Loan translation

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Contents

In linguistics, a calque (pronounced /kælk/) or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal, word-for-word (Latin: "verbum pro verbo") or root-for-root translation.

For example, the common English phrase "flea market" is a phrase calque that literally translates the French "marché aux puces".1

Going in the other direction, from English to French, provides an example of how a compound word may be calqued by first breaking it down into its component roots. The French "gratte-ciel" is a word-coinage inspired by the model of the English "skyscraper" — "gratter" literally translates as "to scrape", and "ciel" translates as "sky".

Used as a verb, "to calque" means to loan-translate from another language so as to create a new lexeme in the target language.

"Calque" itself is a loanword from a French noun, and derives from the verb "calquer" (to copy).2 Loan translation is itself a calque of the German "Lehnübersetzung".3

Proving a word is a calque sometimes requires more documentation than an untranslated loanword, since in some cases a similar phrase might have arisen in both languages independently. This is less likely to be the case when the grammar of the proposed calque is quite different from that of the language proposed to be borrowing, or the calque contains less obvious imagery.

English

From Chinese

101112

From French

From German or Dutch

  • English masterpiece calques either Dutch meesterstuk20 or German Meisterstück 21

From Dutch

From German

From Latin

  • English commonplace calques Latin locus commūnis (referring to a generally applicable literary passage), which itself is a calque of Greek koinos topos44
  • English devil's advocate calques Latin advocātus diabolī, referring to an official appointed to present arguments against a proposed canonization or beatification in the Catholic Church45
  • English wisdom tooth calques Latin dēns sapientiae46
  • English Milky Way calques Latin via lactea47
  • English Rest in Peace calques Latin requiescat in pace48
  • English in a nutshell calques Latin in nuce4950

From Spanish

  • English blue-blood calques Spanish sangre azul51
  • English moment of truth calques Spanish el momento de la verdad, which refers to the time of the final sword thrust in a bullfight.52

From other languages

Latin

  • Latin compassio calques Greek sympathia "sympathy" (Latin: "suffering with", Greek: "suffering together")
  • Latin insectus calques Greek entomos ("insect", from words meaning "to cut into" in the respective languages)55
  • Latin musculus "muscle" (= "common house mouse", literally "little mouse" from mus "mouse") calques Greek mys "muscle" (= "mouse")
  • Latin magnanimus calques Greek megalopsychos (from words meaning "great-souled" in the respective languages)56

Romance Languages

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Examples of Romance language expressions calqued from foreign languages include:

  • French lune de miel, Catalan lluna de mel, Spanish luna de miel, Portuguese lua-de-mel, Italian luna di miele and Romanian luna de miere calque English honeymoon
  • French gratte-ciel, Catalan gratacels, Spanish rascacielos, Portuguese arranha-céus, Romanian zgârie-nori and Italian grattacielo calque English skyscraper
  • French sabot de Denver calques English Denver boot
  • French jardin d'enfants, Spanish jardín de infancia and Portuguese Jardim de infância calque Garden of Infants/children, from German Kindergarten (children's garden)
  • Spanish baloncesto and Italian pallacanestro calque English "basketball"

French

  • French courriel (contraction of courrier électronique) calques English email (contraction of electronic mail)
  • French disque dur calques English hard disk
  • French bienvenue calques English welcome (as if 'well' + 'come'. Eng. 'welcome' is an alt. of O.E. willcyme, willcuma — desired arrival)
  • French carte mère calques English motherboard
  • French en ligne calques English online
  • French haute résolution calques English high resolution
  • French disque compact calques English compact disc
  • French haute fidélité calques English hi-fi (high fidelity)
  • French large bande calques English broadband
  • French modulation de fréquence calques English frequency modulation (FM)
  • French média de masse calques English mass media
  • French surhomme calques German Übermensch (Nietzsche's concept)
  • French OVNI (Objet Volant Non Identifié) calques English UFO (Unidentified Flying Object)
  • In some dialects of French, the English term "weekend" becomes la fin de semaine ("the end of week"), a calque, but in some it is left untranslated as le week-end, a loanword.

