Meanings
plural crash blossoms
- human sciencesA sentence, often a news headline, that is subject to incorrect interpretation due to syntactic and/or lexical ambiguity.
Nouns that can be misconstrued as verbs and vice versa are, in fact, the hallmarks of the crash blossom. Take this headline, often attributed to The Guardian: “British Left Waffles on Falklands.”
2010 January 27, Ben Zimmer, “Crash Blossoms”, On Language, in New York Times Magazine, archived from the original on 01 Feb 2010
Origin
From a headline, "Violinist linked to JAL crash blossoms". The author's intended interpretation is that the violinist (Diana Yukawa), who has blossomed, is linked to a JAL plane crash (since her father was on the plane). However, through syntactic ambiguity, the sentence can also be interpreted to mean that the violinist was linked to something called a "crash blossom".
Full word history & related roots →Cite this entry
crash blossom. (n.d.). In WatkinsX Dictionary. Retrieved November 5, 2026, from https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/crash%20blossom
“crash blossom.” WatkinsX Dictionary, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/crash%20blossom. Accessed November 5, 2026.
WatkinsX Dictionary, s.v. “crash blossom,” accessed November 5, 2026, https://dictionary.watkinsx.com/word/crash%20blossom.
Source: crash blossom on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.