5 ms·

The reason it seems funny to see the word "stuff" in a scientific essay is that it's very much not a French-derived word. French-speaking people ruled England f

by raldi 13y ago

The reason it seems funny to see the word "stuff" in a scientific essay is that it's very much not a French-derived word. French-speaking people ruled England for a while starting in the year 1066, and quite quickly in that region the use of French-derived English words became seen as a sign of high class. That sort of thing, once strongly established, becomes self-perpetuating. That's why, even today, a police officer might say in court, "I observed the individual in the vicinity of the canine" whereas among family the officer might be much more likely to say, "I saw the man near the dog." The first sentence is full of French. The second, Anglo-Saxon. It's the same reason we eat beef and pork, but raise cows and pigs. The people eating the meat were upper class and thus used the French-derived words; the people taking care of the animals used Anglo-Saxon.

rodgerd 13y ago
> French-speaking people ruled England for a while starting in the year 1066 Norman French speaking people. Normandy had been heavily colonised by the Norse, just as Anglo-Saxon England had, and left it quite different to French. Harold had as many connections to Scandanavian royalty as William. Attempts to Latinise Englist are still going strong; any time you hear some folk grammaticist inveigh against split infinitives as "bad English", you're hearing someone who is continuing the 19th Century efforts to Latinise the languae.
ErsatzVerkehr 13y ago
The Google etymology thing (I didn't even know it existed - just search for "stuff etymology" and you get a nice little graph) tells me that the word "stuff" came to English from Greek (stuphein) via Old French (estoffe). So maybe it is not correct to say it's not a French-derived word? But it's also present in German- stoff means something like "material". Amusingly, there's a wikipedia article titled "List of stoffs". The elements have names like Wasserstoff = water stuff = hydrogen. In the attached essay (which claims to be written without German derivatives), it seems strange to prefer "waterstuff" to the very Greek "hydrogen"... ?
- StavrosK 13y ago
  "Atomic" is Greek too, so I don't know why they chose to use one Greek-derived word but not the other.
- friendstock 13y ago
  Correction: The attached essay claims to be written without NON-German derivatives.
  - ErsatzVerkehr 13y ago
    Ahhh - now it makes so much more sense. :-)
- arethuza 13y ago
  For some reason this discussion sent me off to try and find the origin of "loons" and "quines" - the terms for "boys" and "girls" in the dialect of Scots English I am familiar with. "Quine" seems to be based on "quean" but "loon" seems a mystery! NB Referring to someone as a "loonie" is not derogatory - but just means they are a young boy :-)
  - smcl 13y ago
    "Loon" and "Quine" aren't even Scots English, I suspect you'd get funny looks if you used either in Edinburgh or Glasgow. Each are very much "Doric" (the dialect of Aberdeen\shire) words. edit: I recognise your name from another post and remember that you're from Scotland so you probaby know this already :)
- CDokolas 13y ago
  I can't find a reference to "stuff" having a Greek root, and can't think of any either (knowing enough Greek myself).
  - schoen 13y ago
    I find the suggestion surprising myself, given how Germanic the German term sounds to me, but I decided to check in Kluge's Etymologisches Wörterbuch der Deutschen Sprache for the etymology of German "Stoff". Kluge says that it came from Middle Dutch "stoffe", which got it from Old French "estoffe", which had a sense of 'cloth, mesh, fabric (especially of silk)'. He says the word's "economic background" is the importation of silkworms and silk weaving from Byzantium ("where Justinian had brought them in 552 from the Orient") via Sicily and North Italy to France and Flanders, and that the "assumed" etymology of the word in Greek στυφειν can thus be "supported on grounds of cultural history". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_silk#Spread_of_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_silk#Spread_of_prod... But other etymological dictionaries say that the origin of the Old French term is uncertain and may not come from Greek.
toyg 13y ago
The difference with formal language is not just due to Norman rulers: across the whole of Europe for almost 2000 years, the language of Law was Latin and lawyers were educated by (mostly Catholic) Latin-speaking clerics. You can observe the same difference between "vulgar" and "formal" modes in French, Italian, Spanish and probably most other continental languages as well. 'Vulgar' would evolve quickly and absorb influences from all over (invading armies, temporary rulers, fads etc), but formal language would stick to Latin words or their closest local equivalent. This was absolutely necessary at a time when national identities and linguistic cores had not been firmly established and two neighbouring towns might be talking completely different languages for various reasons (even just out of spite for each other).
- groovy2shoes 13y ago
  Yup. In both cases, this is called 'prestige'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics)
- pseingatl 13y ago
  Do you know about Law French? Have you ever seen the Selden Society reports? Before 1600, the law was primarily written in Law French in the UK, a language somewhere between English and French but definitely not Latin.
fsck--off 13y ago
English words derived from French are usually longer then similar words derived from Anglo-Saxon. Bad or insecure writers and speakers, especially when they are members of the middle class, will often assume that using words with many syllables will make them sound smarter and more eloquent. The police officer would prefer the first sentence because it has more syllables, not because it has many words derived from French. He would likely say that he "utilized" his training, instead of "used", even though "use" and "utilize" both derive from French.
- vorg 13y ago
  For talking to (or teaching) non-native English speakers in English, using the Norman-derived verbs can often be useful for avoiding 2-word phrasal verbs (and 3-word prepositional verbs). Many learners of English understand "put" but don't understand "put off", "put up", and "put up with", so saying "postpone", "accommodate", and "tolerate" can help with communication where the objective of the conversation (or lesson) is something else.

