Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends [1 ed.] 9780415957205, 9780415887885, 9780203941775

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

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Routledge Studies in Linguistics 1. Polari - The Lost Language of Gay Men Paul Baker

2. The Linguistic Analysis of Jokes Graeme Ritchie

3. The Irish Language in Ireland From Goídel to Globalisation Diarmait Mac Giolla Chríost

4. Conceptualizing Metaphors On Charles Peirce’s Marginalia Ivan Mladenov

5. The Linguistics of Laughter A Corpus-assisted Study of Laughter-talk Alan Partington

6. The Communication of Leadership Leadership and Metaphor beyond the West Jonathan Charteris-Black

7. Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends Pedro J. Chamizo-Domínguez

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

Pedro J. Chamizo-Domínguez

New York London

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Routledge Taylor & Francis Group 270 Madison Avenue New York, NY 10016

Routledge Taylor & Francis Group 2 Park Square Milton Park, Abingdon Oxon OX14 4RN

© 2008 by Taylor & Francis Group, LLC Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis Group, an Informa business Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 International Standard Book Number-13: 978-0-415-95720-5 (Hardcover) No part of this book may be reprinted, reproduced, transmitted, or utilized in any form by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying, microfilming, and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Chamizo Domínguez, Pedro J. (Pedro José), 1952Semantics and pragmatics of false friends / Pedro J. Chamizo-Domínguez. p. cm. -- (Routledge studies in linguistics ; 7) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-415-95720-5 (hbk. : alk. paper) 1. Translating and interpreting. 2. Semantics. 3. Pragmatics. I. Title. P306.C514 2007 418’.02--dc22

2007004681

Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at http://www.taylorandfrancis.com and the Routledge Web site at http://www.routledge.com

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«Misunderstanding is a by-product of knowing how. Only a person who is at least a partial master of the Russian tongue can make the wrong sense of a Russian expression. Mistakes are exercises of competences» (G. Ryle, The Concept of Mind, p. 60. Original emphasis).

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Contents

Acknowledgments Introduction

ix xi

1

Clearing the Terrain

2

Synonymy, Polysemy, Homonymy, Register and Diachrony

31

3

Semantics of False Friends: Borrowings, Calques and Inheritances

61

4

Semantics of False Friends: Tropical False Friends

91

5

Pragmatics of False Friends

133

6

Main Theses Exposed and Conclusions

165

Notes Bibliography Index

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1

169 171 179

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Acknowledgments

As is customary regarding such studies, I alone should be held responsible for any errors which may remain. Nevertheless, I should like to express my gratitude to those colleagues and friends who have contributed to its composition—giving me suggestions, detecting mistakes and errata, providing me with texts and/or examples, or simply giving encouragement to my work. Here then let me record my thanks to them all: Wolfram Aichinger (University of Vienna, Austria), Antonio Alberte González (University of Malaga, Spain), Keith Allan (Monash University, Australia), Daniel Buncic (University of Bonn, Germany), Marisa Cordella (Monash University, Australia), Bertha Gutiérrez Rodilla (University of Salamanca, Spain), Oliver Leaman (University of Kentucky, USA), Rodrigo López Carrillo (University of Granada, Spain), Lise R. Lorentzen (University of Trondheim, Norway), Anita Naciscione (Latvian Academy of Culture, Latvia), Brigitte Nerlich (University of Nottingham, UK), Salvador Peña Martín (University of Malaga, Spain), Encarnación Postigo Pinazo (University of Malaga, Spain), Marcial Prado (University of California, Fullerton, USA), Alicia Rodríguez Serón (University of Malaga, Spain), Gustavo A. Silva (Pan American Health Organization, Washington, D.C., USA), Gerard Steen (Vrije University, Amsterdam, The Netherlands), Grzegorz Szpila (Jagiellonsky University, Krakow, Poland), Stavroula Varella (University of Sussex, UK), Andrejs Veisbergs (University of Latvia, Latvia), and Magdalena Zawislawska (University of Warsaw, Poland). Finally, I must record my lasting gratitude to those who have generously contributed to this English version. Namely, Paterson Brown (Metalogos Project, USA), Ana Isabel Hernández Bartolomé (University of Valladolid, Spain), Gustavo Mendiluce Cabrera (University of Valladolid, Spain), and Jack Weiner (Northern Illinois University, USA).

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Introduction

The topic of false friends is a linguistic phenomenon which must very frequently preoccupy both academics and foreign-language translators. As I will attempt to demonstrate at length in this study, such linguistic interference is the source of many errors in translation, as well as common misunderstandings occasioned when a speaker attempts to express him/herself in a language other than his/her native one—often including those with some competence in the foreign language concerned, as the aforementioned G. Ryle’s quote points out. Interest in this topic on the part of teachers of foreign languages often in fact arises after they have noticed errors which either they or their students have committed and which have given rise to misunderstandings. A good example of such entanglements is provided by R. Hill in his A Dictionary of False Friends, where he confesses his embarrass at having been confused for a long while regarding the meaning of cognates for the English adjective fastidious in the Romance languages: Since the early 1960s, when I began teaching English as a foreign language, there has been a marked shift in emphasis in the way we teach, from detailed studies of texts, to methods which encourage the students to talk more. From the beginning, I remember noticing how the meaning of certain English words was repeatedly misunderstood: the context might offer no hint of the fact that words like sympathetic, smoking, or control meant something quite different in English from the similar word in other languages. I am ashamed too, when I think how many times I have used fastidious as a reasonable synonym for fussy before I discovered that the former was likely to be understood by all Latins (i.e. speakers of Portuguese, Spanish, French, and Italian) as irritating, troublesome, or annoying. (Hill 1982: i. Original italics). And indeed it seems that Hill is not the only person who has been misled by this variance between English fastidious and its Romance cognates. This adjective has equally tripped up others:

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xii

Introduction Es cierto que a veces inclusive términos similares en dos lenguas no demasiado alejadas entre sí tienen sentidos diversos; recuérdese la alharaca que se armó, tiempo ha, en una reunión de la Sociedad de Naciones cuando un delegado británico dijo del discurso de un delegado de otra nación que era fastidious. Fastidious no quiere decir ‘fastidioso’, sino algo así como ‘muy detallado’ y ‘pormenorizado’. [It is certain that sometimes even quite similar terms in two closely related languages have diverse senses; one has only to recall the furore that was caused some years ago in a meeting of the League of Nations, when a British delegate called the speech of a delegate of another nation, fastidious. Fastidious does not mean (in Spanish) ‘fastidioso’ (annoying), but rather ‘muy detallado’ (very detailed, very thorough) and ‘pormenorizado’ (exhaustive, meticulous)]. (Ferrater Mora 1970: 21; original italics)

