single word requests - modern English kennings


What are some other kennings in any of the major dialects of Modern Standard English? Here are a few examples in use in American English that I offer for starters:



  • rug-rat

  • rice-rocket

  • eye-candy

  • eye-opener

  • tongue-lashing

  • jail-bait

  • mind-share

  • belly-buster

  • tear-jerker

  • coin-toss

  • nail-biter (suspenseful movie)

  • spine-tingler (eerie/scary movie)

  • night-owl

  • grease-monkey

  • disk-jockey

  • code-warrior

  • bit-cruncher

  • stud-muffin

  • saw-bones

  • moon-shine

  • block-buster (a very popular movie)


This is a form of single-word request. I'm not looking for words with a particular meaning but a compound-noun with a particular structure.


A kenning is a compound consisting of two nouns (though sometimes adjective + noun) whose semantic relationship yields, indirectly, a nominal that is not a synonym for either of them, though one of them might be a metonym for part of the idea.


Rice-rocket, for example, is a name for 'fast Japanese motorcycle' (though I've heard it used of souped-up Japanese subcompact cars too). Rice is a metonym for Japan. Rocket yields fast-vehicle by synechdoche.


These are conversational everyday words, not restricted to poetical argot.




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