Article published in:
Gender, Language and the Periphery: Grammatical and social gender from the marginsEdited by Julie Abbou and Fabienne H. Baider
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 264] 2016
► pp. 353–380
Harlots and whores but not lovers
Dressing down the pronoun for a female addressee in a Basque Old Testament
Using a historical sociolinguistic theoretical approach (Conde-Silvestre and
Hernandez-Campoy 2012, 1), this paper shows that a mid-19th century Catholic
Old Testament utilizes the second-person singular pronoun for a female
addressee (noka) to construct sexual and/or violent imagery, which contributed to
noka’s loss and “semantic derogation” (Schulz 1975) over time. Focus is placed on
noka for several reasons: (1) it is the only place in the Basque language (Euskera)
where female gender is marked, as Euskera has no natural or grammatical gender;
(2) my previous ethnographic and archival research suggests that the use of noka
is considered disrespectful, “looked badly upon” and associated with “dangerous”
women like witches; (3) my previous research on Catholic texts in particular
shows that familiar pronouns are used sparingly, and almost always to condemn,
castigate or cast out demons; (4) noka has historically been a key marker of
solidarity, konfiantza (‘trust’) and ‘authentic’ Basque identity; but the negative cast
upon noka, I suggest, discourages its use for such solidarity-building purposes.
Keywords: Basque, gender, historical sociolinguistics, pronouns, religion
Published online: 16 December 2016
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.264.13ech
https://doi.org/10.1075/pbns.264.13ech
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