Shopping on line can be easy, simple and save you lots of money. It can also take a lot of your time, frustrate you, and result in unwanted purchases. Now the same can be said for regular high street shopping, but with the vast opportunity presented by the Internet it will pay you to spend a few minutes reading this and understanding how to better optimize your Calque shopping experience:
1. Compare - without doubt the biggest advantage that the Calque offers shoppers today is the ability to compare thousands of Calque at a time. This is a great thing, but not necessarily all the time! Too much can be daunting at times so take advantage of the great comparison sites and where possible let them do the hard work for you.
2. Research - if it has been said it will be on the internet. Ignorance is no longer a justifiable reason for buying the wrong thing. Take the time to research in detail everything that you could possible want to know about
3. Testimonials - don't know anybody that has bought a Calque? Wrong! If the Calque is good the internet will let you know. Use the Internet as a friend and get testimonials before you buy.
4. Questions - Got a question about Calque then search the Forums, FAQ's, Blogs etc. Don't be afraid to ask .....
5. Reputation - Never heard of the company selling Calque? Don't worry, no reason why you should know every company in the world, but you know someone that does! Use the internet to find out what people are saying about Calque and build up a picture of their reputation for sales, returns, customer service, delivery etc.
6. Returns - still worried that even after all of the above your Calque wont be what you want? Check out the returns policy. There is so much competition now that someone, somewhere is bound to offer the terms that you are comfortable with.
7. Feedback - happy with your Calque then let people know, after all you are depending on others people input in your buying decision, so why not give a little back.
8. Security - check for the yellow padlock on the Calque site before you buy, and the s after http:/ /i.e. https:// = a secure site
9. Contact - got a question about Calque, or want to leave a comment then check out the sites contact page. Reputable companies have them and respond.
10. Payment - ready to pay for your Calque, then use your credit card or PayPal! Be aware of companies that don't accept them, there may be genuine reasons but given the huge amount of choice you have when buying online there is no reason at all not to buy via credit card or PayPal.
In
linguistics, a
calque (International Phonetic Alphabet ) 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.
The common English language phrase "
flea market" is a phrase calque that literally translates the French language "
marché aux puces"
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 "scrape", and "
ciel" translates "sky".
Used as a
verb, "to
calque" means to loan translation 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"). "Loan translation" is itself a calque of the German language "
Lehnübersetzung".
To prove that a word is a calque sometimes requires more documentation than an untranslated loanword, since in some cases it's quite conceivable that a similar phrase could have arisen in both languages independently. This is less so 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
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)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)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)
From French
- English Adam's apple calques French pomme d'Adam
- English bushmeat calques French language viande de brousse
- English by heart (or off by heart) calques French par cœur
- English Governor-General calques French Gouverneur Général
- English free verse calques French vers libre
- English old guard calques French Vieille Garde (the Imperial Guard of Napoleon I)
- English flea market calques French marché aux puces
- English in his/her prime (in the early days) calques French dans sa primeur
- English marriage of convenience calques French mariage de convenance
- English British New Wave (artistic period) calques French Nouvelle Vague
- English rhinestone calques French caillou du Rhin "Rhine pebble"
- English that goes without saying calques French cela va sans dire
Teuto-Dutch
- English underwrite calques either Dutch onderschrift or German unterschrift
- English masterpiece calques either Dutch meesterstuk or German Meisterstück
From Dutch
- English superconductor calques Dutch suprageleider
From German
- English Alzheimer's disease calques German Alzheimer Krankheit
- English antibody calques German Antikörper
- English Arons tube calques German Aronssche Röhre
- English back-formation calques German Rückbildung (lit. "Back building") English in Europe by Manfred Görlach
- English ball lightning calques German Kugelblitz English in Europe by Manfred Görlach
- English beer garden calques German Biergarten
- English Braun tube calques German Braunsche Röhre
- English concertmaster and concertmeister calque German Konzertmeister
- English Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease calques German Creutzfeldt-Jakob-Krankheit
- English transvestitism calques German Transvestismus
- English Diesel engine calques German Diesel motor
- English flamethrower calques German Flammenwerfer' '
- English foreword calques German Vorwort, which itself calques Latin præfatio (from præ-" "before" plus fari "speak") "preface"
- English Geiger counter calques German Geigerzähler
- English heroic tenor calques German Heldentenor
- English intelligence quotient calques German Intelligenz-quotient
- English loan translation calques German Lehnübersetzung
- English loanword calques German Lehnwort
- English mercury vapor lamp calques German Quecksilberdampflampe
- English overman and superman (i.e., self-transcending human) calque German Übermensch
- English pregnancy test calques German Schwangerschaftstest
- English power politics calques German Machtpolitik
- English rainforest calques German Regenwald
- English sports shoe, and athletic shoe calques German Sportschuh
- English standpoint (point of view) calques German Standpunkt
- English superego (formed from Latin super- "over, above" plus ego "I") calques German über-Ich "over-I"
- English stormtroopers calques German Sturmtruppen
- English subliminal (formed from Latin sub-, "below", plus limin (genitive liminis, "threshold") calques German unter der Schwelle, "beneath the threshold"
- English thought experiment calques German Gedankenexperiment
- English watershed calques German Wasserscheide
- English worldview calques German Weltanschauung
- English world war calques German Weltkrieg
From Latin
- English commonplace calques Latin locus commūnis (referring to a generally applicable literary passage), which itself is a calque of Greek koinos topos
- 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 Church
- English wisdom tooth calques Latin dēns sapientiae
- English Milky Way calques Latin via lactea
- English in a nutshell calques Latin in nuce ; see Pliny VII.21
- English Saturday partially calques Latin Diēs Saturnī day of Saturn
Note: the Latin planetary names, as found in the names of the weekdays, in turn calque the Greek names, which calque the ancient Babylonian names (e.g. Friday, and the planet Venus, were named after Freia. See .)
