Linguistic Similarities?

[debka_notion]

In the course of looking for definitions of love for my latest website project (Sparked by something Efi wrote, go figure), I was just reading some random stuff online, which was talking about how one older Greek word for "to kiss" (I originally wrote "kissing", but then I'd have to match it with the same sort of verbal noun later on, and "impregnating" just sounds Odd.) fell out of use because it sounded too much like the verb "to impregnate". I seem to remember a similar issue in French. Oh you linguists out there- know you if this is a common problem? (Either having those words sound alike, or having the slang for one mean the other) Any ideas if this might have something to do with actual etymology, or just coincidence?

Comments

[belu.livejournal.com]

Not offhand, but what's the data?

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

"Make love to" certainly doesn't mean what it used to. And there are those words in the Torah that you can't read out loud anymore...

[fleurdelis28.livejournal.com]

Also -- in terms of shifting meaning, that may occur because one is used for a euphamism for the other, and eventually the legal fiction aspect wore through.

[belu.livejournal.com]

And, of course, these days, you can sleep with someone without actually sleeping, but you can't sleep with them without having sex with them.

[lordameth.livejournal.com]

Doubt it's of any help, but i felt the need to contribute anyway;

as far as I'm aware, most of the common Japanese words for such things come directly from the English - words like "sekusu", "fakku", "kisu". The word for impregnate, interestingly enough, literally comes from "to imbue with life".

I've definitely heard of people having issues with the Japanese word for..um.. girl parts... sounding too much like far more everyday words. But anyway.

[chinchillama.livejournal.com]

Just to add to the confusion-
a classics prof told my class that the term pigs/piglets in reference to girls carried the conotation of our cat like applelation... ahhh, changing slang

Spanish

[thevortex.livejournal.com]

Besar: to kiss
Embarazar: to impregnate

Not entirely dissimilar.

*avoids making fun of Macs* :P

Huzzah!

The Vortex

[tirerim.livejournal.com]

Yeah, this definitely happens, occasionally, though I don't think it's that major in terms of vacabulary shifts. The best example I know of today is 'niggardly' in English, which is just about impossible to use anymore because of its resemblance to the n-word, despite a complete lack of etymological relation. Of course, in some cases the words might be etymologically related, if one word split into two meanings, one of them better than the other, but they continued to sound alike. I can't think of any examples of this off the top of my head, but there are similar cases, like 'queen' and 'cunt' (which both come from the same Old English word), and 'hussy' and 'housewife', which both come from OE 'huswif' -- it originally just meant 'wife', but then came to mean (and to be pronounced) 'hussy', sometime after which 'housewife' was derived from the original form as a replacement.

[shekkichebaz.livejournal.com]

an interesting example of an inverse of this would be cockney 'rhyming' slang. words are used specifically because that word or part of a commonly used phrase containing that word sound like a different more common word.