Word of the day: Prepone

Prepone

[pree-POHN]

Part of speech: verb

Origin: Indian English, 20th century

To reschedule to a time earlier than the current scheduled time.

Examples of prepone in a sentence

"I’m going to call the dentist to see if I can prepone my appointment to this afternoon."

"The head office preponed our annual meeting, leaving my team scrambling to get our reports finished in time."

About Prepone

“Prepone” is a reworking of the word “postpone” to include the suffix “pre-.” It is also related to the Latin “praepōno,” meaning “to place before.”

Did you Know?

As far back as the 16th century, “prepone” meant “to place something in front of another thing,” but in the 20th century, the word was adopted as an opposite term for “postpone,” which has always meant “to put off until the future.” Accordingly, “prepone” is now used to describe moving a date forward in time. While “postpone” was originally a Scottish term, “prepone” is only in wide usage in Indian English (or “Hinglish,” as it is sometimes called, a code-switched merger of “Hindi” and “English”). Though it is an English word, “prepone” is among the cluster of English expressions — such as “passing out of college,” or “being out of station” — that are today considered exclusively Indian English.