Bojany

[Sergey Karpukhin]

Boyan actually refers to a repeated anecdote, something unoriginal, whose punchline is well known to the audience, but which is presented as original or funny. The name derives from the word баян (bayan) spelled a la padonki. According to one theory, bayan was the musical instrument (a type of the accordion), mentioned in one such anecdote: Хоронили тещу. Порвали два баяна (Khoronili teshchu. Porvali dva bayana). The joke was repeated so often on the internet, that the word bayan became a generic name for all instances of such trite facetiousness and now conveys strong connotations of disapproval and frustration. I don't know if there is an English equivalent, other than such approximations as, say, "old hat." The word meme has a different history: lexically, the meaning of the word boyan is narrower than that of the word meme; stylistically, the word meme can and does occur in respectable publications, whereas boyan still belongs to the highly informal register of Russian.   

Sergey Karpukhin
PhD Candidate
UW-Madison

On Jul 20, 2012, at 12:41 PM, Riley, Maureen A CIV (US) wrote:

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> 
> Judging by the definitions offered by one of the online slang dictionaries, it could be translated, in specific contexts, as "urban legend".  
> 
> Maureen Riley
> DLI-Washington
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: SEELANGS: Slavic & East European Languages and Literatures list [mailto:SEELANGS at LISTSERV.UA.EDU] On Behalf Of R. M. Cleminson
> Sent: Friday, July 20, 2012 11:22 AM
> To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.UA.EDU
> Subject: [SEELANGS] Bojany
> 
> We will all be familiar with amusing (or in many cases not very amusing) pictures or gobbets of text that are reposted from site to site on the internet, but I did not know until today that in Russian they are known as бояны.  I am now wondering whether there is an equivalent term in English.  Does anyone know?
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