# Is English contaminating other languages?



## Residente Calle 13

* Do you think that speakers of a language you know are contaminating their language by using words from another language especially English?

*I have heard this a lot from people who know Spanish and French but not so much from Italian speakers. Since I don't speak Portuguese, or German or any other language, I really don't know how anybody else feels but it seems that the opinion that English is a contaminant is not that common in Italy.  

I don't think that it has to do with national pride too much because I have heard Americans who speak French lament that in a few years French will be English and I have heard Britons who speak Spanish wonder in despair if it's even worth learning Spanish vocabulary since it's all turning into English anyway.  

I wonder if what the people who feel English is destorying a language are really saying is that they don't like Anglo-American dominance in politics or culture or something else. I wonder if we should translate "English is destroying our language" as "I hate George Bush and Tony Blair" or "I hate Cold Play and Green Day." I wonder if when they say "Why are we ruining our language" they are really saying "Why are you rapping and watching Hollywood movies?"  

What do you guys think? Is borrowing words and grammar from English messing with your language? Do you think that it's just paranoia and over-reacting? Is it just chauvanistic show-boating? Or is the fear based on something else?


*P.S. If you just speak English, feel free to share how alarmed you are this is happening, how ridiculous the fear is, or something in between.*


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## Bettie

I think that to say that English is contaminating other languages is too strong, of course we use English words now in Spanish everyday, but I don't see it as contamination.


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## maxiogee

How does any language cope with new words? Television? Helicopter? Fax? Transistor etc.?
English does this by either stealing a suitable word from another language or my going back to Latin or Greek. 
What is *contaminative* about taking a word for something which is unnamed in your own language? The Irish for gas is _gais_, and the langauge is none the worse for that.


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## KateNicole

I suppose "contamination" in the figurative sense is relative . . . but at any rate, I think people are the only ones that can contaminate languages. Languages can't contaminate each other. 

If Spanish-speakers, for example, think that English is contaminating their language, I would suppose that it is up to _them_ to refuse to say odd things like "carpeta" instead of "carpet" or "dar para atrás" instead of devolver, as well as politely correct their children and close friends when they make such errors. It's not "English's fault" that such phrases and misuse of vocabulary have crept into certain parts of the Spanish-speaking world. 

I think that for obvious reasons, a language will only stretch and bend as much as its _native speakers allow it to._


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## ireney

Contaminating? Certainly not although we do have the local variety of laughable pro-"language-purity" baffons who make hillarious efforts to make up new words in Greek to replace the English ones we use.
   Anyway, it's always funny to watch them trying to come up with a good reply when you point out to them that the English speaking people (and others) have taken Greek words and incorporated them in their vocabulary for new inventions/concepts or ones they had no word for and therefore we should show to inventions/concepts coming from English speaking language the same courtesy (there are other arguments too but this one I like)

  What gets to me is when people just take an English word, put the verb ending -aro at its end and produce an ugly sounding English-Greek word even if there's a widely used Greek one for whatever they try to describe. It seems at the very least pointless to me.


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## Residente Calle 13

maxiogee said:
			
		

> How does any language cope with new words? Television? Helicopter? Fax? Transistor etc.?
> English does this by either stealing a suitable word from another language or my going back to Latin or Greek.
> What is *contaminative* about taking a word for something which is unnamed in your own language? The Irish for gas is _gais_, and the langauge is none the worse for that.



I don't think it's a secret to those who have read my opinion on this that I agree with you completely and even the diehards admit that it's very hard not to adopt words for new things that come from other places.

But these same diehards will complain, for example, that in Paris you see signs that say "Take Out" when the French "À porter" would do or that some Spanish speakers say "mouse" in Spanish while they feel the Spanish "ratón" would be "better", "more Spanish" or whatever. I guess they should explain. Let's wait and see.

Thanks for participating, Max and Bettie.


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## Residente Calle 13

ireney said:
			
		

> What gets to me is when people just take an English word, put the verb ending -aro at its end and produce an ugly sounding English-Greek word even if there's a widely used Greek one for whatever they try to describe. It seems at the very least pointless to me.



Do you get the impression that they do it just to show off?

Thanks for participating and if you have any examples or complaints, please feel free to share them.


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## Residente Calle 13

KateNicole said:
			
		

> If Spanish-speakers, for example, think that English is contaminating their language, I would suppose that it is up to _them_ to refuse to say odd things like "carpeta" instead of "carpet" or "dar para atrás" instead of devolver, as well as politely correct their children and close friends when they make such errors. It's not "English's fault" that such phrases and misuse of vocabulary have crept into certain parts of the Spanish-speaking world.


Thanks Kate,

The funny thing about _*carpeta *_as it used in "Spanglish" (to mean _*carpet*_) is that it's closer to the orignal meaning of what _*a carpet*_ is than "folder" (the dictionary definition) and the only Latin alternative. _*Alfombra *_is Arabic in origin and _*moqueta *_is French from Arabic.

If you are interested, I have written quite a bit about that word, jajaja. Let me know.


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## Fernando

Yes, I think that English is contaminating other languages, Spanish as an example. No problem when there is no word in Spanish, specially for new concepts. The problem is when using English for resembling "smarter" or "more sophisticated". Everybody should learn English, but I would not mix them because, as said in other threads, I do not understand "Spanglish". Talk to me in Spanish and I will understand you (unless you are a female). Talk to me (slowly) in English and well, I will get it, but a crazy mix is a nonsense.

I do not feel it is politically produced. I do not particularly hate George Bush (I am a rara avis, am not I?).


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## ireney

Show off? Hmmm some yes. Others are the usual ultra-super-uber-nationalists (who usually don't know their own language well enough but that's another issue).

Examples of what they want to change you mean? If so, well, i.e. they disagree with words such as fast-food, surfing, click (as in click with your mouse) etc

Complaints? Hmmm there's the promotaro (promote), managaro (manage) etc and of course the usual nonsense of glittery periodicals who think that saying, weekend, fashion, shopping etc adds some glamour to their inane articles.


Oh, I just remembered another impossibly stupid complain of the aforementioned retards: Our airforce pilots prefer using English terminology for too many and good reasons to enumarate here (one being that the Greek language is NOT really suitable for use in an air-battle situation).
I remember one time there was yet another bruhaha between Greeks and Turkish pilots. No offence to any Turks but _that_ time the Turks were on the wrong. The footage from one of the Greek fighters was released to the media to show that that was the case (a bit complicated to fully explain). Most of the Greeks were a) watching intently trying to figure out WHAT they were seeing or b) getting really excited if they knew what they were seeing for this is not something you see everyday.
Those clever guys were complaining about the pilot's use of English words.


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## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> Everybody should learn English, but I would not mix them because, as said in other threads, I do not understand "Spanglish". Talk to me in Spanish and I will understand you (unless you are a female). Talk to me (slowly) in English and well, I will get it, but a crazy mix is a nonsense.


That's a good argument for not speaking Spanglish to Fernando; he doesn't understand it. And I think that makes a lot of sense. I wouldn't speak to you in French either if I assumed you didn't speak French but is it good argument against Spanglish, or even French, being spoken by those who understand it?


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## Pivra

no... i dont think so...English doesnt contaminate any language... the speakers contaminated their own languages....


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## Fernando

Nobody is saying English does nothing. The speakers are who destroy their own language (and English as well).


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## Residente Calle 13

I guess the title of the thread should be something like :

* Do you think that speakers of a language you know are contaminating their language by using words from another language especially English?*

But that's kind of long for a title of a thread.

If you guys want, we can discuss that subject because that's what I am really asking. Like Fernando and others have said, I don't think English does anything and I don't think any language can be put on trial. What comes out of people's mouths depends, to a large extent, on the brain attached to the mouth.


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## KateNicole

Fernando,
The topic specifically asks, "Is English contaminating other languages?" 
I, too, felt the need to clarify a tad.


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## KateNicole

Calle,
I think the topic name is fine but maybe you could say "Are other languages becoming contaminated WITH English?"


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## Residente Calle 13

KateNicole said:
			
		

> Calle,
> I think the topic name is fine but maybe you could say "Are other languages becoming contaminated WITH English?"



Yeah. I wish I had thought of that!


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## KateNicole

I would consider the example of French restaraunts using "take out" as.........annoying (for lack of a better word) more than I would consider it contamination. 
I think a true example of contamination is when the speaker is completely _unaware_ of his/her mistake or misuse of the language. 

Example: "Quiero checar un libro de la biblioteca" = "I want to check out a book from the library" (????) My students say this every time we go to the library and are clueless . . .

However, when they say "¿Está conectado el _printer_?" I think they do realize they are using an English word . . . or at least I would hope.


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## Residente Calle 13

KateNicole said:
			
		

> I would consider the example of French restaraunts using "take out" as.........annoying (for lack of a better word) more than I would consider it contamination.
> I think a true example of contamination is when the speaker is completely _unaware_ of his/her mistake or misuse of the language.
> 
> Example: "Quiero checar un libro de la biblioteca" = "I want to check out a book from the library" (????) My students say this every time we go to the library and are clueless . . .
> 
> However, when they say "¿Está conectado el _printer_?" I think they do realize they are using an English word . . . or at least I would hope.


These are, I think, important distinctions. I saw advertisments in France that were kind of...contrived. I think it's marketing in the case of "Take out." I really don't like a lot of these borrowings but I think it has to do with the intent. 

I think we do a lot of that in the US too, by the way. I even saw a menu that had "pommes frites" in a NYC bar. Are "pommes frites" better than French fries? I guess that's just a way to sell stuff and I might as well come out and say I have a problem with alot of _marketese_.

I don't know about the knowing and not knowing part of your post, though. I think that we might agree that Spanish speakers are better off knowing _*imprimidora* *_is a word for _*printer *_in Spanish even if they choose to say _*printer*_. I'm sure glad I know both words and I happen to prefer _*imprimidora* *_but not because it's "Spanish."

I just like the way it sounds.


*_*Imprimidora*_ is a word you would not find in the dictionary and many Spanish speakers would say it's not a Spanish word.


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## Fernando

Beg your pardon. "Impresora".


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## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> Beg your pardon. "Impresora".



LOL!

Fernando, that word is not in the dictionary so many people will say it's not Spanish. But it's out there (I find it mostly on US websites). Maybe it's US Spanish? There is such a thing, you know. 

Use _*imprimidora *_at your own risk! At least it's not Spanglish!


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## Fernando

Er... off-topic: imprimidora has 194 appearances in Google against 3.1 million for impresora.

You can find "imprimidora" with the specific meaning of a printer on a surface (as in label printers). When used for PC Printers is either a bad translation from English or Spanglish.


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## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> Er... off-topic: imprimidora has 194 appearances in Google against 3.1 million for impresora.
> 
> You can find "imprimidora" with the specific meaning of a printer on a surface (as in label printers). When used for PC Printers is either a bad translation for English or Spanglish.



Fair enough, Fernando. Thanks for pointing that out. It's really helpful information.


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## KateNicole

Sometimes I think GOOGLE contaminates language. Hahahahahah.  A lot of times when we get corrected we say "But it's on Google 1,284,305 times!!"  
I'm _totally_ guilty of this.  And off-topic.


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## Residente Calle 13

KateNicole said:
			
		

> Sometimes I think GOOGLE contaminates language. Hahahahahah.  A lot of times when we get corrected we say "But it's on Google 1,284,305 times!!"
> I'm _totally_ guilty of this.  And off-topic.


It's not completely off-topic, I don't think, since Google reflects, to some extent, how people really use the language.

I think the complaints about language contamination come mostly from people who think there is too much English in the language that is  *really *used. Of course there are those who think there are too many English words in the dictionaries of their languages, but most complaints, at least the one's I have heard, have to do with what comes out of people's mouths or what they type.


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## cuchuflete

This is a wonderful collection of interwoven topics.

-Vibrant languages are eclectic. English borrows, steals, adopts and adapts shamelessly from other languages. Spanish is full of Greek and Arabic terms, and even Visogothic terms such as bigote. I think this is fine. The dinosaurs of the French Academy who fight a doomed battle to bar the gates disagree.

- Some languages, when needing a new word, go shopping in other gardens, while some invent new words, based on existing ones. Guaraní had no word for airplane. The huge Paraná river fish, the Surubí, has a silver underside, just like the appearance of a jet plane, high overhead. Hence the Guaraní term for a plane is, roughly, "The fish that flies".

-It's just sad when a language has perfectly good words, but these are supplanted by foreign imports just because that is fashionable. Spanish suffers much of this self-abuse by people who do not value the richness of their own linguistic heritage.
There is nothing wrong with a language borrowing when it needs to, but many Spanish speakers use foreign words when their own language already has one or more words that express the same idea with as much or greater precision, and often with more grace.


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## Mariaguadalupe

My native language is Spanish, however my academic native language is English.  How is that possible?  Simple, I learned how to speak, read and write in English long before I ever learned how to do so in Spanish.  Nonetheless, I learned very early on to "respect" both languages.  My mother insisted on that.  She expected us to speak both languages properly.  She did not tolerate our "mixing" English and Spanish.  As a border resident, (US and México) it is very common to listen to people talk about "traques" {tracks} luz, {traffic lights}, bloques {street blocks} and many other such "delicacies".  Definitely, Spanglish is a blooming language.  But as many of you have stated, a language is not responsible for anything.  People, users are the ones responsible to ensure proper language usage.  

I'd better stop here while I'm ahead.

Best regards,

MG


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## Mariaguadalupe

By the way,  _impresora_ is what I say when referring to a printer.


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## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> * Do you think that speakers of a language you know are contaminating their language by using words from another language especially English?
> 
> *I have heard this a lot from people who know Spanish and French but not so much from Italian speakers. Since I don't speak Portuguese, or German or any other language, I really don't know how anybody else feels but it seems that the opinion that English is a contaminant is not that common in Italy.
> 
> I don't think that it has to do with national pride too much because I have heard Americans who speak French lament that in a few years French will be English and I have heard Britons who speak Spanish wonder in despair if it's even worth learning Spanish vocabulary since it's all turning into English anyway.
> 
> I wonder if what the people who feel English is destorying a language are really saying is that they don't like Anglo-American dominance in politics or culture or something else. I wonder if we should translate "English is destroying our language" as "I hate George Bush and Tony Blair" or "I hate Cold Play and Green Day." I wonder if when they say "Why are we ruining our language" they are really saying "Why are you rapping and watching Hollywood movies?"


I see no relation whatsoever between the dislike of excessive borrowing from English and a dislike of the U.S. It's not the only country where English is spoken, for starters, and I don't believe that just because people dislike anglicisms that means that they hate English speakers (or even English).

Are people who embrace anglicisms simply in love with the U.S.?...


Here's a quote from an article which I linked to in two other threads. I think  it helps to understand the other side of this mirror:



> French language policy is motivated by this fear that many essential cultural elements can no longer take place in French. *It is not an effort to shelter French society or the French language from change. In fact, it is most often exactly the opposite.* French language policy institutions actively create and promulgate new terms and new expressions in an unending effort to keep up with cultural change.
> 
> Language, Culture and Reality


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> -It's just sad when a language has perfectly good words, but these are supplanted by foreign imports just because that is fashionable. Spanish suffers much of this self-abuse by people who do not value the richness of their own linguistic heritage.
> There is nothing wrong with a language borrowing when it needs to, but many Spanish speakers use foreign words when their own language already has one or more words that express the same idea with as much or greater precision, and often with more grace.


