Euphemism: Social Linguistic And Psychological Aspects

Euphemism Social lingual And Psychological AspectsAccording the New Oxford Dictionary of English (Oxford University Press 2001) euphemism is a mild or verificatory countersign or expression substituted for superstar considered to be too harsh or blunt when appertainring to something g sass or embarrassing.In the Wikipedia encyclopedia (February 2007), a euphemism is an expression int polish offed by the verbaliser to be little offensive, disturbing, or troubling to the listener than the news program phrase it re surfaces, or in the case of double spill to make it less(prenominal) troublesome for the speaker.When a phrase is persona as a euphemism, it oftentimes becomes a metaphor whose actual message is dropped. Euphemism whitethorn be apply to hide unpleasant or disturbing brains, even when the genuine full barrier is non necessarily offensive. This type of euphemism is use in public relations and politics, where it is sometimes slightingly c all(prenominal)ed d oublespeak. Sometimes, utilizing euphemisms is equated to politeness. at that place argon superstitious euphemisms, based (consciously or subconsciously) on the idea that words pretend the forcefulness to bring bad fortune (for physical exertion, not face the word cancer) and religious euphemisms, based on the idea that some words argon sacred, or that some words be spiritually impelling.In Euphemism and Dysphemism wording used as a shield and weapon (1991), Allan and Burridge claimed that euphemism is characterized by avoidance language and evasive expression, speaker uses words as a protective shield against the anger or disapproval of natural or supernatural organisms. It is an expression that seeks to avoid being offensive.But because our background relies on linguistics euphemism is not exactly a response to proscribed it also functions where the speaker avoids using a distasteful expression and/ or an infelicitous style of addressing or naming.2-EtymologyThe word eup hemism comes from the Greek word euphemos, meaning auspicious/ dandy/ successful speech/kind which in turn is derived from the Greek root-words eu (), good /well + pheme () speech/speaking. The eupheme was primitively a word or phrase used in place of a religious word or phrase that should not be talk aloud etymologically, the eupheme is the opposite of the blaspheme (evil-speaking). The primary example of taboo words requiring the use of an euphemism argon the unspeakable names for a deity, much(prenominal)(prenominal) as Perseph unity, Hecate, Hemesis or Yahweh. By speaking only words favorable to the gods or spirits, the speaker attempted to procure good fortune by remaining in good favor with them.Historical linguistics has revealed traces of taboo deformations in m both languages. Several argon known to mystify occurred in Indo-European languages, including the original Proto-Indo-European words for adopt (*rtkos), wolf (*wlkwos), and deer (originally, hart).In different In do-European languages, each of these words has a difficult etymology because of taboo deformations a euphemism was substituted for the original, which no means h atomic number 53y eater. One example in English is donkey substitution the old Indo-European-derived word ass.In some languages of the Pacific, using the name of a deceased chief is a taboo. Amongst Australian Aboriginal sight, it was forbidden to even use the name or the image of the deceased, so that directly the Australian Broadcasting Commission publishes an apology to indigenous people for using names or images of people who stimulate recently died. Since people are often named after e preciseday things, this leads to the swift development of euphemisms. These languages have a very high rate of vocabulary change. (Dyen, Isidore, A.T. crowd J.W.L. Cole. 1967. Language divergence and estimated word safekeeping rate)The Euphemism TreadmillEuphemisms often evolve over time into taboo words themselves, through a ac t upon dubbed the euphemism treadmill by Steven Pinker. (cf. Greshams Law in economics, founded by Sir Thomas Gresham in 1566). This is the well-known linguistic member known as pejoration.Words originally intended as euphemisms may lose their euphemistic value, acquiring the nix connotation of their referents. In some cases, they may be used mockingly and become dysphemistic. For example, the term c oncentration camps, to describe camps used to house civilian prisoners, was used by the British during the Second Boer War, chiefly because it sounded bland and inoffensive. However, after the Third Reich used