In our last post we explained what a portmanteau (port-man-toe) is, a mashed-up pair of words to make a new, sometimes fake word or colloquialism. And that brings us to the word (or non-word) “Kidult.” A popular colloquialism from the words “kid” and “adult.” This portmanteau is used to describe an adult that is attracted to or fascinated with childish things.
Now you think this is a bit strange, but in our modern world there are plenty of kidults. Video gamers, social media addicts, and toy collectors fall in this group. Then there are those still living with their parents or those who are emotionally unstable, like a teen, and engage in things like road rage.
Kidults are all around us these days, unfortunately.
Transmogrified is the past tense of the verb transmogrify. This is a verb that was in more common use in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries with the first documented use in 1656 in a comic play. We are more accustomed to using transform today, and the meanings are similar.
Transmogrify was and is used to indicate that an object has been transformed, but in a grotesquely manner. We might think of it in the form of fiction where a person changes from a normal person into a monster, perhaps a Count Dracula type character.
Breaking the word into components, “trans” obviously means to change or transit from one thing to another. But we are left with “mogrify” which has no real definition but is interpreted as a grotesque form of modification.
This word is best understood when used in context such as:
“If Joe’s football team loses his exuberance will transmogrify into dejection or anger instantly.”
“In the Harry Potter books many times evil beings transmogrified from normal persons to really terrifying creatures.”
Combining these two words we get something like:
“When an adult acts like a child, they transmogrify into a kidult.”
