Draft:Borrowing

“Light spot on English language borrowing”


• Borrowing : In linguistics, the process of adapting a word from one language for usage in another is called borrowing , also referred to as lexical borrowing. The borrowed term is referred to as a borrowing, borrowed, or loanword . There is justification for from language to another. David Crystal has called the English language an “insatiable borrower.” The modern English vocabulary has been derived from more than 120 foreign languages. The primary source of borrowings for many other languages, modern English is also a significant donor language.

• Passionate Borrowers : Many, many thousands of English words have been learned in this way. English speakers have traditionally been among the world’s most eager learners of other people’s words. Ski comes from Norway, waltz from Germany, mayonnaise from French, yoghurt from Turkish, ukulele from Hawaii, ski from Norway, algebra from Arabic ( loanwords in English from Arabic language ) , sherry from Spanish, and kangaroo from the Gauge language of Australia. We also obtain kayak from an Eskimo language. To be sure, more than half of the terms in an English dictionary that lists their origins can be found to have some degree of linguistic borrowing (though not always by the kind of direct borrowing we are talking about here).

• Justifications for Language Borrowing :

“There may be words in one language that have no equivalents in another. Certain terms for things, social, political, and cultural events and institutions, as well as abstract ideas, might exist in one language but not in the other. We can use a few instances from the history of the English language. Words for several sorts of houses (such as castle, mansion, wigwam, igloo, and bungalow) have been borrowed into English. It has appropriated terms for cultural establishments (ballet, opera, etc.). It has appropriated terms for political ideas (apartheid, glasnost, and perestroika, for example). Likewise, it frequently occurs that terms or expressions from one culture are borrowed to convey breakthroughs in technology, society, or culture. How languages steal words from each other.


• loanwords in English from Arabic language :

Commander of the Seas or Prince of the Seas, Admiral Amīr al-Bihār = أمير البحار Unaware of the Arabic language, court authorities in Elizabethan England introduced the letter “D.” Amiral is still in use in France.

The brick, Adobe al-tūba = الطوبه

This term is frequently linked to the well-known computer software provider Adobe Systems and its offerings, which include Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Acrobat.

Algebra al-jabr = الجبر = finishing up pieces that are missing or broken

The mathematician who created algebra, al-Khwarizmi, wrote a book titled “al-kitab al-mukhtar fe hisab al-jabr wa al-muqabalah” wherein this word first appeared. Latin translation of this algebra book is available.

Travel = Safari سفـر = Safr

Like in the Safari web browser from Apple.

The Swahili language borrowed the Arabic word “safari” to refer to a journey into the wild.


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