First, let's ponder just what sorts of words actually convey relationships between humans and various sorts of nouns. Once you start looking, it turns out there are hundreds, if not thousands. Words like "family" do the job of showing a special relationship between individuals in the context of a common social institution. Likewise, consider "patient," "teacher," "teammate" or "client."
All of these connote authority, activity, function, timeliness and so forth in the context of relationship. Or take "friend" and "enemy," which communicate connection and feeling. "Clerk," "salesman," "athlete" and "student" speak to humans and human activities. We share difficult and nuanced concepts such as "love" through words such as "marriage" and "parent." But there are few words addressing our relationship with money.
The words we develop ought to have several particular qualities. There must be general agreement on their meaning. They should be simple, even if they convey complex concepts. Consider the words of the preceding paragraph. None are more than two syllables. They are all easy to say. Some focus on their subject matter, using related root words. Others have long-forgotten etymologies but are now commonly understood anyway. Finally, they invite us to explore.
Good new words take us to other good new words. Turning again to "family," we can seek significant variations such as "untraditional family," "family of origin," "extended family" and the like. "Family man" quickly fixes a relevant demographic to a married man with children. "Family atmosphere" sets dining expectations. The concepts tend to catch on quickly. Typically, they fulfill communications needs within social units. Or they generate new conversations. In their turn, they spawn other new words and enable exploratory exchange.
The important question is: How do such words come into being? In particular, how do words come into being to enable us to discuss what was hitherto unexplored?
For one, we can look to other languages, where some of the words we could use have functional synonyms. For example, I am told that Asian languages are more relational in nature, and that Native American languages also have the capacity for relational precision. I know enough about German to suspect that we might be well-served by gluing existing words together. For example, we could use linguistic mutations like "collmon" for issues involved with the financial aspects of higher education. Unattractive, but illustrative. Or perhaps "kidfin" could describe the wide-ranging financial implications of rearing children.
From there, we could develop shades of specificity to deal with child care, work/home conflicts, childhood financial education, money saving tips and so forth.
Perhaps more meaningfully, words could be created by using different sources. For example, Dickens, Shakespeare and the Bible have been fertile word sources. Since money is the second most addressed topic in the Bible and frequently appears in Shakespeare's works, these texts could be especially productive. New Testament parables seem particularly potent. "Eye of the needle issues" might describe the problems generated by financial abundance.
Other words can be generated by grafting appropriate language onto an established prefix or suffix. For example, "-logy" from the Latin "logia," is a catchall that combines with those words to indicate the names of their respective sciences, e.g. "psychology," "theology" and "sociology." For example, if we combine this technique with a Merriam-Webster template for "psychology," we get:
Fin·o·lo·gy
1. the science of money and behavior
2. the study of mind and behavior in
relation to money and the money forces
3. the theory or system of finology
Related Forms
fin·o·lo·gist