Once again, I have been asked ‘What is the longest word in the English language?’
The Readers Digest once claimed that the longest word in our language is 189,819 letters long. It is the technical name for a chemical compound which begins with the syllables “Methionylal…” and ends (a long time later) with the final syllables “…prolylleucine.”
The problem with this staggering giant of a word is that it is not really English.
It’s a technical name used by any chemist (foolish enough to try to employ it) regardless of what language they were speaking, or writing, at the time.
Chemical nomenclature is controlled by the IUPAC (the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry) and whatever those chemical names are, they are most certainly not English.
So, what’s left?
Well, there is “pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis” coming in at 45 letters.
This is found in the latest Oxford English Dictionary, but only with the fairly snooty explanation that it is “a factitious word alleged to mean ‘a lung disease caused by the inhalation of very fine silica dust’ but occurring chiefly as an instance of a very long word.”
(Until I came across this, I had no idea the OED has such a nice line in sarcasm.)
But when pressed on radio I’ve settled on the 45-letter long lung disease.
Which means I had to be able to pronounce it, a task that becomes less daunting if you break it up visually into its component syllables thus: pneumono-ultra-microscopic-silico-volcano-coniosis.
Try it. I think you’ll be able to say this dauntingly long word and impress all your friends.
Tonight I will be panellist on the game show 'Quizzical' on Sky News (8pm AEST).
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* My latest book is called Pray Like This. To look at prayer I do what I do in these Ozword columns: I go through the most famous prayer in the world (The Lord’s Prayer, also known as the Our Father) and unpack it word by word—each chapter being a short word-study on a key word in that prayer. There is a total of 21 words studies in all. To find out more, here’s a link to the publisher’s website (where you can buy a copy if you wish): Pray Like This – matthiasmedia.com.au
* My book is Sherlock Holmes: 5-Minute Mysteries -- containing 50 new stories I have written about the great detective. You can find it on Amazon. Just go to Amazon and type in Sherlock Holmes: 5-Minute Mysteries in the search panel. Or use this link: h Amazon.com.au : Sherlock Holmes 5-Minute Mysteries Kel Richards
* My book "Defending the Gospel" is now in a second, fully revised, edition. You can find it here: Defending the Gospel – matthiasmedia.com.au
* If you're looking for my recent book "Flash Jim" you'll find it here -- Flash Jim, The astonis
hing story of the convict fraudster who wrote Australia's first dictionary by Kel Richards | 9781460759769 | Booktopia
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BY THE WAY...
If you'd like to see my A-Z list of Aussie slang, you'll find it here in the Australian Geographic website -- A-Z list of Aussie slang. Here’s the link: The A-Z of Aussie slang - Australian Geographic
The liveliest part of this website is usually the Q and A page -- be sure to check it out from time to time.