Although both Hill and Ferrater here refer to “distinct languages”, it must be emphasised that this phenomenon of false friends can also occur among different dialects of the same language. Moreover, there are examples of what can be considered false friends between different dialects of one language, even when they are not found between some of these dialects and a separate language. For instance, I will allude in chapter 4 to the fact that the British writer Gilbert K. Chesterton was much upset when an admiring American reporter called him “a regular guy”. And needless to say, the pretended reporter’s eulogy in American English became almost an actual injury in British English when it came to Chesterton’s notice. Now, even though this topic of false friends has always been problematical to translators and to language teachers, it has nonetheless been of less interest to linguistic theorists and philosophers of language—who perhaps have considered it a merely practical problem, capable of resolution by an adequate mastery of the languages concerned. For this reason, in the extensive and excellent bibliography about the topic maintained on the Internet by Professors Ryszard Lipczuk and Daniel Bunčić at the University of Bonn (An online hypertext bibliography regarding false friends is available at http://www.uni-bonn.de/~dbuncic/ffbib/subj_un.htm. Accessed 20 November 2006.), there are listed many dictionaries and vocabularies fi lled with examples of this linguistic, problematic phenomenon; notable by their absence, however, are any works which provide a theoretical analysis of the phenomenon. As a result, studies of false friends generally exhibit the following characteristics: • The topic is usually introduced from a pedagogical perspective. Thus these studies dispense with any explanation of how the two cognate terms in the respective languages have evolved such diverse senses. • Since these works are generally written by language teachers and translators in their professional capacity, they usually compare only

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Introduction xiii

•

•

• •

two given languages; thus, as providing only lists of examples, they do not attempt an overall survey of false friends as such. They do not attempt to provide any pragmatic strategies by which the (erroneous) use of false friends can be detected. As a result of that, while false friends have been widely studied from both semantic and morphological points of view, there is a lack of studies on the topic from a pragmatic perspective. They do not usually consider false friends from a diachronic viewpoint, focusing exclusively on synchronic (concurrent) examples of the phenomenon. With a few notable exceptions, they attempt no theoretical analysis of the phenomenon. And fi nally, the topic of false friends has not been connected with the one of the figures of speech, in spite of false friends usually emerge when a given term in a given language is tropically used and eventually lexicalised while it does not in a different language.

For all these reasons, the purpose of this book is to approach the topic of false friends from a theoretical perspective—by means of which, not restricted to any particular language, I may undertake a study of the phenomenon as such. The work will therefore be divided into five chapters. In chapter 1, “Clearing the Terrain”, I attempt to defi ne false friends and to distinguish it from other similar linguistic phenomena, such as false cognates or tricky translation problems in general. These latter arise, of course, regarding the majority of terms—which, in being generally polysemous, virtually never match the polysemy of any other word in whatever language. Chapter 2, “Synonymy, Polysemy, and Homonymy”, studies these three linguistic phenomena and their relevance for a plausible and effective treatment of false friends. In chapter 3, “Semantics of False Friends: Borrowings, Calques and Inheritances”, these latter are presented as the keys for explaining how two given terms come to be semantic false friends. In chapter 4, “Semantics of False Friends: Tropical False Friends”, I investigate the linguistic mechanisms (metaphor, irony, metonymy, euphemism, dysphemism, etc.) which enable us to explain how two given terms in separate natural languages can come to be semantic false friends. Finally, in chapter 5, “Pragmatics of false friends”, some pragmatic strategies are suggested for the detection of false friends both in conversation and in reading a text. Since the present study makes no attempt to be either an exhaustive dictionary or a teaching text for any particular language, I shall not attempt to list the numerous exceptions given by the lexicons for the words under consideration, but only those most relevant to the present study. Indeed otherwise a veritable encyclopaedia would have to be compiled—which moreover could never be complete, given the continual evolution of languages. For the same reason, as well as to maintain a desirable consis-

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xiv Introduction tency, I shall normally refer to a single standard dictionary for each of the languages considered; thumbing through a variety of lexicons would lead to endless qualifications of little utility for our purposes. Therefore, I shall utilise the Diccionario de la lengua española (DRAE, hereinafter) for Spanish, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED, hereinafter) for English, the Dictionnaire de l’Académie Française (DAF, hereinafter) for French and the Duden: Aussprachewörterbuch, Wörterbuch der deutschen Standardaussprache (Duden, hereinafter) for German. For the case of Catalan, I shall generally make use of the excellent Diccionari català-valencià-balear of Alcover and Moll (Alcover and Moll, hereinafter)—although, since this work dates from 1930 and thus lacks many terms subsequently incorporated into the Catalan tongue, I shall also make use of the Gran diccionari de la llengua catalana (AA. VV., hereinafter). Otherwise recourse will be made to any specialised dictionaries which may be relevant in the context. And needless to say, if I only allude to a few European languages, it only happens because of my lack of command in other languages, not because of this linguistic phenomenon is absent in the rest of languages. Again, if somebody could be interested in the topic of false friends in other languages, s/he can consult Lipczuk and Buncic’s bibliography. Nevertheless, if my account on the topic is right, I dare to suggest that my methodology could be applied to the rest of languages whose knowledge, unfortunately, I am not able to reach. So, as Michel de Montaigne wisely said about himself, «Ce que j’en opine, c’est aussi pour declarer la mesure de ma veuë, non la mesure des choses» [And, accordingly, the judgment I deliver, is to show the measure of my own sight, and not of the things] (Essais, II, X). Since a work of this type requires essential diacritic marks, I shall make use of the following: Continental quotation marks («») will enclose textual quotations; double quotation marks (“”) will enclose non-literal citations; and single quotation marks (‘’) will serve to indicate examples which are non-literal citations. Bold type will be used to indicate terms under present consideration, whether in isolation or within a given citation; italic type will represent underlining in the original as well as the titles of books and journals. And fi nally, in spite of the fact that any translation runs the risk of being an actual, tricky betrayal, I dare to translate into English the texts I quote from other languages. These translations have been enclosed in squared parentheses ([]) after the original text.

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1

Clearing the Terrain

1.1. DEFINITION The false friends phenomenon as a linguistic interference issue may be as old as the existence of natural languages itself. However, the term false friends itself is relatively new. In fact, the term false friends [faux amis, in French] was coined by Maxime Koessler and Jules Derocquigny in their well-known and seminal classical work Les faux amis, ou, Les trahisons du vocabulaire anglais: conseils aux traducteurs [False friends, or, The Treacheries of English Vocabulary: Advice to Translators] (1928). Nevertheless, although the eventually most widespread term was not coined until the 20th century, the phenomenon we now term false friends has long been studied. The references have been either occasional allusions to the problems they may pose or attempts to achieve a more systematic treatment. In fact, the oldest work about this topic I have heard of dates back to the 17th century, and it has been recently reprinted and studied (Larsson and Gruszczyński 1998). This work compiles a lexicon about Swedish and Polish false friends, where Latin is still used as a metalanguage: Nomina Polonica convenientia cum Sveticis, partim eundem partim diversum significantia Sensum Ordine Alphabetico collecta atque disposita [An Alphabetically Provided Collection of Polish Nouns, which Partially Coincide with and Partially Diverge from Swedish Nouns]. However, Koessler and Derocquigny’s metaphorical coinage has become so widely spread that it is now lexicalised, at least among linguists and translators. The term now refers to the specific phenomenon of linguistic interference consisting of two given words in two or more given natural languages are graphically and/or phonetically the same or very alike; yet, their meanings may be totally or partially different. To put it in another way, false friends are those words which share their signifiers but differ totally or partially as regards their meanings. The most reasonable and easily understandable defi nition of false friend may be the one provided by T. Hayward and A. Moulin in Saussurean terms:

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2

Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends «The best defi nition of the problem one can give is probably in Saussurean terms. In the learner’s mother tongue a particular signifi ant is associated with a particular signifi é. Once the signifi ant appears, even in a foreign-language context, the above-mentioned association is so strong that the user automatically thinks of his mother-tongue signifi é (in its totality).» (Quoted in Buncic 2000, italics in original).