From Spanish
- English Nobility calques Spanish language
- English moment of truth calques Spanish which refers to the time of the final sword thrust in a bullfight.
From other languages
- English gospel calques Greek language evangelion (good news)
- English High King calques Irish language and Scottish Gaelic Ard Ri
- English pea jacket or pea coat calques North Frisian language pijekkat
- English side-sword calques Italian language spada da lato, referring to a versatile one-handed sword of 16th and 17th century Europe.
Latin
- Latin compassio calques Greek sympathia "sympathy" (Latin: "suffering with", Greek: "suffering together")
- Latin insectus calques Greek entomos
- Latin musculus "muscle" (= "common house mouse", literally "little mouse" from mus "mouse") calques Greek mys "muscle" (= "mouse")
- Latin magnanimus calques Greek μεγαλοψυχος (megalopsuchos)
- Lat. root magnus = Gr. μεγαλος (megalos) = "great; large"
- Lat. root animus = Gr. ψυχη (psuchē) = "soul"
Romance Languages
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 abd Romanian luna de miere calque English honeymoon
- French gratte-ciel, Catalan gratacels, Spanish rascacielos, Portuguese arranha-céus 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)
French
- French courriel (contraction of courrier électronique) calques English email (electronic mail)
- French disque dur calques English hard disk
- 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 School grades (US) (nivel in Standard Spanish)
- Spanish colegio calques English college (universidad in Standard Spanish; colegio, in standard Spanish, is synonymous with escuela and means school)
- Spanish librería calques English library (biblioteca in Standard Spanish; librería in Standard Spanish means bookshop)
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 E-mail
- Spanish alta resolución calques English high resolution
- Spanish enlace calques English link (Internet)
- Spanish sitio web calques English web site
- Spanish página web calques English web page
- Spanish ratón calques English Mouse (computing)
Germanic Languages
Afrikaans and Dutch
- Afrikaans aartappel and Dutch language aardappel calque French pomme de terre ("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"
The latter, as well as the corresponding
fernsprechen (verb:
to phone ), has been on the retreat in recent years in favor of (orthographically normalized)
Telefon.
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"
Slavic languages
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. φιλειν (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"
- необхідний (neobkhidnyj) calques Russian необходимый (neobkhodimyj), both meaning "necessary"
Finnish
- Germanic passive agent marker — There is no passive voice in Finnish language, but an impersonal, where the agent is never mentioned. Due to the influence of Germanic languages, the word toimesta "from the action" has been constructed in order to mention the agent, i.e. to function like the word "by". (It is impossible to translate the word "by" itself, because there is no direct equivalent.) For example, "Lentokonetta lennetään ohjaajan toimesta", approximately "The plane is being flown, from the action of the pilot." This is grammatically incorrect, but used abundantly in legal documents and sloppy translations.
- Swedish language future marker kommer att or German werden calqued as tulla + (verb in Finnish grammar) — There is no future tense in Finnish, and the calque is produced by translation from Swedish and German. Note that the verb tulla takes up the inflection, and is to be placed into the appropriate tense and person. The calque corresponds to English "is going". For example, tullaan muuttamaan "is going to be changed". This is considered incorrect grammar, but perfectly understandable and found in translations, political speech and even in legal documents..
- English you-impersonal calqued; e.g. sä et elä jos sä et syö is word-for-word "you don't live if you don't eat", unlike the native Syömättä ei elä. Note that this phenomenon is not always traceable to English. Here contraction sä of spoken language is used instead of the sinä of written language..
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. Examples include:
- from Greek: sarvikuono (rhinoceros, from Greek "rinokeros"),
- from Latin: viisaudenhammas (wisdom tooth, from Latin "dens sapientiae"),
- 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".
