LL-L "Lexicon" 2007.11.21 (04) [E]

[Lowlands-L List]

L O W L A N D S - L  -  20 November 2007 - Volume 04
Song Contest: lowlands-l.net/contest/ (- 31 Dec. 2007)
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From: Sandy Fleming <sandy at scotstext.org>
Subject: LL-L "Lexicon" 2007.11.21 (01) [E]

> From: Paul Finlow-Bates <wolf_thunder51 at yahoo.co.uk>
> Subject: LL-L "Lexicon" 2007.11.20 (02) [E]
>
> On another site I belong to, a member is trying to promote what he
> calls "Ednew English", and several have tried similar things in the
> past.  A few alternatives  ("linkstrand" for "isthmus") are great,
> many sound plain silly. The 19th C suggestion of "folkswain" for
> "omnibus" made sense, but everybody says "bus" these days anyway.
>
> But I still believe that in most cases, you clear the fog if you keep
> it Anglo-Norse wherever you can.  Of course for many people clearing
> the fog is the last thing they want, and over-latinising is very much
> the hallmark of the lawyer and the politician for that very reason!

OK, having just come home from a psychology course where my
communication support worker was tearing her hair out trying to put
phrases like "sociotropic depresogenic schemata" into BSL, and therefore
agreeing that long words can be used in a most obfuscatory fashion at
times, especially for those who aren't au fait with the subject matter,
I would still say that it's a myth that "saxonised" English is clearer
than English with the usual dosage of latinate vocabulary.

It may be obscuring your meaning to say "I rescued a homo sapiens from
the conflagration", rather than "I saved someone from the fire", but
nevertheless, "rescue", "homo sapiens" and "conflagration" don't mean
quite the same thing as "save", "someone" and "fire". In a different
context you might well need to say "homo sapiens" for the sake of
clarity, since "someone" cpuld easily be taken to cover Neanderthals, "I
saved my money" isn't the same thing as "I rescued my money", and a
conflagration is much more than a fire.

It's a mistake to think clarity can be achieved by prescribing
vocabulary against the grain of common usage, and it's a mistake to
think that you have a choice between Saxon and Latin in English: the
best choice for good English (or good any language) is the mot juste.

I think that what gives the people the impression that latinate
vocabulary in English is unclear is that people often use it to obscure
their meaning (sometimes only from people outside their circle), but it
doesn't follow that making your meaning clear involves choosing
anglo-saxon words wherever possible: it involves choosing the best
English words for the occasion, and that includes both kinds of
vocabulary.

Sandy Fleming
http://scotstext.org/

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From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
Subject: LL-L "Lexicon" 2007.11.21 (01) [E]

Reinhard schreef:
And then there are the so-called "jargons" of the social periphery, people
that are excluded or exclude themselves from mainstream society. However,
as I see it, here one must be careful to differentiate between the use of
jargon for deliberate exclusion from the use of "jargon" of necessity or
convenience. A case of deliberate exclusion is, I believe, Rotwelsch ("gang
gobbledigook"), a German-based "underworld" jargon peppered mainly with
words from Romance languages, Romany and Yiddish, most of them with a twist
or two so even speakers of the donor languages can't understand them.
(Rotwelsch is now extinct, but many imported terms are now well established
in German.)

In the Netherlands, especially Amsterdam, "Bargoens" is more or less
comparable with Rotwelsch in Germany. It was also called "dieventaal" in
the past, the language of thieves, and has a lot of corrupted Yiddish
derived stuff in it, that are now common in colloquial Dutch (e.g. porem =
face, stiekem = sneaky, jajem = gin), and some "Gipsy" words as well (e.g.
bink = guy, joekel = dog). The name "Bargoens" is said to be from two
Breton words, bar + gwyn = bread and wine...

Ingmar

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From: R. F. Hahn < sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Lexicon

Thanks, Ingmar!

I wonder if there are overlaps between Bargoens and Rotwelsch.

Also, quite a few Rotwelsch words ended up in Low Saxon of Germany. I'm not
sure if any of them were adopted directly, i.e., not via German.

Off the top of my head I can think of the following:

   - *Bock* 'desire', 'craving' < Romani *bokh* 'hunger'
   - *dufte* 'nice', 'great' < Yiddish טובֿ *tof* < Hebrew טוב *tov*'good'
   - *Kaff* 'village/town at the back of beyond' < Yiddish כפֿר *kafer *<
   Hebrew כפר *kafar *'village'
   - *Knast* 'jail time', 'jail', 'prison' < Yiddish כנס *knas* '(money)
   fine' < Hebrew כנס *qanas *'to punish'
   - *meschugge* 'crazy' < Yiddish משוגע *meshuge* < Hebrew משוגע *
   m'šuga'* 'crazy'
   - *mies* : 'bad', 'inferior' < Yiddish מיאוס *mis* < Hebrew מיאוס *
   miy'uws* 'loathsome', 'disgusting'
   - *Mischpoche* ~ *Mischpoke* 'family' (derogatory), 'bunch of
   low-lives' < Yiddish משפּחה *mishpakha *< Hebrew משפּחה *mi**šp**â**h*
   *â**h* 'family', 'clan'
   - *schofel* : 'impolite', 'rude' < Yiddish שפֿל *shofl *< Hebrew שפל *
   šâpal* 'inferior'
   - *vermasseln* 'spoil' < Yiddish מזל *mazl *< Hebrew מזל *mazal *
   'luck'

By the way, some derive the *Rot-* part of the name from Romany *rat* ~ *rot
* 'wrong', 'deceptive'.

There are, or better used to be, many types of Rotwelsch and jargons related
to it, e.g.,

   - Buttjersprache of Minden on the Weser at the edge of Germany's
   southwestern Low Saxon area (mostly Romani- but indirectly also
   Yiddish-influenced Missingsch! e.g., *latscho* 'good' < Romani *ladzho
   * 'good'; *Universität* 'prison'; *Kaum haste den jadjedi inne feme un
   denkst, nu kommste ans Schickern, da schallert der dich noch 'ne Strophe!
   * = German: *Kaum hast du den Schnaps in der Hand und denkst: jetzt
   fängt das Trinken an, da singt der noch 'ne Strophe* = 'You've hardly
   got the drink in your hand and think the round of drinking starts when that
   guy sings yet another verse.')
   - Jenisch (Yeniche) in Southern Germany, Switzerland and Austria
   (mostly Romani-influenced)
   - Kochum of Hundshagen in Thuringia, Germany (mostly
   Romani-influenced)
   - Lotegorisch (< Yiddish לשון־קודש *loshn koydesh* < Hebrew* *לשון־קודש
   *la**šown-qowde**š* 'sacred language' = 'Hebrew') of Germany's
   Palatinate (mostly West-Yiddish-influenced)
   - Manisch of the German towns of Gießen, Marburg and Wetzlar (mostly
   Romani-influenced)
   - Masematte of Münster, Westphalia, Germany (mostly Low Saxon with
   Western Yiddish!)

Bargoens:

   - *bink* 'guy' < Romani *beng* 'devil', 'policeman'?
   - *jajem *'gin' < Yiddish יין *yayin *< Hebrew יין *yayin *'wine'?
   - *joekel* 'dog' < Romany *yukkal* ~ *yukkal* 'dog' (cf. English
   "jackal" < Turkish *çakal* < Persian شغال *š**ağ**â**l* = Bengali
   শৃগাল *śrakāl*, Hindi श्रगाल *śragāl*, Sanskrit शृगाल* śr̥gāla*)
   - *porem* 'face' < Yiddish פּנים *ponem* < Hebrew פּנים *p**â**nim*'face'?

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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