That is particularly the reason why false friends are such tricky terms for translators and for non-native users; the latter are confident in the meaning of the word in their mother tongue, and so, they are tempted to suppose that the corresponding term in the other tongue means exactly the same as in their own mother tongue. And, in order to illustrate how deceitful false friends may become, the best we can do is to resort to the term false friends itself, which is now quite common among linguists and translators. As I have just pointed out, false friends is a calque from the French term faux amis, although this translation is at least unsuitable, despite being lexicalised now. And the reason is that treacherous, disloyal or unfaithful friends are not usually called false friends and falsos amigos, but bad friends and malos amigos in English and Spanish, respectively. Yet, the term false friends is the most widely spread in the literature on this linguistic phenomenon, many other denominations have also been used and/or suggested. In fact, D. Buncic (2000: 4) quotes up to 16 more terms referring to the same or analogous phenomena.1 Other scholars as, for instance, F. Navarro (1997), whose authority in translation matters— and more particularly, in medical and paramedical texts — is beyond any reasonable doubt, usually includes false friends under the label palabras de traducción engañosa [misleading translatable words]. However, not all misleading translatable words are false friends, if we follow the defi nition I have provided. For example, the English collocation breast cancer would be tricky if we translate it into Spanish as cáncer de pecho and not as cáncer de mama, because in Spanish cáncer de pecho is used as a euphemism for cáncer de pulmón [lung cancer]. In other words, the so-called misleading translatable words are wider than false friends. As for the terms quoted up by Buncic, I would like to stress five of them insofar as their meanings could be applied to a wider phenomenon than that of false friends. Those terms are false pairs, deceptive words, false cognates, treacherous twins, and belles infidèles [literally, ‘unfaithful good-looking women’]. As can be easily inferred, all those terms used to refer to the present linguistic phenomenon coincide in qualifying it as deceptive or source of mistakes. From these five alternative terms to false friends, the most usual one may be false cognates. But using false cognates instead of false friends may lead us into error; consequently, we had better delimit properly the concepts of false cognates and false friends. Cognate is a learned derivation from the Latin word cognatus2 [relative] and is used in linguistics for those words sharing a common origin, regardless of whether their meanings have evolved

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Clearing the Terrain 3 apart or not. For instance, in Spanish, the words cuñado [brother-in-law] and cuñada [sister-in-law] also derive from the same Latin root as cognate [‘cognado’, in Spanish], and, hence, all the three are a perfect example of linguistic cognates. These divergent Spanish words derived from Latin cognatus are very accurate examples of what I mean. In fact, regarding its grammatical category, the DRAE and the OED do only include cognado and cognate as adjectives and both are concisely defi ned as «emparentado morfológicamente» [morphologically related] and «coming naturally from the same root, or representing the same original word, with differences due to subsequent separate phonetic development» (OED), which obviates any semantic consideration. Accordingly, the Spanish noun padre and the French noun père would be cognates because they both come from the Latin noun pater [all of them ‘father’]; nevertheless, in certain collocations and contexts—i.e., in Honoré de Balzac’s work, Le père Goriot [Old Goriot]— the French term should be translated into Spanish as tío [‘old’, but literally ‘uncle’] and not padre [father]. Furthermore, in some other contexts, the Spanish term should be translated into French as abbé [abbot] when Spanish padre means priest. Thus, cases such as those two words may be partial semantic false friends, though real cognates. Conversely, the Italian word cazzo [cock, penis] and the Spanish word cazo [ladle, small saucepan] would be false friends and false cognates inasmuch as their respective meanings are different; additionally, there is not any etymological relation which dates back to a common root for both words. This makes the set of false friends wider than the set of false cognates, since all false cognates are false friends, but not all false friends are false cognates. More accurately, the set of false friends includes the group of false cognates, but not vice versa. Consequently, false cognates would be a hyponym of false friends, and thus, the latter would be a superordinate term to the extent that it includes false cognates and real cognates, which may have total or partial different meanings, though. Hence, false cognates would be those false friends which I will later label as “chance false friends.”

1.2. CLASSIFICATION From the signifiers point of view and from a synchronic perspective, when false friends are spelled the same or very similar, they are called homographs. For example, the Finish word juusto [cheese] and the Spanish word justo [fair, just] are graphically similar, but their pronunciations are quite different and their meanings completely divergent. Analogously, the French noun van [sieve; horse trailer] and the English noun van share the same spelling, but their meanings do not coincide at all. The same is true of the Dutch van [of] and the Spanish verbal form van [third person plural, simple present tense, verb ‘to go’], which might also be considered false friends of the French and English nouns. On the other hand, when false friends are

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4

Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

phonetically the same or very similar, their accurate name is homophones. To take a case in point, the English noun pun, the French noun panne [breakdown, fault, malfuncion], and the Spanish noun pan [bread] are pronounced similarly; yet, they are not semantically related. However and in order to not make things more complicate than they are by themselves, in the present research I will only consider false friends those pairs which belong to the same grammatical category in two given languages, but not those of different grammatical categories. From a semantic and synchronic point of view, false friends have been classified adopting very different perspectives (Carroll 1992: 101; Trup 1998: 50–60; Buncic 2000; Prado 2001: 9–11; Chamizo Domínguez and Nerlich 2002: 1835–1837; Szpila 2003: 7–10; Pérez Velasco 2004; Chamizo Domínguez 2006a). These perspectives may be summarised into two basic types: 1. Chance false friends. 2. Semantic false friends. For the purposes of this study, chance false friends are those pairs of words which are (graphically and/or phonetically) the same or similar in two or more given languages, but without any semantic or etymological reason which may account for this sameness or similarity. The Spanish word misa [holy mass] and the Slovakian word misa [platter] may be considered paradigmatic cases of chance false friends. Similarly, the Spanish word auge [increase, peak], the French word auge [(watering) trough, manger; bucket, conduit; valley] and the German word Auge [eye] share their spelling forms, but they neither share their meanings nor their pronunciations. A particularly curious instance of chance false friends is the one existing between the Spanish noun chumbo [prickly pear] and the Portuguese noun chumbo [lead], which leads Spaniards to get really surprised when they realise that Portuguese petrol stations have sem chumbo petrol [‘leadless/unleaded’, in Portuguese; ‘without prickly pear’, in Spanish]. The etymology of the Portuguese word is clear: chumbo derives from the Latin noun plumbeum [lead]. Unfortunately, the etymology of the Spanish word is obscure, at least according to the information provided by the authoritative etymological dictionary of Corominas and Pascual (1984–87). The path followed by words becoming chance false friends is sometimes most unexpected. We may even find cases of homonymy in the most unexpected places, such as acronyms and abbreviations. Thus, the English abbreviation DNA means deoxyribonucleic acid in medical and biological jargon; conversely, it means does not answer in the jargon of telecommunication (Allan 2001: 172). Similarly, the noun spa is lately being used in Spanish, although not included in the DRAE yet, with the original English meaning of «a commercial establishment which offers health and beauty treatment (esp. for women) trough steam baths, exercise equipment, massage and the like», but not according to its original meaning of «a medical or mineral

