newfanglement

English

Etymology

newfangled +‎ -ment

Noun

newfanglement (countable and uncountable, plural newfanglements)

1. (uncountable) The quality of being newfangled; novelty or innovation, especially when very complicated or faddish.
   • 1833, Mrs. Catherine Manners (later Catherine, Lady Stepney.), The New Road to Ruin, page 31:

     So it is in traffic of all sorts, which this world lives upon; it's all newfanglement, and that's the fashion of the times.

   • 1899 January, “Mr. Gregory's Letter-box, 1813-1830, Edited by Lady Gregory”, in The Edinburgh Review, volume 189, number 387, page 176:

     The conduct of the great nations too, America, Switzerland, Holland, Italy, &c., has completely opened their eyes as to what they may expect from them; and besides, the novelty and newfanglement of revolutionary clubs and committees having worn off, I believe the great body of those who were disaffected are now disposed to mind their own business, and dismiss politics from their thoughts.

   • 2013, Joyce E. Chaplin, Round About the Earth: Circumnavigation from Magellan to Orbit:

     Fogg's house on savile Row is a steampunk paradise of newfanglement.

2. (countable) Something that is newfangled.
   • 1965, The Business Review, page 4:

     The harvesting machine — drawn by a big caterpillar or four-wheel-drive tractor — is a costly and colossal newfanglement which unearths two rows of potatoes simultaneously, shakes out the soil, separates the rocks from the potatoes which are delivered by moving belt to the accompanying truck that hauls the potatoes to the potato barn where they are mechanically unloaded.

   • 2014, Donald McCaig, Ruth's Journey:

     Everybody know it but nobody wants hear it 'count hearin' don't make nothin' no better. Some things hearin' 'bout make things worse. Ain't like dyin' is some newfanglement nobody ever heard nothin' 'bout afore.

   • 2019, Henry Leach, The Spirit of the Links:

     And, alas! there are even strange golfers who are sighing always for newfanglements, feeling that the things they cannot or must not have, are much better than the things they are blessed with.