Spanish

Many calques found in Southwestern US Spanish, come from English:

  • Spanish escuela alta calques English high school (secundaria or escuela secundaria in Standard Spanish)
  • Spanish grado (de escuela) calques English grade (in school) (nota in Standard Spanish)

See also: Spanglish.

Also technological terms calqued from English are used throughout the Spanish-speaking world:

  • Spanish tarjeta de crédito calques English credit card
  • Spanish alta tecnología calques English high technology
  • Spanish disco compacto calques English compact disc
  • Spanish correo electrónico calques English electronic mail
  • Spanish alta resolución calques English high resolution
  • Spanish enlace calques English link (Internet)
  • Spanish ratón calques English mouse (computer)
  • Spanish en un momento dado calques Dutch op een gegeven moment57

Germanic Languages

 This article does not cite any references or sources.
Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (December 2006)

Afrikaans and Dutch

  • Afrikaans aartappel and Dutch aardappel calque French pomme de terre (English potato "earth apple")
  • Afrikaans besigheid calques English business
  • Afrikaans e-pos calques English e-mail
  • Afrikaans hardeskyf and Dutch harde schijf calque English hard disk
  • Afrikaans klankbaan calques English sound track
  • Afrikaans kleurskuifie calques English colour slide
  • Afrikaans pynappel calques English pineapple calques French pomme de pin
  • Afrikaans sleutelbord calques English keyboard
  • Afrikaans tuisblad calques English homepage
  • Afrikaans wolkekrabber and Dutch wolkenkrabber calque English skyscraper

German

  • Fernsehen from "television"
  • Fernsprecher from "telephone"
    • This term, as well as the corresponding fernsprechen (verb: to [tele]phone [so.]), has been on the retreat in recent years in favor of (orthographically normalized) Telefon.
  • Fußball from "football", referring specifically to association football
  • German Teddybär calques English teddy bear

Icelandic

  • Icelandic rafmagn, "electricity," is a half-calqued coinage that literally means "amber power."
    • raf translates the Greek root ηλεκτρον (elektron), which means "amber"
    • magn, "power," is descriptive of electricity's nature but not a direct calque from the source word "electricity"

Norwegian

  • barnehage (kindergarten) calques German Kindergarten (Kinder "children", Garten "garden").58
  • hjemmeside calques English home page.59
  • hjerneflukt (brain drain) calques English brain drain.60
  • idiotsikker (foolproof) calques English "foolproof".61
  • loppemarked (flea market) calcques English flea market and French marché aux puces ("market with fleas").62
  • mandag (Monday), from Old Norse mánadagr ("moon day") calques Latin dies lunae.63 The name of every day of the week, except lørdag (Saturday), are loan-translations from Latin.
  • overhode (head of a family, chief) calques German Oberhaupt (ober "over", Haupt "head").64
  • samvittighet (conscience) calques Latin (through Low German) conscientia (com "with", scire "to know").65
    • From sam- (co-) and vittig (today meaning "funny" but which stems from Low German, where it meant "reasonable", related to "vite" (to know) and English "wit".)
  • tenåring (teen, teenager), is from Swedish tonåring, which calques English teenager.66

Swedish

  • skyskrapa calques sky-scraper.
  • huvudkvarter calques head quarters.

Slavic languages

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Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unverifiable material may be challenged and removed. (July 2008)

Macedonian

  • Macedonian ракопис (rakopis) calques Latin-derived 'manuscript' and 'handwriting':
    • Mac. root рака (raka) = Lat. manus = 'hand'
    • Mac. root пис- (pis-) = Lat. scribo = 'to write'
  • Macedonian правопис (pravopis) calques Greek-derived 'orthography':
    • Mac. root право (pravo) = Gr. ορθός (orthos) = 'correct';
    • Mac. root пис- (pis-) = Gr. γράφειν (graphein) = 'to write'
  • Macedonian православие (pravoslavie) calques Greek-derived 'orthodoxy':
    • Mac. root право (pravo) = Gr. ορθός (orthos) = 'correct';
    • Mac. root славие (slavie) = Gr. δοξα (doxa) = 'glorification'

In more recent times, the Macedonian language has calqued new words from other prestige languages including German, French and English.