Hi Cuchuflete,

Can you give us an example (or two) of a case where Spanish borrows a word when it already has "one or more words that express the same idea with as much or greater precision" ?

I purposefully left out the part of about "grace." If you say you don't like a borrowing because it's awkward, in my book, you win. I got nothing to beat that.


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## cuchuflete

Hola Residente...

Te ofrezco unas citas que presentan  ejemplos--



> Típicos ejemplos serían el uso anglicado de " honesto " como en la frase "seré honesto contigo " por " sincero ", " llano" o " franco ", la confusión entre " eficaz " e " eficiente ", " optativo" y " opcional ", el soporte técnico que ofrecen las empresas de informática y el servicio de asistencia técnica de cualquier electrodoméstico,el uso de "global " por " mundial ", como en " aldea global " o sea con forma esférica tal y como Colón se empeñó en demostrarnos...





> el uso totalmente inadecuado del artículo indeterminado delante de una profesión como en " Juan es un profesor ", el abuso del posesivo por contagio del inglés ( "el policía resultó herido en una de sus piernas " ), la abundancia de pasivas innecesarias, etc..


source


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## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> I see no relation whatsoever between the dislike of excessive borrowing from English and a dislike of the U.S. It's not the only country where English is spoken, for starters, and I don't believe that just because people dislike anglicisms that means that they hate English speakers (or even English).
> Are people who embrace anglicisms simply in love with the U.S.?...



That's why I mentionned *both *Bush and Blair.

I don't suspect many languages borrow from Canadian or Australian English, my apologies if I'm wrong, but I would just like to point out that the US accounts for 67% of native English speakers and the UK for about 17%. The rest combined are about 16%.

The influence of US English on the world (the BBC and the British Empire as well) ? US English and British pop music and culture? Unless you've been living under a rock there is no need to explain.

But your question about borrowing words because one loves the US is interesting and many people would answer "*yes*." Many linguists will say that words are borrowed because they carry prestige and that many of these loans reflect and admiration for US culture or what that represents (affluence? modernity? coolness?).

There is a reason Latin borrowed so much from the Greeks and the English borrowed so much from the French. It was the Romans who conquered Greece but they admired Greek culture so much that the borrowed a great deal of words and grammar from them.


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## cuchuflete

Merece la pena meditarlo-

" Queremos, finalmente, manifestar nuestro pésame a los frecuentadores del anglicismo y otros -ísmos, no por el ridículo afán de los puristas, sino porque somos conscientes de que en la ignorancia crasa que muestran de las expresiones españolas equivalentes, están *certificando  su  propia  defunción  idiomática*  y, por  contagio, la  del  buen  hispanohablante ." "Manual de corrección. Español normativo" Ramón  Sarmiento


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Hola Residente...
> 
> Te ofrezco unas citas que presentan  ejemplos--



Thanks. None of those sound particularly English to me. But I'm not a good judge of what's a calque and what's not. But these are really good examples of calques as opposed to just borrowing words. My opinion is that these are very subtle but at the same time it's precisely because they don't jump out at me that I find the post so very useful. 

Thanks again. Very helpful post.


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## ireney

Well, when the Romans conquered Greece they were far from the refined culture we know today, so it was quite often just a case of not having the equivalent of a word.

In the case of our loans I think it's more a case of a) new ideas etc b) being much quicker to say copy/paste than andigrafi/epikolisi for example  (we have both. The Greek translation is the 'official one' the one used in books or i.e the Greek version of MS Office or IE c) inadequate knowledge of Greek (i.e. the use of "by the way")

The "coolness" factor exists but not for widely used words/phrases


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## Tropic Lightning

Heres a quote on the English language.


_The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary._
James D Nicholl


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## Residente Calle 13

Tropic Lightning said:
			
		

> Heres a quote on the English language.
> 
> 
> _The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary._
> James D Nicholl



Not only is that really funny, I think it brings up an important point. Some linguists think that to say that languages "borrow words" is not a good way to look at it since most of the time they never give them back.

Interestingly enough, they sometimes do. The French like to say "people" and the purists complain but "*people*" comes from the French "*peuple*." I've heard Puerto Ricans say "*tuna*" for "*atún*" but "*tuna*" is a word English gets from Spanish anyway.

I would call those "repossesed words" if I thought anybody would listen to me. *Give me back my word you!*


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## Mariaguadalupe

The problem with borrowing words from English is that people often _do not_ recognized they have been borrowed from English. As Chucho so aptly put it, _soporte técnico_ instead of _asistencia técnica._ 
Another problem more than borrowing words from English is mistranslation of terms, such as _gravidez_ instead of gravedad for gravity. (as the earth's gravity) 
There are many more examples.


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## Residente Calle 13

Mariaguadalupe said:
			
		

> The problem with borrowing words from English is that people often _do not_ recognized they have been borrowed from English. As Chucho so aptly put it, _soporte técnico_ instead of _asistencia técnica._
> Another problem more than borrowing words from English is mistranslation of terms, such as _gravidez_ instead of gravedad for gravity. (as the earth's gravity)
> There are many more examples.



Wow! I have never heard these!  

But I think a good solution to the problem would be a more thorough or agressive teaching of Spanish. No?  A lot of the issues that Cuchu pointed out are things I would not have picked up on but I think it's not because I know English but because I don't know enough Spanish. Thankfully, I know _*gravedad *_and _*assistencia técnica*_ so the terms you mentionned look odd to me.

I think what some might be complaining is that Spanish speakers don't know enough Spanish vocabulary to spot a calque or a borrowing when they see one.

Interesting post. Thanks!


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## Mariaguadalupe

I don't want to bash any of those popular channels with great documentaries, I do watch them regularly, but they sour my enjoyment of those programs with all of these mistranslations.  

In fact, when I recently heard _antigravidez_ again for the upteenth time, I turned to my mother and asked her if the astronauts had found _antigravidez_ (forgive me for mixing languages) was it because they had used condoms?  Needless to say, I was duly scolded for irreverance.

Ah well!


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## Mariaguadalupe

As a translator, and one who learned English first, I am very careful and double check all terms making sure I am not _inventing or borrowing_ a term.  That's what we call in language teaching as *false cognates*.  Many years ago, _humecta_ was introduced instead of _humedecer (moisturize)_.

Regretfully, as these mistranslations prevail, our spanish language suffers.


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## Residente Calle 13

Mariaguadalupe said:
			
		

> I don't want to bash any of those popular channels with great documentaries, I do watch them regularly, but they sour my enjoyment of those programs with all of these mistranslations.
> 
> In fact, when I recently heard _antigravidez_ again for the upteenth time, I turned to my mother and asked her if the astronauts had found _antigravidez_ (forgive me for mixing languages) was it because they had used condoms?  Needless to say, I was duly scolded for irreverance.
> 
> Ah well!



Are you sure it's not due to the confusion of very similar terms? I think we have a lot of that going on in English. Many, many, people say *nauseous *for what dictionaries say should be *nauseated*. We even invented *flammable *because people think that *inflammable *means something _that cannot catch on fire easily_ when the dictionary says that it's, technically, quite the opposite.

I don't know if it's due to English or not but it looks like your "*gravidez*" might be just one of those kinds of words. I say this because "*gravidez*" doesn't have anything that hints of English. I think "*gravedad*" sound more like "*gravity*", actually.


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## Mariaguadalupe

When one deals with cognates, and I am supposing this is what happens, you go with what _looks similar_ in the other language.  Look at _*gravi*dez_ and _*gravi*ty_.  And yes, there is a lot of confusion about which terms to use.  One that I recently heard is _evacuar un edificio_ instead of _desalojar un edificio_.


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## cuchuflete

A shade off topic perhaps, but I think all participants in this conversation will enjoy and learn from this:

http://72.14.203.104/search?q=cache...+del+inglés"+Clarin&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=37


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## Residente Calle 13

Mariaguadalupe said:
			
		

> When one deals with cognates, and I am supposing this is what happens, you go with what _looks similar_ in the other language.  Look at _*gravi*dez_ and _*gravi*ty_.  And yes, there is a lot of confusion about which terms to use.  One that I recently heard is _evacuar un edificio_ instead of _desalojar un edificio_.



Ah! Yes. It looks like "evacuar" could be influenced by the English "evacuate."

En Santo Domingo, unfortunately, _*desalojar *_is a very frequently used word but it means "to kick out squatters." I suppose that if some Dominican person in New York says "evacuaron las torres" it's probably because the term "desalojar" in Santo Domingo is associated with squatters. In other words, it's a borrowing for precision, at least as for as the Dominican is concerned.

I know the dictionaries say otherwise but to me "desalojar" brings up images of poor people being forcibly removed from houses they have built out of cardboard and little else on government or somebody else's land.


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## Residente Calle 13

I looked up "evacuar" out of curiosity and found this:

*evacuar**.*
 (Del lat. _evacuāre_).
* 1.* tr. Desocupar algo.
* 2.* tr. Desalojar a los habitantes de un lugar para evitarles algún daño.


So what would be wrong with saying "evacuaron el edificio" ?


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## cuchuflete

I know that many languages borrow, beg, usurp and otherwise purloin words from one another.  That doesn't trouble me.  What does concern me is the adoption of essentially foreign syntax and style.

Much of what I read and hear in recent Spanish shows the importation (with no corresponding exporter!) of Anglicisms that grate harshly on my ears.  Once upon a time, not very long ago, most adjectives in Spanish came after the nouns they modified.  An adjective in front of a noun had either a special significance, or was used for emphasis.

More and more, I am coming across adjectives placed, as if they were fresh off the boat from Philadelphia or Portsmouth, in advance of their sustantivos.  I am prepared to call that phenomenon a self-inflicted contamination, which term I would not choose to apply to imported vocabulary.

Ciencia ficción, anyone?


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> I know that many languages borrow, beg, usurp and otherwise purloin words from one another.  That doesn't trouble me.  What does concern me is the adoption of essentially foreign syntax and style.


I'm totally cool with your complaint. But I don't think that's especially rampant nor especially new.

Ralph Penny writes, in _The History of the Spanish language_, that there is little evidence that shows that the impact English  has had on Spanish is more than superficial. "...the internal and external health of  Spanish is reasonably assured for the foreseeable future" he says (321).

There are linguists who report that not only that is not happening but that it cannot really happen. Languages have a remarkable instinct for self-preservation and its speakers  adjust their speech to prevent disintegration (Aitchison 1985:144). There seem to be hidden and inbuilt constraints concerning which elements can  change in a language and a language is only able to accept elements if they are  consistent with trends the language is already undergoing (115,  119). 

Some examples of foreign calques nobody notices or complains about:
_Si Dios quiere_, _que Dios le ampare_ and _bendita sea la madre  que te parió_ are all calques of Arabic (Penny 16). 

I think there are many of these kinds of calques from languages other than English. Because I speak French I notice when the peninsulares use French grammar (like _*camisa a rayas*_) to say things in Spanish (but I think that's understandible). Because I'm not Ecuadorian I notice that they say "Dame cerrando la puerta" and I've read that it's a calque of Quechua grammar. Purists in Ecuador complain but I don't think they say Quechua is contaminating Spanish. Maybe they do. Who knows? I don't. 


*Aitchison, Jean.**. Language Change : Progress or Decay?. New York : Universe Books, 1985. *

*Penny, Ralph. A History of the Spanish Language. 2nd ed. Cambridge:  Cambridge UP, 2002. *


----------



## lazarus1907

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> So what would be wrong with saying "evacuaron el edificio" ?



Tienes toda la razón: Es absolutamente correcto usarlo en esta frase.


----------



## Brioche

One of the problems of borrowed words is that they change their meaning on the journey. So we end up with even more linguistic false friends.

The word _menu_ in English does not have the same meaning as the original French word. No French person would understand _lingerie_ the way English-speakers pronounce it.

The French have invented English words, such as _record man_ which means a person who holds a sporting world record.
The French use the word _footing_ to mean jogging, but le _foot_ is Association Football (soccer).

The Germans use the word _clever_, but it means a rather sly cleverness.
A mobile/cell phone in German is a _handy_, which looks like English, but isn't.


----------



## lazarus1907

> Much of what I read and hear in recent Spanish shows the importation (with no corresponding exporter!) of Anglicisms that grate harshly on my ears. Once upon a time, not very long ago, most adjectives in Spanish came after the nouns they modified. An adjective in front of a noun had either a special significance, or was used for emphasis.



La sintaxis es ya un delito, pero la suplantación de términos españoles por los equivalentes ingleses sin que haya necesidad también me molesta a veces: Los medios de comuniciación (y hablo particularmente en España) están cambiando incluso los nombres geográficos:

Kuwait city en vez de Capital de Kuwait.
Munich (escrito sin tilde), en la película de Steven Spilberg, lo pronuncian "Muinic" según oído.

etc


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## cuchuflete

Residente,
I have great respect for Penny, but his work was originally published some 15 or more years back, and the growing influence of English syntax, especially in marketing, is worth a closer look.


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## Residente Calle 13

Brioche said:
			
		

> One of the problems of borrowed words is that they change their meaning on the journey. So we end up with even more linguistic false friends.



Words in all language change. Why would borrowed words be any different?

Take the word "silly." My dictionary says that it used to mean "blessed' :

[Middle English seli, silli, _blessed, innocent, hapless_, from Old English gesælig, _blessed_.]

Ninety percent of English words are borrowed. It might indeed be a problem for languages to borrow words because they produce false friends but what is one to do? I think the French understand what "footing" means when they use it with each other it just confuses English speakers like me. But then again, the French don't speak French to communicate with English speakers, they do it to talk to other French speakers who know what "footing" is in their language.


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Residente,
> I have great respect for Penny, but his work was originally published some 15 or more years back, and the growing influence of English syntax, especially in marketing, is worth a closer look.



My version of Penny is from 2002. Aitchison's book is from 1985 but she shows, I believe, that what Penny says is not happening cannot possibly happen. Ever. She basically says that very similar languages can merge, that languages can disappear completely, but that one language cannot disintegrate under the influence of the other.

I think her theory is pretty sound but you are free to disagree. Actually, I would prefer it if you did. It makes for a debate!


----------



## cuchuflete

Penny first published the book you cite in 1991, meaning it was likely in the making in the 1980s.  Since then, Spanish advertising has come to adopt some very "Anglo" practices, including use of personal possesives for body parts, hitherto unknown in Spanish.

It may be impossible for one language to overthrow another...I suspect that is a true statement, but subversion and corruption are far from unknown.


----------



## Mariaguadalupe

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> I know that many languages borrow, beg, usurp and otherwise purloin words from one another. That doesn't trouble me. What does concern me is the adoption of essentially foreign syntax and style.
> 
> Much of what I read and hear in recent Spanish shows the importation (with no corresponding exporter!) of Anglicisms that grate harshly on my ears. Once upon a time, not very long ago, most adjectives in Spanish came after the nouns they modified. An adjective in front of a noun had either a special significance, or was used for emphasis.
> 
> More and more, I am coming across adjectives placed, as if they were fresh off the boat from Philadelphia or Portsmouth, in advance of their sustantivos. I am prepared to call that phenomenon a self-inflicted contamination, which term I would not choose to apply to imported vocabulary.
> 
> Ciencia ficción, anyone?


 
Adding insult to injury, our Secretaría de Educación Pública has changed from _sustantivo, verbo, complemento_ to *nucleo del sujeto* y *nucleo del predicado*.  This has changed the way people speak and write in Spanish.


