hypocorrect

English

Etymology

From hypo- +‎ correct.

Adjective

hypocorrect (comparative more hypocorrect, superlative most hypocorrect)

1. (grammar) Not completely correct; nonstandard.
   • 1988, Linguistic Society of America, Meeting Handbook, page 5:

     They produce hypocorrect forms in an effort to speak nonstandard black English.

   • 1999, John Baugh, Out of the Mouths of Slaves, →ISBN:

     Despite being second dialect learners, hypocorrect speakers are reinforcing linguistic divergence.

   • 2013, Jonathan Owens, The Oxford Handbook of Arabic Linguistics, →ISBN, page 180:

     This example also shows the combination of a hypocorrect construction with a “high” stylistic figure, that is, paronomasia (or figura etymologica—mafʿūl muțlaq).

Verb

hypocorrect (third-person singular simple present hypocorrects, present participle hypocorrecting, simple past and past participle hypocorrected)

1. To undercorrect.
   • 1989, Yves-Gerard Illouz, Yves T. De Villers, Emma Dankoski, Body sculpturing by lipoplasty, →ISBN, page 417:

     The surgeon can hypocorrect on the operating table, knowing that in the postoperative period an additional correction will result because of:...

   • 1997, Working Papers in Linguistics - Volume 4, page 337:

     Dillard (1977) and Baugh (19S7; 1992) have also shown that upper-middle class African American college students hypocorrect in their use of AAE phonology and grammar.

   • 2003, Ériu: Founded as the Journal of the School of Irish Learning Devoted to Irish Philology and Literature, page 128:

     Similarly, the change bh>mh can be seen as a form of assimilation where listeners hypocorrect and misassign the nasality from a nasal segment to the labial fricative segment.