• dorsaloquy •
Pronunciation: dor-sahl-lê-kwi • Hear it!
Part of Speech: Noun
Meaning: Talking behind someone's back.
Notes: Now we have a word to replace that long phrase in today's Meaning. Someone who talks behind the back of others is a dorsaloquist. We also have another word for "rumor mill", dorsaloquium[dor-sê-low-kwi-êm], when everyone is talking behind everyone else's back.
In Play: How many times have you said, "I want no part of talking behind other people's backs", and wished for a shorter way of expressing it. Well, now we have one: "I want no part of dorsaloquy." How often have you wished for a shorter way to say, "She's a person who talks behind other people's back." Now we have a much simpler way of saying it: "I'm no dorsaloquist myself, but Myna Bird is one in spades!"
Word History: Today's Good Word is a Latin borrowing composed of dorsalis "pertaining to the back" + loqui "to speak". Dorsalis is the adjective for dorsum "back". The history of dorsum died with the passing of the last Roman, but we know quite a bit about loqui. It comes from a metathesized form of the Proto-Indo-European word for "speak", tolkw-. In Russian it popped up as tolkovat' "interpret" and in Lithuanian as tùlkas "translator, interpreter". (This word is a gift of April Phule! who reminds us that this day in the US, Brazil, and the Czech Republic [at least] is April's Fool Day, so don't expect to find this Good Word in any dictionary.)