Russian word for "cognate"

[T.A.MCALLISTER]

> On Fri, 10 Mar 1995 14:42:48 EST Loren Allen Billings said:
> I don't know how people speak on the east coast, but in the midwest the
> primary meaning of collaborate is still and always has been "to work
> together," from its Latin roots cum + laborare. Are you perhaps
> confusing this with collusion?
>
> >There was a lively discussion on the LINGUIST list recently about the
> >word _informant_.  One subcriber, who does field work in Liberia, as I
> >recall, would never use that word there because of it's meaning of
> >"infomer" (i.e., CIA collaborator; see below).

In British English during the Second World War, the term "collaborator"
acquired the meaning of "Non-German person who helped the Nazis". It
is gradually losing that negative connotation, but is still regarded with
suspicion by some members of the older generation.

These days, it is usually acceptable in a context which makes the exact
meaning clear (e.g. "Britain and France have collaborated on the Channel
Tunnel project"), but would probably not be acceptable when the
type of the collaboration is not explicit, especially when applied to a
citizen of a country which was invaded by the Nazis (e.g. "His former
boss and former collaborator, Jules Leclerc ...").

To avoid such problems, we tend to use "co-worker" or some such
alternative. No doubt in a few years, the negative connotation will be lost
entirely, as it seems to have been among younger people, and we can
revert to the primary meaning.

Alec McAllister
Arts Computing Development Officer
Computing Service
University of Leeds
LS2 9JT
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tel 0532 333573