the expression to describe its death camps, the term gained negative connotation. Since then, overbold terms have been invented for them, such as internment camps, resettlement camps, etc. as well as, in some versions of English, sens room, itself a euphemism, was replaced with bathroom and water closet, which were replaced respectively with restroom and W.C.Connotations easi ly change over time. Idiot, imbecile, and moron were once neutral terms for a soulfulness of toddler, preschool, and primary school mental ages, respectively. As with Greshams law (1566), negative connotations tend to crowd out neutral ones, so the word mentally mentally retarded was pressed into help to replace them. As a result, new terms like mentally challenged or special have replaced retarded. A identical progression occurred withLame c frilled handicapped disabled differently-abled.Although in that case the meaning has also broadened (and hence has been narrowed with adjectives, which themselves have been euphemised) a dyslexic or colorblind person would not be termed crippled. In the early 1960s, Bill Veek, who was missing part of a leg, argued against the then-favored euphemism handicapped, saying he favourite(a) rippled because it was merely descriptive and did not carry connotations of limiting ones capability the way handicapped (and all of its consequent euphe misms) seemed to do.It can apply to naming of racial or ethnic groups as well, when proposed euphemisms become successively corrupted.George Carlin (Propaganda amateur Word games Euphemisms, September 2002) gave a famous monologue of how he thought euphemisms can to a lower placemine assume attitudes towards serious issues such as the evolving terms describing the medical problem of the cumulative mental trauma of soldiers in high stress situationsShell shock (World War I) battle fatigue (World War II) Operational debilitation (Korean War) (Vietnam War).He contended that, as the name of the condition became more complicated and seemingly arcane, sufferers of this condition have been taken less seriously as people with a serious illness, and were given poorer treatment as a result. In the tell(prenominal) routine, he echoed Bill Veeks opinion that crippled was a perfectly valid term (and noted that early English translations of the Bible seemed to have no qualms about sayin g that Jesus corned the cripples).3- Classification of euphemisms. (Wikipedia Encyclopedia, February2007)Many euphemisms fall into one or more of these categories- Terms of foreign and/or proficient origin (derrire, copulation, perspire, urinate, security breach, mierda de toro, prophylactic, feces occur )- Abbreviations (SOB for son of a fightch, BS for bull strapper, TS for tough shit, SOL for shit out of luck, BFD for big fucking deal)- Abbreviations using a phonetic alphabet (Charlie Foxtort for Cluster fuck, Whisky tango Foxtort Oscar for What the fuck, over?, Bravo Sierra for bullshit)- Plays on abbreviations (barbecue sauce for bull shit, sugar honey ice afternoon tea for shit, Maryland farmer for motherfucker, catch (or see) you next Tuesday for cunt)- Use in to the highest degree clinical settings (PITA PT for wo(e) in the ass patient)- Indirections (behind, unmentionables, privates, live together, go to the bathroom, sleep together)- Mispronunciation (goldarnit, dadg ummit, freaking)-Litotes (not exactly thin for fat, not in all truthful for lied, not unlike cheating for cheating)- Changing nouns to modifiers (makes her look slutty for is a slut, right-wing element for right-wing, of Jewish persuasion for jew). There is some disagreement over whether certain terms are or are not euphemisms. For example, sometimes the phrase visually impaired is labeled as a politically straighten out euphemism for blind. However, visual impairment can be a broader term, including, for example, people who have partial sight in one eye, a group that would be excluded by the word blind. There are three antonyms of euphemism dysphemism, cacophemism, and office staff word. The first can be either offensive or merely humorously deprecating with the plunk for one primarily used more often in the sense of something reckonly offensive. The last is used mainly in arguments to make a point seem more correct.4-The evolution of euphemisms.Euphemisms may be formed in a number of ways. (Wikipedia Encyclopedia, February 2007) Periphrasis or circumlocution is one of the most common-to speak around a given word, implying it without saying it. Over time, circumlocutions become recognized as conventional euphemisms for item words or ideas.To alter the