Query Details
| Query Subject: |
Taboo Words
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| Author: | Christian Kjaer Nelson | |
| Submitter Email: | click here to access email | |
| Linguistic LingField(s): |
General Linguistics
Lexicography |
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| Query: |
Some time ago, on one of these lists (Linguist List,Language Use
List,Linguistic Anthropology List), I read of the phenomenon of avoiding words or even syllables of words just because they *sounded* like taboo words. I even seem to recall the poster reported an instance in which Pat Robertson pardoned himself for using a word that had a syllable sounding like ''damn'' or ''hell'' or whatever in it even though that syllable did not at all derive from a taboo word. Anybody save that post, or have any information to share about this that is more specific than what I can (not) remember? Thanks in advance for any help, Christian Nelson Dr. Christian K. Nelson Communication Department, Machmer Hall Box 34815 University of Massachusetts Amherst, MA 01003-4815 USA 413/545-6345 cnelson@comm.umass.edu The other day my 12-year-old daughter suggested that 'chocolate' seems to be a truly 'international word' - and offhand I couldn't think of any language I'd studied in which the word for 'chocolate' was anything but a phonetic loan of some kind. Does anybody know of a language with a non-'chocolate'-sounding word for 'chocolate'? And I wonder if there are any other such words, e.g. tea? Coffee? Curry? Are there any 'international' non-food words, I wonder? Please respond to me privately and I'll post a summary if there is enough interest. Karen Steffen Chung National Taiwan University karchung@ccms.ntu.edu.tw I have been studying different uses of reduplication and diminution, and I have come across a source that is indefinite about a linguistic example. It is probable that the laguage belongs to a Polynesian (or Melanyi) group, but can there be more precision about it? The example I am referring to is following KAPIR 'stone' KAPIR-KAPIR 'small stones' The interesting thing about this example is that it shows a connection between plural and diminutive meanings. If there are further examples of such an interplay in any language, I would be grateful to hear about them! Jan K. Lindstrom Assistant Scandinavian Languages and Literature University of Helsinki Hello, I would very much appreciate any examples of languages which contrast -i- and -ji- after initial consonants. (English has such a contrast only word-initially, e.g. 'ear' vs. 'year'.) I'm interested in contemporary spoken languages, not textual or reconstructed languages. (Written Tibetan has such a contrast, but its actual articulation is unknown.) If anyone has more general information on how prevalent such contrasts are in the world's languages, and what types of consonants they are more likely to occur after, that would be great, too. (Ladefoged and Maddieson's Sounds of the World's Languages has no info on this.) I'm borrowing a friend's account to post this query since I'm not on the list, so I'd appreciate it if you could send replies to me directly at: zev@socrates.berkeley.edu Thanks, Zev Handel |
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| LL Issue: | 9.1151 | |
| Date posted: | 17-Aug-1998 | |
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