----------



## cuchuflete

Mariaguadalupe said:
			
		

> Adding insult to injury, our Secretaría de Educación Pública has changed from _sustantivo, verbo, complemento_ to *nucleo del sujeto* y *nucleo del predicado*.  This has changed the way people speak and write in Spanish.


Please don't tell me what that burrrrocratic jibberish is supposed to mean...are they following el bushito into the nuke ya ler world? I'm all for talking about nucleos in cell biology, but..........


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## Residente Calle 13

lazarus1907 said:
			
		

> Tienes toda la razón: Es absolutamente correcto usarlo en esta frase.


Una de las cosas que más me molestan en este debate son los _falsos anglicísmos_. Muchas personas evitan. por ejemplo, la palabra _*tráfico *_porque se parece a _*traffic*_. Creo que es absurdo. La palabra _*tráfico *_viene del italiano y se usa desde la época del Renacimiento. ¡Nada que ver con el inglés!

El que quiera evitar ciertas palabras en su vocabulario, o a el que no le guste los anglicísmos, bueno...está bien...tiene el derecho. Para mí esa actitud no tiene nada de malo. Pero sí me molesta que se supriman palabras, o se tilden de incorreciones del hablar,  por ignorancia del idioma. Creo que eso lo que más me molesta.

Sí alguien quiere evitar el uso de extranjerismos, anglicismos, o lo que sea, está bien. Pero que opino que almenos deberíamos investiguar bien antes de tildar una palabra o una frase de «incorrecta».


----------



## lazarus1907

Mariaguadalupe said:
			
		

> Adding insult to injury, our Secretaría de Educación Pública has changed from _sustantivo, verbo, complemento to nucleo del sujeto y núcleo del predicado.  This has changed the way people speak and write in Spanish._


_

Mmmmm, como sujeto se puede entender tanto un sustantivo como un sintagma  cuyo n*ú*cleo normalmente es un sustantivo. La estructura sujeto+verbo+complemento no ha cambiado que yo sepa, pero sintácticamente tanto el sujeto como el predicado tienen sus núcleos. Yo tuve que estudiar ambas desde que estaba en la escuela primaria._


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Penny first published the book you cite in 1991, meaning it was likely in the making in the 1980s.  Since then, Spanish advertising has come to adopt some very "Anglo" practices, including use of personal possesives for body parts, hitherto unknown in Spanish.
> 
> It may be impossible for one language to overthrow another...I suspect that is a true statement, but subversion and corruption are far from unknown.



Yeah. If  you get a chance, read Aitchison. I think she does a good job at talking about how languages work without delving into the techinical jargon that plagues books about linguistics.

I think that _marketese_, in any language, is a language of it's own. That's why spoofs of commercials are so damn funny. But don't quote me one that. That's pure opinion and speculation. I don't have anything to back that up.


----------



## Brioche

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> But then again, the French don't speak French to communicate with English speakers, they do it to talk to other French speakers who know what "footing" is in their language.


 
Actually, many French people do communicate with English speakers.

They believe that the English words which they have borrowed from English are English words, and thus can be used in English. Most of the time it's true. Why would they think otherwise?


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## danielfranco

I believe that English is not so much contaminating other languages as it is infiltrating them.
Like it seems to happen with most languages, this is driven by social, political and economic reasons; but, mostly, this happens because people talk to each other...
We all have heard before (many times over) the example about how scientists used Latin to do their scientific stuff. Then, it became fashionable to say their stuff in German. Then it was French. Now it's English's turn. And soon enough it'll be some other language. Some of that stuff gets filtered down to the everyday language usage, and we all end up using erstwhile foreign terms to describe new concepts or items. For example, who would stop nowdays to meditate on the fact that "fuselage" was a French word, originally, in the Twentieth Century? In the present, you just board your plane and hope the fuselage holds together one more trip.
I believe this is a topic worthy of discussion, and it's timely and relevant, but I suspect that one or two hundred years in the future, people will still be wondering how come some language or other is messing with their own. And I believe these future languages will still be very, very similar to the ones we know today.


----------



## maxiogee

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> There is a reason Latin borrowed so much from the Greeks and the English borrowed so much from the French. It was the Romans who conquered Greece but they admired Greek culture so much that the borrowed a great deal of words and grammar from them.



I'm not a historian, but was not Italy settled by Greeks in about the 8th century BC? Surely that's where the Romans got their "greekness" from - the cross-identification of their Gods and Godesses shows their origins.


----------



## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> That's why I mentionned *both* Bush and Blair.
> 
> I don't suspect many languages borrow from Canadian or Australian English, my apologies if I'm wrong, but I would just like to point out that the US accounts for 67% of native English speakers and the UK for about 17%. The rest combined are about 16%.
> 
> The influence of US English on the world (the BBC and the British Empire as well) ? US English and British pop music and culture? Unless you've been living under a rock there is no need to explain.
> 
> But your question about borrowing words because one loves the US is interesting and many people would answer "*yes*." Many linguists will say that words are borrowed because they carry prestige and that many of these loans reflect and admiration for US culture or what that represents (affluence? modernity? coolness?).


Well, I know many people who use anglicisms without even thinking about it, and as far as I can tell they barely even remember that the U.S. and the U.K. exist, in their everyday life. When everyone else is doing it, you start doing it, too. I'm not saying people never copy a foreign language because of its perceived greater prestige, but I don't think that's the norm, either.

Still, let's assume people did copy foreign languages because of prestige -- so what? How exactly does that justify adopting anglicisms? If you ask me, classifying languages by "prestige" is shallow and immature. It's the sort of thing that most teenagers eventually grow out of.

I don't want my language to be reduced to the status of ephemerous teenager slang. 



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> There is a reason Latin borrowed so much from the Greeks and the English borrowed so much from the French. It was the Romans who conquered Greece but they admired Greek culture so much that the borrowed a great deal of words and grammar from them.


Fortunately, we don't have to be pedantic Roman intellectuals, and we weren't invaded by the Normans.


----------



## Outsider

maxiogee said:
			
		

> I'm not a historian, but was not Italy settled by Greeks in about the 8th century BC? Surely that's where the Romans got their "greekness" from - the cross-identification of their Gods and Godesses shows their origins.


Parts of southern Italy had been settled by Greeks, but later, when Rome conquered Greece, many Roman intellectuals did borrow lots of words from Greek. They went to the point of bringing new letters and digraphs into the Latin alphabet: Y, Z, and the infamous CH, PH, RH, TH which English still puts up with.


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## Outsider

Here's a very transparent example of English contaminating other languages. When I learned French, I was taught that the French word for "weekend" is... weekend! Why "weekend", and not _fin de semaine_, which is what "weekend" means in French? _Fin de semaine_ is even used in Québec, I believe. I guess using English is, like, cooler, even for dinosaurs.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> Well, I know many people who use anglicisms without even thinking about it, and as far as I can tell they barely even remember that the U.S. and the U.K. exist, in their everyday life. When everyone else is doing it, you start doing it, too. I'm not saying people never copy a foreign language because of its perceived greater prestige, but I don't think that's the norm, either.
> 
> Still, let's assume people did copy foreign languages because of prestige -- so what? How exactly does that justify adopting anglicisms? If you ask me, classifying languages by "prestige" is shallow and immature. It's the sort of thing that most teenagers eventually grow out of.
> 
> I don't want my language to be reduced to the status of ephemerous teenager slang.
> 
> Fortunately, we don't have to be pedantic Roman intellectuals, and we weren't invaded by the Normans.



Thanks for your opinion.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Brioche said:
			
		

> Actually, many French people do communicate with English speakers.
> 
> They believe that the English words which they have borrowed from English are English words, and thus can be used in English. Most of the time it's true. Why would they think otherwise?



Of course French _*speakers *_speak to English speakers. But mostly French speakers speak to French speakers in French who understand French.


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## Residente Calle 13

maxiogee said:
			
		

> I'm not a historian, but was not Italy settled by Greeks in about the 8th century BC? Surely that's where the Romans got their "greekness" from - the cross-identification of their Gods and Godesses shows their origins.




Could be. I'm no historian either.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

danielfranco said:
			
		

> I believe this is a topic worthy of discussion, and it's timely and relevant, but I suspect that one or two hundred years in the future, people will still be wondering how come some language or other is messing with their own. And I believe these future languages will still be very, very similar to the ones we know today.



Thanks Dan,

I suspect you are quite correct.


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## Residente Calle 13

*What do you guys think about this quote?*



> Once it hits the ground, a human language must and will change.  Because change can proceed in various directions, once a language is spoken by  different populations, it must and will diverge into dialects. Juxtaposed with  other languages, human languages must and will mix.
> —John McWhorter, _The Power of Babel_


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## Vanda

> Cuchu said:
> It's just sad when a language has perfectly good words, but these are supplanted by foreign imports just because that is fashionable


Terminologies apart, I think it does happen here. The problem is not borrowing, incorporating, whatever, English words, the problem for me is that most of the words being used are - let me say it in a _very personal_ way - "ours" in the sense they are most of Latin origin, words that came back home with another spelling and pronunciation, new clothes. 
Some examples: Nowadays everybody here has lunch at "Self service" restaurants, banks and other kind of services are done " on line" , I won´t even mention the computing words , well just one: delete . And there´s a big list of words like that.
IMHO, the reason people use them is most because of laziness in thinking about them as they already are in their own language. - here I mean MY people. Also, I do agree with cuchu, many people think it´s fashionable.


----------



## Outsider

> Once it hits the ground, a human language must and will change. Because change can proceed in various directions, once a language is spoken by different populations, it must and will diverge into dialects. Juxtaposed with other languages, human languages must and will mix.
> —John McWhorter, _The Power of Babel_


I don't think anyone opposes change in general. Only certain kinds of change. I'm curious, though, if Mr. McWhorter really believes that English will disintegrate into dialects, too -- because I really don't see that happening any time soon. 

It's very easy for English speaking authors to glorify change unconditionally. They don't have to endure it in the same way that others do.


----------



## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> Thanks for your opinion.


Feel free to discuss it.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> I'm curious, though, if Mr. McWhorter really believes that English will disintegrate into dialects, too -- because I really don't see that happening any time soon.


It happened hundreds and hundreds of years ago. I don't sound like someone from Virginia, Scotland, England, Jamaica, or Australia when I speak English.


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## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> Feel free _to _discuss it.


I don't think there is much to discusss there. You don't want your language reduced to teenage slang. That's your opinion and you are entitled to it.


----------



## cadylayne

as an italian speaker, i have noticed that english words are becoming quite an integral part of italian. there are many many words especially in the fields of technology etc. they even have a "ministro dello trade" in the parliament.

Other italian speakers, please feel free to disagree with me.

cadylayne


----------



## Angel Rubio

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> Hi Cuchuflete,
> 
> Can you give us an example (or two) of a case where Spanish borrows a word when it already has "one or more words that express the same idea with as much or greater precision" ?
> 
> I purposefully left out the part of about "grace." If you say you don't like a borrowing because it's awkward, in my book, you win. I got nothing to beat that.


 
Sandwich, instead of "emparedado".
In french: "weekend" instead of "fin de semaine".

To deny some languages contaminate others is to deny reality. I think language is not only use as a way of comunication but as a way to show status and this is what I feel is nonsense.


----------



## Angel Rubio

cadylayne said:
			
		

> as an italian speaker, i have noticed that english words are becoming quite an integral part of italian. there are many many words especially in the fields of technology etc. they even have a "ministro dello trade" in the parliament.
> 
> Other italian speakers, please feel free to disagree with me.
> 
> cadylayne


 
I have the feeling italian is contaminating any other languages:

pasta, pizza, capuccino, ravioli, tagliatelli, ....etc are common words in every language of this world.


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## cadylayne

a valid point, but notice they're all food items. i don't think other italian words not associated with food as used as frequently.

cadylayne


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## Residente Calle 13

cadylayne said:
			
		

> as an italian speaker, i have noticed that english words are becoming quite an integral part of italian. there are many many words especially in the fields of technology etc. they even have a "ministro dello trade" in the parliament.
> 
> Other italian speakers, please feel free to disagree with me.
> 
> cadylayne


Can I agree? 

Yes. If they pick up an Italian newspaper or watch Italian TV and English speakers will see some words they recognize and some they don't. I find it interesting that computer in French is *ordinateur*, in Spanish it's *ordinador*/*computadora *but in Italian it's *computer*. And I understand that a *pullman *is a bus of some sort in Italy. Now where did that come from?

But I don't hear many complaints from Italians that their language is being corrupted by English. It doesn't seem to provoke the legislation of France and Quebec or the uproar in the Spanish-speaking world.

I wonder if I'm just not listening closely enough.


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## cadylayne

sorry for my typo everyone, "are used as frequently"


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## Angel Rubio

prima donna, andante, andante ma non tropo, piano, pianissimo, and much more related to music and at the end. Bravo!


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## cadylayne

that's true, i'd forgotten about music. But then you'd have to say the same about french and ballet terms. pas de bourree, degage, tendu, plies, and all the other french expressions we use: lingerie, creme de la creme etc


----------



## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> I don't think there is much discusss there. You don't want your language reduced to teenage slang. That's your opinion and you are entitled to it.


Discussing my opinions with open-minded people does not bother me.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> It happened hundreds and hundreds of years ago. I don't sound like someone from Virginia, Scotland, England, Jamaica, or Australia when I speak English.


It seemed, though, that Mr. McWhorter was saying a little bit more than that. He seemed to be implying that "All languages are doomed to disintegrate into separate languages, anyway, so why bother to preserve your own?" 

Unless "your own" happens to be _his_ own, of course.


----------



## optimistique

Vanda said:
			
		

> Terminologies apart, I think it does happen here. The problem is not borrowing, incorporating, whatever, English words, the problem for me is that most of the words being used are - let me say it in a _very personal_ way - "ours" in the sense they are most of Latin origin, words that came back home with another spelling and pronunciation, new clothes.
> Some examples: Nowadays everybody here has lunch at "Self service" restaurants, banks and other kind of services are done " on line" , I won´t even mention the computing words , well just one: delete . And there´s a big list of words like that.
> * IMHO, the reason people use them is most because of laziness *in thinking about themas they already are in their own language. - here I mean MY people. Also, I do agree with cuchu, many people think it´s fashionable.



I agree with you 100%! In the Netherlands teenagers use English terms they encounter on their computer and games, which they don't bother translate, since everybody using a computer, or playing the same games, understand them. Business people and scientists use English terms they encounter and use in their own jargon. The media and commercial makers are especially fond of using English. They think it's more appealing and will make people prefer to buy or use their stuff.  It's certainly fashionable to a lot of people to use a lot of English words. Also to the government, in fact I would like the Dutch government to be a bit more like the French one, in that they honour their Native language.

I also agree with what is said a long time before already, that it is not the English speakers' fault, but the people's own fault. Still I don't like the phenomen (Although I find comfort in knowing that there are a handfull of English words that they borrowed from Dutch).

However, it is only a natural process, that has been there from the start and will be going on forever, the exchange of words between language and the infiltration of the dominant language into other.
Just think that roughly 50% of the words French is now borrowing from English had all entered the language by French to begin with. If English would be contaminating languages now, then English itself would already be rotten to the bone. But Dutch too, it has borrowed so many vocabulary from French and German, in all different kind of ages, words that aren't even recognisable as such anymore. So after French and German, now it's the turn to English to 'contaminate' us.

