The longest english word you know

@zhangw (145)
China
December 18, 2008 5:42am CST
Once, in a english linguistics class ,in order to express the construction of english word, our teacher showed us a quite long word. It takes about a whole line of a B5 paper.It's interesting. Tell me the longest word you know.
1 person likes this
6 responses
phyrethyme
@phyrethyme (1267)
• Philippines
18 Dec 08
"Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" is the longest word I know. The others are quite shorter, mostly names of chemical compounds. What's the longest word you know?
zhangw
@zhangw (145)
• China
18 Dec 08
That's it!! I wrote it on my notebook, but I forgot to take that notebook. It's so long,I can't remember it,and don't know it's meaning. You remember it?
phyrethyme
@phyrethyme (1267)
• Philippines
18 Dec 08
Lung disease, I think. I will check it out to make sure then get back with you. XD
phyrethyme
@phyrethyme (1267)
• Philippines
18 Dec 08
Oh right. It's a lung disease cause by inhalation of silica dust. I checked an online dictionary. XD
ThePaintGuru
@ThePaintGuru (541)
• United States
18 Dec 08
You might want to look here (wikipedia link): http://is.gd/cj4J
ThePaintGuru
@ThePaintGuru (541)
• United States
18 Dec 08
Oh I should probably add that English isn't particularly known for constructing long words. When you compare it with compounding languages (Germanic ones, for instance), it is very terse
bunmi2501
@bunmi2501 (465)
• Nigeria
18 Dec 08
The longest english word I know is "smiles" because it got a mile in between the 2 "S". Just a joke i learnt back in school days.
zhangw
@zhangw (145)
• China
18 Dec 08
oh!^-^ I've heard about this joke.
mjweed21
@mjweed21 (693)
• Philippines
18 Dec 08
I don't have in mind. But if you don't mind, could you share to us that long english word that your teacher had introduced?
MichaelJay
@MichaelJay (1100)
•
18 Dec 08
The longest English word I know which was alaways quoted to us at school (half a century ago!) was 'antidisestblishmentarianism'
ratcliffe07
@ratcliffe07 (128)
• United States
19 Dec 08
My teacher in the 8th grade taught me the longest english word at that time in the dictionary. It means dust in the lungs caused by volcanoe ash. Here it is :) (oh and we even had a little song to go with it to remember it): pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovalcanoconiosis