Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

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Saim
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Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Saim » 2016-01-21, 13:35

I thought it'd be fun to compile English loanwords in other languages, where the meaning has been warped to an extent that it's not really recognisable as the original word. If you want to add similar examples not involving English, feel free. In some cases these may come from varieties of English other than my own, so feel free to correct me if that's the case.

[flag=]es[/flag][flag=]ca[/flag] fucker - womanizer, lady's man, player
English meaning: bastard, son of a bitch (cabrón, hijo de puta, capullo). The Spanish usage would probably understandable to most native speakers in context.

[flag=]es[/flag][flag=]ca[/flag] swagger - someone who has swag
English meaning: A sort of abrasive confidence. Swag is an African-American variant. Swag and swagger mean essentially the same thing.

[flag=]es[/flag][flag=]ca[/flag] -ing words like footing (jogging) or goming ("rubber"-ing; i.e., bungie jumping). Feel free to add other examples.

[flag=]sr[/flag] partibrejker - party pooper
English meaning: None, although the word is understandable in context (break + party).

[flag=]sr[/flag][flag=]pl[/flag] boks, boks - boxing

[flag=]he[/flag] בול - spot on!; bull's-eye
English meaning: I have never heard "bull" used as a shortened form of bull's-eye, which in English has another meaning (male bovine). "Bull's-eye" isn't normally used as an interjection, except when actually playing darts or perhaps to some extent in shooting (not in the case of saying "exactly!", "spot on!" when someone has something right).

[flag=]hr[/flag][flag=]sl[/flag] ful - very, totally

(Most European languages) Autostop, stop - hitchhiking.

(Many European languages) Basket - basketball.

(Many European languages) Smoking - dinner jacket (smocking jacket).

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby voron » 2016-01-21, 16:09

[flag=]sr[/flag] eventualno - possibly, conceivably

[flag=]tr[/flag] istop etmek - to stop a car('s engine)
Funny about this is not only that the meaning of "stop" has narrowed, but also that it got adapted to the Turkish phonetics (native Turkish words cannot start with 2 consonants, cf. Izmir, from Greek Smyrna).

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Car » 2016-01-21, 16:57

There really are too many in German to post all of them, so I'll just link to the Wiki article, even though I can't confirm all of them:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pseudo-an ... _languages
Please correct my mistakes!

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby TheStrayCat » 2016-01-21, 17:23

[flag=]uk[/flag][flag=]ru[/flag] ноутбук (noutbuk) - laptop computer.

Apparently it's derived from "notebook computer", a certain kind of laptops, but the term was extended to denote all types of portable computers.

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby linguoboy » 2016-01-21, 17:29

Saim wrote:[flag=]es[/flag][flag=]ca[/flag] swagger - someone who has swag
English meaning: A sort of abrasive confidence. Swag is an African-American variant. Swag and swagger mean essentially the same thing.

I more often hear swag in the countable sense of "free stuff" (probably because I work with librarians, and we're all about snatching up vendor giveaways at conventions rather than having any sort of style). So I originally interpreted "someone who has swag" as "someone who has free stuff to give away".

When it comes to German examples, bodybag for "rucksack" takes the motherlovin' cake. And Twen for "twentysomething" is especially confusing because of the existence of tween.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Saim » 2016-01-21, 19:01

voron wrote:[flag=]sr[/flag] eventualno - possibly, conceivably


To nije anglicizam, nego latinizam. Mnogo evropskih jezika ima neku takvu reč s istim značenjem, engleski je zapravo izuzetak.
That's not an Anglicism, but a Latinism. Many European languages have some kind of word like that that has the same meaning; it's actually English that's the odd one out.

Catalan, Occitan - eventualment (possibly)
Spanish, Asturian, Galician, Portuguese, Italian - eventualmente (possibly)
French - éventuellement (possibly)
Polish - ewentualnie (possibly)

Isti je slučaj kod reči "aktuelan" (en. "actual" = istinit, stvaran) i "prezervativ" (en. "preservative" = konzervans)

The same is true of "actual" (sr. "aktuelan" = current) and "preservative" (sr. "prezervativ" = contraceptive).

Hrvatski jezični portal daje ovu etimologu:

✧ nlat. eventualis ≃ lat. eventus: događaj

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby vijayjohn » 2016-01-21, 19:09

A couple of examples from Malayalam:

"touchings" - snacks served with alcohol at a toddy shop. My dad claims that this word has become a bona fide Malayalam word by now, in which case I guess it would be written ടച്ചിങ്സ്. It's pronounced as you'd probably expect in an Indian accent: [ʈəˈt͡ʃiŋsɯ].

"feeling" - balls/testicles. :lol: My dad likes joking that you can even say "അവൾ എന്റെ feeling-ഏൽ തട്ടി [əˈʋəɭ ˈɛnde ˈfiːliŋeːl t̪əˈʈi]," which means "she hurt my 'feelings'." ;)

I believe "ability" also can mean something like 'penis size', or else maybe it's similar to "feeling." I remember my dad telling me a story about some white lady in Kerala taking an autorickshaw and doing something that was physically strenuous (I forget what, maybe lifting some really heavy luggage or something), then saying, "Did you see my ability?" and then the driver says, " :oops: Madam, that is not what we call 'ability' here."

