Maybe this is part of the whole language barrier I encounter as a non-native speaker.

[Benjamin Barrett]

I've been thinking about Japanese. There certainly is PC speech, where
traditionally discriminatory terms for blind, laborer, barber, mentally
retarded and the like have been replaced with acceptable terms. And
there is a nice way to talk about defecation and a bad way. There are
also polite pronouns and vulgar ones, and you might change the pronoun
you're using to your buddy, for example, when your grandmother walks in.

But I am sure that using a word that sounds similar as a substitute for
a taboo word does not exist. Fart, darn, heck, etc.

To me, the classic example is "Gee," which can be considered a
respelling of "G," short for "God," and therefore euphemistic and
unacceptable to some people. (I read this example in a novel once.)

I also saw "'Holy buckets!' exclaimed Audra Ostergard of Nebraska"
(http://www.planetout.com/news/article.html?2008/02/22/7) today. I think
"holy cow" is the general default for holy shit. I wonder whether  these
holy XX items are an extension of this pattern of substituting similar
words because "holy shoot" just doesn't work. BB

Baker, John wrote:
> Thinking about this further, it seems to me that Arun Raman is asking =
> specifically about taboo deformation in the profanity context.  In =
> English these seem mostly to be found in the contexts of profanity =
> (darn, heck), defecation (pee), and sexuality (archaic quaint and =
> Internet fark come to mind, though I'm probably missing something =
> obvious).  I don't know to what extent taboo deformations, as opposed to =
> other euphemisms, are found in other languages.  I would be interested =
> in what Arun has to say about Indian languages.
> =20
> =20
> John Baker
> =20
>
> ________________________________
>
> From: American Dialect Society on behalf of Baker, John
> Sent: Fri 2/22/2008 2:23 PM
> To: ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU
> Subject: Re: Maybe this is part of the whole language barrier I =
> encounter as a non-native speaker.
>
>
>
>         Isn't this just another way of asking whether other languages
> have euphemisms?  And, of course, there are euphemisms in many languages
> (all of them?), although there may be variation in what is treated
> euphemistically.
>
>
> John Baker
>
>
> Arun K Raman <arunkr.shivers at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
>   ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Arun K Raman
> Subject: Maybe this is part of the whole language barrier I encounter as
> a non-native speaker.
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
> -------
>
> Without going into the territory of what is or is not profanity, It
> always astonishes me when people censor "profanity" with substitute
> words that are obviously meant to be something else.
>
> My daughter was watching some PBS children's program called "A Big, Big
> world" and I heard the phrase "what the heck..." as an obvious
> substitute for "What the hell..."
>
> Does this happen in other languages as well? Or is this a fairly
> western/English-based pheomenon?
>
> I can't recall much of this happening in most Indian languages.
>
>

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