3. Weenie

A funny thing happens at Walt Disney World's Epcot. Although it has a very high hourly capacity, Spaceship Earth's line usually is at its longest earlier in the morning, and it tails off throughout the day. Why is that? A few reasons, actually: For most, it's the very first attraction they encounter, and for some, Spaceship Earth is an iconic and important ride that must be experienced early.

But, on some level, part of the reason why Spaceship Earth earns such a lengthy wait in the morning is that people are quite simply drawn to it. There's something about its massive scale and intricate architecture that grabs the retinas and doesn't let them go until you're safely seated in your time-traveling vehicle.

Structures that possess this effect – the visual tractor beam – actually have a name in Disney circles: They're called “weenies.”

A weenie serves a few purposes from an Imagineer's perspective. The first is that visual tractor beam thing – they draw guests toward them, either by being visually impressive or offering some form of preview of a thrill to come, like the drop on Splash Mountain.

The second thing they do is offer a visual anchor off of which the rest of a park or land can draw its inspiration from . The clearest example of objects that fill this role are the various park icons – the castles, Spaceship Earth, the Tree of Life, etc. Not only does Spaceship Earth draw guests toward it, but it is a central focal point that all other nearby buildings must fit alongside of. As such, these weenies control a large part of the aesthetic look of a given park or land.

A good rule of thumb for identifying a weenie is this: If you're staring slack-jawed at something for more than a few seconds, it's probably a weenie.

4. Contradictions

Dreams usually have something of an internal logic. Even if you're able to fly in a dream, it doesn't seem out of the ordinary to you – it simply is the truth of that dream. However, if in the middle of that dream, a blaring alarm goes off in your ear, that disrupts the internal logic of the dream, causing it all to come crashing down and, eventually, you wake up.

Disney's attractions and parks actually operate much in the same way as a dream. They establish a set of rules, and if those rules are broken, the magic dissipates. For example, Frontierland is designed to look like an old Western town – sort of the last settlement on the edge of the wilderness. How would you feel if you were walking through Frontierland and, suddenly, you saw a cast member walking around in his Space Mountain outfit. It'd be pretty jarring, right?

Imagineers call these moments “contradictions,” but what they really mean is “magic killers.” Disney goes to great lengths to mitigate any moments like this that could arise, most famously constructing an underground tunnel system beneath the Magic Kingdom that prevents out-of-place cast members and the like.

Ideally, everything at a Disney park should follow a consistent internal logic and feel. The only exception being when Disney internationally wants to manipulate that logic, like at the end of MuppetVision 3D, when the theater blows up and you see Disney's Hollywood Studios beyond the theater wall. In this moment, the internal logic is broken – you're back in the theme park -- but the result is a classic Muppets-style joke.

Ultimately, the goal is for Imagineers only to show you what they want you to see, so that even if you think you're getting a peek behind the scenes, it's all an intentional effect in service of telling a great story.

There are countless other pieces of Imagineering jargon worth exploring, and this is only a taste. But, these words all fall into a similar realm – they were invented to describe ways of telling a story better. Since day one, Disney's parks have been about telling great stories; Imagineers just needed a vocabulary to use while doing so.