  • Macedonian натчовек (natčovek) = calques German-derived 'overman' (Übermensch)
    • Mac. root над- (nad-) = Ger. über = 'over'
    • Mac. root човек (čovek, man) = Ger. mensch = 'people'
  • Macedonian облакодер (oblakoder) = calques English skyscraper:
    • Mac. root облак (oblak, cloud)
    • Mac. root дере (dere, to flay)
  • Macedonian клучен збор (klučen zbor) = calques English keyword:
    • Mac. root клуч (kluč, key)
    • Mac. root збор (zbor, word)

Some words were originally calqued into Russian and then absorbed into Macedonian, considering the close relatedness of the two languages. Therefore, many of these calques can also be considered Russianisms.

Russian

The poet Aleksandr Pushkin (1799–1837) was perhaps the most influential among the Russian literary figures who would transform the modern Russian language and vastly expand its ability to handle abstract and scientific concepts by importing the sophisticated vocabulary of Western intellectuals.

Although some Western vocabulary entered the language as loanwords — e.g., Italian salvietta, "napkin," was simply Russified in sound and spelling to салфетка (salfetka) — Pushkin and those he influenced most often preferred to render foreign borrowings into Russian by calquing. Compound words were broken down to their component roots, which were then translated piece-by-piece to their Slavic equivalents. But not all of the coinages caught on and became permanent additions to the lexicon; for example, любомудрие (ljubomudrie) was promoted by 19th-century Russian intellectuals as a calque of "philosophy," but the word eventually fell out of fashion, and modern Russian instead uses the loanword философия (filosofija).

  • Russian любомудрие (ljubomudrie) calqued Greek-derived 'philosophy':
    • Russ. root любить (ljubit' ) = Gr. φιλεῖν (filein) = 'to love';
    • Russ. root мудрость (mudrost' ) = Gr. σοφία (sofia) = 'wisdom'
  • Russian зависимость (zavisimost' ) calques Latin-derived 'dependence':
    • Russ. root за (za) = Lat. de = 'down from'
    • Russ. root висеть (viset' ) = Lat. pendere = 'to hang; to dangle'
  • Russian полуостров (poluostrov) calques German Halbinsel, both meaning 'peninsula':
    • Russ. root полу- (polu-) = Ger. halb = 'half; semi-'
    • Russ. root остров (ostrov) = Ger. Insel = 'island'
  • Russian детский сад (detskij sad) calques German Kindergarten, both literally suggesting 'children's garden'

Ukrainian

  • велике спасибі (velyke spasybi) calques Russian большое спасибо (bol'shoe spasibo), both literally "a big thank-you"

Greek

  • Διαδίκτυο from English Internet
  • Τηλεόραση from Television
  • Γύρος from Turkish Döner Kebap

Finnish

Since Finnish, a Finno-Ugric language, differs radically in pronunciation and orthography from Indo-European languages, most loans adopted in Finnish either are calques or soon become such as foreign words are translated into Finnish. Examples include:

  • from Greek: sarvikuono (rhinoceros, from Greek "rinokeros"),
  • from Latin: viisaudenhammas (wisdom tooth, from Latin "dens sapientiae"),
  • from English: jalkapallo (English "football", specifically referring to association football),
  • from English: koripallo (English "basketball"),
  • from English: kovalevy (English "hard disk"),
  • from French: kirpputori (flea market, French "marché aux puces"),
  • from German: lastentarha (German "Kindergarten"),
  • from German: panssarivaunu (German "Panzerwagen"),
  • from Swedish: moottoritie (highway, from Swedish "motorväg"),
  • from Chinese: aivopesu (brainwash, from Chinese "xi nao"),
  • from Spanish: siniverinen (blue-blooded, from Spanish "de sangre azul")

Hebrew

When Jews make an aliyah to Israel, they sometimes change their name to a Hebrew calque. For instance, Imi Lichtenfield, founder of the martial art Krav Maga, became Imi Sde-Or. Both last names mean "light field".

