. However, Oxford adds: And adds: “Popularized in the 1990s by the American animated television series The Simpsons.”
That word that Ms Marvel uses was inherited from us by The Simpsons
There is a history of the use of “embiggen”, and the translation of this word that Ms Marvel popularized among young people, and dates back to 1996, to the sixteenth episode of the seventh season of The Simpsons entitled “Lisa the Iconoclast”.
In the chapter, Jeremiah Springfield says, “A noble spirit ‘greats’ the smallest man.”
In the dub, it was adapted as “enlarges”.
An anecdote. When Professor Edna Krabappel mentions that she had not heard that word outside of Springfield, her classmate replies that the term “has perfect ‘validity'”, which was the translation of “cromulent”, a word that was added to the dictionary on the same date. that “embiggen” in the Oxford Dictionary in April 2017.
Sources: The Springfield Shopper, Merriam-Webster, Oxford, and Marvel.com
The story of Kamala Khan awaits you in our online store with:
Ms. Marvel: I’m Not Normal
Introducing the international sensation: the new Ms. Marvel!
Kamala Khan is an ordinary girl from Jersey City, until she receives extraordinary powers; but who really is the new Ms. Marvel? Teen? Muslim? inhuman? Find out as she takes the Marvel Universe by storm!
When Kamala realizes the dangers of her new abilities, she also notices a hidden secret behind them. Is Kamala ready to wield these immense powers or will the weight of her legacy in front of her be too much to bear? She doesn’t know either, but just the same, step aside, Jersey, because here she comes!
Acclaimed writer G. Willow Wilson (Air, Cairo) and favorite artist Adrian Alphona (Runaways) bring you this historic moment!
Collects Ms. Marvel (2014) #1-5 and material from All-New Marvel Now! Point One #1.
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