Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: Are you sure? No, definite.
From: kyle@animal
Date: 28 Jul 92 14:04:52 GMT
 <1992Jul17.105015.17987@cs.tu-berlin.de> <1992Jul20.165728.21746@cc.ic.ac.uk>
Nntp-Posting-User: kyle

In article <1992Jul20.165728.21746@cc.ic.ac.uk>, shan@ee.ic.ac.uk (Shan Parfilt) writes:
> In article <1992Jul17.105015.17987@cs.tu-berlin.de> wolfi@opal.cs.tu-berlin.de (Wolfgang Schwanke) writes:
>>shan@ee.ic.ac.uk (Shan Parfilt) writes:
>>
>>>>'Oui' is the mutilated form of vulgar Latin 'hoc ille' ('so it is') as used
>>>>in northern France. So is 'oc', its southern counterpart.
>>>>* Wolfgang
>>>
>>>'Oui' is not the 'mutilated' form of anything. It might however be the 
>>>'descendant' of something - or some such similarly objective, scientifically
>>>justifiable phrase. The 'vulgar' in 'Vulgar Latin' is another term like 
>>>'mutilated', although this particular phrase has come in time to stand
>>>for a particular type of Latin (ie non- 'standard').  
>>>
>>>Shan Parfitt
>>
>>You seem to imply some negative connotation, which I never intended of course.
>>I translated from a book, perhaps badly. The original term was 'verschliffen',
>>should I have used 'slurred'?
>>
>>Wolfgang
> 
> I would say that 'slurred' has a negative connotation aswell! What's wrong 
> with something like 'mutated' , 'modified', or something? Or 'descendant'?
> Shan

I think slurred is an excellent translation of verschliffen and I disagree that
slurred necessarily has a negative connotation.  Let us remember that con-
notations exist in the mind of the beholder.

'Slur' may have a very broad meaning, but it certainly represents a
combination of articulatory changes including palatalization or ellipsis of
consonants, leveling of vowels, changing of stops to liquids, etc.
All of these changes can occur in a lexeme over time due to repeated
usage in contexts where speed is required. It's also the same process that
the utterances of drunks or exhausted people undergo. Of course, phonetic
and morphological change in language is systematic, and would apply to more
than
just one word or combination of words. However, slurring, as such, is still
an apt description of many of those changes.

Having said that, I would also like to make a plea that we not let the
concept of 'political correctness' creep into the linguistic arena. Let there
be no forbidden words, particularly if they help portray the history of
language in a colourful way that makes it real to people. Part of
the fun of researching word origins is the insight we gain into how time
and usage "weather" words, which indeed may be viewed as a form of mutilation.
French is a wonderful language in its own right, but one must admit that,
viewed as a much-changed form of Latin, the word "mutilated" might apply.
Of course, in the grand perspective of things we must not forget that
Latin is itself only a weathered and mutilated form of ancient Indo-European
and that even Indo-European, far from being the grandfather of all languages,
was only one of several language families of that era and was, like all
the others, the "verschliffen" descendent of earlier languages, none of
which could be considered pure or archetypical.

I think that type of perspective helps us realize that, though time
may "slaughter" the original form of a language, the resulting mutant,
bastardized offspring can give us a language as beautiful and complete in
its own right as French.

Stimmt's, Wolfgang?

Xref: sparky sci.lang:6196 sci.classics:603 sci.anthropology:650 talk.philosophy.misc:1510 sci.philosophy.meta:1390 rec.arts.books:13525