New Word #84: Sound Of Holiday

ESL, vocabulary 2 Minutes

Image by Gerhard G. from Pixabay

I went to Trader Joe’s today and grabbed its “Holiday Guide”. The first sentence is like this: “What the heck is Jingle Jangle? It could be a reference to ’70’s-era Rankin-Bass cartoon characters or lyrics to a cowboy ditty referencing spurs.” I have no idea what it is talking about. Also why are there quotes on 70? I thought 70s without the quotes is a sufficient reference. “Stop thinking about grammar.” I told myself but I just couldn’t stop it. When I started learning English, it was all about vocabulary and grammar. Even now, so many years later, whenever I read, I first notice the grammar before I pay attention to the content. It’s a bad habit I just can’t unlearn.

The “Holiday Guide” reminds me that Christmas is a wonderful time for learning new words. There are so many of them that I don’t know where to start, but if I’m forced to make a choice, I will start with jingle and jangle–the sound of the holiday season.

jingle and jangle

jingle: a light ringing sound such as that made by metal objects being shaken together. “the jingle of a bridle”
jangle: make or cause to make a ringing metallic sound, typically a discordant one. “a bell jangled loudly”

tinkle and tintinabulation

tinkle: make or cause to make a light, clear ringing sound. “cool water tinkled in the stone fountains”
tintinabulation: a ringing or tinkling sound.

ditty and paean

ditty: a short, simple song.
paean: a song of praise or triumph.

monody and monotone

monody: an ode sung by a single actor in a Greek tragedy. 2. a poem lamenting a person’s death.
monotone: a continuing sound, especially of a person’s voice, that is unchanging in pitch and without intonation.

rhyme and chime

rhyme: correspondence of sound between words or the endings of words, especially when these are used at the ends of lines of poetry.
chime: a melodious ringing sound, as produced by striking a bell.

twang and twangle

twang: a strong ringing sound such as that made by the plucked string of a musical instrument or a released bowstring.
twangle: to make a twanging sound, esp on a musical instrument.

clamor and clangor

clamor: a loud and confused noise, especially that of people shouting vehemently.
clangor: a resounding clang or medley of clangs the clangor of hammers.

knell and toll

knell: the sound of a bell, especially when rung solemnly for a death or funeral.
toll: (with reference to a bell) sound or cause to sound with a slow, uniform succession of strokes, as a signal or announcement.

dingdong and singsong and clink-clank

dingdong: 1. (informal•North American) a silly or foolish person. 2. with the simple alternate chimes of a bell. “the church bells go ding-dong”
singsong: (of a person’s voice) having a repeated rising and falling rhythm. “the singsong voices of children reciting tables”
clink-clank: a usually repeated noise

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28 thoughts on “New Word #84: Sound Of Holiday”

  1. I don’t think the ’70’s was in quotes. The person used (not incorrectly, in my opinion) an apostrophe to abbreviate 1970 but where I feel they went wrong is adding a second apostrophe when just the letter s, the way you added it in 70s would be correct. I would say either ’70s or 70s.

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    1. So true. It baffled me until I put it on the post and received comments like yours. Social media is a wonderful thing, isn’t it? You can be a wonderful teacher if your aspiration is in the teaching profession. I am sure of that.

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  5. I associate ‘jingle jangle’ (another example of reduplication) with guitar music of the early to mid 60s such as The Beatles and The Byrds. Additionally, it’s a line from Bob Dylan’s ‘Mr Tambourine Man’ – “In the jingle jangle morning I’ll come following you.” No apostrophe is necessary when writing the 60s, 70s etc 🙂

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