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From: pad@hocsm.UUCP (p.a.dunkin)
Newsgroups: net.flame,net.nlang
Subject: Re: A whole nother story
Message-ID: <116@hocsm.UUCP>
Date: Mon, 25-Mar-85 23:01:37 EST
Article-I.D.: hocsm.116
Posted: Mon Mar 25 23:01:37 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 27-Mar-85 03:09:04 EST
Organization: AT&T Information Systems Labs, Holmdel NJ
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(libation to the line-eater)
Reference: <515@ima.UUCP>, <492@cadovax.UUCP>

Prefixes and suffixes are common parts of words in English and related
languages.  "A whole nother" is an example of a whole nother kind of
grammatical phenomenon - the infix.  Webster's New Collegiate says that
an "infix" is "a derivative or formative element ... inserted in the
body of a word."  "A whole nother" stretches this point a bit, since
it consists of a whole word inserted in another word, but I think that
"whole" is still considered an infix.

Infixes (or, according to some article I read a long time ago, *printable*
infixes) are rare in the English language but more common in others, like
Latin.  (Perhaps it is because there are so few polite examples of infixes
that high school teachers do not consider the construction proper. :-) )
Are there any language scholars out there who know whether infixes are
correct-but-unusual or incorrect in English?

Pat Dunkin
(...!houxm!ahuta!hocsm!pad)