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Clearing the Terrain 5 spring or well» [‘balneario’, ‘baños’ or ‘termas’, in Spanish]. However, the English noun itself was originally an acronym of the Latin phrase salus per aqua [health through water] and/or borrowed from the toponym Spa, a small town in eastern Belgium noted for its mineral springs; whereas the Italian spa is also the acronym of società per azioni, which refers to public limited company. As a result, the Italian spa has two different meanings, which make this word become a partial false friend as regards the noun spa in other languages, where it only entails one meaning. To be precise, Italians write spa when they mean mineral spring or resort and SpA when they mean public limited company, but their pronunciations are identical in both cases. Chance false friends across two languages are equivalent to homonymy within a single language. Although chance false friends are usually less problematic than semantic false friends, they are frequently a source of surprising mistakes—because they are more easily spotted out in context—as reflected in the example quoted by Maxime Koessler, where the French Consul in Malaga used the French verb s’assommer [to knock oneself out] according to the meaning of the Spanish verb asomarse [to lean out]; and the French verb enterrer [to bury] according to the meaning of the Spanish one enterar [to inform, to acquaint, to tell]: «On peut montrer le péril à l’oeuvre par l’anecdote du Consul de France à Malaga, si imprégné d’espagnol qu’il criait du jardin à sa femme à l’étage : ‘Assomme-toi que je t’enterre !’ pour lui dire : ‘penche-toi que je te mette au courant.’ (En castillan, asomarse, se montrer á la fenêtre, enterar, mettre au courant.)» [One can show an actual instance of this riskiness through the following anecdote. The French Consul in Malaga was so much imbued with Spanish that he would shout from the garden to his wife who was at the fi rst floor: ‘Knock yourself out so that I bury you!’ instead of saying ‘Lean out of the window so that I inform you.’ (In Castilian asomarse, to lean out of the window, enterar, to inform)] (Koessler 1975: LXX). Likewise, although the English noun rape and the Spanish noun rape [monkfish, anglerfish] are instances of chance false friends, Julio C. Santoyo (1989: 55) claims to have found in a restaurant menu the English phrase «Rape sailor’s style» as the translation of the Spanish course «Rape a la marinera» [monkfish with prawns, mussels and onions in a wine sauce]. And to make things more complicated, the Spanish term rape is an instance of homonymy: thus, rape1 means «rasura o corte de la barba hecho de prisa y sin cuidado» [closely-cropped hair], whereas rape2 means «pejesapo» [anglerfish, literally ‘toadfish’], which, in turn, is defi ned as «pez teleósteo marino del suborden de los Acantopterigios, que llega a un metro de longitud, con cabeza enorme, redonda, aplastada y con tres apéndices superiores largos y movibles, boca grandísima, colocada, así como los ojos, en la parte

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

superior de la cabeza, cuerpo pequeño y fusiforme, aletas pectorales muy grandes, y pequeñas las del dorso y cola. Carece de escamas, es de color oscuro por el lomo y blanco por el vientre, y tiene por todo el borde del cuerpo como unas barbillas carnosas» (DRAE). Consequently, the Spanish phrase rape a la marinera never is interpreted as sexual violation but both as closely-cropped hair sailor’s style or as angler fish cooked in seafood sauce. We usually understand the latter as the acceptable interpretation, only because we have found it written in a restaurant menu context. However, the fi rst interpretation might be the most acceptable one in a barber’s context, for example; while both interpretations could be plausible in a sea context. And, in turn, something similar could be said about the English utterance «Rape sailor’s style», since the noun rape means three ravishment or violation, plunder or pillage, and colza. Chance false friends may be found in any two given languages, inasmuch as they are the result of random changes. Therefore, when both languages do not share any common origin, the ratio of chance false friends is higher than semantic false friends. In this case, except for some isolated borrowings, every pair of similar terms we may fi nd is an acceptable candidate to be considered chance false friends. Semantic false friends are those pairs of words that are (concerning spelling and/or phonetics) the same or similar in two or more given languages and which are etymologically related. This relation may be either because they both come from an original source—mainly Latin, Greek, and to a lesser extent, Arabic or Hebrew for European languages—or because one language has borrowed a certain word from another language, but has changed its meaning, as we will see later on. Depending on these two causes, semantic false friends will be more frequent than chance false friends inasmuch as the two languages are more closely related. Latin and Greek borrowings are usually a common source of false friends in modern languages, even when they are used as technical terms in a particular sociolect. Two are the reasons: 1) because their meanings in modern languages may be different to the original meaning in their respective original languages; and/or 2) because they may have different meanings in two given modern languages (Korning Zethsen 2004). And this is what makes such false friends particularly deceitful: in cases where these languages share meaning and signifier, two given terms will be more difficultly distinguishable a priori. Semantic false friends across two different languages are the equivalent to polysemy within a single language. Semantic false friends may fall, in turn, into two different groups: 1. Full semantic false friends: those whose meanings in two or more given languages are completely different, and thus, one should never be translated by the other in any case. 2. Partial semantic false friends: those in which two or more given languages share some of their meanings, whereas other meanings are not

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Clearing the Terrain 7 common. Consequently, context will determine whether they could be translatably interchanged. An actual paradigmatic case of full semantic false friends is the one between the English noun topic, «the subject of a discourse, argument, or literary composition; a matter treated in speech or writing, a theme; also, a subject of admiration, animadversion, satire, mockery, or other treatment» (OED), and the Spanish noun tópico. Both nouns derive from the Greek term tópos [place, ‘τóπoς’, in Greek] and were coined in modern languages via the allusion to Aristotle’s Topics [‘Τοπικοί’ or ‘Τοπικά’, in Greek]. Nevertheless, the English term has acquired its current meaning undergoing a process of amelioration, while its Spanish cognate has undergone a pejorative process, which has resulted in the meaning «expresión vulgar o trivial» in its most common use, or «lugar común que la retórica antigua convirtió en fórmulas o clichés fijos y admitidos en esquemas formales o conceptuales de que se sirvieron los escritores con frecuencia» [both ‘commonplace’] (DRAE) in its technical use of the rhetoricians’ jargon. As a result of these two diverging processes, topic and tópico have adopted so opposite meanings that if the pupils in an English speaking country’s class say the teacher taught certain topics in the class, the teacher would be a reputable professional; on the other hand, if the Spanish pupils say a certain teacher taught tópicos in class—and much more if they use the augmentative topicazos—the teacher’s prestige will be extremely questioned. However, besides this common meaning, the Spanish noun tópico is also used in medical jargon with the meaning «dicho de un medicamento o de su modo de aplicación: De uso externo y local» (DRAE), whereas the English noun also means «an external remedy locally applied, as a plaster or blister», meaning which was also used by English-speaking doctors in the past, and it is now labeled as obsolete in the OED. And if we now focus on their corresponding adjectives—tópico/tópica and topical in Spanish and English, respectively—then things change radically. This fact is so because, employed as adjectives, these terms may be substituted one by the other without any change concerning the truth values of the sentences involved. In this case, tópico/tópica means «dicho de un medicamento o de su modo de aplicación: De uso externo y local», which fi nds its exact correlate in the English adjective topical as «that belongs or is applied to a particular part of the body», sense recorded in the OED as a present use. Similarly, an exemplary case of partial semantic false friends might be the one between the Spanish adjective inexcusable and its English and French cognates and homographs, inexcusable. The three of them derive from the same Latin adjective, inexcusabilis, and share the meanings of indefensible, unforgivable or unjustifiable. The shared sense is defi ned only as «not excusable; incapable of being excused or justified» (OED), «qui ne saurait être excusé; qui ne mérite aucune excuse» (DAF) and «que no tiene disculpa», in English, French and Spanish respectively. However, the