pronunciation or spelling of a taboo word (such as a swear word) to form a euphemism is known as taboo deformation. There are an awe-inspiring number of taboo deformations in English, of which many refer to the infamous four-letter words. In American English, words which are un bankable on tv set, such as fuck, may be represented by deformations such as freak even in childrens cartoons. Some examples of Cockney rhyming slang may serve the same purpose-to call a person a berk sounds less offensive than to call him a cunt, though berk is nearsighted for Berkeley Hunt which rhymes with cunt. Bureaucracies such as the military and large corporations often spawn euphemisms of a more see (and to some, mor e sinister) nature. Organizations coin doublespeak expressions to describe objectionable actions in terms that seem neutral or inoffensive. For example, a term used in the past for contamination by radioactive isotopes is Sunshine Units.Military organizations frequently do kill people, sometimes deliberately and sometimes by mistake in doublespeak, the first may be called neutralizing the target and the second collateral damage. Violent destruction of non-state enemies may be referred to as pacification. devil common terms when a soldier is accidentally killed (buys the farm) by their own side are hearty fire or blue on blue (BOBbing) (Buy the farm has its own interesting history).Execution is an established euphemism referring to the act of putting a person to death, with or without judicial process. It originally referred to the execution, i.e. the carrying out, 3f a death warrant, which is an indorsement to a sheriff, prison warden, or other official to put a named person to d eath. In well-grounded usage, execution can still refer to the carrying out of other types of orders for example, in U.S. legal usage, a judicial writ of execution is a direction to enforce a civil money judgment by prehend property. Likewise, lethal injection itself may 3e considered a euphemism for putting the convict to death by poisoning.Industrial unpleasantness such as pollution may be toned down to outgassing or runoff- descriptions of physical processes instead than their minus consequences. Some of this may simply be the application of precise technical terminology in the place of popular usage, but beyond precision, the advantage of technical terminology may be its lack of randy undertones, the disadvantage being the lack of real-life context.5-Euphemisms for the profane. (Wikipedia Encyclopedia, February 2007)Profane words and expressions in the English language are globally taken from three areas religion, excretion, and sex. While profanities themselves have been around for centuries, their limited use in public and by the media has only slowly become socially acceptable, and there are still many expressions which cannot be used in polite conversation. The common marker of acceptability would appear to be use on prime-time television or in the presence of children. The word damn (and most other religious profanity in the English language) has lost its shock value, and as a consequence, euphemisms for it (e.g. dang, darn-it) have taken on a very stodgy feeling. Excretory profanity such as piss and shit may be acceptable in adult conversation (provided that they are used in a literal sense rather than a figurative sense), while euphemisms like Number One and Number Two are preferred for use with children. Most sexual terms and expressions, even technical ones, either remain unacceptable for general use or have undergone radical rehabilitation (penis and vagina, for instance).a- Religious euphemismsEuphemisms for God and Jesus are used by Chris tians to avoid taking the name of God in a vain oath, which would violate one of the Ten Commandments. When praying, Jews will typically use the word Adonai (my master). However, when in a colloquial setting, this is deemed inappropriate, and so typically one replaces the word Adonai with the word HaShem, which literally means, The Name. It is notable that Adonai is itself a word that refers to the Jewish Gods name, but is not the name itself. Traditionally, Jews have seen the name of God as ineffable and thus one that must not be spoken. Even in English, some religious Jews will write God as G-d, in imitation of most Hebrew writing which does not include vowels. Because of this, the name of God in quaint Hebrew writings is transliterated as JHVH, YHVH, or YHWH, the four letters collectively known as the tetragrammaton. The vowels of Gods spoken name are therefore unknown, though such pronunciations as Yahweh