Making up language

Words that were invented by fiction writers, and now we all use them

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Sometimes, preexisting words just don’t cut it for writers. So they invent new ones. That was the case for terms like utopia, robot, and nerd. Whether they grew to be used in philosophical texts or on playgrounds, they have certainly entered our vocabulary. Let’s take a look at 11 examples!

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The word has been many things, from a schoolyard insult to a badge of honor for having certain interests. It first appeared in Dr. Seuss’s 1950 book If I Ran the Zoo, where a strange creature called a "Nerd" appears among other fanciful beasts.

Seuss didn’t define it as brainy or awkward, but within a few years, the word was popping up in slang to describe socially inept people or bookworms.

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Today, when we say "cyberspace," we mean the intangible digital world we enter when we go online. But the word was coined by sci-fi writer William Gibson in his 1982 short story Burning Chrome.

Gibson later famously described cyberspace as a "consensual hallucination" shared by billions of connected users. The term predates the World Wide Web by nearly a decade, yet it foresaw the immersive, sometimes overwhelming, reality of living digitally.

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Today, when we say we have "debunked" a myth, we mean that we have exposed it as false. The word itself, however, originated as a literary invention in 1923, coined by American writer William E. Woodward in his book Bunk.

Woodward used debunk to mean stripping nonsense, or "bunk" of its dignity, a definition that closely aligns with how the word is still used today.

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Today, we picture robots as everything from Roombas to humanoid androids, but the word itself dates back to a 1920 Czech play, R.U.R. (Rossum’s Universal Robots) by Karel Čapek.

The term comes from robota, meaning "forced labor" or "drudgery." In the play, however, the "robots" were not mechanical but biological constructs, closer to what we might now call clones. Both the term and the concept spread quickly across Europe and the United States, reaching the vocabulary of more and more writers.

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When we say something is "utopic," we mean it’s impossibly ideal. The term "utopia" was coined by Sir Thomas More in his 1516 book Utopia, where he described an imaginary island society with perfect laws, harmony, and equality.

But the trick was in the name: in Greek, ou-topos means "no place" while eu-topos means "good place." The word took off quickly, giving us not only "utopia" but also its darker twin, "dystopia," which would dominate much of modern literature.

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Few words sound as delightful as what they mean, and "serendipity" is one of them. It refers to a happy accident, a lucky discovery made while looking for something else.

The term was coined in 1754 by Horace Walpole, a British writer and politician, inspired by a Persian fairy tale titled The Three Princes of Serendip. In the story, the princes are constantly making discoveries "by accident and sagacity."

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Fans of Harry Potter know Lumos as the spell that lights the tip of a wand. J. K. Rowling coined the word by drawing on Latin roots, such as lumen, meaning "light."

"Lumos" has since slipped into everyday use to the point that some smartphone voice assistants recognize it as a command to turn on a device’s flashlight.

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The word hobbit instantly evokes images of small, hairy-footed inhabitants of the Shire, thanks to J. R. R. Tolkien. A trained philologist with a deep fascination for languages, Tolkien coined numerous terms, including hobbit and mithril, that have since entered popular culture.

The word became widely recognized even beyond The Lord of the Rings fan base. While hobbit originally referred to a fictional race in Tolkien’s legendarium, it is now sometimes used informally to evoke something small, cozy, or diminutive in character.

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Today, we use tween to describe the awkward stage between childhood and adolescence, typically covering ages 9 to 12. The word itself, however, traces back to J. R. R. Tolkien, who first introduced the idea of "tweens."

In The Fellowship of the Ring, hobbits in their "tweens" were those between 20 and 33; no longer teenagers, but not yet considered fully adult in hobbit society. Marketers later borrowed the catchy term to describe human preteens, and it stuck.

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The word "gossip" feels inseparable from modern life. Yet it began as the Old English term godsibb, meaning a "godparent" or a close, trusted companion. It was Geoffrey Chaucer, in The Canterbury Tales, who helped nudge the meaning toward talk and chatter.

