Thingamajigs and Whatchamacallits: Unfamiliar Terms for Familiar Things

Rod L. Evans Ph.D.

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Have you been guilty of catachresis* at work? Have you defenestrated* your dictionary in frustration? Do you have phloem bundles* stuck in your diastema*? Scratching your occiput* now?

Rod L. Evans's Thingamajigs and Whatchamacallits will help take the mystery out of some of our most obscure words. Containing hundreds of words from agitron (the phenomenon of wiggly lines in comic strips indicating that something is shaking) to zarf (the holder for a paper cone coffee cup), this lively reference will enable you to easily locate your thingamajig or whatchamacallit, be it animal, vegetable, mineral, or punctuation mark.

Leave no linguistic oddity unexamined-your brain will thank you.

*catachresis: strained, paradoxical, or incorrect use of a word;
*defenestrate: to throw out a window;
*phloem bundles: stringy bits between the skin and the edible parts of a banana;
*diastema: the gap between teeth in a jaw;
*occiput: the back part of the head or skull

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Rod L. Evans, PhD, is a professor of philosophy at Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. He is the author of Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge; The Artful Nuance; Sorry, Wrong Answer; Thingamajigs and Whatchamacallits; and many other books. Dr. Evans’ lecture topics and philosophical interests include language, trivia, and ethics.