So, I don't like it at all personally, but I also know that it can't be evaded. 
Who knows, over a 50 years, there's another dominant language and then it's that one that's threatening us all, and the borrowings from English aren't even talked about anymore, IF they all have survived.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

cadylayne said:
			
		

> a valid point, but notice they're all food items. i don't think other italian words not associated with food as used as frequently.
> 
> cadylayne


*Balcony, cameo, casino, fresco, piano, opera, studio, *and *umbrella *are often used non-food Italian words in most English dialects.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> Discussing my opinions with open-minded people does not bother me.
> 
> It seemed, though, that Mr. McWhorter was saying a little bit more than that. He seemed to be implying that "All languages are doomed to disintegrate into separate languages, anyway, so why bother to preserve your own?"
> 
> Unless "your own" happens to be _his_ own, of course.



Again, that's your opinion of what McWhorter was implying. I'm happy to see that it doesn't bother you to discuss your opinion with open-minded people. I think that's great. But I don't think you can argue against personal taste. If someone doesn't like slang, loanwords, or thinks English is ruining their language, I don't think I have the right to tell them that they are wrong even if I disagree.


----------



## cadylayne

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> *Balcony, cameo, casino, fresco, piano, opera, studio, *and *umbrella *are often used non-food Italian words in most English dialects.



i was not aware balcony or umbrella were originally italian. 
grazie


----------



## Angel Rubio

I don´t think there is something wrong with this "contamination". Every language welcome new words in an effort to explain what is not posible to explain in his own terms.

But the growth of spanglish an other mix languages is only the result of ignorance of both, spanish and english. Or the use of a foreign language to show status. So why don´t you just speak in english?. At least someone will understand you!.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Angel Rubio said:
			
		

> But the growth of spanglish an other mix languages is only the result of ignorance of both, spanish and english. Or the use of a foreign language to show status. So why don´t you just speak in english?. At least someone will understand you!.


I can answer that! I live in New York and so does my mother. We both mix English words in our Spanish because of a lot of reasons but I can't speak English to my mother because she doesn't speak English!  She will only understand Spanish (or what she and I consider is Spanish).


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## Residente Calle 13

cadylayne said:
			
		

> i was not aware balcony or umbrella were originally italian.
> grazie



Prego. 
We get a great deal of art and architecture terms from Italian, in English, but I wouldn't say that those are very common. My impression is that Spanish has many Italian loanwords too but nobody complains about those at all.


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## love4lingua

I think either way you word it, that it is definately contaminating other languages. I didn't see it so much in Spain as i did in Germany, where people use English words frequently in order to appear cool.  What is it with the English language!!  Rar :O)


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## Residente Calle 13

love4lingua said:
			
		

> I think either way you word it, that it is definately contaminating other languages. I didn't see it so much in Spain as i did in Germany, where people use English words frequently in order to appear cool.  What is it with the English language!!  Rar :O)



Thanks, love4lingua! 

I believe they call it _*Denglish*_, in Germany. I've read about that. Unfortunately, I don't speak German .


----------



## Fernando

Spanish has not so many loan words from Italian. Most loan words were adquired in 15th and 16th centuries (Spain was the hegemonic power in Italy at the time and Italian Renaissance was at its peak) and Italian had some Spanish loans also. It comes to my mind the word "bisoño" (in Italian it means "I need", in Spanish a novel soldier, who was ever saying "I need").

In no case it is the same case. First, Italian and Spanish were at a similar level at the time. Second, the number of loans was so slow to admit a soft "españolización" of the terms. Third and most important, Italian and Spanish are very close. An Italian word in the middle of a Spanish conversations does not disturb. An English or German word blows as a bomb. In many cases the Italianism are adaptations that Italian did from a Latin word. The Spanish speakers simply copied the adaptation (they would have done it probably anyway).


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> Spanish has not so many loan words from Italian. Most loan words were adquired in 15th and 16th centuries (Spain was the hegemonic power in Italy at the time and Italian Renaissance was at its peak) and Italian had some Spanish loans also. It comes to my mind the word "bisoño" (in Italian it means "I need", in Spanish a novel soldier, who was ever saying "I need").
> 
> In no case it is the same case. First, Italian and Spanish were at a similar level at the time. Second, the number of loans was so slow to admit a soft "españolización" of the terms. Third and most important, Italian and Spanish are very close. An Italian word in the middle of a Spanish conversations does not disturb. An English or German word blows as a bomb. In many cases the Italianism are adaptations that Italian did from a Latin word. The Spanish speakers simply copied the adaptation (they would have done it probably anyway).



But Fernando, many of the words that are borrowings from English and that some purists object to are actually Latinate terms. For example, in Argentina if you have an electrical problem, *llamas al service*.* El service* is a generic term for the repair guys. It's from English but the root is _*servir *_which is Latin. 

I don't think people object to words because they are or aren't Latin. Nobody complains about *moqueta *or *alfombra *and they are both Arabic loanwords and everybody complains about _*carpeta *_for _*carpet *_and it's Latin.

In some countries, like Argentina, there are many more Italian borrowings like _*laburo *_and _*gamba *_but I will include a list of Italian loanwords that many might not even suspect are Italian.

aguantar, alerta, apartamento, arsenal, artesano, bala, balcón, banca, bancarrota, banco, banquete, bizarro, brillar, bronce, brújula, campeón, cantina, capricho , caricatura , caricia , carnaval, cartucho, cartulina, cascada, casino, charlatán, corbata, cortejar, déspota, destacar, diletante, diseñar, ducha, dúo, empresa, esbelto, esbozar, escopeta, esdrújulo, estafar, estropear, festejar, folleto, formato, foso, fracasar, grotesco, grupo, intrigar, libreto, medalla, mercancía, millón, miniatura, modelo, muralla, palco, payaso, pedante, piloto, poema, póliza, porcelana, raqueta, regalar, rotonda, serenata, soda, tacaño, tarot, traficar, and trampolín.

The fact that they look and sound like Spanish hides the numbers of Italian words in Spanish.

I don't think the rate of words being borrowed at one time makes that much of a difference. Around 1500, Spanish was *flooded *with words from American languages. I don't know if people complained then, I doubt, but what can be almost certainly declared is that it was *cool *to say American words among Spanish speakers of the time. 

The Italian words came mostly in the Renaissance and there was also a big *flood *of words.


----------



## Angel Rubio

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> I can answer that! I live in New York and so does my mother. We both mix English words in our Spanish because of a lot of reasons but I can't speak English to my mother because she doesn't speak English!  She will only understand Spanish (or what she and I consider is Spanish).


 
I live in Brussel exactly in de border between the dutch speaking and the french speaking area. If I go out of my house and turn right I must speak french if I go left I must speak dutch (no joking if one day there is a civil war here because of the language they will dig trenches in my garden). I´m spanish and have working knowledge of english and some italian friends. That means my child is in contact with 3 to 5 different languages every day. She speaks dutch to her mother, spanish to me, shouts to the television in english, greets people saying "bonjour" and finds funny the word italians use for her bellybottom "ombelico". And when she can not find the proper word in a language, she borrows a word from another. I do the same. So I don´t think there is many people that can understand "spanglish" or any other mixed language the way I do.

But I still see our situation as "provisional". I speak better english, dutch, french, spanish and italian, growing at diferent rates, every day and I hope in the future, no mix language will be needed. At least It won´t happen because we procrastinate in our effort to improve.

Please, don´t take this personally. Even if this message answers to your quote is not specifically adress to you.

Hugs


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Angel Rubio said:
			
		

> But I still see our situation as "provisional". I speak better english, dutch, french, spanish and italian, growing at diferent rates, every day and I hope in the future, no mix language will be needed. At least It won´t happen because we procrastinate in our effort to improve.
> 
> Please, don´t take this personally. Even if this message answers to your quote is not specifically adress to you.
> 
> Hugs


Yeah. For us, the situation is permanent. My mother is still attached to her native Santo Domingo and wants to die there but she lives here. Here, is NYC, and here is where most of my family lives. We almost all speak Spanish but we all mix English words in Spanish and in my family that is going to stop only when my family stops speaking Spanish and there is no Spanish left to mix English with.

Some of my nephews mix Spanish with English. Some don't. They don't because they don't speak Spanish and I don't think they ever will.

And the mixing is done by people who can't manage to go to the bank here without an intepreter. Even some of my monolingual aunts, who actually have university degrees in Spanish literature from Santo Domingo, will say something like :

«*Because* yo te dije que se me perdió el celular *so *tú sabías que no te iba a *llamar pa' tras anyway*.»


I don't think they would write that, but they say it. Mostly, because everybody they speak to understands that. If not, I doubt they would say it. 

I know that sentence sounds horrible to many people but that's the way it is. To be honest, some of the things Spaniards say when they mix French words and grammar with Spanish sound goofy to me. The difference is that grammar authorities say those mixings are okay and that fewer people seem to notice.

Abrazos.


----------



## cuchuflete

There is another aspect of linguistic mixing that 
Residente's last post suggested, almost.  Others have
touched on it as well.

When a language, let's call it a 'target' language, adopts
words, phrases, sayings, from a 'source' language, at first
it is, as Fernando accurately said of English terms in Spanish,
chocante~like a bomb~obvious and disconcerting.

But then what happens over time? In Spanish, many such foreign borrowings are castellañizado, and in English they are anglicized. After a few decades, or a century, the foreign origin becomes hard to detect.

The 'invaded' language gradually absorbs the invader, and makes it part of its own organism. Similarities remain, but the invader is co-opted. Here's a simple example. Chapeau
from French somehow (I don't know the history) became common in Portuguese. Perhaps in earlier times it sounded nearly alike in both languages, and the spelling may have been more similar than today. For quite a while, it has been a common Portuguese word, chapéu, which looks similar, and is pronounced so differently from the original that the French origin is not obvious. 

I'm sure each of us can cite thousands of similar examples of words which were once quite foreign-sounding, and which have been polished into forms which sound more native.


----------



## Fernando

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> many of the words that are borrowings from English and that some purists object to are acutally Latinate terms.



They have been barbarized beyond remedy. Service (actually, servis) is not Spanish by any rate.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> aguantar, alerta, apartamento, arsenal, artesano SÍ, bala, balcón,
> banca (?), bancarrota SÍ, banco ALEMÁN, banquete, bizarro, brillar, bronce
> brújula, campeón SÍ , cantina , capricho , caricatura , caricia , carnaval, cartucho , cartulina , cascada , casino , charlatán , chulo? , coliseo LATÍN, corbata , cortejar Sí, déspota , destacar , diletante SÍ, diseñar , ducha , dúo, empresa , esbelto , esbozar, escopeta, esdrújulo, estafar , estropear, festejar, folleto, formato , foso, fracasar, grotesco , grupo, intrigar, libreto, medalla, mercancía, millón FRANCÉS / ITALIANO, miniatura, modelo, muralla, palco, payaso, pedante, piloto, poema, póliza, porcelana, raqueta , regalar, rotonda , serenata, soda, tacaño, tarot, traficar, and trampolín.
> The fact that they look and sound like Spanish hides the numbers of Italian words in Spanish.



None of them are Italian. All of them have been ADAPTED from Italian. No word (except "gas", maybe) is a complete invention. Possibly many Italians would think these words are not Italian, because, as you have said, THEY DO NOT SOUND AS ITALIAN ANY MORE, or, if Italians, they sound so close that it means no difference.

The same (to a minor degree) can be said about French loans.

Edit: Cuchuflete post say it better.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> I don't think the rate of words being borrowed at one time makes that much of a difference. Around 1500 Spanish was *flooded *with words from American languages. I don't know if people complained then, I doubt, but what can be almost certainly declared is that it was *cool *to say American words among Spanish speakers of the time.
> 
> The Italian words came mostly in the Renaissance and there was also a big *flood *of words.



I do not know your definition of "flooded" but, definitely, there were no "flood" of American Native languages. And for sure there were no "charm" in saying American words. 

About Italian, I have said before when and how these words were lent. And yes, people complained them. They considered it as poets' idiotic inventions (even when they were from a very close language).


----------



## emma1968

It's a matter of fact that also Italian language is influenced by English one. Someone said that Spanish speakers use the word "mouse" instead their word "ratòn". We don't even have a proper word to identify it, we simply call it "mouse" . But not for this I'm scared by English influence.
I think that with all these modern ways for communicating it's normal that the most spoken language influences the others, but can't happen to the point of overpowering them or of delating them.

That's my personal italian point of view.
Emma.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> They have been barbarized beyond remedy. Service (actually, servis) is not Spanish by any rate.
> 
> None of them are Italian. All of them have been ADAPTED from Italian. No word (except "gas", maybe) is a complete invention. Possibly many Italians would think these words are not Italian, because, as you have said, THEY DO NOT SOUND AS ITALIAN ANY MORE, or, if Italians, they sound so close that it means no difference.



By that definition, then I say that carpeta, troca, and bildín are not English but US Spanish.



			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> And for sure there were no "charm" in saying American words.




I beg to differ.In Spain, the lexical borrowings from American languages were prestige, a badge  of honor and saying as many exotic American words as posible was a sign that you  had been to the Americas during the time this wave of American words were  borrowed. 

The French say *pomme de terre* for potato, and the Italians say *pommo d'oro* for tomato. So much for "necessary borrowings because it's something we don't have." Why *puma*? Why not just *león*? Why *jaguar*? Why not just *pantera*? The word *canoa *was adopted in 1492. There are plenty of adequate Spanish equivalents. The Conquistadores were showing off. I'm not making this up. I read this in several places. When I find a source, I'll post it.


----------



## drei_lengua

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> * Do you think that speakers of a language you know are contaminating their language by using words from another language especially English?*
> 
> I have heard this a lot from people who know Spanish and French but not so much from Italian speakers. Since I don't speak Portuguese, or German or any other language, I really don't know how anybody else feels but it seems that the opinion that English is a contaminant is not that common in Italy.
> 
> I don't think that it has to do with national pride too much because I have heard Americans who speak French lament that in a few years French will be English and I have heard Britons who speak Spanish wonder in despair if it's even worth learning Spanish vocabulary since it's all turning into English anyway.
> 
> I wonder if what the people who feel English is destorying a language are really saying is that they don't like Anglo-American dominance in politics or culture or something else. I wonder if we should translate "English is destroying our language" as "I hate George Bush and Tony Blair" or "I hate Cold Play and Green Day." I wonder if when they say "Why are we ruining our language" they are really saying "Why are you rapping and watching Hollywood movies?"
> 
> What do you guys think? Is borrowing words and grammar from English messing with your language? Do you think that it's just paranoia and over-reacting? Is it just chauvanistic show-boating? Or is the fear based on something else?
> 
> 
> *P.S. If you just speak English, feel free to share how alarmed you are this is happening, how ridiculous the fear is, or something in between.*


Yes, I would say that English is contaminating other languages. For example, "mezclado" is mixed. One day I saw "mixto". Oh my, have I wasted all of my time and effort learning Spanish? Another example is "Details" instead of "Einzelheiten". I was reading a German article and saw this word "Details". I was thinking, "Couldn't they have written 'gehen auf die Einzelheiten'?".

Frankly, I am glad you started this thread. It really makes me angry when I and others have spent a great deal of effort learning Spanish, German (in my case), and other languages only to see so many English words where there is a simple and suitable equivalent in the native language. Of course, we have words in English from German like "Wanderlust" and "Schadenfreude" and from French like "déjà vu". However, these words have no English counterpart because they represent concepts.

p.s. contaminate is an understatement

Drei


----------



## cuchuflete

Here is a common example of an early American import to Spanish: patata.  It remains as papa....closer to the original, in the Islas Baleares.   Even the Santa RAE describes it as "cruce de papa y batata), and then does a circle jerk and defines batata as patata!  