Over time, the term drifted further, shifting from "companion" to "idle talk" and, eventually, to its modern association with rumor and speculation.

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We all know what it means to be a butterfingers: clumsy, prone to dropping things, with hands seemingly as slippery as if coated in butter. This playful insult is often credited to Charles Dickens, who used it in his novel The Pickwick Papers to mock a character’s poor grip on objects.

Word drift

These everyday words had much darker origins

Words you once heard in a certain context may no longer mean the same thing today. Many terms we use comfortably in casual conversation were once considered shocking profanities or deeply offensive, and the journey from taboo to tame is often more surprising than you'd expect. We've all muttered "darn it" after spilling coffee on a clean shirt, or exclaimed "oh my gosh!" when a friend shared an unexpected piece of news, without giving it a second thought. Find out what really happened to these 10 words that used to be understood very differently.

It slips out easily in moments of surprise, like if someone told you you won the lottery, or mild frustration, like when the neighbor’s kid is making a racket when you’re trying to take a nap. But back in the 18th century, it was once considered a sneaky form of blasphemy.

"Gosh" emerged as a way to avoid saying "God," which many considered taking the Lord's name in vain. Ironically, the very attempt to be polite was itself seen as deceitful and irreverent.

We say it when we stub a toe or realize we forgot something at the grocery store. But "darn," a minced oath for "damn," was once viewed with suspicion precisely because of its apparent innocence, considered a sly, morally dishonest attempt to skirt around profanity while still invoking its spirit. Clergymen and etiquette guides alike warned against it as far back as the 19th century.

The edge wore off as the word passed from generation to generation, until all that remained was something almost endearing.

You might say it when you realize you've locked your keys in the car or knocked your phone off the counter. Hard to believe, then, that as recently as the early 20th century, this word was once a coarse and genuinely taboo scatological term.

Over time, as informal speech became more accepted in public life, it gradually shed its shock value, until it landed where it is today: mild enough to appear in mainstream advertising.

Today, "brass" mostly calls to mind a shiny metal or a jazz band. But, in 16th and 17th-century England, it was used as slang for a person's backside or private parts.

As the slang faded from common use, the word returned to its more literal, respectable meanings.

It sounds almost charming today; something a grandparent might say when they can't find their glasses. In the 17th and 18th centuries, however, it was used deliberately to replace much stronger expletives, carrying a weight that the whimsical word no longer suggests.

You hear it in movies, in song lyrics, in everyday frustration. But for much of Western history, well into the 19th century, "damn" was grave religious profanity, implying a wish for someone's eternal punishment.

Its sting faded as religious language lost its grip on everyday speech throughout the 20th century.

Today, the word sounds almost theatrical, something out of a period drama. From the Middle Ages through the 19th century, it was a sharp and damaging insult used against women considered to be of loose morals.

Over time, as the social and moral frameworks that gave the word its power shifted, it retreated into archaism.

You might come across it in a Victorian novel and barely notice it. At the time, throughout the 18th and 19th centuries, it was a loaded minced oath for "God," and using it in polite society was considered outright blasphemy.

As religious strictures relaxed in the 20th century, the word lost its charge entirely.

These days, it's just a small, mouse-like mammal. But from the Middle Ages all the way through the 19th century, "shrew" was a vicious, misogynistic insult hurled at women considered argumentative or difficult.

Increased awareness of gendered language throughout the 20th century helped strip the word of its insulting edge, though Shakespeare's use of it still raises eyebrows.

We use it to express emphasis, disbelief, or frustration without a second thought. Once, however, – particularly through the 18th and 19th centuries – "hell" was reserved almost exclusively for warnings of divine judgment, and invoking it casually was seen as deeply irreverent.

As religious language became less central to everyday life in the 20th century, the word's fearful charge slowly dissolved.