What good are books?

Yes, so I was caught reading in class on Friday. And not one of the three books for class. Oops! So, what was I doing? I was looking for the origin of the now popular designer breed dogs. How does one trace the oral language. By definition, orality is impossible to trace by the very ephemerality of its nature. So how do we find out how long the word has been in use? We use literature, of course.

In this case, an argument had erupted between a friend and me about how long people have been breeding two distinct breeds of dogs to create a cross breed. (On purpose, obviously, accidental crosses have been around forever.) Many people are familiar with the Labradoodle, almost the President's dog of choice, and long been purported to be allergen and shedding free. But the question was, when did these mixes start becoming popular? So I turned to books to help me find the answer. I still have not come across conclusive evidence as to the year the designer breed fad started, but I did find reference in The Girls of Huntington House (the book I was reading in class) to a Cockapoo, which is a crossing of a Cocker Spaniel and a Poodle (usually miniture or toy). The book was first published in 1972. This means that the word Cockapoo had to have been in common usage from at least sometime in the 1960's.

So you see, I do not need help, as Dr. Sexson claimed; rather, I was doing research into the origins of a word, which surely started by the oral tradition of labaling things, but can only be traced now by literature.

The combination of two words to create a new word is called portmanteau. For example, brunch is a combination of breakfast and lunch, a spork is one of those annoying plastic impliments you find at picnics that resemble a spoon with tines. When did portmanteau come to mean this? Why, it was first used by Lewis Caroll in his book Through the Looking-Glass, of course!