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Dog shmog computer shmomputer

  Tags: Filler Words
 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room Post Reply
clumsy
Octoglot
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Poland
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 Message 1 of 4
23 October 2012 at 11:34pm | IP Logged 
I have noticed there is an interesting construction in English when talking about things that one finds anoying: repeat the word and add shm- prefix to the second instance.

Interesting because in Polish we have the same construction with sr-
kot srot
mysz srysz

I have read that it came to English from Jewish immigrants.

Could those immigrants be from Poland?
Or is this construction originating from Hebrew/Yiddish?


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Cabaire
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Germany
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 Message 2 of 4
23 October 2012 at 11:57pm | IP Logged 
It is part of Yiddish. To cite the dictionary:

"שמ...préfixe qui, en précédant ou remplaçant l'initiale d'un mot, sert à exprimer, par des formes souvent éphémères, un jugement dédaigneux:

עסן-שמעסן: mais qui pense à manger?
געלט-שמעלט: l'argent, on s'en fout!
שמאָליטיק: (iron.) politique

These words are formed often on the fly. I suppose they entered Polish from the Jiddish speakers too.

Edited by Cabaire on 23 October 2012 at 11:58pm

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vonPeterhof
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 Message 3 of 4
24 October 2012 at 8:34am | IP Logged 
In Russian we have two of these reduplication constructions - the shm- and the m-. The former obviously comes from Yiddish, while the latter is stereotypically associated with non-native speakers from the Caucasus and/or Central Asia. Dunno where it actually originated or how widespread it is in reality.
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Iversen
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Denmark
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 Message 4 of 4
24 October 2012 at 11:10am | IP Logged 
And something similar goes on in Bahasa Indonesia and Malaysia, where reduplication generally implies a plural, but sometimes acquires a life of its own


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