Cassidy

[Gerald Cohen]

The message below is important, because Daniel Cassidy reserves special
contempt for scholars who disagree with him without knowing Gaelic.

Meanwhile, despite the deservedly negative evaluation of Cassidy's book, I'm
reminded of the admonition not to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
Specifically, are any of Cassidy's proposed etymologies of value? As an
etymologist that's the question I'll have in mind as I read through his book
(e.g., for "kibosh" possibly from Gaelic words meaning "cap of death").

No doubt there's a lot of bathwater in his book. But if even a single one of
Cassidy's numerous proposed etymologies turns out to be correct, his book
will not be totally without value.

Gerald Cohen


On 10/16/07 12:19 PM, "David Bergdahl" <dlbrgdhl at GMAIL.COM> wrote:

> I sent  some of our recent posts to a former colleague who's an Irish/Celtic
> specialist (though not primarily a linguist).  He writes:
>
> David:
>
> Forgive me if I have said this before.  Daniel Cassidy's reputation is zilch
> in Irish American scholarship.  The two leading journals, NEW HIBERNIA
> REVIEW and EIRE-IRELAND, have both rejected him.  He takes such rejection
> with vituperation.  He's a credulous empire-builder.  That does not mean
> there is not much influence of spoken Irish (Gaelic) on spoken English.  One
> is the lenition of initial B's in some NYC place names, "Vrooklyn" for
> "Brooklyn." As for vocabulary, slob and phony are pretty well accepted, I
> think.
>
> There is other Irish influence not from spoken Irish.  Stephen Foster was
> Irish (and gay), and the words and music for "Dixie" were written by
> Irishmen in New York.  You probably know about the naughty implications of
> the title "Dixie."
>
> None of this means Cassidy is right.
>
> Best,
>

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