- tappuach adamah (potato) from French pomme-de-terre
- gan yeladim from German Kindergarten
- chashmal for "electricity" from Greek ēlektron (amber)
See also
References
External links
- EtymOnline
- Merriam Webster Online
In linguistics, a
calque (International Phonetic Alphabet ) 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.
The common
English language phrase "
flea market" is a phrase calque that literally translates the
French language "
marché aux puces"
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 "scrape", and "
ciel" translates "sky".
Used as a
verb, "to
calque" means to loan translation 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"). "
Loan translation" is itself a calque of the German language "
Lehnübersetzung".
To prove that a word is a calque sometimes requires more documentation than an untranslated loanword, since in some cases it's quite conceivable that a similar phrase could have arisen in both languages independently. This is less so 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
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)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)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)
From French
- English Adam's apple calques French pomme d'Adam
- English bushmeat calques French language viande de brousse
- English by heart (or off by heart) calques French par cœur
- English Governor-General calques French Gouverneur Général
- English free verse calques French vers libre
- English old guard calques French Vieille Garde (the Imperial Guard of Napoleon I)
- English flea market calques French marché aux puces
- English in his/her prime (in the early days) calques French dans sa primeur
- English marriage of convenience calques French mariage de convenance
- English British New Wave (artistic period) calques French Nouvelle Vague
- English rhinestone calques French caillou du Rhin "Rhine pebble"
- English that goes without saying calques French cela va sans dire
Teuto-Dutch
- English underwrite calques either Dutch onderschrift or German unterschrift
- English masterpiece calques either Dutch meesterstuk or German Meisterstück
From Dutch
From German
- English Alzheimer's disease calques German Alzheimer Krankheit
- English antibody calques German Antikörper
- English Arons tube calques German Aronssche Röhre
- English back-formation calques German Rückbildung (lit. "Back building") English in Europe by Manfred Görlach
- English ball lightning calques German Kugelblitz English in Europe by Manfred Görlach
- English beer garden calques German Biergarten
- English Braun tube calques German Braunsche Röhre
- English concertmaster and concertmeister calque German Konzertmeister
- English Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease calques German Creutzfeldt-Jakob-Krankheit
- English transvestitism calques German Transvestismus
- English Diesel engine calques German Diesel motor
- English flamethrower calques German Flammenwerfer' '
- English foreword calques German Vorwort, which itself calques Latin præfatio (from præ-" "before" plus fari "speak") "preface"
- English Geiger counter calques German Geigerzähler
- English heroic tenor calques German Heldentenor
- English intelligence quotient calques German Intelligenz-quotient
- English loan translation calques German Lehnübersetzung
- English loanword calques German Lehnwort
- English mercury vapor lamp calques German Quecksilberdampflampe
- English overman and superman (i.e., self-transcending human) calque German Übermensch
- English pregnancy test calques German Schwangerschaftstest
- English power politics calques German Machtpolitik
- English rainforest calques German Regenwald
- English sports shoe, and athletic shoe calques German Sportschuh
- English standpoint (point of view) calques German Standpunkt
- English superego (formed from Latin super- "over, above" plus ego "I") calques German über-Ich "over-I"
- English stormtroopers calques German Sturmtruppen
- English subliminal (formed from Latin sub-, "below", plus limin (genitive liminis, "threshold") calques German unter der Schwelle, "beneath the threshold"
- English thought experiment calques German Gedankenexperiment
- English watershed calques German Wasserscheide
- English worldview calques German Weltanschauung
- English world war calques German Weltkrieg
From Latin
- English commonplace calques Latin locus commūnis (referring to a generally applicable literary passage), which itself is a calque of Greek koinos topos
- 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 Church
- English wisdom tooth calques Latin dēns sapientiae
- English Milky Way calques Latin via lactea
- English in a nutshell calques Latin in nuce ; see Pliny VII.21
- English Saturday partially calques Latin Diēs Saturnī day of Saturn
Note: the Latin planetary names, as found in the names of the weekdays, in turn calque the Greek names, which calque the ancient Babylonian names (e.g. Friday, and the planet Venus, were named after Freia. See .)
From Spanish
- English Nobility calques Spanish language
- English moment of truth calques Spanish which refers to the time of the final sword thrust in a bullfight.
From other languages
- English gospel calques Greek language evangelion (good news)
- English High King calques Irish language and Scottish Gaelic Ard Ri
- English pea jacket or pea coat calques North Frisian language pijekkat
- English side-sword calques Italian language spada da lato, referring to a versatile one-handed sword of 16th and 17th century Europe.
