Czarist and Soviet terminology in English

[Anna Frajlich-Zajac]

In many instances мещанин (< Pol. mieszczanin) was also used as  
a euphemism  for Jew.

_______________________________
Anna Frajlich-Zajac, Ph.D.
Senior Lecturer
Department of Slavic Languages
Columbia  University
704 Hamilton Hall, MC 2840
1130 Amsterdam Avenue
New York, NY 10027
Tel.  212-854-4850
Fax: 212-854-5009
http://www.annafrajlich.com/





On Nov 28, 2010, at 9:43 AM, R. M. Cleminson wrote:

> Of course one really does need to have access to the original  
> before saying anything definite, but I imagine that the word in  
> question is мещане, which in 20th-century Russian does have  
> the same negative cultural connotations as "petty bourgeois" in  
> English.  In the official class system in force in Imperial Russia,  
> a person engaged in trade but with insufficient capital to enrol in  
> one of the three guilds of купцы was classified as a  
> мещанин.  This category also included artisans, shopkeepers  
> and suchlike.  Etymologically, мещанин (< Pol. mieszczanin)  
> is indeed the equivalent of bourgeois -- but the two words have  
> gone their separate ways in Russian.
>
> ----- Originálna správa -----
> Odosielateľ: "Jules Levin" <ameliede at EARTHLINK.NET>
> Komu: SEELANGS at bama.ua.edu
> Dátum: nedeľa, november 28, 2010 09:38:01
> Predmet: [SEELANGS] Czarist and Soviet terminology in English
>
> Another question has arisen in my Genealogy listserv.  Unfortunately I
> do not have access to the
> original Russian but am making inferences from the translations  
> provided
> by paid translators of 19th Century
> records.   The term "petty bourgeois" is being used to describe
> merchants who could not afford to pay their
> annual license fees.  I suspect this is a Soviet era Russian-English
> dictionary translation of a phrase that would
> have a more felicitous translation in modern English.  Any thoughts?
> Jules Levin
> Los Angeles
>
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