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This week, two readers have asked about the word evil. Efi Gat Mor wondered if it is related to devil but Rebekkah Graves waxed philosophical, thus:
First of all, let's deal with the
etymology. Evil has quite a different history from that of devil
which comes Now to the really interesting stuff. There is a widely held belief that the etymology of a word reveals its "real" meaning. This is just not so. The etymology of a word simply reveals its origins, not its "true" meaning. Words simply do not have secret inner meanings. Meanings are fluid and context-dependent; they are not contained in words but in the minds of those who speak the words. Both of us (Melanie and Mike) think that we know perfectly well what is meant by green until we try to select upholstery material together. Our choice of material is not made any simpler by knowing the word's Indo-European roots. Let us assume, for the sake of argument, that tax-collector is derived from the Armenian word for hemorrhoid (surprisingly, this assertion is not precisely accurate). Would this mean that a modern speaker actually means hemorrhoid whenever he says tax-collector, even if he is consciously unaware of this abstruse nugget of etymology? Surely not. That would suppose (as Rebekkah implies with her "subliminally") that we all possess a subconscious knowledge of the etymology of each word in our vocabulary. If this really were the case then readers of Take Our Word For It could just as profitably take their etymology queries to a psychoanalyst. To find out what someone really means when they use a word just ask them, "What did you really mean by that?". For information on Halloween, check out these web sites: http://www.neopagan.net/Halloween-Origins-text.html and |
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Last Updated 11/04/01 12:26 PM