Abstract
The term ‘loan-word’ is used to denote a word taken from a foreign language and used as though it were native to the language into which it has been borrowed. A widespread belief crops up from time to time in several languages that the use of loan-words is in some way discreditable. The French have coined the blend-word franglais to denote a variety of French that has too many English loan-words, and admirers of German describe it as ‘pure’ because it uses compound words made up of native elements to express many ideas for which we, in English, use loan-words.
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Notes
See Otto Jespersen, Growth and Structure of the English Language (Blackwell, eighth edition, 1935) ch. V.
Mary S. Serjeantson, A History of Foreign Words in English (Kegan Paul, 1935) ch. V.
J. A. Sheard, The Words We Use (Andre Deutsch, 1954) ch. VI.
Leo Rosten, The Joys of Yiddish (Penguin, 1971) pp. xiii f.
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© 1981 G. L. Brook
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Brook, G.L. (1981). Loan-words. In: Words in Everyday Life. St Antony’s. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-03394-2_2
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-03394-2_2
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
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