talkie

Etymology

It is formed from English talk + -ie,^[2][3][4] on the pattern of movie.^{[3][4][5][6][7]} Barnhart and Etymonline take it as a shortening of talking picture, recorded from 1908.^[8][2] It is originally American.^[8][9][5]

Earliest recorded meaning

A film with a synchronized soundtrack of spoken dialogue: 1913, in the San Francisco Call of 7 January,^[3][6][8] at first mostly in the plural, the talkies.^[5] A Washington Post report of February 1913, quoted by Etymonline, said that Edison's new kinetophone was expected to become known as the "talkies", as distinct from the "movies".^[2]

Semantic evolution

The word was coined while sound films were still experimental, and spread with the coming of sound to the cinema.^[3][2] The talkies were such films as a whole, set against the silent films.^[3][2][10] Etymonline notes that the first Hollywood films shown on television were called tele-talkies (1928).^[2] Collins now describes a talkie as an early sound film.^[11] The word is the model for walkie-talkie.^[4]

Timeline

• 1913 – a film with a synchronized soundtrack, also the talkies, such films collectively.^[3][6][8][2]
• 1928 – tele-talkies, Hollywood films shown on television.^[2]

Meanings

Noun

1. (informal) A motion picture with a soundtrack of speech, especially one of the early ones, as opposed to a silent film: Her grandfather remembered the first talkie to reach the town.^{[11][12][3][6]}
2. the talkies: sound films collectively, or the cinema of sound films.^[3][5]

Word family

• walkie-talkie

Related words

• talk
• movie
• talking picture

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
3. ^ a b c d e f g h Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
4. ^ a b c Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
5. ^ a b c d Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
6. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
7. ^ Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
8. ^ a b c d Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
9. ^ Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
10. ^ Soanes, Catherine; Stevenson, Angus, eds. (2004), Concise Oxford English Dictionary, 11th ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
12. ^ The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt