snail mail

snail mail

English

WOTD – 3 April 2012

Etymology

A retronym emphasizing postal mail's slowness compared to email.

Pronunciation

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

Noun

snail mail (uncountable)

1. (retronym) Postal mail, especially as compared to email.
   • 1993 Nov. 9, L. R. Shannon, "Peripherals: MCI Mail Changes The Nature Of Letters," New York Times (retrieved 3 April 2014):

     To send a letter by snail mail (the Postal Service), you must still compose it, and also print it out, unless you write it by hand or on a typewriter.

Synonyms

• smail

Translations

postal mail

Catalan: correu ordinari m Chinese: Mandarin: 郵局遞送的郵件, 邮局递送的邮件 (yóujú dìsòng de yóujiàn) Danish: sneglepost c Dutch: slakkenpost, snailmail Estonian: tigupost Finnish: etanaposti (fi) French: courrier papier m, courrier traditionnel m Galician: correo postal m German: Schneckenpost (de) f, Snailmail (de) f Snail-Mail f

Icelandic: sniglapóstur (is) m Italian: posta cartacea f Norwegian: Bokmål: sneglepost m Nynorsk: sniglepost m Portuguese: correio lesma m Russian: (обычная (ru) (obyčnaja)) по́чта (ru) f (póčta) Spanish: correo postal m, correo ordinario m Swedish: snigelpost (sv) c Telugu: తంతి తపాలా (tanti tapālā)