LL-L "Language learning" 2008.03.24 (11) [E]

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L O W L A N D S - L - 24 March 2008 - Volume 11
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From: Sandy Fleming <sandy at scotstext.org>
Subject: LL-L "Language learning" 2008.03.24 (05) [E]

> From: Elsie Zinsser <ezinsser at icon.co.za>
> Subject: LL-L "Language learning" 2008.03.23 (06) [E]

> Sandy, you don't mean Folk Etymology?

Sort of, but taken further than that (see below).

> From: Mike Morgan <mwmosaka at gmail.com>
> Subject: LL-L "Language learning" 2008.03.23 (09) [E]

> Yes, agreed. But i think what Sandy was getting at was a bit different
> than the "Every Good Boy Does Fine", "A Rat In Tom's House Might Eat
> Tom's Ice Cream" sort of thing. It happens with learning and teaching
> spoken / written languages as well, but with sign languages students
> are ALWAYS asking about WHY a given sign means a given thing and are
> coming up with such memory-aiding etymologies themselves ... OR being
> supplied them by teachers (some of whom are in fact convinced that
> they are true when in fact sometimes the historical record shows quite
> clearly that they are not). I have been involved in teaching Japanese
> Sign Language, American Sign language and now Indian Sign language,
> and I have seen it happen frequently with them all. (On the other
> hand, in teaching Russian off and on for some 15 plus years, NOBODY
> ever asked me why жена zhena means "wife"; they just accepted it,
> memorized it, and moved on.)

Yes, that's it exactly.

With folk etymology the connection looks probable though it may turn out
to be incorrect on calling in the real etymologists. But even folk
etymologists wouldn't be fooled by my examples of "parent < pay rent" or
"caoutchout < cow chew".

In learning spoken French you might want to think of "cow chew" as a
mnemonic device for the French "caoutchout", but you know, really, that
the actual etymology of the word will be something completely different,
which can be gotten at from written records and appropriate analysis.

In learning sign languages, however, many signs work as mnemonics just
as they stand, _and_ the mnemonic device is also the correct
etymological explanation. In French Sign Language, for example, the sign
for "bed" is quite obviously a graphic representation of a four-poster
bed. The sign for "sex" is the very same bed with the mattress going up
and down!

This makes things easy for students when they learn these sort of signs,
which in turn gives them an appetite for discovering the graphical
meaning behind all signs. Unfortunately, not all signs yield to this
sort of treatment. So when we move over to British Sign Language, for
example, the sign for "bed" isn't so blindingly obvious, but it becomes
so when you're told that it means "bed". But the sign for sex (one of
the more usual ones, anyway), is much more difficult to figure out. In
fact I don't know what it's supposed to represent.

This results in students (and also sometimes native speakers, when asked
for an explanation) applying their imaginations to such signs and trying
to see the graphical reality behind it.

For example, I had a discussion with some Irish signers about the Irish
Sign Language Sign for Ireland. They had various theories, eg:

"It's a person dancing a jig."
"It's a fork being stuck into a potato."

Similarly Australian Deaf interpretations of the Auslan sign for
"Australia":

"It's a kangaroo."
"It's a prisoner being deported."
"It's a modification of the BSL sign for 'Britain'".

The upshot is that not only do people just make up an explanation that
seems to make sense to them, but once they've done so they often decide
that this _must_ be right and will thereafter hold forth that this is
why the sign is what it is. Moreover it's difficult to argue about it
because there's a scarcity of written records.

It gets worse. The made-up etymology undergoes a process of reification
according to the signers' beliefs about it. People who believe the sign
for Australia is derived from "kangaroo" tend to sign a jumpy version of
the sign, while the prisoner faction makes the sign sideways and the
modificationists sign it with the same small movement as the sign for
"Britain".

This has lead to me watching native signers carefully to see how they
really make the sign. I've noticed, for example, that the sign for
"Ireland" as made by many native signers doesn't really fit either of
the above theories. I would now like a way of communicating to people
the idea that the formation of a particular sign "is not what you
imagine", so that I can then introduce them to the sign as I've actually
observed it.

So what I was looking for was a term that would distinguish this sort of
thing from both folk etymology and a mere mnemonic device. The reason
I'm looking for such a term is that I'd like to have something that I
can say to signify to people that what they're doing is fine as a
mnemonic, but remind them that it's probably completely made up and
nothing to do with the sign's etymology.

Perhaps Roger's suggestion of "fantasy etymology" comes closest to this.
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