In the days of Góngora and Quevedo, almost all 'elegant' writing was overloaded with Italianate words, most of which have either disappeared, or morphed into forms so thoroughly castellañizado that their roots are no longer obvious.


----------



## diegodbs

I have a small dictionary (4000 entries) with words found in Spanish texts in Spain, dating back to the 18th century until 1988 when the dictionary was published. And all of them keeping their original spelling.

châssis, Delikatessen, fado, factotum, pick up, offside, dybbuk, curaçao, optimum, Oprichnina, glasnost, ora et labora, etc etc.


----------



## Fernando

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> By that definition, then I say that carpeta, troca, and bildín are not English but US Spanish..



For sure, they are not English, since any English speaker would understand them. The problem is that only a few Spanish speakers could understand them neither (let alone, use them). And I would doubt that every "US Spanish" speakers could.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> I beg to differ.In Spain, the lexical borrowings from American languages were prestige, a badge  of honor and saying as many exotic American words as posible was a sign that you  had been to the Americas during the time this wave of American words were  borrowed.



At most, they were not pretending for using cultivated words, but for travelling very much.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> Why *puma*? Why not just *león*? Why *jaguar*? Why not just *pantera*?



Because a león is not a puma and a jaguar is not a pantera? 



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> The word *canoa *was adopted in 1492. There are plenty of adequate Spanish equivalents.



Please, examples? ¿Barca? A canoa is not a barca.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> For sure, they are not English, since any English speaker would understand them. The problem is that only a few Spanish speakers could understand them neither (let alone, use them). And I would doubt that every "US Spanish" speakers could.



There are tons of words in Spanish that US Spanish speakers don't understand. There are many words from Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Costa Rica, even other parts of Spain that some Madrileños don't understand. Does that mean that they are not Spanish. Do you know what a pariguayo is? It's in the the DRAE. But you probably don't know what it means because it's regional Spanish. I posit that "troca" is just that. Regional Spanish.



			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> Because a león is not a puma and a jaguar is not a pantera?



Tell that to the Venezuelans who are happy to use *léon *even though they actually have *pumas*. In the US, mountain lion does just fine.




			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> Please, examples? ¿Barca? A canoa is not a barca.



No it's not. And *una carpeta* is not *una alformbra*, and *un mouse* is not *un ratón*, and *un building* is not *un edificio*, and *un rufo* is not *un techo*, and *un lonche* is not *una comida* and *un coat* is not *un abrigo* etc. etc. etc.

I could justify using any of those Spanglish terms based on the fact that they don't quite mean what the Spanish terms mean to the people who use them. *Abrigo *might mean *coat *to you but it doesn't to them and they are the Spanglishers. Since when do people talk so that it makes sense in other countries unless they are talking to somebody from another country?

It seems to me that when the word is accepted then there are no _supposéd_ equivalents but when it's not then there are plenty of equivalents.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

emma1968 said:
			
		

> That's my personal italian point of view.
> Emma.



Hi Emmma,

Do you think most Italians are of the same opinion?

And thanks for you personal Italian point of view!


----------



## Fernando

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> There are tons of words in Spanish that US Spanish speakers don't understand. There are many words from Argentina, Chile, Bolivia, Costa Rica, even other parts of Spain that some Madrileños don't understand. Does that mean that they are not Spanish. Do you know what a pariguayo is? It's in the the DRAE. But you probably don't know what it means because it's regional Spanish. I posit that "troca" is just that. Regional Spanish..



That is a point. Anyhow, when I talk to my friends and we see a group of beautiful women, I use to say they are "un grupo muy simpático". All of my friends know exactly what I am talking about, but I do not pretend to call it "regional Spanish". That (at most) is PRIVATE Spanish. Unless there is a consistent use (that is only achieved, most times) for written use, I can not admit that is regional Spanish (or English, it makes the same).



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> Tell that to the Venezuelans who are happy to use *léon *even though they actually have *pumas*. In the US, mountain lion does just fine.



Given they do not have leones, they "rise" the puma Standard. As you can see, Anglos preferred to adopt the English term (if a poor one) than adapting the Indian term.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> No it's not. And *una carpeta* is not *una alformbra*, and *un mouse* is not *un ratón*, and *un building* is not *un edificio*, and *un rufo* is not *un techo*, and *un lonche* is not *una comida* and *un coat* is not *un abrigo* etc. etc. etc.



Possibly you are right. I am completely unaware of the nuances between building and edificio but I guess can exist. When adapting "leasing" to Spain Spanish we give them only one meaning: "financial leasing" (as a matter of fact, a kinf of fin. Leasing different from the American one). But I seeriously doubt that two US Spanglish speakers could agree in such nuances.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> It seems to me that when the word is accepted then there are no _supposéd_ equivalents but when it's not then there are plenty of equivalents.



Sometimes, the acceptance or not of a word is a question of fashion. That is no good, but it is just History, which breeds the languages. My point (again) is the acritical introduction of English (or Nigerian) words in one's language only contribute to split and destroy the language, rather than to its proper evolution.

You seem to imply that we "discriminate" English imports in favour of French imports (specially in Spain). You must know that RAE was created to "defend" Spanish from French (as English was hardly an enemy at the time).


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> That is a point. Anyhow, when I talk to my friends and we see a group of beautiful women, I use to say they are "un grupo muy simpático". All of my friends know exactly what I am talking about, but I do not pretend to call it "regional Spanish". That (at most) is PRIVATE Spanish. Unless there is a consistent use (that is only achieved, most times) for written use, I can not admit that is regional Spanish (or English, it makes the same).


_*Troca *_is said and understood by more than just a group of friends. There are about 30 million of us who speak Spanish as a native language in the US and many of us don't say *troca *but many of us do. It's not a joke amongst friends.



			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> As you can see, Anglos preferred to adopt the English term (if a poor one) than adapting the Indian term.


Well, what *you *call the English term. (Some English speakers do say *puma*.) If you applied the rule here that you applied it to the "Italian" words in Spanish then the choice between *mountain lion* and *puma* is the choice between two English words who happen to be be of either *Latinate *or *Guaraní *descent. Only about ten percent of words in English can be traced to anglosaxon. In that sense, *lion *is no more "English" than *puma. *Unless you think it is because it's been in English longer.




			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> Possibly you are right. I am completely unaware of the nuances between building and edificio but I guess can exist. When adapting "leasing" to Spain Spanish we give them only one meaning: "financial leasing" (as a matter of fact, a kinf of fin. Leasing different from the American one). But I seeriously doubt that two US Spanglish speakers could agree in such nuances.


They have to! Otherwise people would not be able to use that form of speech. Why would anybody speak in such away that nobody understands?
When I tell my sister "me compré un coat y te compré un abrigo" she knows the coat is for me and the sweater for her. We are both NYC Spanglish speakers. Trust me, I grew up speaking Spanglish. We understand each other just as badly as other people who speak Spanish.



			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> Sometimes, the acceptance or not of a word is a question of fashion. That is no good, but it is just History, which breeds the languages. My point (again) is the acritical introduction of English (or Nigerian) words in one's language only contribute to split and destroy the language, rather than to its proper evolution.


The linguist I have read say that it has never ever happened in the History of the world. Never, never, ever. Can you show me an example of a language that has borrowed itself out of existence?




			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> You seem to imply that we "discriminate" English imports in favour of French imports (specially in Spain). You must know that RAE was created to "defend" Spanish from French (as English was hardly an enemy at the time).


I don't see what the RAE has to do with anything. People don't like Spanglish who don't even know what the RAE is. 

But I think that people in Spain don't realize that when they say "camisa* a* rayas" instead of "camisa *de* rayas" that they are copying a French way of saying that. They can't complain or discriminate against French because they have been saying Spanish phrases with French grammar for so long they don't realize it looks weird to anybody else.

There were many complaints about French when Spain and France had issues. Some complaints I have seen as recent as the 196Os. But today, nobody says "recular" is not as good as "retroceder." People don't know that it's a French calque.

Why "marcha atrás" (marche arriérre) ? We say riversa! Why? Because you're right next to France. It's normal. Guess what? We're right next to the US. It's regional.


----------



## germinal

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> That's why I mentionned *both *Bush and Blair.
> 
> I don't suspect many languages borrow from Canadian or Australian English, my apologies if I'm wrong, but I would just like to point out that the US accounts for 67% of native English speakers and the UK for about 17%. The rest combined are about 16%.
> 
> There is a reason Latin borrowed so much from the Greeks and the English borrowed so much from the French. It was the Romans who conquered Greece but they admired Greek culture so much that the borrowed a great deal of words and grammar from them.


 
British English borrows many words and phrases from Australian/Canadian/American English.    Why not?


----------



## Residente Calle 13

germinal said:
			
		

> British English borrows many words and phrases from Australian/Canadian/American English.    Why not?



Sorry!

I put a disclaimer in there, so...

I apologize once again!


----------



## KittyCatty

> bellybottom


 sorry I couldn't let this go uncorrected - it's bellybutton!
I think it is a shame that english is such a global language, because it is completely unnecessary to be so dominant. And anglophones have such a high level of complacence, many don't feel it is necessary to even think about learning another language. The main problem is we don't hear other languages enough. Foreign films are rarely shown in england, and if they are it's only in 2 cinemas in the country, in London. And I never hear foreign music on British radio. Yet I know many other countries oblige their school students to learn english, they hear english/US music on the radio and they see english/US films. The problem is the dominance of Hollywood film, and Microsoft which has turned the technology world english-speaking. I wish there was more cultural variation in England, but it is deemed unnecessary because of the globalisation of english, which I personally find a terrible shame.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

KittyCatty said:
			
		

> sorry I couldn't let this go uncorrected - it's bellybutton!
> I think it is a shame that english is such a global language, because it is completely unnecessary to be so dominant. And anglophones have such a high level of complacence, many don't feel it is necessary to even think about learning another language. The main problem is we don't hear other languages enough. Foreign films are rarely shown in england, and if they are it's only in 2 cinemas in the country, in London. And I never hear foreign music on British radio. Yet I know many other countries oblige their school students to learn english, they hear english/US music on the radio and they see english/US films. The problem is the dominance of Hollywood film, and Microsoft which has turned the technology world english-speaking. I wish there was more cultural variation in England, but it is deemed unnecessary because of the globalisation of english, which I personally find a terrible shame.



I'm sorry to report that it is my impression that in most of the US it's much worse. There is a strong Hispanic influence but the cross-over is new and not necessarily complete (at least not in most of America IMHO). Take solace in knowing that you don't have to travel terribly far to hear many different languages in the UK. You can even decide to make your way down to London which gave me the impression of being the more diverse than even NY.


----------



## Outsider

KittyCatty said:
			
		

> I think it is a shame that english is such a global language, because it is completely unnecessary to be so dominant. And anglophones have such a high level of complacence, many don't feel it is necessary to even think about learning another language. The main problem is we don't hear other languages enough. Foreign films are rarely shown in england, and if they are it's only in 2 cinemas in the country, in London. And I never hear foreign music on British radio. Yet I know many other countries oblige their school students to learn english, they hear english/US music on the radio and they see english/US films. The problem is the dominance of Hollywood film, and Microsoft which has turned the technology world english-speaking. I wish there was more cultural variation in England, but it is deemed unnecessary because of the globalisation of english, which I personally find a terrible shame.


I have to say that I disagree with that. I have no problem with English being the global language that it is. It's just a new state of affairs we'll have to adapt to, and it even brings many advantages. The predominance of English may at times overwhelm us, but it also pushes us forward, and opens up new worlds of information to us.

I don't think the invasion of other languages by sometimes excessive English vocabulary should be blamed on English speakers. It's us native speakers who should tend to our languages -- absolutely.

I wouldn't say that children are obliged to learn English in school, either. Not any more than they are obliged to learn math, or history. They are _offered that opportunity_. And most of them don't complain about English, I can tell you. (Now math is a different story...  )


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said that most Latinate terms that have been borrowed into Spanglish from English have been bastardized beyond recognition. I haven't done a study so I can't tell. I also don't know what he means by "bastardize". Words meanings change. I don't see how some change and others get bastardized and by what critieria that's decided. 

But I would like to share with you the story of kerp. It's an Indoeuropean root that is behind the term carpet and carpeta. The way that it's used in Spanglish is quite loyal to the Indoeuropean. I would say that the use of carpeta for "folder" is a bastardization if I actually thought and wrote like that.

---

The use of _carpeta_ for 'carpet' in Spanglish is decried because it already means  'folder'; another case of prescriptive grammarians telling people that they are  not saying what they're saying.


_Carpeta_ means more than just 'folder' in Spanish; it means  different types of coverings. Moreover, the Spanglish _carpeta_ is a calque  from English but according to the DRAE, the Spanish _carpeta_ came from  French which had borrowed the word from English too and most of the definitions  for _carpeta_ in the DRAE range from 'folder' to various 'coverings' for  furniture, doors, walls, and windows; carpets as coverings for floors did not  become common until the 18th century.


Since a _carpeta_ is 'a covering.' The meanings between a  covering for papers, a couch, a table, or a door and something that later was  used to cover a wood or concrete floor are not that different; the Spanglish  _carpeta_ is very much in the vein of what any of the definitions of the  Standard Spanish word means.  


A search for 'carpet' in an English language dictionary will  reveal that the word that Spanish borrowed from the French was one that the  English had borrowed originally from the French and that French had gotten the  word from across the Alps; Medieval Latin borrowed it from Old Italian, which  had borrowed it from Latin.  


The Indoeuropean root is _kerp_ (or the variant _karp_)  and according the American Heritage Dictionay, it means 'to gather', 'to  harverst', or to 'to pluck'. So ironically, because of the way carpets are made,  by 'plucking' the fibers, the Spanglish _carpeta_ for 'carpet' is closer to  the original meaning of the term than the description as a 'folder' that you  will find in the DRAE.  


But original meaning is not what drives speakers to use words.  There are reasons why Spanish speakers borrowed 'carpet' from French, why the  French borrowed it back from the English and originally borrowed it from Italy.  


One of the ways in which words get borrowed is through trade.  People often trade for products they lack (it's one of the advantages of the  practice in the first place) and perhaps the Spanish speakers who first borrowed  'carpette' had no carpets in their language, just as many Cubans who came to the  United States did not have carpets in Cuba, so they borrowed the foreign word.  


Oddly enough, the "proper" alternative to the Spanglish  _carpeta_, many say, is _alfombra_ which is another borrowed word.  However, in Spain, the Arabic _alfombra_ is losing out to the French  _moqueta_ which was probably, in French 'un tapis de mosquée.' That would mean that both _moqueta_ and _alfombra_ are ultimately  Arabic loanwords and that, ironically, the 'incorrect' Spanglish _carpeta_  is not only more faithfull to the original meaning of the Latin verb *carpere*, it's the most Latin of the three.


But _carpeta_ in Miami is just another case of that word  being borrowed, once again, into the lexicon of Spanish speakers. Those same  speaker say _factoría_ becuase of the English _factory_ (which is also  a Latinate term) and the fact that it is a "correct" Spanish word that you can  find in the DRAE's dictionary (a fact ignored by many anti-Spanglishers) it's a  mere coincidence.  


