gay et al.

[Jules Levin]

On 3/20/2013 2:46 PM, anne marie devlin wrote:
> Thanks for that.  It certainly makes more sense that космонавты refers 
> to OMOH.  I will have to quiz my informant again re космонавты and a 
> stupid person in a high position.
>
> As for жиды, the 16 year-old native speaker was convinced it was a 
> short form adjective and simply a derivative of жадны - quite 
> shocking.  It reminds me somewhat of a recent semantic change of the 
> word 'gay' in British - and to a lesser extent - Irish English.  It's 
> used by children and teenagers to mean 'bad' or 'undesirable'.

A small independent circle of retired linguists have been exchanging 
emails re the development of 'gay' in English.  Its current popular 
meaning is no later than the 60's.  Standard dictionaries of English, 
both in GB and North America, gave 'wanton', a pejorative meaning 
'desolute', etc., as a third meaning of 'gay'.  It is possible, though 
not likely, that the negative meaning cited above descends from that 
earlier meaning and is therefore older than its current most usual 
meaning.  If the 'bad' meaning is limited to school jargon, it may just 
be a juvenile reaction to a usage that they really do not understand.   
Since this isn't a sociology list I will refrain from going into a more 
detailed explanation.
Jules Levin
Los Angeles





>
> It seems that xenophobia is on the rise and rascist language is 
> becoming normative n social network sites and the media.
>
> AM
>
> Date: Wed, 20 Mar 2013 15:53:58 -0400
> From: aisrael at AMERICAN.EDU
> Subject: [SEELANGS]
> To: SEELANGS at LISTSERV.UA.EDU
>
> Synonyms: брат, братан, брательник, братуха, брателло. Maybe some 
> more. Does not necessarily mean 'brother'.
>
> борцуха — a derogatory word for a person from the Caucasus or some 
> other non-Slavic person who does wrestling.
>
> http://yablor.ru/blogs/kakoy-on-borcuha/2404554
>
> On Mar 20, 2013, at 1:44 PM, anne marie devlin wrote:
>
>     братух-борцух 
>
>
> Alina Israeli
> Associate Professor of Russian
> WLC, American University
> 4400 Massachusetts Ave.
> Washington DC 20016
> (202) 885-2387 fax (202) 885-1076
> aisrael at american.edu <mailto:aisrael at american.edu>
>
>
>
>
>
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