ETYMOLOGY OF ENGLISH WORDS

 

Etymology is the study of the history of the form of words and, by extension, the origin and evolution of their semantic meaning across time. The meaning of a word isn’t set in stone. Instead, it’s fluid and malleable, and essentially, the people who speak a certain language can change the current meaning of a word, usually unknowingly. This process of semantic change goes on every day.

 

The early stage of Modern English (the kind spoken by William Shakespeare in the 1500s), borrows heavily from Latin and Ancient Greek, as well as other nearby languages such as French, German and Dutch. The English language freely imbibed the Greek and Latin words and with time their usage has both modified and multiplied as you can see in this chart:

 

Root Word	Language	Meaning	Modern Examples
Bio	Greek	Life	Biology, Biography
Phobos	Greek	Fear	Claustrophobia, Arachnophobia
Photo/Phos	Greek	Light	Photography
Demos	Latin	People	Democracy, Demographic
Bon	Latin	Good	Bonus, Bonanza
Aud	Latin	Hear	Audio, Audience
Mir	Latin	Amazement, wonder	Mirage, Miraculous

 

 

The English then went on to colonize countries in Asia, Africa, Australia and America and these cultures also added words and phrases which are art and parcel of the English language today. Thus words like Bunglow, Bundobast, Cachmere, Chutney from India, Domkop, Robot, Howzit and Bongo from Afrika are today used freely in English without even realizing their origin. I have, in the past written two blogs on the influence the Indian and African languages had on English and you can read them by clicking the following hyperlinks:

https://surajitbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2021/07/indian-influence-on-english-language.html

https://surajitbrainwaves.blogspot.com/2021/07/african-continent-and-english-language.html

As if that was not enough newer technology added newer words like blog, workaholic etc. as did the new generation of English speakers with words like ‘selfi’!.  This means that the English that we use today is a unique blend of many kinds of influences. It’s only when we look closely that we can see the roots.

 

Words, like facts, are difficult to remember out of context.  Remembering is greatly facilitated when you have a body of information with which to associate either a word or a fact.  For words, interesting origins or histories will help provide a context.  For example, a hippopotamus is a "river horse," from the Greek hippos, meaning "horse," and potamos, meaning "river."

 

Not only words, even phrases are easy to understand if you understand the story behind them. If you were offered a Hobson's choice, would you know what was meant?  Thomas Hobson owned a livery stable in seventeenth-century England.  He loved his horses, and to prevent any one horse from being overworked, he hired them out in turn, beginning with stall number one.  Customers had to take the horses they were given.  Thus Hobson's choice means no choice at all.

Tracing the origin of words

Etymology thus is the study of the origins of words.  The English language is living and growing.  Although many of our words have been part of our language for many years, new words are added all the time.  The English language is influenced by many sources and by various processes:

 

• Derived from Foreign Words - English, in many cases, has been commonly expanded by incorporating foreign words into it.  Most of our language has ancient Anglo-Saxon or Latin origins.  Other languages have also added to our vocabularies. In the last century the English colonies like India, Nigeria, South Africa and Australia are adding words to enrich it. Thus many words have crept into English from foreign cultures such as slogan (Gaelic), coyote (Nahuatl), and avatar (Sanskrit)

 

• Modifications: Once people begin to use a word, they may change it, perhaps to make it easier to say. They may also form new words by modifying old words.  ‘Selfie’ is a good example. How else would you describe photographing yourself?

 

• Semantic shift: Change of words and their meaning wich cnanging times as in Mood comes from Old English mod, which meant mind or spirit and Dream in Old English meant a festive atmosphere. Certain other significant semantic shifts are:

Euphemisms: what are socially acceptable changes.

·         Housecleaner instead of maid.

·         Server instead of waiter or waitress

Functional shift: how words get new parts of speech.

·         A soldier > to soldier on

·         A load > to upload

·         To drive > a drive

Generalization: extending the particular to the general.

·         Fanatic (religious zealot) to sports fanatic

 

• Additions through Technology & Products - Our words often reflect current interests, trends, and innovations.  One of the most recent contributors to our language has been computer technology, which has created words such as bytes, key-board, monitor, and disk. Another way new words come into our language is through the development of products.  Some examples include: Kleenex, Walkman, Scotch tape, Xerox, and Linoleum.