and Jehovah are common guesses. Euphemisms for hell, damnation, and the d evil, on the other hand, are often used to avoid invoking the power of the adversary.b- Excretory euphemismsWhile urinate and give are not euphemisms, they are used almost exclusively in a clinical sense. The elemental Anglo-Saxon words for these functions, piss and shit, are considered vulgarities, despite the use of piss in the King James Bible (in Isaiah 3612 and elsewhere). The word manure, referring to animal feces used as fertilizer for plants, literally means worked with the hands, alluding to the mixing of manure with earth. Several zoos market the byproduct of elephants and other large herbivores as menagerie Doo or Zoopoop, and there is a brand of chicken manure available in garden stores under the name Cock-a-Doodle Doo. Similarly, the string of letters BS, or the word bull, often replaces the word bullshit in polite society.There are any numbers of lengthier periphrases for excretion used to excuse oneself from company, such as to gunpowder ones nose or to see a man a bout a horse (or dog). Slang expressions which are neither particularly euphemistic nor dysphemistic, such as take a leak, form a abstract category.c- Sexual euphemismsThe Latin term pudendum and the Greek term (aidoion) for the genitals literally mean shameful thing. construct and crotch refer to a larger region of the body, but are euphemistic when used to refer to the genitals. Euphemisms are more common in reference to sexual practices or orientations, particularly non-heterosexual ones, as shown in this quote from the UK version of Queer as Folk, which includes both euphemisms and dysphemisms regarding male homosexualityBecause Im queer, Im gay, Im homosexual, Im a poof, Im a poofter, Im a ponce, Im a bum boy, batty boy, backside artist, bugger, Im bent, I am that arse bandit, I lift those shirts, Im a faggot-arsed, fudgepackin, shitstabbin uphill gardener. I dine at the downstairs restaurant, I dance at the other end of the ballroom, Im Moses and the parting of the red chee ks. I fuck and am fucked, I suck and am sucked, I rim them and wank them, and all single man has had the fucking time of his life, and Im not a pervert. Virtually all other sexual terms are still considered profane and unacceptable for use even in a euphemistic sense.d- Euphemisms referring to profanity itselfIn the French and Spanish language, words that mean swear word are used as exclamations in lieu of an actual swear word. The Spanish word maldicin, literally meaning curse word, is occasionally used as an interjection of lament or anger, to replace any of several Spanish profanities that would otherwise be used in that same context. In French (especially Canadian French), the word sacre, meaning religious profanity, is sometimes used as a substitute for an actual religious profanity (most commonly sacrament).6-Euphemisms for death. (Wikipedia Encyclopedia, February 2007 Dead and Buried Death Euphemisms, March 2007)The English language contains numerous euphemisms cogitate to dying, death, burial, and the people and places which deal with death. The practice of using euphemisms for death is likely to have originated with the magical belief that to speak the word death was to invite death where to draw Deaths attention is the ultimate bad fortune-a common scheme holds that death is a taboo subject in most English-speaking cultures for precisely this reason. It may be said that one is not dying, but fading quickly because the end is near. People who have died are referred to as having passed away or passed or departed. Deceased is a euphemism for brain dead, and sometimes the deceased is said to have gone to a better place, but this is used primarily among the religious with a concept of Heaven. There are many euphemisms for the dead body, some polite and some profane, as well as dysphemisms such as worm food, or dead meat. The corpse was once referred to as the shroud (or house or tenement) of clay, and modern funerary workers use terms such as the love d one (title of a bracing about Hollywood undertakers by Evelyn Waugh) or the dearly departed. (They themselves have given up the euphemism funeral director for grief therapist, and hold arrangement conferences with relatives.) Among themselves, mortuary technicians often refer to the corpse as the client. A recently dead person may be referred to as the late John Doe. The terms cemetery for graveyard and pioneer for burial are so well-established that most people do not even recognize them as euphemisms. Contemporary euphemisms and dysphemisms for death tend