[Lexicog] salutations and leave-takings

[Cami Borza]

Wayne,
Sorry to answer so late, I've checked the messages only this morning.

I generally don't write to the list because it's not much that I have to say that others have not already said (it seems that I always read a message after many have already answered). But it happens that I did a research on this topic "salutations and leave taking" in one of the Congolese languages.

>From the result of my research and after talking with many colleagues about the Congolese languages they've studied, it seems that there are hardly any salutations in these languages. I mean salutations of the kind we are used to like "hallo", "good morning", "good day" etc.

But these languages have other ways of greeting. I was really surprised to read that there are actually languages that have no form of greeting!!!! In Mayogo, the language I studied, the most common word one uses to greet someone is the equivalent of "I see you" which can be used any time of the day. The morning greeting is "your eyes are open?" or "are you up?"; the day greeting is "have you spent the day?"; the afternoon greeting is "you are coming back?"(generally from the field). The answer to all these would be either the equivalent of "yes" or just restating what the other said or simply "mmmmm".

If I were to generalize, many Congolese languages, when greeting or having small talk basically state the obvious like "are you here?" "yes, I'm here". But I have to say that greetings is of utmost importance for Congolese people in general. And one cannot just say "hallo" and leave, one has to stay and converse for a minimum of 5 to 10 minutes. Otherwise you are defying the other and are being very rude.

One last note:  my language helper had a very hard time when she had to translate for me all these greetings. She had to look for the right French word and she said "there are no French words for this or that" and she gave me the word closest in meaning.

Cami Borza
SIL-ECG

Wayne Leman <wayne_leman at sil.org> wrote:
For many of us, it would seem reasonable to assume that salutations and
leave-takings would be universal. Yet, my own experience indicates that
neither are. Cheyenne, the language I work with, has neither an indigenous
salutation or leave-taking. In recent times, Cheyennes have borrowed, so now
has loan translations which translate back to English as "Good morning,"
"Good day", "Good evening", and "I'll see you again later." But those who
think about such things often recognize that they come from English. And I
suspect that they use these loan translations more with non-Cheyennes and in
"bilingual education Cheyenne" (taught in school classes) than they do in
their normal contacts with one another.

So, how about you? Are you familiar with languages which lack indigenous
salutations or leave-takings?


Wayne Leman
Cheyenne dictionary project



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