 

• Generational changes - As words are used, subtle differences become permanent changes and even new words, themselves:

·         Baby talk: Jammies, bye-bye, tummy

·         Coinages (purposely invented words): Workaholic, blog

·         Combining forms: Mini, clipped from miniature and added to everything: minicomputer, minivan

·         Compounding: Do and Undo

·         Nonsense words: Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, jabberwocky

·         Onomatopoeia (words that sound like their meaning): Slam, crack, bump

·         Phrasal verbs (getting by, down, in, off, on, over, and out): Tune in, clean up, buzz off

·         Prefixing and suffixing: Pre-heat, post-prandial, legal-ize, re-educate-ion

·         Reduplication (the doubling of a syllable or word element to strengthen or emphasize meaning): Flip-flop

 

• People's Names - sometimes when a person invents or introduces something, that thing becomes associated with the person's name.  The person, through time, is forgotten while the name lives on in our language.  Examples include:
• mesmerize - F.A. Mesmer, an Austrian doctor and hypnotist.
• sideburns - an American English alteration of burnsides, Ambrose E. Burnside, a Union general.
• Gandhian – The philosophy of non violent protest practiced by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi in Indis’ freedom struggle
• Alzheimer’s Disease

 

• Words from Letters - The initials for the names of things may actually come to replace the names.  The initials become the words that represent the thing, concept, or group.  The following are examples of words that have developed from initials.
• TV - TeleVision
• COLD- Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease
• COD - Cash On Delivery
• VIP – Very Important Person

 

• Word Histories - Some words also have interesting histories.  Learning the stories behind the meanings is a good way to learn those words.  The following examples will give you an idea of how history can affect language.
• footman - It was once thought to bring bad luck if a person stepped on the door threshold when entering a house.  Rich people hired a servant to stand at their doors.  His job was to guard against a guest's stepping on the threshold.  The guard became known as a footman.
• hooker - A synonym for prostitute.  The term became popular during the Civil War.  The women involved were camp followers.  General "Fighting Joe" Hooker approved their presence in order to boost the morale of his men.

 

Interesting history of some English words       

Let us trace a few of these English words that have a pretty peculiar history and stem from ancient words that used to mean something very, very different.

 

1. From 'Salt' to 'Salary': Our monthly earnings can be described by the English word 'salary', familiar to most English speakers, as it's been part of the English language for more than 200 years. Surprisingly enough, though, this very word stems from an ancient Latin word 'salarium', which was the pay Roman soldiers were given to purchase salt, both a necessity and a luxury at the time. The root of the word 'salarium', in turn, is the Latin word 'sal', which means 'salt'.

 

2. From 'Ignorant' to 'Nice': If you were to wish a nice day to an English speaker in the 13th century, they surely wouldn't like it. This is because the word 'nice' used to mean 'stupid' back then. In fact, for centuries, 'nice' and its earlier versions have been used to describe all kinds of derogatory human characteristics, such as being frivolous, poor, silly and clumsy, but the origins of the word date back to the Roman times, where the Latin word 'nescius' used to mean 'ignorant'. In fact, it wasn't until the 15th century that this word came to mean something positive, more specifically, someone who is delicate or dainty.

 

3. From 'King' to 'Check': We routinely use the verb 'check' to say we examined or validated something, but the ancestor of this term isn't even a verb. The beginnings of this word date back to Middle Persian, where the word 'šāh' meant ‘king’ remember the Shah of Iran! From Persian, it had jumped to Arabic, and eventually, to European languages, where it was first used in the game of chess to denote a situation in which the king is threatened. Only by the 19th century, the word 'checker' came to mean 'a person who checks or controls' in English, and with time, it gained widespread use and transformed into a verb. The 'checker fabric pattern' and 'checkerboard' also originated from this Persian term.

 

4. From 'Ninth' to 'Noon': Another word with a Latin origin, the word 'noon', confusingly enough, used to refer to 3 PM. More specifically, the Latin term 'nona (hora)', literally translated as 'the ninth hour (from sunrise)'. From Latin, the term was borrowed into Old English through Ecclesiastical Latin, and somewhere around the 12 century, it came to mean midday instead of 3 PM, likely due to a shift in the customary midday meal schedule. So essentially, we have our lunch break to thank for the word 'noon' as we know it.

 

5. From 'Star' to 'Disaster': In the olden days, humans used to blame catastrophes on the unfavorable alignment of stars, and both astrology and the word 'disaster' are remnants of those days. Until the 16th century, English didn't have the word 'disaster' in its vocabulary. The word was borrowed into English from Italian, where it literally meant an ill-starred event, with the Latin word for 'star', 'astra' being its base. With time, the relation to the stars was erased and the word turned into a synonym for 'catastrophe', as we use it in Modern English to this day.

