New word discovered in laboratory; scientists amazed

Researchers successfully ‘Frankenstein’ five words together

By Greg Waldock, Staff Writer

Scientists at the Linguistic Experimentation Lab in Massachusetts have been on the bleeding edge of language research for decades, and now they may have outdone themselves. Last week, a formerly top-secret project to develop increasingly ridiculous contractions was made public as the scientists announced their latest discovery: The rare English quintuple contraction, “y’all’dn’tv’e,” meaning “you all would not have.”

“We were all sitting in the meeting room being concerned about the McGill University’s newest contraction, ‘who’d’n’t’ve’,” said lead researcher, Dr. Mlynarczyk, in their press conference last Thursday. “Four entire words crammed into one. How could we compete? Well, our Mississippian colleague was telling us the bad news from Montreal, and then said, ‘Y’all wouldn’t’ve believed them dang phonetic contracted auxiliary verbs, I tell ya,’ and it was like a light switch for us: Y’all wouldn’t’ve. Genius.”

McGill University, previously excited about their four-word contraction, has admitted defeat. Dr. Sigurdardottir, Linguistic scientist, tweeted, “We really thought our four words crammed together was neat. But five? We didn’t stand a chance. It’s a radical new science.”

Though rumours circle about a fabled Manhattan Project-like attempt to somehow weaponize these amazing discoveries, the Canadian government has been tight-lipped about potentially unethical English language experimentation. McGill has been restricted to English contractions, as the local Quebecois in Montreal refuse to speak any French syntax invented before 1763.

But purists exist in the Anglosphere, too. Watchdogs have criticized the Language Experimentation Lab for dabbling in forces far beyond their understanding.

“I mean, does anyone actually know how English even works?” asks Judith Manning, concerned mother. “Our children are already being exposed to romantic languages in the media. What if this new contraction is dangerous? It’s a slippery slope to using gendered nouns, and God knows why those exist.”

According to Dr. Mylnarczyk, English is a good language for experimenting with due to the fact that “it’s already so messed up—if anything could break it, it would already be gone. English is the mutant bastard hybrid of, like, three entire language groups and hundreds of dialects; it should be complete gibberish. We literally could not screw it up more if we tried, except by introducing gendered nouns, maybe.”

When asked her opinion on secret government contraction projects, Mrs. Manning stated, “Yeah, no, that’s kind of uncomfortable, I guess. But have you seen gendered nouns? All of Europe uses them. The whole continent. It’s insane. Couches aren’t feminine. They’re couches.”