The united states and the word

The united states and the word

Trumpisms and Bushisms constitute the very essence of Americanisms.

Donald Trump's (perhaps) unintended coining of a new word ¬“unpresidented” is hardly unprecedented.

Considering some of his predecessors(पूर्ववर्ती) have also added new words and expressions to the English language, philologists (भाषाशास्त्री/ भाषा विज्ञानी) may have mis-underestimated (to borrow George Bush's felicitous (धन्यवाद पात्र) contribution) the US President-elect. Or have they?

Notwithstanding his Ivy League education, Trump has shown he is no mug with neologisms (नवनिर्मित प्रयोग), spoonerisms (a verbal error in which a speaker accidentally transposes the initial sounds or letters of two or more words, often to humorous effect), malapropisms (the unintentional misuse of a word by confusion with one that sounds similar) and other lapsus linguae that characterised the Bush innings in the White House. From his patented “yuge!” (for huge) to “bigly“ (for big league), to “I'm not unproud,“ (of his tweets trashing a former Miss World), Trumpisms have made a mild splash in Lingua Americana modestly enriched by Bushisms.

American presidents going back to its founding fathers have had a reputation of being language mavens (निपुण/प्रवीण) , albeit underwritten by erudition (ज्ञानविस्तार/विद्वत्ता) that is alien to Bush and Trump. Presidential historians and lexicographers say George Washington coined, among many others, the expressions “hatchet man” and “out-of-the-way” (for secluded), and popularized the word “indoors” and “administration” (for government).

Thomas Jefferson was a matchless neologiser (someone who coins new words) who fabricated “belittle” to convey something less important by verbising the word little. Among some 100-plus words he contributed were “Anglophobia” and “odometer”. From his days in Paris, he fashioned the word “pedicure” to describe the care of feet, toes and toenails. “I am a friend to neology. It is the only way to give to language copiousness and euphony (सुश्रव्यता/जो सुनने में अच्छा लगे), “he wrote to John Adams.

Lincoln sweetened the language with “sugarcoat” and FDR came up with “iffy” to tactfully knock down Supreme Court decisions with which he disagreed. It was Theodore Roosevelt, forging terms such as “lunatic fringe” and “bully pulpit” among others, who was a linguistic “loose cannon” (also his expression).

Around this time, American politics also threw up many election-related terms such as whistlestop, barnstorming and stump speech, as maverick (अपरंपरागत/स्वतंत्र विचार वाला) candidates (after Samuel Maverick, a Texas rancher who refused to brand cattle like others did) travelled the countryside in trains, making campaign speeches on tree stumps (hence, stumping) outside barns.

By the turn of the 20th century, the US was getting over anti-British sentiment. Shakespeare ¬ arguably the greatest wordsmith in English history ¬ was all the rage. Lincoln had the Complete Works of Shakespeare in his study in the White House, and in early 1900s, it was said American households typically kept two books at home: the Bible and Shakespeare.

Americans loved the Bard because they saw in him a pioneer (अग्रगामी /प्रथम/ नव): an inventive wordsmith who coined new words and expressions ¬1,700 by one estimate ¬ all the time. In fact, when the Folger Shakespeare library was inaugurated in Washington DC in 1932, it was said the US capital had three great memorials that “stand out, in size, dignity and beauty, conspicuous above the rest: the memorials to Washington, Lincoln, and Shakespeare.”

Yep, not Thoreau or Twain, Shakespeare was the literary icon. There were calls to bestow (प्रदान करना) honorary US citizenship on the Bard. Further down in history Kennedy, Reagan and Clinton were all avid (उत्साही/उत्सुक/लालयित) Bardolators, frequently citing a man who bedazzled America with new-fangled words such as scuffle and swagger.

Typical of America, swagger has now been sized down to “swag” to denote stylish confidence, a quality that Bush and Trump possess despite their obvious lack of scholarship. Although Bush's coinage of “misunderestimated” found qualified praise, with some linguists appreciating one compact word to describe “underestimating by mistake”, his periodic murder of grammar was underscored by a query he once posed at a school event: “Rarely is the question asked: Is our children learning?” Trump has chipped in with “Somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 pounds” while describing sedentary (अधिक बैठा रहने वाला/निष्क्रीय/आसीन) hackers. President Obama himself is no great shakes with neologisms despite his soaring oratory and literary flourish evident in his two books. During his election campaign, he startled Americans by sending out an email with the subject-line “Hey!” Apparently , his digital team tested 18 different combinations of emails and subject lines before concluding that the casual, informal “Hey!“ worked better than any official and presidential greeting.“Hey!“ became his signature call.

Another time, Obama berated critics of his healthcare bill for getting “all wee-weed up”. Wordsmiths got their knickers in a twist trying to decipher (समझना) this unheard of expression, forcing the White House to clarify that “bed wetting would be the more consumer-friendly version” of wee-weed up.

The American love of language was brought home starkly to me one evening on InterState-90 when I was pulled over by a cop, a term that originated in England but was banned by the Brits because it was seen as insulting to policemen. When he had walked languidly over and asked me for my registration, I told him it was in my dicky. “What is a dicky, sir?” he asked. “The boot of the car, officer,” I responded. That still left him bemused.

The American word for dicky, aka boot, is “trunk”. A lengthy discussion on the discreet charms of the English language ¬ during which time I was hoping he would forget my infraction ¬ did not save me from the $150 ticket. He did not misunderestimate my honey-tongued spiel (भाषण देना).