[lit-ideas] "Tsk tsk" (Was: "The African Language")

 
 
In a message dated 7/30/2004 2:09:21 PM Eastern Standard Time,  
atlas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx writes:
I  usually
don't bother learning their languages.  Where's the  profit?  With the
dialects there must be ten thousand tongues  there.  Stick to English, Julie.
You've got the money, make them come  to you.  Just say stuff with a lot of
vowels and some voweless  consonants thrown in and gesticulate angrily.
They'll understand.
Hope  this is of some help to you,


-----
 
Geary forgots to mention the glottal African click ("tsk tsk"). This has  
acquired a different meaning in English, though (it can still be heard with the 
 
original meaning in parts of Mozambique -- The reason for the semantic change 
is  adjudicated to the African explorers (to the continent -- Stanley, etc.). 
 
In African, the glottal click notably means "no". In English it became  
something like "baloney". 
 
R. Goodall (_Lang in Soc_, vol. 56) has explained the change applying  
Grice's theory of implicature: African negative sentences -- featuring 'tsk 
tsk'  -- 
become -- to the ears of the explorers -- (e.g. "There are no lions in the  
jungle") a source of English mirth or critique.
 
Cheers,
 
JL

 


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