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

Spanish adjective has evolved a secondary metaphorical meaning which is not common to its English and French cognates. According to the secondary meaning developed in Spanish, inexcusable also means «que no puede eludirse con pretextos o que no puede dejar de hacerse», and therfore is synonymous with ineludible [‘unavoidable’ and ‘inéluctable’, in English and French, respectively]. Consequently, the Spanish word has become more polysemous than its English and French correlates, and thus, a new partial semantic false friend has appeared, resulting in a source of possible mistranslations for English or French speakers unaware of the polysemy of the Spanish term. This was exactly what happened to my friend Brigitte Nerlich when we fi rst co-authored a piece of paper: she read that I had written «a diferencia del Principio de Interés, el Principio de Expresividad ‘es más difuso y difícil de defi nir’, aunque su papel sea inexcusable en la conversación» [Unlike the Interest Principle, the Expressivity principle ‘is much more diffuse and difficult to be defi ned’, although its role is unavoidable in conversation] (Nerlich and Chamizo Domínguez 1999: 90) and she understood that inexcusable meant the same as the English cognate. But, since in this context the interpretation of unforgivable for inexcusable did not make sense, and so, she immediately asked me: “Pedro, what do you mean?” The mistakes derived from the polysemy of the Spanish adjective inexcusable may be disambiguated depending on the context in which the adjective is located. Accordingly, an English translator could reasonably decide in each case whether the Spanish adjective should be translated into English as unavoidable or as inexcusable. But, as in most cases of polysemy, the utterance of a polysemous term can be interpreted in various ways according to the function in context and the speakers’ knowledge and assumptions. However, this is not even clear in the examples provided by the DRAE to illustrate the two senses of inexcusable in Spanish. Hence, the DRAE illustrates the meaning of imperdonable [unforgivable] with the example «un error inexcusable» [an inexcusable error] and of ineludible [unavoidable] with «una visita inexcusable» [an unavoidable visit]. But it is obvious that, in an adequate context, un error inexcusable may mean un error ineludible [an unavoidable error] and una visita inexcusable may mean una visita imperdonable [an inexcusable visit]. This ‘dichotomical’ distinction between full semantic false friends and partial semantic false friends is operational and reasonably works in most cases if we disregard nuances and understand in an abstract manner the two languages involved and with an only source of information for each of these languages. But in practice this distinction has many blurred areas resulting in concrete cases of false friends being interpreted either as full or partial in relation to the source of information selected or available. For instance, let us study the case of the English noun scholar and the Spanish noun escolar to illustrate this point. According to the OED, the salient meanings of the English term would be: 1) «One who acknowledges another as his master or teacher; a disciple»; 2) «One who has acquired learning in the ‘Schools’;

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Clearing the Terrain 9 a learned or erudite person; esp. one who is learned in the classical (i.e. Greek and Latin) languages and their literatures»; 3) «In illiterate use, one whom the speaker regards as exceptionally learned. Often merely one who is able to read and write»; and 4) «A student who receives emoluments, during a fi xed period, from the funds of a school, college or university, towards defraying the cost of his education or studies, and has a reward or merit». However, the Spanish term only has the primary meaning of «alumno que asiste a la escuela para recibir la enseñanza obligatoria» [schoolboy/girl] (DRAE). This comparison shows that the nouns scholar and escolar would be full false friends, so they would never be synonymous and, consequently, they would produce mistranslations in whatever the context if replaced one by another. Nevertheless, if we resort to another source of information (Fergusson 1986), the situation changes considerably. R. Fergusson provides two different senses for the English noun scholar. According to the fi rst one, scholar would be a synonym of schoolboy, schoolgirl, student, pupil or learner, as well as an antonym of teacher, senses which would coincide with the ones of the Spanish term escolar. The second sense of the English term is synonym of savant, intellectual, academic or egghead, as well as antonym of dunce, and as such, it would be an instance of false friend in relation to its Spanish cognate. Accordingly, scholar and escolar would only be partial false friends. Therefore, the English noun could be translated by its Spanish cognate if in an English sentence scholar can be substituted by student or pupil with no change in the sentence truth values. And, conversely, scholar could not be translated by the Spanish noun escolar if in an English sentence this term can be substituted by savant or intellectual with no change in the sentence truth values. The diachronic factor must be added to the problems that may influence the interpretation of false friends; i.e. the different sources of information, or the variants in meaning of the different dialects or sociolects of a language. This diachronic factor makes terms which are not false friends at a particular historical moment become false friends in a later period; or vice versa: present false friends at a particular moment may stop being so because a language may adopt a particular meaning for a term as the result of a borrowing or a calque. For instance, among the various meanings of the English verb realise we may fi nd the one of darse cuenta, «advertirlo, percatarse de ello» and, «comprenderlo, entenderlo» (DRAE) or percatarse, «darse cuenta clara de algo, tomar conciencia de ello» in Spanish, meanings which were not traditionally attached to the French verb réaliser. Nevertheless, the French verb has recently been used with this meaning, which is exceedingly annoying for French language purists (Cantera et al 1998: 200), for whom the most adequate French verb for the Spanish verb percatarse would be s’apercevoir, which is defi ned by the DAF as «prendre conscience de, se rendre compte que», and which is one of the salient senses of English to realise when it means «to conceive, or think of, as real;

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

to apprehend with clearness or detail of reality; to understand or grasp clearly; to become aware of the presence of» (OED). And this diachronic consideration is relevant both from the theoretical and practical point of view. From the theoretical point of view, insofar as it is particularly the diachronic explanation which accounts for the existence of semantic false friends, and so, in this particular case the historic consideration of a word is essential to account for its meaning at a certain moment. And from the practical point of view, this issue seems even more interesting, especially when somebody knows that two given terms are currently false friends. In this case, we may tend to think that they may have been false friends in former historic times and, therefore, misunderstand past texts. An exemplary case of this idea may be the English adjective fastidious and its cognates in other languages. We have seen in the introduction that, at present, fastidious can never be translated into Spanish as fastidioso/fastidiosa: while the English adjective is a synonym of hard to please, meticulous, dainty, delicate or squeamish (Fergusson 1986), the Spanish noun means «enfadoso, importuno; que causa disgusto, desazón y hastío» [annoying, tiresome] or «fastidiado, disgustado» [displeased, angry or upset] (DRAE). That is the reason why R. Hill confessed that for quite a long time he had misinterpreted the meaning of the cognates fastidious in Roman languages, such as the French adjectives fastidieux/fastidieuse, «qui provoque la lassitude, l’ennui» [annoying, tiresome] (DAF), or the Catalan adjectives fastidiós/fastidiosa or fastijós/fastijosa, «que dóna fastig» [annoying, tiresome] or «que sent fastig» [upset] (Alcover and Moll). Likely, Ferrater Mora made reference to a diplomatic incident due to a misinterpretation of the meaning of this English word by a Romance language speaker. Nevertheless, in the past English fastidious also meant the same as the Spanish adjectives fastidioso/fastidiosa, though this sense is now considered obsolete. Among others, the OED provides the following definition of fastidious «that creates disgust, disagreeable, distasteful, unpleasant, wearisome»; it also documents this meaning with the following quote from 1734: «His partner, whose usage was… fastidious to him». This being the situation, a speaker—whether a native or non-native speaker of English—who does not know this sense may misunderstand this OED quote or an occasional use of the English term when used by someone who knows and occasionally plays on both its present and past meanings of the adjective in question. Likewise, the current meaning of the English noun preservative is «A chemical substance or preparation used to preserve things subject to decomposition, as perishable food-stuffs» (OED). In Spanish, though, this concept corresponds to conservante, a term appearing on can or tin labels to indicate the presence or absence of additives. On the other hand, the noun preservativo is used in Spanish and many other languages as a euphemism for condón [condom] or, as the DRAE defi nes it, «funda fi na y elástica para

