Oxford Guide to Etymology by Durkin Philip;

Author:Durkin, Philip;
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Published: 2011-08-20T16:00:00+00:00

6.10 Some conclusions from chapters 5 and 6

Some generalizations about etymologies which involve borrowing can be drawn from the topics we have examined in the last two chapters:

• Borrowed words are often subject to processes of accommodation to the phonology or morphology of the borrowing language, either at the time of borrowing or subsequently. They may also form compounds or derivatives in the borrowing language.

• Not all components of the meaning of a word need be borrowed.

• Borrowed words are subject to change (semantically, phonologically, or morphologically), just like any other words.

• Borrowing between languages (interlinguistic borrowing) is not necessarily a once-and-for-all process, just as borrowing within languages (intralinguistic borrowing) is not either.

• Initial interlinguistic borrowing is typically followed by intralinguistic borrowing, as a word spreads to different registers or varieties of a language and to the usage of different speech communities.

• After the date of initial borrowing, borrowed items frequently show further influence from the donor language, through the borrowing of additional senses, or through formal remodelling after the donor form. Loanwords may in time become either less like the corresponding form in the donor language (through internal processes of change in either the borrowing language or the donor language), or more like it (through remodelling of a previously naturalized form after the form in the donor language).

• A good etymology which involves borrowing will have a working hypothesis as to how and why (as well as when and where) borrowing occurred, and also as to how and why the borrowed word, sense, etc. has subsequently spread within the borrowing language.

Of course, we will not always have sufficient data to address all of these issues, but we should not assume, simply because we have only limited data available to us, that the reality is likely to have been any less complex than in instances where we do have abundant data.

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