If something is out of place in time, we call it anachronistic. I want a word that means something lacks meaning or context because of geographic or conceptual displacement rather than chronological displacement.
Searches on websites like this has suggested:
- anomalous
- incongruous
- unmeaning
- uncromulent
Anomalous and incongruous seem wrong to me because they imply something is abnormal. I want to say something is done whose meaning is lost or unknown because of displaced context without implying it is abnormal.
I'm not sure about "unmeaning" or "uncromulent". Anyone have other suggestions? Or can you suggest a neologism formed from a- or an- !
EDIT:
I should have given an example...
Imagine you go into the home of someone who only speaks English and has a strong penchant for interior decorating. The person has placed a Chinese language cookbook in their kitchen to decorate the kitchen. The cookbook is not truly out of place because it is where it is supposed to be. However, its original purpose has been lost by being removed from the context of Chinese language speakers. This is the kind of situation I am trying find a word for.
My actual use would be describing Xmas decorations in Asia, but I don't want to get sidetracked by the accusation I am suggesting Asians can't put up Xmas decorations. That is NOT what I'm suggesting, just that the decoration's original or intrinsic meaning is lost when nobody knows anything about Xmas.
I think perhaps "anachorism" is closest, although the thing is not really in an incorrect place.
I tried to come up with some neologisms by combining ana- with Greek words meaning "understandable" or "dwelling place" but nothing really sounded good.
I did find another word "enchorial", but unenchorial would mean non-native, and focus on the place rather than the object. I don't want to say the objects don't belong here but that this place doesn't make sense of the objects.
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