to be quite colorful, and someone who has died is said to have passed away, passed on, checked out, bit the big one, kicked the bucket, bitten the dust, bought the farm, cashed in their chips, croaked, given up the ghost (originally a more courteous term, cf. the death of Jesus as translated in the King James Version of the Bible Mark 1537), gone south, shuffled off this mortal coil (from William Shakespeares Hamlet), or as sumed room temperature. When buried, they may be said to be pushing up daisies or sleeping the big sleep or taking a dirt nap or six feet under. There are hundreds of such expressions in use. (Old Burma-Shave jingle If daisies are your favorite flower, keep pushin up those miles per hour).Euthanasia also attracts euphemisms. One may put one out of ones misery, put one to sleep, or have one put down, the latter two phrases being used primarily with non-humans. There are a few euphemisms for killing which are neither respectful nor playful, but rather clinical and detached. Some examples of this type are terminate, wet work, to take care of one or to take them for a ride, to do them in, to off, frag, smoke, whack or waste someone. To cut loose (from U.S. Sgt. Masseys card of activities during the American occupation of Iraq) or open up on someone, means to shoot at with every available weapon. To terminate with extreme prejudice originally meant to end ones employment without possibi lity of rehire (as opposed to lay off, where the person can expect rehire if business picks up), but now the term usually means kill. Often (though not always) an adjective is added for emphasis. In the movie Apocalypse Now, Captain Willard is told to terminate Colonel Kurtzs commission with extreme prejudice. The Dead parrot Sketch from Monty Pythons Flying Circus contains an extensive list of euphemisms for death, referring to the deceased parrot that the character played by John Cleese purchases (the sketch has led to another euphemism for death pining for the fjords, although in the sketch it was used by the shop owner to mean the parrot was not dead, but was merely quiet and contemplative). A similar passage occurs near the beginning of The Twelve Chairs, where Bezenchuk, the undertaker, astonishes Vorobyaninov with his classification of people by the euphemisms used to speak of their deaths. Also a scene in the film Patch Adams features Patch (Robin Williams) dressed in an ang el costume, reading material out various synonyms and euphemisms for the phrase to die to a man dying of cancer. This evolves into a contest in the midst of the two men to see who can come up with more, and better, euphemisms, ending when Patch comes up with and if we hide you ass up, well have a place to park my bike.7- Euphemism in politics (Doublespeak)What, distinguishes doublespeak from other euphemisms is its deliberate usage by governmental, military, or corporate institutions. Doublespeak is in turn distinguished from jargon in that doublespeak attempts to fog and conceal the truth, while jargon often provides greater precision to those that understand it (while potentially confusing those who do not). An example of the distinction is the use by the military of the word casualties instead of deaths-what may appear to be an attempt to hide the fact that people have been killed is actually a precise way of saying personnel who have been rendered incapable of fighting wheth er by being killed, being badly wounded, being captured in battle, being psychologically damaged, being incapacitated by disease, being rendered ineffective by having essential equipment destroyed, or having been disabled in any other way. Casualties is used instead of deaths, not for propagandists or reasons of squeamishness, but because most casualties are not dead, yet nevertheless useless for waging war.This type of euphemism may be found often in policy debate, such as the use of affordable to mean subsidized or the use of homeland for United States. (Lutz, 1987. Doublespeak From Revenue Enhancement to Terminal Living. How government, business, advertisers, and others use language to deceive you. New York). ordinary examplesWORDEUPHEMISMjanitorcustodiancustodianbuilding engineercrippleddisableddisabledphysically challengedretardedMentally challengedretardedspecial, exceptionalusedsecond-handSecond-handpre-ownedvictimsurvivorDied, deadpassed away, passedOld person ripened citize n, seniorproblemchallengeproblemissueproductsolutionIllegal drugsillegal substances habituationsubstance abusebeggarpanhandlerpanhandlerthe homeless(http//www.nyu.edu/classes/copyXediting/euphemisms.html)