The suffix -gate is a word ending that has its roots in an American scandal that occurred in the 1970s. We will examine the meaning of the suffix -gate, where it came from and some examples of its use. The suffix -gate is added to words in order to designate a scandal or a controversy. Some recent examples of the use of the suffix -gate include hamburgergate, a lighthearted controversy involving the placement of cheese on hamburger emojis, pizzagate involving …
The origin of the suffixes -aholic, -oholic and -holic is unusual as they are not directly derived from a Latin or Greek root. We will look at the meaning of the suffixes -aholic, -ohlic and -holic, where they came from, some examples of their use in words and some examples the use of these words in sentences. The suffixes -aholic, -ohlic and -holic indicate an addiction to the item depicted in the stem word, an abnormal dependency on it or …
The suffix -phobe means a thing or person who fears or doesn’t like a certain thing. A suffix is a word stem that is attached to the end of a word. The suffix -phobe is found in many words one would find in a dictionary such as germophobe and xenophobe. However, -phobe is also often used to coin words, especially for comic effect. The suffix -phobe comes from the Greek word phobos which means fear, panic, flight. The suffix -phile …
-wise is a suffix that is attached to a noun with a hyphen to form an adjective or adverb that means with respect to or concerning, in the manner of or in the direction of. Some words with the suffix -wise have dropped the hyphen and been accepted into English usage. Examples are clockwise, which means the direction in which the hands of a clock travel and lengthwise, meaning parallel with an item’s length. Coined words such as security-wise and …