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The wikipedia article on linguistic competence says:

Againsting the syntax-centered view of generative grammar(syntactocentrism), he specifically treats phonology, syntax and semantics as three parallel generative processes, coordinated through interface processes.

I've never heard the word 'againsting' and can't find it in a dictionary. Is it an emerging neologism, wishful thinking or a typo?

Joe
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  • Considering that against makes perfect sense there, I'm going with "typo". – Hellion Oct 01 '14 at 14:55
  • It works as a misspelt preposition. But it also would work as a gerund (if the word existed). And, knowing academic writing style, it wouldn't surprise me if this were deliberate. – Joe Oct 01 '14 at 14:56
  • The writer sounds like they know what they're doing. They probably feel that they are at liberty to make free with do-it-yourself words and usages. I'd class this as libertinism rather than descriptivism. – Edwin Ashworth Oct 01 '14 at 15:22
  • It seems like he's using the word to mean arguing against. – Barmar Oct 01 '14 at 16:32
  • Agreed. The question is 'is this a real word?'. – Joe Oct 01 '14 at 16:42
  • ... The only real test as to its general acceptability is whether it appears in OED (which updates every three months). There are those who claim that just about any letter string ever appearing in print etc should be considered a word, those claiming 'words' coined by fairly standard methods of generation should be, those claiming that 'words' claimed to fill valid requirements in the lexicon should be ... And there are those who claim they shouldn't (automatically). The OED test is not perfect, but I can't think of anything better for general English. – Edwin Ashworth Oct 01 '14 at 17:19

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Google Ngram can't find any occurrences. This suggests that the author of that sentence created it.

Whether it's a "real word" is debatable. We seem to understand it, and no readers of the Wikipedia article have felt the need to edit it, which argues for its realness. Every neologism has to go through this stage: someone has to be the first to use it. If it catches on, it becomes more and more real.

Barmar
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