70, 71, 72. Shakespeare, in a pickle

We all know that Shakespeare was an amazing and influential writer. We all study his works in school and can recite some of his more famous lines when prompted. Basically, anyone who does not know Shakespeare or at least one of his works must be an incredibly sheltered person.

But exactly how influential were Shakespeare's writings? A quick look at the book Brush Up Your Shakespeare would show us a surprising amount of simple, everyday words and phrases we use. Some of these phrases include full circle, the makings of, seen better days, and a sorry sight. However, as popular as these phrases are, a good portion of the ones we use every day have slightly altered meanings than they originally did when taken out of context from Shakespeare's works. For example, while sweets for my sweet has amorous undertones, the phrase had an entirely different meaning in Hamlet; they were originally funeral flowers.

One of my favorite phrases to use is in a pickle. I always found it a humorous phrase to use (why would being in a difficult position mean I'm inside a pickle?!) When I was little, I always thought it should be in a pickle jar because of how hard to open those things are. To be "in a pickle" means you are in a "quandary or difficult position." A long time ago, a pickle was a spicy sauce made to go with meats. In the 16th century, pickle was also used to name a preservative that was made from a mixture of spiced, salt vinegar. Eventually, in the 17th century, we began to call the vegetables that were being preserved in this sauce (cucumbers or gherkins) pickles. So to say that you are in a pickle does not mean that you are inside the vegetable, but rather you are inside the mix-- you are as mixed up and disoriented as the veggies that make up the pickle. Shakespeare first used this phrase in The Tempest, from 1610.

Sources:
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/phrases-sayings-shakespeare.html
     http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/in-a-pickle.html

Vernon, Jennifer. "Shakespeare's Coined Words Now Common Currency." National Geographic News.  National Geographic., 22 Apr, 2004. Web. 26 Apr 2011.

43, 44, 45. Clippings, Coinage, and Morphological Misanaylsis

Not too long ago, we learned the origins of the term, "nickname." The term used to be "ekename," which was a compound word for "additional name." The misunderstanding of the phrase "an ekename" led to it becoming "a nekename." Now we simply know it as a nickname.

This totally blew my mind. I raised my hand and said that I always thought that it was called a nickname because you were "nicking" a part from your name. For example, my name is Samantha but I go by Sam. I thought my 'nickname' was Sam because I "nicked" it from Samantha. Doctor Howard reminded me that 'Sam' from 'Samantha' is an example of a clipping, and that my misunderstanding was a great example of a morphological misanalysis.

A clipping is exactly what it sounds like-- a shortening of a longer word into a smaller one. Like Sam from Samantha, or exam from examination. A morphological misanalysis, or false/folk etymology, is when a word or phrase is misheard or misanalyzed (like my misunderstanding of why we call it a 'nickname'). This happens a lot in songs; we mishear the lyrics and so we think the song says something entirely different (I get made fun of for this all the time). Other examples (provided in our course-pack) would be take it for granite instead of take it for granted, or chester drawers from chest of drawers (this was one I said when I was little, except I think I said cheshire-- ironically enough, I had a set of drawers that had Alice in Wonderland characters on it).

Thinking about all of this reminded me of my earlier entry about southern accents and the "pop versus soda" debate. I used to say coke instead of pop or soda, and I thought maybe this was a morphological misanalysis on my part when I was young. But I quickly realized that it was not this but another English word formation process-- coinage.

In North Carolina, every soft drink was called a coke, not just Coca-Cola. Just like we tend to call all tissue Kleenex, or instead of saying we're going to copy it, we are going to xerox it. This seems like the same thing to me.

It is really interesting (and oddly exciting) to discover a term for something I said in my childhood.