Other words are also often borrowed more than once in Spanish.  _Carpeta_ is not the first and won't be the last. On the online DRAE, you  will find _facha_ from Italian even though there was already a word for  'appearance' in Spanish and a _facha_ in Spanish which meant 'axe' (it has  since, like many initial *f* words turned into an initial *h* word  like _hijo_).  


And Spanish did not stop there; _facha_ was adopted once  again, in the 20th century, to mean 'fascist.' However, _facha_ is not  condemned by the language purists; it's a legitimate word.  


Another Italian term, _gamba_, was borrowed into two dialects  of Spanish in different ways. In Buenos Aires, _una gamba_ is 'a human leg'  like it is in Italian and generally not 'shrimp' as it is in Spain although it  comes from the same word. The Italian word is derived ultimately from the Greek  for 'curvature.' There is no difference between the Argentinian _gamba_, or  the Iberian one, and the Miami _carpeta_.


_Carpeta_ does mean 'folder' to Miaminos in addition to  'carpet' just as many Argentinians know that _una gamba_ can be seafood in  addition to their use as 'leg' and that _una carpeta_ can cover either your  graduate school thesis or hardwood floor.  


And even if _carpeta_ did not make sense as 'carpet' at all  _aguacate_ was 'testicle' in Nahuatl and _cuate_ was 'twin' and the  DRAE does not reject these terms because they mean different things now in  Spanish. It even admits _vianda_ from the French word for 'meat' with the  meaning it has in the Antilles and Costa Rica where it's the part of the typical  meal that's *not* meat.  


But not even the Twin Towers, with all of the emotional baggage  those words carry around the world, are immune from this kind of scrutiny.  _Las torres gemelas_ should be called _las torres mellizas_, wrote  Ovidio Cordero Rodríguez, because _gemelo_ implies 'identical twins' ("Las torres  mellizas"). Words change from the more narrow to the more broad and vice  versa. _Mellizo_ is just a short semantic step away from _gemelo_.


----------



## Fernando

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> They have to! Otherwise people would not be able to use that form of speech. Why would anybody speak in such away that nobody understands?.



I know plenty of groups in Madrid that hardly understand each other. None of them pretend to speak Spanish, but their own private register of Spanish.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> The linguist I have read say that it has never ever happened in the History of the world. Never, never, ever. Can you show me an example of a language that has borrowed itself out of existence?



Osco, bretón, ibero, celta, toscano,... All of them in one moment or another "decided" that the language of culture was Latin or French or Italian and simply died, after lending a few words to the language which absorbed them. The dissapearance of a language (Spanish, eventually) is not a big deal to me, assuming it (its speakers) has nothing to give to the world (science, religion, philosophy...) but I think it is not (at the moment) the Spanish case. 

And, again, I do not think that Spanglish has a mimimum of standarization to classify it as a Spanish dialect or regional Spanish. Do you know what does "leasing", "renting" or footing" means in Spain? 



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> But I think that people in Spain don't realize that when they say "camisa* a* rayas" instead of "camisa *de* rayas" that they are copying a French way of saying that.



I can agree with that.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> I know plenty of groups in Madrid that hardly understand each other. None of them pretend to speak Spanish, but their own private register of Spanish.


Are they comprised by millions of people? Millions of people speak and understand Spanglish. It's on government forms, books, poetry, movies, songs, tv, and just about everywhere you find Latinos in the US. It's not *private*. It's very public!




			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> Osco, bretón, ibero, celta, toscano,... All of them in one moment or another "decided" that the language of culture was Latin or French or Italian and simply died, after lending a few words to the language which absorbed them.


Those languages did not borrow their way out of existence. People who spoke Osco opted for another language. My nephews who don't speak Spanish did not decide to borrow so many English words that their Spanish was gone. They just never learned Spanish. That's how languages die. It's not through borrowing, it's through not learning the langauge of your parents. Or, sadly, being exterminated.



			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> And, again, I do not think that Spanglish has a mimimum of standarization to classify it as a Spanish dialect or regional Spanish. Do you know what does "leasing", "renting" or footing" means in Spain?


No but I don't have to because I don't live in Spain. And you don't have to know what un *jolopeo *is because you don't live in New York. But you don't need to know what *quilombo*, *chuchaqui*, *pololo*, *catire*, or *cuache *means either. 

I don't care what you classify it as or if it meets any requirements. It's how we talk here and people understand when I tell them: "¿Trajiste lonche de tu casa?" Yeah. It's not a private thing amongst friends. Just about anybody who speaks Spanish in NY understands that. I can talk to a complete stranger about *lonche* here where I live.


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## Juri

I couldn't say English is "contaminating", it seems to me quite normal that modern languages "accept"modern terms from English, instead of forming them(illo tempore) from greek and latin.In Italian there are no problems about , it's accepting a lot of them. I noted for instance that in the only letter "S" of dictionary, there are 84 common english words, as: slogan,slip,smog,speaker,stick,step,short, shaker,shrapnel,swing, surplus,
shampon,self-control. At the letter "T" there are 39, like:trance,
trust,trolley,trench,tender,ticket,tight,toast,traveller checks,touring club,thrilling,turf.
 It's a bit different for weak, treatened languages as Slovenian, where are also used words as: štart,stevard,skuter,šampòn,tòust,trend, tràmvaj,vìkend; but they use the more possible own words. I had so discussion this morning with the lector, because i used in a translation the term"under 17"!In italian quite normal.


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## Residente Calle 13

Juri said:
			
		

> In Italian there are no problems about , it's accepting a lot of them.



Yes. That's what I understand so far. I haven't heard one Italian say that there are too many English words in Italian.


----------



## cuchuflete

Residente,
I'm curious about this...



> But you don't need to know what *quilombo*, *...*means either.


Are you referring to the prostíbulo or the barullo usage, both of which are pretty common in the Cono Sur countries?  Or, is there a Spanglish definition also?


----------



## Fernando

No, the point of Residente (I disagree) is that Spanglish (or US Spanglish?) are legitimate regional words (such as quilombo or pololo in Argentina). 

My point is that is (mostly, not all nor always) rotten Spanish and it is just the previous phase to complete dissapearance of the use of Spanish (or English) or at most, a local use.


----------



## cuchuflete

Residente has proposed, based on readings in linguistics, that
a language cannot 'borrow its way out of existence'.
History supports that supposition or proposition.

However, I think things may change as historical circumstances arise which have not been known before.

Here is a case in point: Spanglish

It began as an agglomeration of Lat. Amer. forms of Spanish, 
(Yes, I said 'forms', specifically to avoid digressions into yet another fruitless discussion of what is a dialect, what is a language, etc.!)  It incorporated English words, which is perfectly logical, given that it is spoken by people living in places that mostly use American English.

I have done no scientific or other research, but it seems to me that over the past thirty or forty years, the % of English in Spanglish has increased, quite a lot.  That leads me to speculate that over the next few decades, one of the following will happen:   

1- Spanglish will morph from a regional form of SP into a regional form of English, with lots of SP words and grammatical forms... or
2- It will just die out, as most of those who speak it die out, and their children will be adept enough in EN to only use Spanglish to talk with their aging parents and grandparents.
Some words will survive, as has been the case for all major immigrant groups in the US. ...or
3-Continued large-scale immigration of native SP speakers to the US will give an ever-evolving Spanglish continued life....and as it continues to borrow more EN words, it will grow farther away from SP, and form an entirely new hybrid language.

#3 has historical precedents: vulgar latin languages.


----------



## Outsider

An even better precedent is creole languages...


----------



## Residente Calle 13

Fernando said:
			
		

> No, the point of Residente (I disagree) is that Spanglish (or US Spanglish?) are legitimate regional words (such as quilombo or pololo in Argentina).



Fernando, I understand and appreciate your assessment. (Pololo is from Chile, btw) But the point of communication is not to sound pleasing to people who are very far away and when I Spanglish with Latinos in the NY I'm communicating many things that have nothing with what I am saying. It's cultural. I don't care if it sounds like crap in Mexico City or Buenos Aires. I don't live there.

It doesn't matter to people in New York if people in other cities think it's legitimate. Most New Yorkers don't even care what other New Yorkers think.

I think _*zumo *_(Arabic) for _*jugo *_(Latin)is an unecessary borrowing. I can never really understand when Spaniards say "flipear" or "halucinar". Will you stop saying these things? No. Why? Because who cares what Residente Calle 13 who lives in New York thinks? And I think that's fine. People in Madrid should not stop saying things because people in New York think they are awkward.




			
				Fernando said:
			
		

> My point is that is (mostly, not all nor always) rotten Spanish and it is just the previous phase to complete dissapearance of the use of Spanish (or English) or at most, a local use.



Okay. You think Spanglish is rotten and it means Spanish might be dying in the US? I can tell you that the opposite is happening. Never has Spanish been so strong in the USA. English isn't doing that bad either. Actually not only are English and Spanish doing well in the US, they are doing great in the entire planet!

I don't see Spanish rotting anytime soon and neither do the linguists who write about this subject.

Let me share with you one more Ralph Penny quote. This chapter of this book was written in 2002 or so. It's a new chapter to this book and I bought this edition of the book even though I owned a previous edition because I wanted to know what Penny thought was happening to Spanish due to globalization.

*In the current Spanish-speaking world, there is no evidence of significant moves towards the adoption of separate spelling and grammatical codes in different countries...pressures towards convergence today are greater than in the past...speakers almost always handle this variation in ways that do not impede communication. (320)*

You can disagree. That's your right. But I'm pointing to you to a professor at Oxford (they can be wrong too) so I'm going go with Penny on this one. With all the borrowing from all the languages, Spanish, even Spanglish, is still Spanish and Spanglish speakers can communicate with you just like anybody who's learned some standard Spanish in Bolivia, Venezuela, Panamá, or Uruguay can.


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## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> An even better precedent is creole languages...


One creole, says Aitchison, can borrow it's way out of existence by borrowing words from *another very similar* creole and this has been documented. But never has a language that is very different from another borrowed so many words from it that it "died". So says Aitchison.


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> 3-Continued large-scale immigration of native SP speakers to the US will give an ever-evolving Spanglish continued life....and as it continues to borrow more EN words, it will grow farther away from SP, and form an entirely new hybrid language.


If I were pro-Spanglish I would hate immigration. Immigration is the worse enemy of Spanglish. When I was a kid, we used to have "quequi"  (cake) for our birthdays. But because of the influx of Dominicans to New York in the nineties this word has become rarer around here. You see, the Dominicans don't know what the heck a "quequi" " is. They say *bizcocho*. We knew *bizcocho *but said "quequi" . In order to deal with the flood of Dominicans we had to switch back to the Dominican word.

That's why I think that the more immigrants come, the more we have to curb the use of Spanglish to be able to communicate with the recent arrivals. Many of the recent arrivals are not that enthusiatic about saying "quequi" either. I think they turn the tide back to more Latinamerican words.


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## felicia

Angel Rubio said:
			
		

> I have the feeling italian is contaminating any other languages:
> 
> pasta, pizza, capuccino, ravioli, tagliatelli, ....etc are common words in every language of this world.


   Is the word "contamination" rightly used here?  Surely the addition of new words can be enriching to a language?  And in my language - Norwegian - we have French, German, Italian and Russian words, as well as Greek and Latin - and a whole lot of English. We also have "McDonald" language...!!!  Finland is a country which tries to keep their language "clean" but proves difficult with the advance of technology in all fields.


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## Residente Calle 13

felicia said:
			
		

> Is the word "contamination" rightly used here?  Surely the addition of new words can be enriching to a language?  And in my language - Norwegian - we have French, German, Italian and Russian words, as well as Greek and Latin - and a whole lot of English. We also have "McDonald" language...!!!  Finland is a country which tries to keep their language "clean" but proves difficult with the advance of technology in all fields.


That's a very good question. However, I don't know how _not _borrrowing words keeps a language "clean." Are foreign words dirty? Is *speech *better than *language *because it's Germanic or is *language *just as okay a word even though it's French?


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## cuchuflete

> I think _*zumo *_(Arabic) for _*jugo *_(Latin)is an unecessary borrowing.



Zumo is not a borrowing used in place of jugo, as they only overlap in meaning some of the time.  The supposed Arabic roots of zumo are not conclusive, and it may have a Greek origin, either directly or through medival Arabic.

Even the Santa Madre RAE is unsure.


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## diegodbs

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Zumo is not a borrowing used in place of jugo, as they only overlap in meaning some of the time. The supposed Arabic roots of zumo are not conclusive, and it may have a Greek origin, either directly or through medival Arabic.
> 
> Even the Santa Madre RAE is unsure.


 
In Spain both words don't overlap.
- Jugo de carne
- Zumo de naranja

But we don't say:

- Zumo de carne
- Jugo de naranja


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## Residente Calle 13

Well, if *zumo *is not Latin it was borrowed. In NYC Spanglish, we don't care for such a *jugo/zumo* distinction. It's unnecessary to us. It's like Frenc: *a**u jus/jus d'orange*. In NYC, _*una alforma*_ is a rug  but to install carpeting is _poner* una carpeta*_. In some countries, they don't care for that distinction. And that's fine. That's how they talk there. When I left Santo Domingo it was _poner *una alfombra*._

We Dominicans in New York don't even really sound like our cousins in Santo Domingo. I don't see why we should sound like people in another Spanish speaking country. The Spanish or Spanglish here is different because we're different!


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Residente,
> I'm curious about this...
> 
> Are you referring to the prostíbulo or the barullo usage, both of which are pretty common in the Cono Sur countries?  Or, is there a Spanglish definition also?



No. There is no NYC Spanglish version. The  "quilombo" I was reffering to was the one in "¡Mi vida está hecha un quilombo!" I'm not familiar with any other meanings, actually. I know the dictionary says that but I trust what I hear. I hear Argentinos use "quilombo" in that sense.

P.S. Yeah, it's a loan word.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Zumo is not a borrowing used in place of jugo, as they only overlap in meaning some of the time.  The supposed Arabic roots of zumo are not conclusive, and it may have a Greek origin, either directly or through medival Arabic.
> 
> Even the Santa Madre RAE is unsure.



Btw, I don't really think it's an unnecessary borrowing. I'm just playing devil's advocate.


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## psicutrinius

Well...

I am afraid I joined the fray a bit late, and that most of the ideas I may expose have already been at least broached, but here I go:

*English borrows or steals words from other languages*. Of course. As well as other languages do the same. Why? A legitimate reason would be that the word refers to a concept which exists EXACTLY in another language and whose meaning is best "captured", nuances and all, by this particular word. If, on top, it is short and easily spelled, why should anybody bother in finding out other "translations"?

Example? One comes to my mind: Taboo, but there will be many more.

*English contaminates other languages*. Well. It depends on what you may have in mind: Like it or not, English is at the forefront of many fields, and therefore, many words appear in English because *they were invented in English*. I am afraid that, for instance, "software" is (and should be) software, and that the mind - racking that produced "logiciel" in French (and "programari" in Catalan), is just a waste. Had the software been invented (or the term coined) first in France, logiciel or something very close to it would be the English word.

So, that one is a perfectly logical and legitimate "seepage".

Spanglish, on the other hand, is just sort of a "tribal acknowledgement". It is neither Spanish nor English, and I am afraid that it is due (besides) to laziness. No effort in trying to remember (in most cases, remember, not find), the proper word in the other language. "carpeta" is an already quited example. Another would be "espidómetro" for "velocímetro", and I am pretty sure that no effort would really be needed to remember "velocidad".

