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Article published In:
Diachronica
Vol. 38:4 (2021) ► pp.565–600

Loanwords vs relics

A new method in lexical borrowing studies exemplified by Yiddish-Slavic language contact

ORCID logo | University of Warsaw
| University of Warsaw
One of the major issues in historical and contact linguistics is how to distinguish between inherited and acquired vocabulary in a given language: both traditional historical linguistics and modern contact linguistics are in this respect eventually forced to resort to inferences. The aim of this paper is to propose a diagnostic test to aid in the identification of putative substratum relics in the lexicon. The method for this test consists in juxtaposing and comparing word families in the source and recipient language. We use the example of Yiddish-Slavic language contact, in which contact-induced changes are still relatively transparent. We employ wordnets – digital networks of lexical entities connected by lexico-semantic relations – in order to visually “map” lexical and semantic relations of transferred lexemes within the recipient language onto the source language. The method allows us to combine contemporary empirical data with historical analysis.
Keywords: lexical borrowings, loanwords, lexical relics, Yiddish, Polish, language contact, substratum, adstratum
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Yiddish-Slavic language contact
  • 3.Methods: The diagnostic test
    • 3.1Terminology and data collection
    • 3.2The diagnostic test
      • 3.2.1Working hypothesis
      • 3.2.2Procedure
        • a.Semasiological analysis
        • b.Collocational analysis
        • c.Derivational analysis
        • d.Onomasiological analysis
    • 3.3Limitations of the test
  • 4.Results
    • 4.1Semasiological analysis
    • 4.2Collocational analysis
    • 4.3Derivational analysis
    • 4.4Onomasiological analysis
    • 4.5Verification
      • 4.5.1Testing on a sample Polish loanword candidate in Yiddish
      • 4.5.2Testing on Slavic relics in German
  • 5.Discussion
    • 5.1Cross-linguistic mapping – a new proposal for lexical borrowing studies
    • 5.2Limitations of mapping as a method
      • 5.2.1Material limitations
      • 5.2.2Technical limitations
      • 5.2.3Lexicological limitations
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations and other markers
  • References
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial (CC BY-NC) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].

Published online: 15 March 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.19047.gel
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