Etymologies can be simple or complex. Much like the lives of people, it depends upon how much a word has traveled and what adventures it has had.  I will end this presentation with etymology of the word ‘English”. The root of ‘English’ is ‘Engl’ which came from the ancient Germanic tribe, the Angles, who spoke a language that later became English.  The -ish is just a suffix that means “language of”!

WIT, SARCASM, BANTER, PUN, IRONY, SATIRE & LAMPOON

 

 

If you think they are all the same with minor differences here and there, you have not even scratched the surface of the English language. A wit is a natural aptitude for using words and ideas in a quick and inventive way to create humour. This requires a capacity for inventive thought, quick understanding and keen intelligence. The ability to use words or ideas in an amusing, clever, and imaginative way is often a treasured attribute which very few people have.

 

Wit, humour, irony, sarcasm, satire, repartee mean a mode of expression intended to arouse amusement. When a writer uses wit in their work they're attempting to provoke laughter by mocking someone or something. Wit often uses paradoxes and clever turns of phrase in order to surprise and please the reader. Traditionally, the ability to create witty statements has been seen as a trait of high intelligence. One key hallmark of wit is that it often takes a second to figure out. A witty remark is one that goes over people’s heads at first, but that they then get (and laugh at) after a few moments. It is a kind of mental time-bomb that only goes off once it’s been processed a bit. Thus, wittiness is a subjective quality – for some people, a line will be immediately understood and therefore not very witty (even though it might still be funny or clever). But other people might hear the same line and need to process it for a moment before they get it. To them, it took some time to land, so the line would be witty.

 

Wit is one of the defining features of James Bond in every Bond film. In particular, the character Q, who gives Bond his gadgets, is famous for his witty lines. In The World is Not Enough, Q even makes a witty remark about this attribute of the films! When he meets Bond for the first time, he says “Ah, the legendary 007 wit – or at least half a one.” I intend to list a bunch of famous witty statements from history later on for you to savour.

 

Sarcasm

Sarcasm is an ironic statement meant to mock or ridicule another person. The term has its origins from the Greek root word “sarkezein” meaning “to tear flesh, bite the lip in rage, sneer.” Wit is often sarcastic – that is, the speaker says the opposite of what they mean, but in a dry or cutting way. There is a cruel or contemptuous element in sarcasm. For example, saying "they're really on top of things" to describe a group of people who are very disorganized is using sarcasm. When you get an “F” on an exam and your friend says, “Nice job, Einstein” that is sarcasm.

Sarcasm can differ from country to country. While an Englishman will keep a straight face and quip “Wow, did you get dressed in the dark this morning?” an American will gently punch your shoulder while guffawing loudly “Wow, did you get dressed in the dark this morning? Just kidding! Your clothes are fine! You look great! Hahahahah”

 

Banter/Repartee

As the two main characters meet, they exchange a series of humorous jabs, making light of their situation and causing one another to laugh, this witty back-and-forth is referred to as banter or repartee, and is frequently used in movies to show that two characters are clever, as well as personally close. Of course, a witty repartee is also important in real life, as friends frequently talk this way with one another. Example:

Friend 1 -“You’re not doing much, are you?”

Friend2 – “You should quit your day job and be my bodyguard. I’ll pay you double”

 

Wordplay/Pun

Wordplay is a broad term that can encompass any kind of playing around with language for humor and fun. Obviously, this broad definition would include many examples of wit as well. A pun is a literary device that is also known as a “play on words.” Puns involve words with similar or identical sounds but with different meanings. Their play on words also relies on a word or phrase having more than one meaning. Let us see a few examples:

·        The cyclist was two tyred to win the race.

·        It’s difficult for crabs to share because they are shellfish

·        If you stand by the window, I’ll help you out

·        The population of Ireland is always Dublin

·        The road to success is always under construction

·        My fat friend did not buy a belt, thinking it is a waist of time.

 

Irony

Irony describes situations that are strange or funny because things happen in a way that seems to be the opposite of what you expected. Note the "opposite" here. If an expectation is black, then an ironic outcome would be white, not off-white or gray. Example:

Bill Hillmann, the author of multiple books about how to not get gored by bulls was the only non-Spaniard to get gored in the 2014 running of the bulls in Pamplona. If it’s raining outside and someone says, “What lovely weather we’re having!” — that is irony.