Also, I guess this is kind of off-topic, but here's an expression from Indian English that I've never seen in any other variety of English:

"problem man" - man with serious mental issues

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby md0 » 2016-01-21, 19:22

(Most European languages) Autostop, stop - hitchhiking.


Huh. I would assume we either got it or modelled it after German. But apparently German is one of the languages that doesn't use it.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby vijayjohn » 2016-01-21, 19:27

Oh, that reminds me, I forgot that various Indian languages use "auto" for 'autorickshaw'.

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Car » 2016-01-21, 19:57

meidei wrote:
(Most European languages) Autostop, stop - hitchhiking.


Huh. I would assume we either got it or modelled it after German. But apparently German is one of the languages that doesn't use it.

No, we call that Trampen as is correctly indicated there. But compounds using auto exist in a couple of languages that don't use the word on its own.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Dormouse559 » 2016-01-21, 20:10

[flag=]fr[/flag]
slip - briefs (underwear)
English meaning (closest one): women's undergarment worn under a dress (Wikipedia)

clip - music video
English meaning: any piece of video

se scratcher - to crash
English meaning: (to scratch) to rub with a sharp object

tennisman - tennis player
English meaning: None, but the meaning is transparent. In the 1990 French spelling reform, the plural is tennismans.

[a lot of sports words] foot, basket, snow - football/soccer, basketball, snowboarding
English meaning: Not the sports; a foot is a foot, a basket is a basket and snow is snow.

baggy, slim - baggy jeans, skinny jeans
English meaning: "Baggy" and "slim" are mainly adjectives, and "slim" is never used in reference to skinny jeans. The French plural of "baggy" is "baggys".
Last edited by Dormouse559 on 2016-01-21, 22:09, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby kevin » 2016-01-21, 21:49

Car wrote:No, we call that Trampen as is correctly indicated there.

I'm more used to the perfectly German per Anhalter fahren, though trampen does exist, of course. (Well, being used to... I don't think I've ever done either. ;))

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Car » 2016-01-22, 11:12

kevin wrote:
Car wrote:No, we call that Trampen as is correctly indicated there.

I'm more used to the perfectly German per Anhalter fahren, though trampen does exist, of course. (Well, being used to... I don't think I've ever done either. ;))

It's not as common as it used to be. My mother used to do it a lot during her time in England in the early 70s with some friends. Not only would no woman dare to do it these days, you'd actually have a hard time finding anyone who's willing to take someone in their car.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby WallOfStuff » 2016-01-23, 6:37

linguoboy wrote:I more often hear swag in the countable sense of "free stuff" (probably because I work with librarians, and we're all about snatching up vendor giveaways at conventions rather than having any sort of style). So I originally interpreted "someone who has swag" as "someone who has free stuff to give away".
That's how the old people use it. :lol:

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby PrimroseandBlue » 2016-02-17, 11:19

With that Hebrew borrowing of bull via bullseye to mean spot-on: an English speaker would probably use another game reference, "bingo", to convey that as an interjection.

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Marah » 2016-02-18, 16:21

[flag=]fr[/flag] boissons light
[flag=]en[/flag] diet drinks
Par exemple, l'enfant croit au Père Noël. L'adulte non. L'adulte ne croit pas au Père Noël. Il vote.

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby dEhiN » 2016-02-23, 17:33

Saim wrote:[flag=]he[/flag] בול - spot on!; bull's-eye
English meaning: I have never heard "bull" used as a shortened form of bull's-eye, which in English has another meaning (male bovine). "Bull's-eye" isn't normally used as an interjection, except when actually playing darts or perhaps to some extent in shooting (not in the case of saying "exactly!", "spot on!" when someone has something right).

Bull can also be a shortened form for bullshit. Especially used by people who don't want to swear.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby dEhiN » 2016-02-23, 17:36

linguoboy wrote:
Saim wrote:[flag=]es[/flag][flag=]ca[/flag] swagger - someone who has swag
English meaning: A sort of abrasive confidence. Swag is an African-American variant. Swag and swagger mean essentially the same thing.

I more often hear swag in the countable sense of "free stuff" (probably because I work with librarians, and we're all about snatching up vendor giveaways at conventions rather than having any sort of style). So I originally interpreted "someone who has swag" as "someone who has free stuff to give away".

That's interesting; I generally think of swag as synonymous with bling - fancy accessories and material objects used for showing off. But I do think of swagger as a sort of abrasive confidence. I guess in my neck of the woods swag and swagger, while originally meaning the same thing, have deviated in usage.
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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby Varislintu » 2016-02-24, 11:04

In Finnish, there is the word biisi, which means 'song' or 'piece of music'. It comes from English 'piece', through (the old) Helsinki slang, and is now a nation-wide low and medium register word that exclusively means 'song', it doesn't retain any of the other usages that the English 'piece' has.

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Re: Pseudo-Anglicisms, adapted Anglicisms

Postby vijayjohn » 2016-02-24, 16:36

How'd the first consonant there end up being voiced? :hmm: Hyperforeignization? :P


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