Talk:semi-learned borrowing

RFV discussion: June 2021

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semi-learned borrowing

Googling didn't find me any examples with this meaning: "(linguistics) A word in a language that was a learned loan in a previous stage of the language but subsequently passed by inheritance into the current language by undergoing sound changes. These words occur, for example, in the Romance and the Indo-Aryan languages."

The examples of the phrase I could find are applied to words that have been modified on borrowing to roughly match the pattern of inherited words, but don't show any obvious subsequent borrowing. Most of these were of dubious validity in that they seem to have been taken from a single source, namely Wiktionary, which would mean that they were not independent.

This definition also seems a little odd. It seems to require that the word has undergone a sound change while in the language it was borrowed into. Also, that might be a bit tricky to evaluate. If momentum was a learned loan into Modern English, then whether it is now a semi-learned loan may vary from accent to accent. I know the first vowel underwent a sound change (reduction to schwa) in much standard UK English in the 20th century. Perhaps I have misunderstood 'in a previous stage', and the English word Christ is a 'semi-learned borrowing' in Modern English because it is ultimately inherited from a learned borrowing into Old English. --RichardW57 (talk) 02:17, 5 June 2021 (UTC)

cited Kiwima (talk) 22:30, 6 June 2021 (UTC)

But none of them are for the alleged meaning! What do I do? Should I create another sense and change the challenge from {{rfv}} to {{rfv-sense}}? Carey 2007 would also raise the question of whether 'learned borrowings' from Irish to Welsh are possible - I am doubtful that any deliberate borrowing is a learned borrowing, as that definition currently stands. I find it hard to believe that non-learned borrowings are restricted to slip-ups where the originator didn't notice that he was using a foreign word. --RichardW57m (talk) 12:36, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

You can either do that, or simply edit the definition, and we can resolve it as passed as modified. Kiwima (talk) 20:48, 7 June 2021 (UTC)

RFV-resolved. I have changed the RFV to RFC. @RichardW57m, you can update the definition or someone else can. Kiwima (talk) 22:23, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

I somehow missed last week's suggestion. I've resurrected the objection as {{rfv-sense}}. The current definition is wrong, not just a mess. --RichardW57 (talk) 23:53, 14 June 2021 (UTC)

Fine. I am leaving this as an RFD. I don't think we need to leave this as still an RFV. Kiwima (talk) 22:26, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Request for Clarification

@Kiwima: The definition has already been reverted to a fairly suitable one. What clarification is needed? --RichardW57 (talk) 01:09, 23 June 2021 (UTC)

I find the term "semi-learned" useful for hybrid forms where a popular descendant was slightly reshaped to be more in line with the etymon (say, in Romance, a lost intervocalic d was reinserted, but the inherited vocalism was left intact). However, if a word was borrowed from Latin into Old French in the year 1000 and then simply underwent the regular sound changes that followed, I can't see anything "semi-learned" in it. It's simply a borrowing at a particular point in time. 90.186.170.208 17:23, 14 October 2021 (UTC)