 

Satire

Satire is the art form of using hyperbole to ridicule the egregious. Most commonly it’s used to expose the follies of the over-pompous or the self-important. Satire often makes fun of people by imitating them in ways that expose their stupidity or flaws. American presidential elections are a season for satires in the television programme Saturday Night Live. Oh My God on India TV is a satire on the state of Indian politics. Satire is often made to make you laugh and then make you think. It's not humour for its own sake — there is a message to it. Sarcasm and satire are both caustic remarks trying to bring out the discrepancy, dichotomy, hypocrisy, the double- standard, the falsehood, the moral degradation of an individual, or of the society

 

Lampoon

A lampoon is an attack on someone, something, an institution, or an activity. It more specific than satire and seeks to address broader social behaviors and vices. For example, it’s easy to draw a difference between satire about politics and the specific lampooning of a political figure. Sometimes, these attacks are unjust. It is certainly going to depend on the reader to determine whether or not they’re deserved and/or if they’re funny. Half of India feels calling a political leader ‘Pappu’ is funny while his party men think it as unjustifiable lampooning!

 

 

Famous witty statements from history

 

A good insult truly is rare, and is something to be relished like a fine wine. When you offend somebody with such artistry and wit, you can't pretend to be offended. It's best not to take such put-downs personally, and just let it go. Let me share with you a few of my favorite crushing zingers.

 

• “She ran the whole gamut of the emotions, from A to B.” What author Dorothy Parker had to say on Katharine Hepburn’s acting. 
  
• “All morons hate it when you call them a moron.” Author J.D. Salinger, from his novel Catcher in the Rye.
• “My dear, you are ugly, but tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be ugly.” What the British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said to Lady Astor, the first female Member of Parliament, after she called him “disgustingly drunk.”
• “Nancy, if you were my wife, I’d drink it.” What Winston Churchill had to say after being informed by Lady Astor that if she was married to him, she would have poisoned his coffee.
  
• “Bill Clinton is a man who thinks international affairs means dating a girl from out of town.” This is what author Tom Clancy had to say on the 42nd President of the United States.
• “I like your opera. I think I will set it to music.” Composer Ludwig van Beethoven, slapping another composer with his wit.
• “I don’t approve of political jokes; I have seen too many of them get elected.” Comedian Jon Stewart on the tools of his trade.
• “If your brains were dynamite, there wouldn’t be enough to blow your hat off.” Quoted from the novel Timequake, by author Kurt Vonnegut Jr.
• “She speaks five languages and can’t act in any of them.” Sir John Gielgud on Casablanca star Ingrid Bergman.
• “One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bonafide stupidity there ain’t nothing can beat teamwork.” One of author Mark Twain's most famous insults.
• “What problems do you have, apart from being blind, unemployed, and a moron?” Tennis star John McEnroe, to a Wimbledon spectator.
• “Your hair wants cutting.” Taken from Lewis Carroll's novel, Alice in Wonderland - what the Mad Hatter said to the March Hare.
• “His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.” Actress Mae West on a man she didn’t like in Belle of the Nineties (1934).
• “Some of my best leading men have been dogs and horses.” Actress Elizabeth Taylor on her storied acting career.
• “Gentleman, Chicolini here may look like an idiot and talk like an idiot, but don’t let that fool you. He really is an idiot.” Comedian Groucho Marx in Duck Soup (1933).
• “He is simply a hole in the air.” What author George Orwell wrote in his novel The Lion and the Unicorn.
• “He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I ever met.” President Abraham Lincoln, on one of his political opponents.
• “He has Van Gogh’s ear for music.” What writer and filmmaker Billy Wilder had to say, while listening to an actor sing in the movie Kiss Me, Stupid.
• “It costs a lot of money to look this cheap.” Dolly Parton, referring to herself.
• “Suppose you were an idiot, and suppose you were a member of Congress; but I repeat myself.” Mark Twain on the members of Capitol Hill.

Wit is a biting or insightful kind of humor. It includes sharp comebacks, clever banter, and dry, one-line jokes. It is often cynical or insulting, which is what provides it with its characteristic sharpness. To distinguish irony from satire and sarcasm, remember that irony pertains to situations while satire and sarcasm are forms of expression. People make satire and sarcasm happen. Irony is just there. Pun is playing around with language for humor and fun and lampoon is a deliberate attack on a person or an institution or an event in a funny way.