  • mesilat barzel (railway) from German Eisenbahn
  • iton (newspaper) from German and Yiddish zeitung
  • tappuach adamah (potato) from French pomme-de-terre
  • gan yeladim from German Kindergarten
  • kaduregel (כדורגל) (football, specifically association football) from English football

See also

References

  1. ^ a b flea market. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  2. ^ calque. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  3. ^ Robb: German English Words germanenglishwords.com
  4. ^ brainwashing. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  5. ^ [1]
  6. ^ long time no see: Information and Much More from Answers.com
  7. ^ [2]
  8. ^ lose face - Definitions from Dictionary.com
  9. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  10. ^ Novotná, Z., "Contributions to the Study of Loan-Words and Hybrid Words in Modern Chinese", Archiv Orientalni, (Prague), No. 35 (1967), pp. 613–648. (In English; examples of loan words and calques in Chinese)
  11. ^ Novotná, Z., "Contributions to the Study of Loan-Words and Hybrid Words in Modern Chinese", Archiv Orientalni, (Prague), No. 36 (1968), pp. 295–325. (In English; examples of loan words and calques in Chinese)
  12. ^ Novotná, Z., "Contributions to the Study of Loan-Words and Hybrid Words in Modern Chinese", Archiv Orientalni, (Prague), No. 37 (1969), pp. 48–75. (In English; examples of loan words and calques in Chinese)
  13. ^ Adam's apple. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  14. ^ free verse. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  15. ^ old guard. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  16. ^ Lynch, Guide to Grammar and Style — N
  17. ^ new wave. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  18. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  19. ^ Foreign Words. Fowler, H. W. 1908. The King's English
  20. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  21. ^ masterpiece. Dictionary.com. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition. Houghton Mifflin Company, 2004. Accessed 2008-11-17.
  22. ^ Plant Info O-R
  23. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  24. ^ antibody. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  25. ^ English in Europe by Manfred Görlach
  26. ^ beer garden. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  27. ^ concertmaster - Definitions from Dictionary.com
  28. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  29. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  30. ^ heldentenor - Definitions from Dictionary.com
  31. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  32. ^ loanword - Definitions from Dictionary.com
  33. ^ a b German Loan Words in English M-Z
  34. ^ superman. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  35. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  36. ^ standpoint. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  37. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  38. ^ storm trooper. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  39. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  40. ^ "thought experiment." Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary. 2008. Accessed 2008-11-17.
  41. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  42. ^ worldview. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  43. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  44. ^ commonplace. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  45. ^ devil's advocate. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  46. ^ wisdom tooth. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  47. ^ Milky Way. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  48. ^ RIP. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  49. ^ in a nutshell - Definitions from Dictionary.com
  50. ^ Pliny VII.21
  51. ^ blue blood. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  52. ^ moment of truth. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  53. ^ gospel. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: Fourth Edition. 2000
  54. ^ Online Etymology Dictionary
  55. ^ Webster's Third New International Dictionary
  56. ^ http://medicalsciences.med.unsw.edu.au/somsweb.nsf/resources/histology02/$file/AnatomyGlossary2004_V2.pdf
  57. ^ Cruijff de film
  58. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker
  59. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker
  60. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker
  61. ^ Ordnett.no - Ordbok
  62. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker
  63. ^ Ordnett.no - Ordbok
  64. ^ Ordnett.no - Ordbok
  65. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker
  66. ^ Søk i elektroniske ordbøker

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