*PSEUDO - Sophisticated language* This is when the Anglicisms are used to "show off" and this is truly a contamination, but English itself has nothing to do here. It is all due to the idiocy -or lack of culture- of (some of) the natives. Using (as an example) "obsoleto" instead of "anticuado" in Spanish denotes that the user either wants to boast of knowing English where he needs not to, or else that his / her Spanish vocabulary is appallingly short.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Spanglish, on the other hand, is just sort of a "tribal acknowledgement".


What language didn't start out as just that? Latin was started by a tribe in Latium. Can you think of a language that wasn't started by a group of people who has some sort of tribal connection? Yes, I drop my final esses and it's not only because that's how my parents talk. I don't want to conform to some foreign model. I think my people are ok. For that same reason, I think it's okay to say "la administración Bush." I'm not afraid of English words or American culture. I'm American too. I live here and I like it here. I like English and I like English speakers in my country. They is cool people. I'm more afraid, frankly, of la administración Bush.



			
				psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Using (as an example) "obsoleto" instead of "anticuado" in Spanish denotes that the user either wants to boast of knowing English where he needs not to, or else that his / her Spanish vocabulary is appallingly short.


How many Spanish words do you think I can find that do with just that? Isn't _*curriculum *_due to some people wanting to brag that they know Latin? Isn't _*opera *_from Italian and _*boutique *_from French the same thing? You find these in both Spanish and English. It's even good Spanglish! 

A great deal of the words that Spanish gets from Latin are utlimately Greek. Why did the Romans use so many Greek words? Hmmm. I would say many of them wanted to show of that they knew Greek or were literate (in many cases, in Rome, you were not considered educated unless you knew Greek).

That's one way words come into the language. People want to showoff. It's about word choice. When I say_* status quo*_ in English I'm doing the same thing. When I say _*rendez-vous*_, _*leitmotiv*_, or _*latte*_ it's the same thing. "Look at me, I'm cosmopolitan." 

I don't get those words from the dictionary although they happen to be there. I get them from people around me and I imitate their snobbery because I'm a snob myself and want people to think I'm smart.

Many of the loanswords made in any language are unnecessary. Mexicans don't have to say *cuate*. They say it because they think it's cool and that it's a Mexican thing to do. How tribal of them! Which region doesn't have their words and their ways? Why should NY, Miami, Chicago and LA be any different?

We don't always talk out of necessity. Sometimes we talk to impress people, land a job, get people to do stuff they would not otherwise do, take somebody home, or simply feel good about ourselves.

Spanglish impresses people too. Believe it or not. Just like "*cuate*" it says "I'm one of you, boo."


----------



## psicutrinius

No, sir. When you say "leitmotiv", or "status quo" you use short for a meaning which is perfectly clear and which you can say, either using the same word or using two or three lines in your language. That's the difference. Whereas when you say "espidómetro" you are lazy enough not to say speedmeter or velocímetro. In this latter case, you do NOT invent a word. you just "let it happen".

And the purpose of the language is to understand and make yourself understood. At least in this century, and when meanings can be arcane and abstract. 

Or at least, I believe should be


----------



## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> No, sir. When you say "leitmotiv", or "status quo" you use short for a meaning which is perfectly clear and which you can say, either using the same word or using two or three lines in your language. That's the difference. Whereas when you say "espidómetro" you are lazy enough not to say speedmeter or velocímetro. You do NOT invent a word. you just "let it happen".
> 
> And the purpose of the language is to understand and make yourself understood. At least in this century, and when meanings can be arcane and abstract.
> 
> Or at least, I believe should be


Jajaja. I say that when you say _*leitmotiv *_instead of "using two or three lines in your language" it's due to laziness! Say the two or three lines! Stop being lazy! Why is some lazy behavior good and other lazy behavior bad?

I don't say "espidómetro" but when I say "lonche" I make sure that it's perfectly understood. I don't say it to people who don't know what it means just like I don't speak Spanish to people who don't speak Spanish.


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## Residente Calle 13

I have often heard the "it's lazy" argument against Spanglish and Franglais...and a lot of other forms of speech.

All languages are lazy. Does your language have pronouns? What's a pronoun if it's not a shortcut? Does you say UN instead of United Nations? You're lazy!
Elliptical phrases too. "Vive en Canarias." is short for "Juan Sánchez vive en las Islas Canarias." Is that laziness or efficiency? How about "phone" or "hermano" ? How about our entire number system! Why don't we always write them out? I can go on forever on this!

Jajaja.


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## petereid

All of our languages are a mixture, created over millennia, of words inherited, borrowed or stolen from elsewhere, English itself is a creole language. A mixture of gaelic, celtic, british, pictish, saxon,angle, french, latin, german sanscrit and many and various languages from around the world. Even our favourite word of agreement OK comes from west africa. probably via Portugal and teh USA.  Just enjoy the richness of everone's languages, well as far as we can.


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## Outsider

petereid said:
			
		

> Even our favourite word of agreement OK comes from west africa. probably via Portugal and teh USA.


I thought it came from 'Oll Korrect' and the Victorian fad of funky spellings.


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## cuchuflete

After well over 100 posts, all but two or three really interesting, 
I am still convinced that living languages borrow (!)--yes, and do return the borrowed goods, sometimes in changed forms-- and steal from one another.  I'm equally convinced that 'contamination' is a silly word to describe this, most of the time.  It's the borrowers who do the importing, and often for good reason.   

I am troubled by the recent phenomenon of exporting, through the thesaurus of the folks who gave us the blue screen of death.   It has some serious defects-- well-documented for anyone who cares to look-- that I would call exported contamination.


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## Residente Calle 13

I don't think anybody knows where okay comes from. It doesn't stop some people from saying that you shouldn't use this «barbarismo» in Spanish because the Spaniards have "vale."

They don't know where it's from but it's been _*spoiled *_by the Americans, of course.


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## Vanda

> Originally Posted by *psicutrinius*
> _Using (as an example) "obsoleto" instead of "anticuado" in Spanish denotes that the user either wants to boast of knowing English where he needs not to, or else that his / her Spanish vocabulary is appallingly short._




_Obsoleto is a Spanish and  Portuguese word - probably some other romance language too. It´s not English, it came from Latin  . Just in case....   _


----------



## ireney

Urgh! (and this is not chat "language", it's an approximation of the sound I made when I read all the posts I hadn't up to now).

Personally, as I said before, I don't like the "use" of 'hybrids' that are unnecessary and sound definitely strange (the ones some try to incorporate by adding -aro I mean).

On the other hand, the Greek language which is admittedly one of those languages that have given out a lot of loans, has also been positively enriched (sp?) by words of many other languages and anti-loans (incorporating a word from another language which they have incorporated in theirs from a Greek one): Out of the top of my head we have Italian, Turkish, Albanian, French, English and Latin in abundance and I know of Spanish, Arabic and even Farsi (sp?) ones.

So, I am wondering, have we contaminated the other languages or have the contaminated ours ? ( I am currently thinking of phenomenon (sing), phenomena (pl)


----------



## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> I don't think anybody knows where okay comes from.


In the Talk Page of that entry, I found the following:



> quote from OED online:
> 
> [App. < the initial letters of _oll_ (or _orl_) _korrect_, jocular alteration of ‘all correct’: see A. W. Read in Amer. Speech (1963) 38, (1964) 39, etc.
> From the detailed evidence provided by A. W. Read it seems clear that O.K. first appeared in 1839 (an instance of a contemporary vogue for humorous abbreviations of this type), and that in 1840 it became greatly reinforced by association with the initialism O.K. n., O.K. int. (see discussion s.v.).
> 
> Other suggestions [...] all lack any form of acceptable documentation.


Sorry if I'm too OT (off-topic ), but this is a language forum, after all...


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## psicutrinius

When you say leitmotiv or status quo, the meaning is perfectly clear (and, by the way, in MORE THAN ONE LANGUAGE), whereas if you must use two or three lines, yes, that takes longer AND BESIDES, qualifying and punctuating the sentence so that it means EXACTLY the same thing puts you at risk of getting lost in between.

Yes, pronouns are shortcuts. But they are UNDERSTOOD by EVERYBODY in that language. And if you mean that "le software" instead of "le logiciel" is franglais, ok, this is what I called "legitimate":

*"I am afraid that, for instance, "software" is (and should be) software, and that the mind - racking that produced "logiciel" in French (and "programari" in Catalan), is just a waste. Had the software been invented (or the term coined) first in France, logiciel or something very close to it would be the English word".*

Languages are alive, and, as I said before, there is a right to borrow (even steal) words from any other, provided it is shorter and conveys exactly the meaning you intend. Saying "estoy hablando con un amigo a través del ordenador, en un programa especial que se llama xxx y que está diseñado especialmente para eso" instead of "estoy chateando"  is STUPID and, besides, anybody listening (or reading) will not -very probably- understand exactly what you mean until he asks "you mean, chatting?" and you answer "yes".

You should also remember that a Spanish classic (if I remember correctly) said "lo bueno, si breve, dos veces bueno".


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## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Yes, pronouns are shortcuts. But they are UNDERSTOOD by EVERYBODY in that language. And if you mean that "le software" instead of "le logiciel" is franglais, ok, this is what I called "legitimate":


What if I don't care about what's legitimate? 

When I talk in English, I don't care if what I am saying is understood in England unless I'm there. Heck, I don't even care if it's understood in New Jersey! Why should I care that my Spanglish is not understood in San Salvador or Caracas? I don't live there. I live here! 

Do you think everything they say in San Salvador is understood in New York? Should they care that in New York their Spanish sounds weird? I think they don't have many reasons to give a damn and that when they do they adjust.

We have a lot of immigration from every country that speaks Spanish here in New York. Spanish speakers do okay talking to each other. Spanglish doesnt make it easier or harder. It's just as confusing as a conversation between a Chileno and a Nicarangüense who use no Spanglish whatsoever.


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## psicutrinius

Yes And why care whether anybody beyond your block understands you?


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## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Yes And why care whether anybody beyond your block understands you?


Some people do and some people don't. Some people can't help it. Some people only care when it's needed. 

I went to England and walked under a subway, three times, back and forth, because I saw a sign that said "Subway" and where I am from that means a train station, and that's what I was looking for, not a tunnel that goes under a street. Should the Brits change their way or should us Yanks change ours? Do we have to say everything the same and which one of those two ways should we pick? 

Trust me, I understand the importance of speaking to people who live in other blocks. But there is always and there will always be a local way of talking. In Ecuador, that local way has a lot of Quechua words, in Mexico, it has a lot of Nahuatl words, in Argentina, it has a lot of Italian words, I don't see how New York City Spanglish breaks that pattern.


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## cuchuflete

Vanda said:
			
		

> [/i]
> 
> _Obsoleto is a Spanish and  Portuguese word - probably some other romance language too. It´s not English, it came from Latin  . Just in case....   _



Francico de Quevedo used obsoleto in many of his poems.
Have a look at the Polifemo, 1606.  The Diccionario de Autoridades (1737 volume) includes it, defining it as, you guessed it, anticuado.  So don't blame it on English speakers, unless you want to disown one of Spain's greatest Golden Age
poets. Yes, he was given to _culturanismo_, for fun and to devastate his enemies, but the word was not uncommon in the 17th century.


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## Outsider

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> _English contaminates other languages_. Well. It depends on what you may have in mind: Like it or not, English is at the forefront of many fields, and therefore, many words appear in English because _they were invented in English_. I am afraid that, for instance, *"software" is (and should be) software*, and that the mind - racking that produced "logiciel" in French (and "programari" in Catalan), is just a waste. *Had the software been invented (or the term coined) first in France, logiciel or something very close to it would be the English word.*


I don't agree with that at all. Why shouldn't other languages create their own words for new concepts? Has English "copyrighted" the word software?

I'm not arguing whether "logiciel" sounds nice enough or not. I just think that other languages have every right to prefer a different word for "software", if they wish.


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## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> I'm not arguing whether "logiciel" sounds nice enough or not. I just think that other languages have every right to prefer a different word for "software", if they wish.



Languages don't prefer anything, people do. The Académie française is a bunch of people who make subjective decisions. The AF decided on _*logiciel *_and the people _*complied*_. They tried _*baladeur *_for _*walkman *_and people in France chuckled.

The same thing happens in Spanish. The RAE can say whatever it wants. In the end, the people decide. They vote with their mouths. It's very democratic, actually. The RAE doesn't like _*parking*_. So what? People say it and write it in Spanish anyway.


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## Outsider

Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> Languages don't prefer anything, people do.


Obviously, that's what I meant.



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> The Académie française is a bunch of people who make subjective decisions.


How is everyone else different from them, in that respect?



			
				Residente Calle 13 said:
			
		

> The AF decided on _*logiciel *_and the people _*complied*_. They tried _*baladeur *_for _*walkman *_and people in France chuckled.
> 
> The same thing happens in Spanish.


So the folks in the Academies aren't perfect. Sue them.


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## Residente Calle 13

You want to know the difference between the French people and the Académie française? 

The AF is made of up a small group of people who tell other people what they should write and say while France is made up of tens of millions of people who make up their own minds about how they should communicate.


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## Residente Calle 13

Outsider said:
			
		

> So the folks in the Academies aren't perfect. Sue them.



How about if we just made up our own minds about what comes out of our mouths? I don't hate the AF or the RAE. I just ignore them when they say something preposterous which is very often.


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## psicutrinius

This is going nowhere. Trying to put the discussion back on rails, I reformulate (meaning I will try to make some of my ideas better understood, not backing down on them):

When some new activity appears, it normally does along with a word that describes it, in the language of the place were it was born, and *usually* this name sticks. Examples were taboo and software.

It happens now that most of them come from English, so that's why most of them carry an English "tag",

When (and unfortunately, in my view, not often enough, at least lately), this happens with *another* language, this tends to stick, too -and English borrows it as well. That is, this happens with (and among), all languages.

Therefore, (the example was "logiciel"), it is a WASTE to try until you find some way of redefining (actually, renaming) it because "it was not invented here". Again, this is one example. And I said it at least twice before.

Since the purpose of the language is to *communicate*, and I think that the more people can do so, the better, it must have rules_,_ so that as many people as possible understand the same things when the same words are used.

*OF course*, Language is no Maths, and rules cannot be (by far) as deterministic, but *rules there must be*, or nobody would understand each other.

The world is imperfect and this is why there are so many languages and dialects and idioms and so son -and none is better than any other- but enough is enough (and all the more so at this time, when everybody interacts with everybody, everywhere, every time), and I guess nobody needs -on top of the already existing complexity- to create a "new" language out of laziness. I mean Spanglish. Again, the examples are espidómetro y carpeta (and not "chatear". This is what (and why) I called it "legitimate").

As it is, right now, if you want "your" name to stick to something, there is a way: Invent some useful thing and here you are. And I said this before as well. If the French had invented *the *software, this would now be called logiciel (or something very close) in English (in the lines that make English speaking people say "reservoir" to define the lake behind a dam).

Yes, pronouns are shortcuts, and there are other shortcuts, but they are either codified -thus *ruled *by a so-called "authority", or because they are in widespread use and well understood -and (for me) useful because being pretty well defined and SHORTER and less confusing than otherwise. You have an example of this, too, in previous posts.

Ah, by the way: Pronouns for an example are, not "lazy" but necessary. Did you ever consider how boring (and confusing) would using over and again the name and the modifiers necessary?.

As it is, we (all people) have more than enough in trying to convey in words whatever we want to express, in a way that CAN BE UNDERSTOOD BY AS MANY OTHERS AS POSSIBLE. Nobody needs any "new language" which is understood only by "the initiated".