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Clearing the Terrain 11 cubrir el pene durante el coito, a fin de evitar la fecundación o el posible contagio de enfermedades». The same meaning is also found in the Catalan term preservatiu: «funda amb què es cobreix el membre viril per impedir contagis veneris» (Alcover and Moll), as well as in the Polish term prezerwatywa: «guma, kondom» (Szpila 2003: 216). However, the English term preservative was also used in the past—at least during the 18th century—as a euphemism for condom, «‘Armour’ was the term most frequently used by eighteenth-century writers other than physicians (…). Writers, both medical and otherwise, referred to the device as a ‘preventive’ or, more usually, a ‘preservative’» (Kruck 1981: 8. My emphasis). Thus, in this case and at that synchronic time, preservative would be perfectly translatable into Spanish as preservativo, and the mistranslation would be conservante. In these cases where the synchronic and diachronic axes are superimposed, the decision about the most adequate equivalence of the two terms given at a particular time will usually be provided by the context in which the troublesome terms may appear. Nevertheless, we can always imagine some contexts where the hearer may have a reasonable doubt about the meaning of some term—especially when speakers are aware of the polysemy of the term in question and they use it on purpose to create some stylistic or cognitive effect. Here we may also determine some scale according to the probability that a particularly obscure text may lead us to an error. Thus, in the two above-mentioned cases, the probabilities of fi nding an obscure context are very different. In the pair preservative/preservativo the contexts in which they may appear are so apart that the possible misunderstandings will be reduced to minimum. Conversely, in the case of the pair fastidious/fastidioso misinterpretations are extremely likely to arise in the sense that the possible obscure contexts in which they may occur—and, in fact, they do occur as demonstrated by the aforementioned Hill’s and Ferrater’s quotes—may be plentiful. Hence, if we try to rebuild the statement which provoked the incident referred to by Ferrater, it could have been something like [1] “Dear colleague, your speech has been extremely fastidious.” However, in a context of a diplomatic meeting—as referred to by Ferrater—the listener of [1] felt offended by the speaker when he really tried to flatter him. The problem was that the context did not provide a clear clue about whether to interpret [1] as [1.1] “Dear colleague, your comprehensive/exhaustive”

speech

has

been

extremely

or as [1.2] “Dear colleague, your speech has been extremely boring.”

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

And even more, we also even imagine the speaker and the listener being aware of the meanings of the present and the former meanings of fastidious —what does not seem to be the case, according to the result. We can also picture the speaker uttering [1] on purpose so that the listener could not be completely sure whether the speaker’s intention was either to flatter or to offend him when he uttered [1].

1.3. VAGUENESS IN THE TRANSLATION OF FALSE FRIENDS In the case of full semantic false friends we can quite surely decide when a mistranslation has taken place, maybe due to the translator not noticing that two terms of two given languages can never be considered synonyms and, thus, one can never be translated by the other. On the other hand, partial semantic false friends behave in a different way from the formers, the partial ones being what I fi nd most interesting. Partial semantic false friends are those pairs of words in two given languages which share some of their meanings, whereas they do not share other meanings depending on context. Consequently, translators should carry out a hermeneutic process prior to perform the translation. And this process is quite alike the one carried out by translators in many other cases, especially when dealing with any polysemy or ambiguity in the original text (Chamizo Domínguez 2005). And when this hermeneutic process prior to translating is either not carried out or inadequately carried out, then the result is that what is said in the target language (hereafter TL) may be quite different to what the author meant in the source language (hereafter SL). In these cases, the scholar or the translator will have to give up to any attempt to establish an axiology between the diverse translations of the same text, even when two given translations of a same text are incompatible between them. The interpretation task then becomes a previous sieve to the translation task, and hence, what readers may understand from what they are reading is a function of the previous interpretation carried out by the translator. And this interpretation does not necessarily be negatively assessed, but in many cases it may help to clear up determined particularly obscure extracts. There might even be cases in which a translation may cast any light on the source text, making it clearer and more intelligible. That seems to be the case of the French translation of Hegel’s Phänomenologie des Geistes [Phenomenology of Mind] because «translation can illuminate, compelling the original, as it were, into reluctant clarity (witness Jean Hyppolite’s translation of Hegel’s Phenomenologie). It can, paradoxically, reveal the stature of a body of work which had been undervalued or ignored in its native guise» (Steiner 1975: 396). Steiner refers to Jean Hyppolite’s translation into French of the Phänomenologie des Geistes by Hegel, entitled La Phénoménologie de l’Esprit (Hegel 1944). And there

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Clearing the Terrain 13 might be other cases in which we can maintain that «el original era infiel a la traducción» [the original was unfaithful with regard to its translation] as José Luis Borges paradoxically stated about the English translation of William Beckford’s Vathek insofar as «el francés del siglo XVII era menos apto que el inglés para comunicar los ‘indefi nidos horrores’ (la frase es de Beckford) de la singularísima historia» [17th century French was rather less apt than English for communicating the ‘indefi nite horrors’ (the phrase is from Beckford) of this extremely peculiar story] (Borges 1980: 253). We will take this into account in two different instances, although they both come from two essential works in the history of philosophy. The fi rst case is a famous parenthesis from L. Wittgenstein’s Tractatus logico-philosophicus. It is not a real false friend, but it may help me to raise the issue I want to highlight, though. If any translation requires a previous interpretation of the text to be translated, the translation itself will be in turn influenced by this interpretation. Thus, the interpretation of a text and its translation is relevant regarding the interpretation of the understanding of the author’s thinking. To illustrate this point, let us focus on the solution provided for the well-known controversy about the Wittgensteinian solipsism, which will highly depend on whether a German sentence is understood and, thus, translated: [2] «Dass die Welt meine Welt ist, dass zeigt sich darin, dass die Grenzen der Sprache (der Sprache die allein ich verstehe) die Grenzen meiner Welt bedeuten» (Tractatus, 5.62. Original emphasis). In fact, [2] was fi rstly translated into English as: [3] «That the world is my world, shows itself in the fact that the limits of the language (the language which I understand) mean the limits of my world» (Wittgenstein 1922. Original emphasis). Accordingly, the problematic parenthesis in question has been usually interpreted as the language only I understand. And since this translation seems to suggest that Wittgenstein could be solipsist, a further English version of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus tried to maintain the original German ambiguity by translating this annoying parenthesis as «of that language which alone I understand» (Wittgenstein 1961). As for Spanish translations are concerned, the fi rst one reads «el lenguaje que yo sólo entiendo» [the language only I understand] (Wittgenstein 1957: 163) and, consequently, Wittgenstein has defended solipsism; while a further translation opted for «del solo lenguaje que yo entiendo» [the only language I understand] (Wittgenstein 2003: 235), and accordingly Wittgenstein has been not a solipsist at all. As for Catalan and French translations, all the three choose the second interpretation and read «de l’únic llenguatge que entenc» [of the unique language I understand] (Wittgenstein 1989: 131), «du seul langage

