honcho > honchas

[Douglas G. Wilson]

>There is a cute example of a coinage based on a folk etymology in the
>Doonesbury strip for 30 Jan. 07.
>
>[Two female engineering students are sitting in front of a robot
>which they cannot get to work as intended] We're engineering
>*honchas*, and the thing just sits there mocking us!
>
>The word _honchas_ appears to be a derivative of _honcho_, based on
>the assumption that the word is a borrowing from Spanish; the a -> o
>substitution would then be in accord with the regular pattern in
>Spanish gender marking.  The only trouble is _honcho_ comes from
>Japanese. The OED provides this citation from an unimpeachable
>source: "1955 Amer. Speech XXX. 118 Honcho. 1. n. A man in charge.
>(This is a Japanese word translated roughly as 'Chief officer',
>brought back from Japan by fliers stationed there during the
>occupation and during the Korean fighting...)." ....

Cute. A number of Web examples appear. I also find (much sparser) "hobo" >
"hoba" and "bozo" > "boza". Also "Anglo" > "Angla".

I think it's probably more-or-less right to ascribe this "honcha"
development to folk etymology, although I think it's also possible to make
one word behave like another without making any assumption about etymology.

The word "honcho", here meaning "straw boss" (essentially "foreman", I
think), appeared in the mainstream US press at least as early as September
1945 (according to my glance at the newspapers). It looks like it should be
Japanese "hanchou" and I don't see anybody disagreeing (except for that AS
author way back when, who was puzzled about the origin).

I find by Web-search a street in San Diego named "El Honcho Place". Is this
"honcho" the same one? Or is there some 'real' Spanish word "honcho"? You
can find lots of examples of "honcho" used in Spanish text on-line but it
seems to be the English word usually.

-- Doug Wilson


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