Languages ‘borrowing’ words from other languages and changing their meaning is common, and English is no exception! Chris Ożóg explores some of the interesting English loanwords, and provides a free lesson activity download for you to use in class.
Picture a mansion. What do you see? A large house and bigger garden, expensive car out front? Staff? Beds made of money in plush penthouse suites? Or a standard apartment block in urban area?
And what’s happening in the following examples? Why do they sound strange?
1. Don’t be serious about me. I think about you all the time.
2. Could you pass me my handy?
3. The police used water cannons at the meeting.
Something is not quite right, but what?
Loans You Don’t Get Back
Let’s start with the picture you have of a mansion. I’m guessing that you didn’t picture an apartment block. If that’s the case, then that’s because you are not Japanese. If you were, you would know that a mansion (マンション, pronounced as man shyon) is an apartment building or condominium. You can well imagine my amazement when I first heard a student tell me they lived in a manshon! Instead of the celebrity parties and luxuries my mind conjured up, the student was in fact telling me that they lived in a flat or apartment.
It might seem like an amazing coincidence that Japanese and English have a word that sounds the same, is related to houses, but means different things. However, there is a simple explanation: the word originally came from English. The word “mansion” was borrowed from English some time in the 1950s and started to be commonly used in Japanese. When one language ‘borrows’ a word from another, the word is known as a loanword or borrowing. So, manshon is an English loanword borrowed into Japanese.
The Language Borrowers
Borrowings like this are common in all languages. English is no exception and borrows words whenever it feels like it. For example, which languages do you think English borrowed the following words from (answers at the end of the post)?
1. Café
2. Amok
3. Shampoo
4. Cosplay
5. Robot
Back to mansion though, it has not only been borrowed – its meaning has also changed. The Japanese meaning has changed a little from the original English meaning. This is what makes it confusing to an English speaker hearing the word in Japanese.
Small changes in meaning are also is what is happening in our three examples from the top. Here’s what they mean:
1. Serious – anxious or worried in Thai
2. Handy – a mobile phone in German
3. Meeting – a street protest or demonstration in Russian
If you read the first examples again now, they’ll make a lot more sense!
English Does it Too
So Thai, German, Japanese and Russian borrow English words and change their meanings, but what about English? Well, English is exactly the same. Take the Japanese drink sake /sɑ:keɪ/, for example. We all know what it is but, ask a Japanese person for sake, and they might be a little confused. But why? It’s a Japanese word, no? Well – yes, and no.
Sake is a Japanese loanword in English. However, in Japanese, sake does not mean sake! In Japanese, sake is the general word for alcohol. The word has come into English as a specific type of alcohol, but to say sake in Japanese you need to say nihon-shu. The meaning has changed a little, but is still related.
The same thing has happened with some of our other English examples from above. Café is originally French and means coffee, while shampoo was borrowed from Hindi and meant to press, knead or soothe (source). English, like other languages, is happy to borrow words, but only if it can also play around with their meanings.
In the Classroom
Loanwords with different meanings are interesting to think about, but they can also be used for an engaging speaking activity. The attached activity outline uses English loanwords in many different languages, including Thai, Polish, and Flemish, as well as the examples above. Try it out in class and let us know how it goes in the comments.
Download the loanwords activity
But don’t be serious about it. You could plan it on your handy. Or in your mansion. Whatever works.
Answers to the loanwords in English question: 1) French, 2) Malay, 3) Hindi, 4) Japanese*, 5) Czech.
*Cosplay was originally borrowed into Japanese from English costume play. It was shortened to cosplay in Japanese and then re-borrowed back into English with the meaning it now has today.
Make sure to check out Chris’s previous article exploring how teachers can learn about their own accents.