Suddenly that term is in the headlines, thanks to the latest
outburst from The Donald (whom, by now, out of due respect, we should rather
designate: The Trump).
I worked for a while at Merriam-Webster, based in
Springfield, Massachusetts. Our
dictionaries were rather good as regards the vocabulary of Roman Catholicism
(and this, based largely on the makeup of the local workforce), not so good on
Yiddishisms in English (“Yinglish”).
For that, you were better off with Random House.
I grew up near New York, and was sometimes surprised at the
absence, from the M-W Collegiate, of terms derived from Yiddish, which
to me were quite familiar -- though merely by osmosis; I did not grow up in an especially
Jewish environment. Whereas Trump -- a New York macher -- would definitely know these things.
Anyhow: schlong (noun) ‘penis’ looks
to derive (via Yiddish) from German Schlange
‘snake’ (via geometric resemblance -- though only in the flaccid state). From that, to its use as a verb, is (as
Bertie Wooster would say) “but the work of an instant”. When Der Trumpmeister said that Obama “schlonged”
Hillary, he meant (literally) that he defeated her, but (metaphorically) that
he … shtupped her. (Pardon my
Yiddish.)
Today’s Washington Post has a commendable article “Donald
Trump’s ‘schlonged': A linguistic investigation”
Kudos in particular that they consulted Steven Pinker (whom,
in these pages, we have often had occasion to praise) before posting. Only … here, the professor is not at
his best: suggesting that the
verbal use was a mere “malaprop” (i.e., malapropism), stemming from ignorance. Whereas:
even had no-one ever before used the noun as a verb in this way, that
use still lay ready to hand, for any competent native speaker. Moreover, the whole shtick the Post
appends, re verbing nouns, is quite périmé;
it had a certain (erroneous) point, fifty years ago, but not now. And indeed,
the very article adduces attestations, prior to the cause célèbre in question, that antedate the use. Trump's offense was purely social, not linguistic.
Philological note: Our (Yinglish) word schmuck, likewise derives
via Yiddish from German:
literally, ‘decoration’; metonymically, ‘membrum virilis’. Yet thence, the term boogied
semantically to designate … well … you know … a schmuck -- anglicè, a ‘dickhead’,
a ‘dork’.
As for Schlange,
it has no etymological equivalent in English, though it might be related to our
word sling. The word Schlange was coined (replacing earlier
words like Natter (compare English adder) or Unke, as a deverbal, by reference to its slithering, looping
motion. English snake is
likewise deverbal, being related to an old word meaning 'crawl'.
Finally, shtupp
looks likely related to German stopfen
‘to stuff’; if so, there is a
parallel semantic evolution in (British) English, to ‘get stuffed’.
Doubtless it was such considerations as these, rather than
mere churlishness, which prompted the glossophilic candidate to avail himself
of so colorful a verb.
The BBC has an informative article on the matter here:
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35167332
For further merry musings on word origins, click here.
Herr Doktor Trumpf, pondering Teutonic etymologies |
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-35167332
For further merry musings on word origins, click here.
No comments:
Post a Comment