LINGUIST List 9.898

Thu Jun 18 1998

Disc: Recent Change in English

Editor for this issue: Martin Jacobsen <martylinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Rick Mc Callister, Re: 9.872, Disc: Recent Change in English
2. bingfu, Re: recent change in English

Message 1: Re: 9.872, Disc: Recent Change in English

> Date: Thu, 11 Jun 1998 19:22:36 -0700 (PDT) From:
>bwaldHUMnet.UCLA.EDU (bwald) Subject: Re: 9.849, Disc: Recent Change
>in English: Borrowing proper names 

[snip] Anthea Fallen-Bailey
>implied that the motivations for choosing between calquing or
>(direct) borrowing are more complex, e.g., William of Orange
>consolidated his power in the Netherlands, where he was called
>Willem, but later took power in England so that he and his wife were
>known *locally* as William and Mary.

	Or "Billy" as in the "Billy Boys".

[snip]
>
>Translation of personal names, however, also often occurs in cases of
>*personal* contact, sometimes even as a matter for negotation, e.g.,
>in the 1950s-60s in NYC Greek bilinguals named "Jim" in English would
>introduce themselves as "Jim" and comment that that is how Greek
>"Dmitri" is translated into English. "Dmitri" was a common name for
>Greek speaking males. Knowledge of the Jim = Dmitri equation allowed
>*personal* choice, ultimately decided by the name bearer.

	Among working-class and first generation Hispanics with names
that don't translate, I've seen this as well, e.g. "Jesse" for Jesus,
"Connie" for Concepcion, but Juan, Jose, Maria, Margarita. But with
names like Angel, Sarah, Gabriel, Martha, they'd use the English
pronunciation when speaking English and the Spanish pronunciation when
speaking Spanish.

> The public arena can be one in which there is an open struggle for
>who gets to make the naming decision. In a sociopolitically symbolic
>sense , the struggle is between the caller and the callee. EG In LA
>in the 1970s, many Spanish-English bilinguals, in particular,
>readopted their Spanish first names, e.g., "Francisco", as *public*
>names, repudiating the translated names, "Francisco" > "Frank" that
>they had been given by the public culture during the educational
>process. Unlike baptism or total renaming, the translation
>acknowledges the *private* name of the individual, as used among
>family, but creates an *opposing* public name which creates a degree
>of *distance* between private and public identity (= form of
>self-reference). The private name "Frank" might remain as in intimate
>private situations, upon negotiation with the speaker, since it may
>also have already developed personal, esp familial, bonds prior to
>recognition of its political signficance. At this level we can see
>that trends in names are connected with larger socio-cultural trends,
>e.g., reflecting "multiculturalism" in the current accomodation
>practices of the standard European cultures, reflected in their
>languages.

	I've only seen this among college educated Hispanics. In the late
70s, I worked with a woman named Tonanzin. We used to make bets on who
could get her to tell us her "real" name. I went to grad school with a
Chicano playwright named Carlos Morton --his grandfather chose the last
name because he was so "salado" in finding a job-- who changed his first
name from Charles because, as he explained, a Chuck Morton had no
legitimacy whatsoever writing plays on Chicano topics.
	It would be an interesting project to track down these tendencies
to see if they are class based.

>
[snip]


Rick Mc Callister
W-1634
MUW
Columbus MS 39701
rmccallisunmuw1.muw.edu

	I heard this many times in TV shows.

	It is possible that 'you did good' is similar to 'he drove
slow' and even 'he died young/famous'? It seems problematic to equate
'he drove slow' simply to 'he drove slowly', because the contrast
between 'he drove slowly/*slow to the garage'.

	In othre words, 'good' ih 'he did good' is somewhat has some
predicate properties.

	BWT, do you accept 'you did good this job' or 'you did this
job good.'?
	
	Is there any clear definitions of 'arguments' and
'predicates'?

	Best
	Bingfu
	USC