I hope this makes my views clearer and, in any case, I see no way of doing so in a better or clearer way. 

Yes, every language is a huge bunch of words stolen, borrowed or derived from all others. Fine. I am not concerned by this. I am interested in trying to get along with what I have as an instrument for making myself understood (and understand others) today, not in whether (for instance) obsolete WAS at its roots better suited in Spanish than anticuado. TODAY, the word is what it is, and using the other is confusing (in Spanish), and / or a boast -or an expression of a poor vocabulary

And that's all


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## Outsider

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Therefore, (the example was "logiciel"), it is a WASTE to try until you find some way of redefining (actually, renaming) it because "it was not invented here".


Hold on a minute -- but isn't "logicel" precisely that "way of renaming" the concept that you're talking about?


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## psicutrinius

Ever heard of nokia? it gets saying it (mobile phone) difficult in Finnish .

Well, sir. I am calling it a day. You want to bend arguments and rebound them as boomerangs, you do, but not with me. After all, I am trying to expound a view which seems quite reasonable. You get too carried away: Pronouns equalling laziness? It is not (or should not) a matter of having the last word, especially so in EVERY case. Thus, this is my last post here

Bye bye


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## Outsider

You wrote something, I disagreed. It's not the end of the world, really.


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## Residente Calle 13

Here's my response to a few of your points.



			
				psicutrinius said:
			
		

> Since the purpose of the language is to *communicate*, and I think that the more people can do so, the better, it must have rules_,_ so that as many people as possible understand the same things when the same words are used.
> 
> Sí,  ¿pero a qué preció? At what price? Why should we tell an Argentino that he should not say _*laburo *_because in Guatemala he would not be understood. Isn't telling a Niuyorquino that he shouldn't say _*bildin *_the same thing? If we are going to understand everything everybody says in Spanish we are going to have to make choices. Whose Spanish is going to be the lingua franca? Costa Rica's? Why theirs? What makes the Ticos so special over any other group of people who speak Spanish?
> 
> *OF course*, Language is no Maths, and rules cannot be (by far) as deterministic, but *rules there must be*, or nobody would understand each other.
> 
> The rules exist and linguists write about them. They are not the ones the RAE makes up and that people listen to only when they feel like it.
> 
> I mean Spanglish. Again, the examples are espidómetro y carpeta (and not "chatear". This is what (and why) I called it "legitimate").
> 
> Spanish started out as a very "incorrect" version of Latin mixed with a great deal of Basque influence. Was it out of laziness? Good! I like the results! Do you really think we say "izquierdo" in Spanish because people were too lazy to think and come up with "siniestro"? When "izquierdo" was favored it was borrowed and now nobody even suspects it's Euskera.
> 
> Yes, pronouns are shortcuts, and there are other shortcuts, but they are either codified -thus *ruled *by a so-called "authority", or because they are in widespread use and well understood -and (for me) useful because being pretty well defined and SHORTER and less confusing than otherwise. You have an example of this, too, in previous posts.
> 
> Many languages that have no authority have pronouns. Spanish had pronouns before there was a RAE. Actually, even people who have no writing, and thus can't codify anything, have pronouns. Languages don't need to be codified at all. These "grammar rules" you read about are mostly artificial and arbitrary. The real rules are not the ones the RAE writes.
> 
> As it is, we (all people) have more than enough in trying to convey in words whatever we want to express, in a way that CAN BE UNDERSTOOD BY AS MANY OTHERS AS POSSIBLE. Nobody needs any "new language" which is understood only by "the initiated".
> 
> I don't think people talk to people to be understood by the maximum number of people possible. I talk to my sister so that *my sister* understands me and to you so that *you* understand me. I'm not trying to cast a wide net when I talk to my neighbor. I'm just trying to tell him to turn the music down. I don't care if how I say it sounds odd in Bolivia. I would if I was in Bolivia!
> 
> TODAY, the word is what it is, and using the other is confusing (in Spanish), and / or a boast -or an expression of a poor vocabulary
> 
> I say most Spanglishers have a richer vocabulary. I know _roof_, _techo_, *and *_rufo_. I have a bunch of words that English and Spanish speakers who don't Spanglish don't have!


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## cuchuflete

Spanglish?  No, the sky is not falling.  It won't corrupt either English or Spanish.  It may serve those who speak it, but if it's the only language they know, then they are confined to a rather small universe. 

For those who are content to communicate only within their neighborhood, it probably works well. I don't expect Spanglish literature, if there is such, to enjoy robust sales abroad.  But, as Residente has told us many times, it is for local communication.  If it is useful and adequate for that local communciation, that's good news for those who speak it.  The Spanglish speakers who have some interest in the wider world will, I suppose, add Spanish or English or both to their arsenals.  

Arguments about whether it derives from borrowing, or is inspired by either laziness or crafty and economic use of whatever is at hand and does the job, simply start and end nowhere.  I'll have a wonderfully good laugh should the day arrive when the politically kerrect crew, in the interest of glorifying all things multicultural, establish the Academia of Spanglish, dedicated to the preservation and propagation of........


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Spanglish?  No, the sky is not falling.  It won't corrupt either English or Spanish.  It may serve those who speak it, but if it's the only language they know, then they are confined to a rather small universe.



Bingo! That's why I think it's not only normal but probably good that black kids speak Black English Vernacular but it's not good, I think, that they ONLY speak BEV. I would say that about any local variety of lesser prestige including Valleygirleses. It's not a color thing. It's about getting a job, moving ahead in life, and being able to reach out to other communities.



			
				cuchuflete said:
			
		

> I don't expect Spanglish literature, if there is such, to enjoy robust sales abroad.



I wouldn't rule that out. There is some Spanglish poetry and literature. There is a Spanglish magazine in NY. It's not just for the _neighborhood_. But to be honest, I don't care if it's a literary language. I'm barely literate anyway. 

I should have picked "quoteman" as a nick! Here's one more!

[...] Spanglish isn't only a phenomenon that takes place en los Unaited Esteis;  in some shape or form, with English as a merciless global force, it is  spoken—and broken: no es solamente hablado sino quebrado—all across the Hispanic  world, from Buenos Aires to Bogotá, from Barcelona to Santo Domingo (5).

*Stavans, Ilan. Spanglish: A New American Language. New York: Rayo, 2003.  *


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## cuchuflete

Debil's advocate said:
			
		

> I wouldn't rule that ((Spanglish literature sales abroad)) out. There is some Spanglish poetry and literature. There is a Spanglish magazine in NY. It's not just for the _neighborhood_.


You just contradicted all of your many vehement proclamations that you don't give a hoot how Spanglish would sound to Bolivian, Madrileño or other ears.

Sure, some linguistic archaeologist might find it abstruse enough for a thesis, but it's an inward-focused language, and would be read abroad only as a curiosity or a subject for linguistic analysis, and it would not be read as literature.


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> You just contradicted all of your many vehement proclamations that you don't give a hoot how Spanglish would sound to Bolivian, Madrileño or other ears.


Did my post say I did give a hoot? When? Can you quote me the sentences where I say I really want Bolivians and Madrileños to understand Spanglish?

This thread is not about Spanglish so it would be off-topic to talk about Stavans. 



			
				cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Sure, some linguistic archaeologist might find it abstruse enough for a thesis, but it's an inward-focused language, and would be read abroad only as a curiosity or a subject for linguistic analysis, and it would not be read as literature.


Who's the linguistic archaeologist? Which thesis? You lost me.


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## deddish

English _is_ "contaminating" other languages, in my opinion. More realistically said, people who speak other languages are deciding to integrate English words into their own language. (Heck, the US English is even contaminating the CA English- you've no idea how annoying it is to see "Drive Thru" all over the place, and how many of my friends spell colour as color.) But, at the same time, English is being "contaminated" by other languages- again, English speakers are using other words.

Most of what I know of it is that people think it is _très cool_ to use other languages, especially French or Japanese- of course, that's secluded to my highschool friends and the people I talk to over the 'net (who are mostly American). 

So yes, there's lots of words getting taken by other languages. But there always have been. 

Some languages might dissapear in the face of English, but I don't really think it's going to happen any time soon. If it does, English by then will probably have absorbed so many other words that it'll hardly be the English we know today anymore. (I think someone else brought that up.) 

Hmmm... Franglais and Spanglish...

Mostly I just add a French ending to an English word (and pronounce the first bit with French rules) if I forget the French word for it. Often it turns out to be correct, sometimes it sounds right and I manage to convince myself that it is until my teachers yell at me for anglicism. I don't know of much _real_ "franglais" to the extent of Spanglish, in fact I usually treat the idea as a joke- whereas Spanglish is actually... a commonly used language, I guess.

I don't know much about it though, so out of curiosity, is it... a very irregular language depending on how certain people morph English and Spanish together? Or are there a commonly accepted vocabulary list and grammatics? I'm guessing the latter if there's actual published magazines in the language.

There's a lot of language-mixing in countries like Canada and the US that are large "cultural melting-pots" or whatever you'd like to call them, especially in metropolitan areas like LA, NY, and Toronto, where there's really freaking huge immigration rates. There's lots of little Chinatowns and similar ideas of other ethnicities, so an English-speaking person usually has a good chance in those places to pick up on a few other words. If they think that they're neat, then they'll use them, and bingo, it spreads like the plague- everyone (well, not actually everyone) wants to be "in style" and "hip" and "with the times", and what better an authority on those things are there than the kids from the big cities, right?

I don't even know what I'm saying any more, so I'll go get some sleep now.


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## Residente Calle 13

deddish said:
			
		

> I don't even know what I'm saying any more, so I'll go get some sleep now.



Don't be so modest. I think you made some very interesting points in your post. Thanks so much for contributing to this discussion.


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## psicutrinius

> I say most Spanglishers have a richer vocabulary. I know _roof_, _techo_, *and *_rufo_. I have a bunch of words that English and Spanish speakers who don't Spanglish don't have!


 
You mean that knowing "rufo" besides "ruf" (as it sounds) equals having a *richer* language? 

I for one would learn Spanglish if I lived in your environment. Pleasant to me it would not be but, yes, if I decide I will live in a given environment, I will certainly do my best to merge into it, and this would be quite a different reason for doing so.

However, I would consider it as a toll to be paid for merging there, NOT enrichment. 

Enrichment in that sense would be, to me, learning a *language *(German, Russian, Hungarian or Swahili... you name it), not just transliterating written English into Spanish pronunciation (and viceversa) at my will and whim.

I see we frontally disagree. Well, nothing to be said about. This is my choice and that is yours. And that closes the discussion. I am afraid we* can not* bring positions closer, so let's not make it endless.

I will say, however, and for the record, that this has been a stimulating discussion, and that it has been quite a boost for my English. At least, for writing on complex (and controversial) matters at a snap. And for this, (and for your views) I thank you. Sometimes one reaches some conclusions in a way so blindingly clear to oneself that not even the possibility of other ideas is considered.


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## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> You mean that knowing "rufo" besides "ruf" (as it sounds) equals having a *richer* language?
> 
> I for one would learn Spanglish if I lived in your environment. Pleasant to me it would not be but, yes, if I decide I will live in a given environment, I will certainly do my best to merge into it, and this would be quite a different reason for doing so.
> 
> However, I would consider it as a toll to be paid for merging there, NOT enrichment.


And that's where I have to say, *I can't argue against that*. If you consider that "una camisa marrón" is better than "una camisa brown" because "marrón" which was borrowed from French enriches Spanish and "brown" which is borrowed from English does not, or ruins it, then that's a matter of personal taste.

It would be just as dumb to argue about whether or not brown is a good color. I have not been able to come up with an argument for convincing people to like things that they don't like.

But what I don't accept, and I'm not saying that this is your argument, is that  borrowing words is due only to ignorance, need, and snobbery. I don't think you are being a snob by saying "una camisa marrón" and I don't think it's because you are ignorant. (And I don't think there was no word for brown until Spanish took it from French).

If "marrón" is the word you know, you say it. I also know it and use "una camisa brown" almost unconscioulsy although I suspect there is a reason we chose one word over the another.

And I don't think, I repeat, that it's because French is a Latin language that "marrón" is supposedly better than "brown." Spanish has "blanco" from the Goths and it's just as Germanic as "brown."

Many people who don't like Spanglish would prefer that one say "Me gusta el zumo de piña" and not "Me gusta el juice de piña" (a sentence I find, personally, retarded) even though "juice" is more Latin than "zumo."

But if you don't like it, what can I do? In fact, I think the best reason to speak Spanish without Spanglishing it is because you like it that way.


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## cuchuflete

> "Me gusta el zumo de piña" and not "Me gusta el juice de piña" (*a sentence I find, personally, retarded*)


Why would that sentence be any more, or less, 'retarded' than any other Spanglish sentence which borrows/uses a single English noun, surrounded by otherwise SP vocabulary and grammar? 

Using juice avoids any potential contretemps among partisans of either jugo or zumo.


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## Residente Calle 13

psicutrinius said:
			
		

> I will say, however, and for the record, that this has been a stimulating discussion, and that it has been quite a boost for my English. At least, for writing on complex (and controversial) matters at a snap. And for this, (and for your views) I thank you. Sometimes one reaches some conclusions in a way so blindingly clear to oneself that not even the possibility of other ideas is considered.


I don't like to say "you're welcome" so let me tell you that I thank you for participating. I have had many of these kinds of arguments with people whose opinion is the opposite of mine and I think that's made me smarter. 

I once had an argument with a man who I was trying to convince that Spanish spelling would be better if it was less complex. His answer: "Yeah, but I like it the way it is." I don't think you can really argue against that.


----------



## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Why would that sentence be any more, or less, 'retarded' than any other Spanglish sentence which borrows/uses a single English noun, surrounded by otherwise SP vocabulary and grammar?


I didn't say it was. I just said it sounded retarded to me.


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## cuchuflete

> I just said it sounded retarded to me.



Any idea why?


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## Residente Calle 13

cuchuflete said:
			
		

> Any idea why?



Believe it or not, my first instinct is that it's unnecessary. Don't think for a second that people who speak "substandard" dialects don't have the same prejudices that people who speak "standard" dialects do.

But after giving it some thought, I would say that it's maybe because *juice *and *jugo *are too similar, to me, in my dialect, to justify "Me gusta el juice." 

*Juice *and *jugo *are basically the same here and there. I think we tend to use the English word when what we experience here is different or to mark a nuance. My mother says "beige" because she doesn't know another Spanish word that quite captures that even they she knows "beige."  I think that's why some people say "una camisa brown." It's probably the same reason people say "teal" or "lavander" or "lime."

If you think about it, the brain has all of these words in there, why would it allow unnecessary ones? Why would we have two words that mean the exact same thing unless it's absolutely necessary? But that's a matter for a different thread.


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## MarX

Residente Calle 13 said:


> * Do you think that speakers of a language you know are contaminating their language by using words from another language especially English?*


No.
Living languages have always been influencing each other.
Besides, no matter how many words from other languages are used, a language will always maintain its originality. Just take a look at English. 

Salam (an Indonesian loanword from Arabic),


MarK


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## balasang

I don't think it's 'contaminating. Influencing, yes, but contaminating? No. English is like the new 'Latin' and/or Greek which in the past had influenced many languages particularly those in Europe.

Pretty much like Tagalog vocabulary is 10% Chinese-derived and 20% Spanish-derived, some are Arabic, Sanskrit and Malay derived.


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