Talk:Portmanteau (luggage)

Merger proposal

Very clearly, the Portmanteau (luggage) article is thin and in need of work. Merging it with Portmanteau (mail) won't really address that problem. One could just as plausibly suggest that Portmanteau should be an omnibus article, and if we are in the merging mode that's where it should go. 7&6=thirteen (☎) 19:38, 16 January 2014 (UTC)[reply]

This term needs to be moved from WikiProject Linguistics into a style or fashion area, or the history thereof. The article appears poorly researched, and suffers from various misappropriations of the term for commercial gain (including equating a Gladstone with a portmanteau). Imagine trying to put a gentleman's coat of any sort into a Gladstone bag; this, I would guess, is a post-Looking Glass misattribution of terms. I believe the most accurate historical meaning—which would be traced if a school of design student or similarly well-versed individual contributed—is of an elongated or somewhat cylindrical bag, whose chief attribute was a large single space to be able to hold a gentleman's coat with minimal folds. Google "portmanteau luggage" and look at images. The subset of images that match my description will be clear. Separately, but importantly, it is absolutely clear that portmanteau and trunk making went hand in hand through the 19th century (e.g., see here [1]). Trunks, not small hand cases for briefs or papers, like the Gladstone. (That portmanteaus of the original design might have been cross-purposed as bags to carry mail is not improbable, but this is all WP:OR.)

There is no question that there has been obscuring of the term, esp. since. Lewis Carroll's need to emphasize an apparent acquired meaning of two compartments. But it is very certain that all two compartment briefcases, suitcases, or Gladstones were not what the term originally meant. Bottom lines, separate this from linguistics, a wholly separate and distinct connotation; don't merge it with the mailbag (yet, until it is developed); and give it to the Fashion Institute of Technology or the SAIC, where it belongs. Then, and only then, see what the article looks like, and decide whether to merge. (says a fan of the original, real portmanteau, in the area before a gazillion compartments were required to arrange all our useless stuff) Le Prof Leprof 7272 (talk) 09:29, 29 June 2014 (UTC)[reply]