I got sidetracked by Google Ngram this morning and made the following discovery.
This is a plot of the ratio of "trailer sailer"/"trailer sailor" compared to the ratio of "sailer"/"sailor" (in english-language publications). Note that almost nobody spells it "sailer" on its own, but "sailer" is actually more common than "sailor" when combined with the word "trailer." I'm advised by a linguist (my wife) that this is an example of linguistic analogy. We tend to change the spelling of the word when it's associated with the word "trailer" because the "er" ending of "trailer" is more familiar than the "or" ending of "sailor."
What are your speculations about the peak in "trailer sailer" around 2006, and the subsequent decline?
For the Brits: My suspicion is that this is more common in American English than in British English, but the Google results I got are unclear so I can't say for sure.
This is a plot of the ratio of "trailer sailer"/"trailer sailor" compared to the ratio of "sailer"/"sailor" (in english-language publications). Note that almost nobody spells it "sailer" on its own, but "sailer" is actually more common than "sailor" when combined with the word "trailer." I'm advised by a linguist (my wife) that this is an example of linguistic analogy. We tend to change the spelling of the word when it's associated with the word "trailer" because the "er" ending of "trailer" is more familiar than the "or" ending of "sailor."
What are your speculations about the peak in "trailer sailer" around 2006, and the subsequent decline?
For the Brits: My suspicion is that this is more common in American English than in British English, but the Google results I got are unclear so I can't say for sure.