Latin
- Latin compassio calques Greek sympathia "sympathy" (Latin: "suffering with", Greek: "suffering together")
- Latin insectus calques Greek entomos
- Latin musculus "muscle" (= "common house mouse", literally "little mouse" from mus "mouse") calques Greek mys "muscle" (= "mouse")
- Latin magnanimus calques Greek μεγαλοψυχος (megalopsuchos)
- Lat. root magnus = Gr. μεγαλος (megalos) = "great; large"
- Lat. root animus = Gr. ψυχη (psuchē) = "soul"
Romance Languages
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 abd Romanian luna de miere calque English honeymoon
- French gratte-ciel, Catalan gratacels, Spanish rascacielos, Portuguese arranha-céus 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)
French
- French courriel (contraction of courrier électronique) calques English email (electronic mail)
- French disque dur calques English hard disk
- 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 School grades (US) (nivel in Standard Spanish)
- Spanish colegio calques English college (universidad in Standard Spanish; colegio, in standard Spanish, is synonymous with escuela and means school)
- Spanish librería calques English library (biblioteca in Standard Spanish; librería in Standard Spanish means bookshop)
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 E-mail
- Spanish alta resolución calques English high resolution
- Spanish enlace calques English link (Internet)
- Spanish sitio web calques English web site
- Spanish página web calques English web page
- Spanish ratón calques English Mouse (computing)
Germanic Languages
Afrikaans and Dutch
- Afrikaans aartappel and Dutch language aardappel calque French pomme de terre ("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"
The latter, as well as the corresponding
fernsprechen (verb:
to phone ), has been on the retreat in recent years in favor of (orthographically normalized)
Telefon.
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"
Slavic languages
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. φιλειν (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"
- необхідний (neobkhidnyj) calques Russian необходимый (neobkhodimyj), both meaning "necessary"
Finnish
- Germanic passive agent marker — There is no passive voice in Finnish language, but an impersonal, where the agent is never mentioned. Due to the influence of Germanic languages, the word toimesta "from the action" has been constructed in order to mention the agent, i.e. to function like the word "by". (It is impossible to translate the word "by" itself, because there is no direct equivalent.) For example, "Lentokonetta lennetään ohjaajan toimesta", approximately "The plane is being flown, from the action of the pilot." This is grammatically incorrect, but used abundantly in legal documents and sloppy translations.
- Swedish language future marker kommer att or German werden calqued as tulla + (verb in Finnish grammar) — There is no future tense in Finnish, and the calque is produced by translation from Swedish and German. Note that the verb tulla takes up the inflection, and is to be placed into the appropriate tense and person. The calque corresponds to English "is going". For example, tullaan muuttamaan "is going to be changed". This is considered incorrect grammar, but perfectly understandable and found in translations, political speech and even in legal documents..
- English you-impersonal calqued; e.g. sä et elä jos sä et syö is word-for-word "you don't live if you don't eat", unlike the native Syömättä ei elä. Note that this phenomenon is not always traceable to English. Here contraction sä of spoken language is used instead of the sinä of written language..
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. Examples include:
- from Greek: sarvikuono (rhinoceros, from Greek "rinokeros"),
- from Latin: viisaudenhammas (wisdom tooth, from Latin "dens sapientiae"),
- 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".
- tappuach adamah (potato) from French pomme-de-terre
- gan yeladim from German Kindergarten
- chashmal for "electricity" from Greek ēlektron (amber)
See also
References
External links
- EtymOnline
- Merriam Webster Online
Calque - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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 ...
Dictionary of Difficult Words - calque
Skip to page content | Tiscali Quicklinks. Please visit our Accessibility Page for a list of the Access Keys you can use to find your way around the site, skip directly to the main ...
calque - Wiktionary
word formed by word-for-word translation of a word in another language
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calque - Definitions from Dictionary.com
Definitions of calque at Dictionary.com. ... 1. a loan translation, esp. one resulting from bilingual interference in which the internal structure of a borrowed word or phrase is ...
calque - definition of calque by the Free Online Dictionary, Thesaurus ...
Definition of calque in the Online Dictionary. Meaning of calque. Pronunciation of calque. Translations of calque. calque synonyms, calque antonyms. Information about calque in ...
C A L Q U E
In Calque 4 we published a poem titled "Elementary Things" by Dmitry Golynko, translated by Eugene Ostashevsky. What follows is an interview with the poet and a section from the ...
Calque - Wikipédia
Cette page d’ homonymie répertorie les différents sujets et articles partageant un même nom.
Calque (linguistique) - Wikipédia
En linguistique, et plus précisément en lexicologie, étymologie et linguistique comparée, on appelle calque un type d' emprunt lexical particulier en ce sens que le terme ...
RhymeZone: calque
A rhyming dictionary, thesaurus, spell checker, and word finding tool for poets, writers, musicians, and language enthusiasts. ... Type in a word below to find its rhymes, synonyms ...