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14 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends que je comprenne» [of the unique language I understand] (Wittgenstein 1972: 142) and «le seul langage que je comprenne» [the unique language I understand] (Wittgenstein 1993: 93), respectively. Let us remember, though, that it is no more than a parenthesis, although the rivers of ink expended on whether Wittgenstein’s was a solipsist or not (see Hintikka 1966; García Suárez 1966). Anyway, since the ambiguity of the German sentence cannot be kept into Spanish, Catalan or French the translator has to interpret it before translating it or, still better, s/he is already interpreting it due to the mere process of translation. And it goes without saying that what is understood by readers of a translation about the original author’s thinking will depend on the choices carried out by its translator. The second case I want to refer to is a real instance of a partial semantic false friend which has given way to the most diverse translations of several texts of René Descartes’ Discours de la méthode [Discourse on Method]. The instance is the French adjective raisonnable, which may be synonymous with both rationnel/rationnelle or pensant/pensante and with acceptable, fondé/fondée, logique or sensé/sensée (Bertaud du Chazaud 1983). Consequently, it can be translated into Spanish both as racional and razonable, and into English as rational and reasonable, respectively. This situation being so, Descartes’ Spanish translators had to opt for one of the two meanings of the French adjective when translating Descartes’ French works. Indeed, the original polysemy and ambiguity of the French term needs to be necessarily disambiguated when translating into Spanish. Therefore, the translator has to choose in each case between the Spanish terms racional [rational] and razonable [reasonable]. Unfortunately, insofar as the alleged rationality of humankind is not usually accompanied by reasonableness, and thus, the choice of one term or another entails not only an interpretative option, but also a philosophical one. This dichotomy is due to the Spanish adjective racional being usually applied to the theoretical background, whereas the adjective razonable is usually applied to practical background. Consequently, for instance, when we say “un hombre racional” [a rational man], the result is redundant because all men are supposed to be rational by defi nition. Conversely, when we say “un hombre razonable” [a reasonable man], the result is not redundant, since in this case the term razonable is a synonym of prudente [prudent], comprensivo/comprensiva [understanding, sympathetic], or tolerante [tolerant, open-minded]. So, Descartes uses several times the adjective raisonnable in his Discours de la méthode, a work which has been translated into Spanish about 15 or 20 times. As I do not intend to be too protracted, I will keep to the classic translations by Manuel García Morente (Descartes 1968) and by Risieri Frondizi (Descartes 1983a). García Morente systematically translates raisonnable by razonable, and hence, his translations entail that Descartes is referring to (human) reasonableness when using this adjective. Frondizi, on the other hand, systematically translates raisonnable by racional, and hence, his translations entail that Descartes is referring to (human) rationality when using this adjective.

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Clearing the Terrain 15 Obviously, the result will be that the readers of the Spanish translations will get very different ideas about what Descartes meant when he used the adjective raisonnable, in case he did not mean both senses at the same time. Thus, when Descartes has to deny that the ability to distinguish between what is true and false is not universal in humankind and that this ability does not depend on some humans being more raisonnables than others, but on the methods applied, he states as follows: [4] «Et distinguer le vrai d’avec le faux, qui est proprement ce qu’on nomme le bon sens ou la raison, est naturellement égale en tous les hommes; et ainsi que la diversité de nos opinions ne vient pas de ce que les uns sont plus raisonnables que les autres, mais seulement de ce que nous conduisons nos pensées par diverses voies, et ne considérons pas les mêmes choses» (AT. VI 2. I have updated the original spelling. My emphasis). So what Descartes would have meant in [4] will be something very different if we interpret it from García Morente’s translation or Frondizi’s. For the former, Descartes would be discussing about reasonableness, whereas for the latter, he would be discussing rationality: [5] «Y distinguir lo verdadero de lo falso, que es propiamente lo que llamamos buen sentido o razón, es naturalmente igual en todos los hombres; y, por lo tanto, que la diversidad de nuestras opiniones no proviene de que unos sean más razonables que otros, sino tan sólo de que dirigimos nuestros pensamientos por derroteros diferentes y no consideramos las mismas cosas» (Descartes 1968: 29. My emphasis). [6] «Y de distinguir lo verdadero de lo falso, que es propiamente lo que llamamos buen sentido o razón, es por naturaleza igual en todos los hombres; y, por lo tanto, que la diversidad de nuestras opiniones no procede de que unos sean más racionales que otros, sino tan sólo de que dirigimos nuestros pensamientos por caminos distintos y no consideramos las mismas cosas» (Descartes 1983a: 69. My emphasis). And something similar happens with English translations of the text in question, since the French adjective raisonnable may be understood and consequently translated into English as rational or reasonable. In fact, one of the several translations into English of Descartes’ work opts for translating the French adjective as rational; and accordingly Descartes is not speaking about reasonableness at all: [7] «And of distinguishing the true from the false, which is properly speaking what is called Good Sense or Reason, is by nature equal in all men. Hence, too, it will show that de diversity of our opinions does not proceed from some men being more rational than others, but solely

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16 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends from the fact that our thoughts pass trough diverse channels and diverse objects are not considered by all» (Descartes 1983b: 41. My emphasis). By contrast, another English translator cut the Gordian knot by substituting the original French adjective for an English noun. And I would like to stress that this translation seems to be particularly ingenious and elegant, since it maintains in English the original vagueness of original French text. But, unfortunately, this translation will not make the reader aware about whether Descartes is speaking on rationality or on reasonableness: [8] «And of distinguishing truth from error, which is properly what is called good sense or reason, is by nature equal in all men; and that the diversity of our opinions, consequently, does not arise from some being endowed with a larger share of reason than others, but solely from this, that we conduct our thoughts along different ways, and do not fi x our attention on the same objects» (Descartes, undated. My emphasis). In short, in light of this, I must wonder whether Descartes’ text refers to rationality, reasonableness, or both at once. And to add fuel to fi re, it is also plausible to think that Descartes himself would not be aware of the vagueness of his own text and, consequently, consider that he betrayed his own ideals of clarity and distinctness as truth criteria, if we could point out to him this vagueness. Perhaps Blaise Pascal had in mind texts like that when he categorically did disqualify Descartes by writing in his Pensées: «Descartes inutile et incertain» [Descartes good-for-nothing and uncertain] (Pascal 1976b: 1137). One can hardly imagine any worse disqualification of Descartes’ philosophical ideals and being so economic with words at the same time! And something similar happens when Descartes uses the term âme raisonnable as a synonym of res cogitans, and not of bon sens or bona mens. In this case, what Descartes would have meant with âme raisonnable will be very different whether we stick to one translation or the other: [9] «J’avais décrit, après cela, l’âme raisonnable, et fait voir qu’elle ne peut aucunement être tirée de la puissance de la matière» (Descartes 1973: AT. VI, 59. I have updated the original spelling. My emphasis). [10] «Después de todo esto, había yo descrito el alma razonable y mostrado que en manera alguna puede seguirse de la potencia de la materia» (Descartes 1968: 66. My emphasis). [11] «Había yo descrito, después de todo esto, el alma racional y mostrado que en manera alguna puede seguirse de la potencia de la naturaleza» (Descartes 1983a: 114. My emphasis).

