Word of the Day
Tchotchke
trinket: a trinket or piece of bric-a-brac
[Mid-20th century. < Yiddish tshatshke ]
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This word came up yesterday during the workday. Now, I know what a tchotchke is and I knew it was from Yiddish before looking it up. However, the word came to my attention via an email discussion at work and the fact that the individuals involved spelt it "chochke." Now if there is one thing I can't stand is misspelled words. I am a linguist, so I should be sympathetic to phonetic spellers, but I just can't help it. I don't mind differences in regional spelling standards, but misspellings sort of leap of the page and smack me in the face. I suppose deep down I believe that poor spelling shows a lack of respect for following the rules, especially, as in this case, the offenders are flagrantly and happily continuing to misspell tchotchke. I wonder if poor spellers also get a lot of speeding tickets? I've never had one, so perhaps there is indeed a correlation.