by raldi 13y ago

rodgerd 13y ago

> French-speaking people ruled England for a while starting in the year 1066 Norman French speaking people. Normandy had been heavily colonised by the Norse, just as Anglo-Saxon England had, and left it quite different to French. Harold had as many connections to Scandanavian royalty as William. Attempts to Latinise Englist are still going strong; any time you hear some folk grammaticist inveigh against split infinitives as "bad English", you're hearing someone who is continuing the 19th Century efforts to Latinise the languae.

ErsatzVerkehr 13y ago

The Google etymology thing (I didn't even know it existed - just search for "stuff etymology" and you get a nice little graph) tells me that the word "stuff" came to English from Greek (stuphein) via Old French (estoffe). So maybe it is not correct to say it's not a French-derived word? But it's also present in German- stoff means something like "material". Amusingly, there's a wikipedia article titled "List of stoffs". The elements have names like Wasserstoff = water stuff = hydrogen. In the attached essay (which claims to be written without German derivatives), it seems strange to prefer "waterstuff" to the very Greek "hydrogen"... ?

StavrosK 13y ago
"Atomic" is Greek too, so I don't know why they chose to use one Greek-derived word but not the other.
friendstock 13y ago
Correction: The attached essay claims to be written without NON-German derivatives.
- ErsatzVerkehr 13y ago
  Ahhh - now it makes so much more sense. :-)
arethuza 13y ago
For some reason this discussion sent me off to try and find the origin of "loons" and "quines" - the terms for "boys" and "girls" in the dialect of Scots English I am familiar with. "Quine" seems to be based on "quean" but "loon" seems a mystery! NB Referring to someone as a "loonie" is not derogatory - but just means they are a young boy :-)
- smcl 13y ago
  "Loon" and "Quine" aren't even Scots English, I suspect you'd get funny looks if you used either in Edinburgh or Glasgow. Each are very much "Doric" (the dialect of Aberdeen\shire) words. edit: I recognise your name from another post and remember that you're from Scotland so you probaby know this already :)
CDokolas 13y ago
I can't find a reference to "stuff" having a Greek root, and can't think of any either (knowing enough Greek myself).
- schoen 13y ago
  I find the suggestion surprising myself, given how Germanic the German term sounds to me, but I decided to check in Kluge's Etymologisches Wörterbuch der Deutschen Sprache for the etymology of German "Stoff". Kluge says that it came from Middle Dutch "stoffe", which got it from Old French "estoffe", which had a sense of 'cloth, mesh, fabric (especially of silk)'. He says the word's "economic background" is the importation of silkworms and silk weaving from Byzantium ("where Justinian had brought them in 552 from the Orient") via Sicily and North Italy to France and Flanders, and that the "assumed" etymology of the word in Greek στυφειν can thus be "supported on grounds of cultural history". https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_silk#Spread_of_production https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_silk#Spread_of_prod... But other etymological dictionaries say that the origin of the Old French term is uncertain and may not come from Greek.

toyg 13y ago

The difference with formal language is not just due to Norman rulers: across the whole of Europe for almost 2000 years, the language of Law was Latin and lawyers were educated by (mostly Catholic) Latin-speaking clerics. You can observe the same difference between "vulgar" and "formal" modes in French, Italian, Spanish and probably most other continental languages as well. 'Vulgar' would evolve quickly and absorb influences from all over (invading armies, temporary rulers, fads etc), but formal language would stick to Latin words or their closest local equivalent. This was absolutely necessary at a time when national identities and linguistic cores had not been firmly established and two neighbouring towns might be talking completely different languages for various reasons (even just out of spite for each other).

groovy2shoes 13y ago
Yup. In both cases, this is called 'prestige'. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prestige_(sociolinguistics)
pseingatl 13y ago
Do you know about Law French? Have you ever seen the Selden Society reports? Before 1600, the law was primarily written in Law French in the UK, a language somewhere between English and French but definitely not Latin.

fsck--off 13y ago

English words derived from French are usually longer then similar words derived from Anglo-Saxon. Bad or insecure writers and speakers, especially when they are members of the middle class, will often assume that using words with many syllables will make them sound smarter and more eloquent. The police officer would prefer the first sentence because it has more syllables, not because it has many words derived from French. He would likely say that he "utilized" his training, instead of "used", even though "use" and "utilize" both derive from French.

vorg 13y ago
For talking to (or teaching) non-native English speakers in English, using the Norman-derived verbs can often be useful for avoiding 2-word phrasal verbs (and 3-word prepositional verbs). Many learners of English understand "put" but don't understand "put off", "put up", and "put up with", so saying "postpone", "accommodate", and "tolerate" can help with communication where the objective of the conversation (or lesson) is something else.