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Clearing the Terrain 17 And, in this case, English translations diverge in a parallel way as well: [12] «I have described after this the rational soul and shown that it could not be in any way derived from the power of matter» (Descartes 1983b: 60. My emphasis). [13] «I had after this described the reasonable soul, and shown that it could by no means be educed from the power of matter» (Descartes, undated. My emphasis). Now, our understanding of whether Descartes tries to refer to soul’s rationality or reasonableness depends on its translators’ interpretations; and such divergent interpretations are possible because the French adjective raisonnable is a partial semantic false friend with regard to the Spanish adjectives racional and razonable, and the English adjectives rational and reasonable. With regard to the negation of raisonnable, déraisonnable, «qui manque de raison; qui va contre la raison» (DAF), the problem between French and Spanish is exactly the opposite one. Here we have an instance in which the translators could not fi nd or did not fi nd convincing the Spanish adjective desrazonable for the original French adjective. However, desrazonable exists in Spanish, and is defi ned by the DRAE as «fuera de razón» [beyond reason]. This has forced translators to suggest various alternatives, which are hardly synonymous with desrazonable: [14] «Et je ne m’étonne aucunement des extravagances qu’on attribue à tous ces anciens Philosophes, donc nous n’avons point les écrits, ni ne juge pas, pour cela, que leurs pensées aient été fort déraisonnables» (Descartes 1973: AT. VI, 70. I have updated the original spelling. My emphasis). [15] «Y no me asombro en modo alguno de esas extravagancias que se atribuyen a los antiguos filósofos, cuyos escritos no poseemos, ni juzgo por ellas que hayan sido sus pensamientos tan desatinados» (Descartes 1968: 73. My emphasis). [16] «Y no me asombro en manera alguna de las extravagancias que se atribuyen a los antiguos fi lósofos, cuyos escritos no poseemos, ni considero por esto que sus pensamientos hayan sido poco razonables» (Descartes 1983a: 123. My emphasis). And, as usual, something similar happens with English translations: [17] «And I do not in the least wonder at the extravagances attributed to all the ancient philosophers whose writings we do not possess, nor do I judge from these that their thoughts were very unreasonable» (Descartes 1983b: 64).

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18

Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends [18] «And I am not at all astonished at the extravagances attributed to those ancient philosophers whose own writings we do not possess; whose thoughts, however, I do not on that account suppose to have been really absurd» (Descartes, undated. My emphasis).

Again, if one pays attention to what Spanish translations literally say, neither the adjective desatinado [wrong or unwise] nor the syntagm poco razonable [scarcely reasonable] exactly translate the French adjective déraisonnable, which is much more disqualifying and categorical. In fact, both cases might be considered as meiosis or litotes of desrazonable. As far as the English translations are concerned, one also might argue that something may be (or may be considered) unreasonable, but not necessarily absurd as well. For instance, playing lottery might be considered unreasonable, but it is not obviously absurd, illogical or irrational. In fact a distinction like that was argued by Pascal, and by appealing to the example of lottery itself, in order to make “reasonable” the belief in God. It is about his well-known Argument of Wager, also known as Pascal’s Wager [Le Pari de Pascal, in French], which could be summarised as follows: it is always a better “bet” to believe in God, because the expected value to be gained from believing in God is always greater than the expected value resulting from non-belief. And this is exactly what, according to Pascal, people who play lottery do. They invest a small quantity of money having their hopes pinned on gaining a greater one. And if we do not consider that lottery players are irrational, we could consider that the belief in God is not on a par irrational as well—Pascal concludes. The moral of all these explanations is that we shall often not be able to apply axiological criteria to the translations of partial false friends, as it is also the case of most occurrences of polysemy and ambiguity. Instead, these translations rely on the translator’s previous interpretation of the original text. Obviously, it might be argued that there may be some translations more preferable than others in relation to the contextual criteria or to the coherence with other texts of the same author being translated. However, there will always be some particularly obscure texts which may be liable to different acceptable interpretations and, in any case, this resort would also be a translation. And, if it is the case that the TL does not maintain the original polysemy or ambiguity, then the translator will have to select one of the diverse possible alternatives, even though knowing full well that all the different original senses are not kept.

1.4. LEXICALISATION AND FALSE FRIENDS Although this is not always explicit in the literature about the topic, two given terms in two given languages will function as false friends if, and only if, they occur during the same synchronic moment in the two languages in

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Clearing the Terrain 19 question. Furthermore, we do not have to take into account the ups and downs such terms may have undergone during the history of the linguistic system they belong to. However, as languages are constantly evolving and some influence the others, pairs of terms which are full or partial false friends at a particular synchronic moment may frequently stop being so with the passing of time. This is especially true when we study borrowings and calques, as we will particularly see in chapter 3. Let us analyse some examples of this kind to illustrate how former false friends in the past are now just about to stop being or have already stopped being false friends with the passing of time. And vice versa: terms which were never false friends in the past have now become false friends out of consideration for historic vicissitudes. The Spanish noun secuela and the English noun sequel are usually cited as examples of partial semantic false friends (Prado 2001: 439–440). The Spanish noun has various meanings; both outdated meanings as «séquito (gente que en obsequio, respeto o aplauso de alguien le acompaña y sigue)» [retenue, followers] or «secta» [sect], and current meanings such as «consecuencia o resulta de algo» [consequence] and «trastorno o lesión que queda tras la curación de una enfermedad o un traumatismo, y que es consecuencia de ellos» [sequel] (DRAE). Likewise, the English noun does not only refer to subsequent development, but it also refers to second parts or next installments: «the ensuing narrative, discourse, etc.; the following or remaining part of a narrative, etc.; that which follows as a continuation; esp. a literary work that, although complete in itself, forms a continuation of a preceding one» (OED). And these meanings are not shared with the Spanish term by now. That is to say, the English noun sequel is a synonym of continuation, following-up, upshot, issue or aftermath (Fergusson 1986) in everyday language, while in medical jargon is a synonym of English sequela, as defi ned by the OED: «a morbid affection occurring as the result of a previous disease.» In the latter sense, the meaning coincides with the Spanish term secuela in its medical usage. The result is that the English noun becomes a partial semantic false friend with respect to its Spanish cognate secuela. Nevertheless, the Spanish term is lately also being used with the meaning of second parts or next installments, as can be regarded in the following text: [19] «Después de acabarlo, el propio Fairbanks levantó la producción de la película y se asignó a sí mismo el papel protagónico de The mark of Zorro, la primer pieza de una secuela interminable que sigue reciclándose en la pantalla» [After having fi nished, Fairbanks himself produced the film and, thus, he awarded himself the main character in The mark of Zorro, the fi rst piece of a never-ending sequel which keeps on being recycled on screen] (Jordi Soler, “Los orígenes de El Zorro”, in El País Semanal, No. 1522, November 27 2005, p. 45).

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

Up to now, that meaning is unknown in Spanish, but it might well change if its use becomes widespread, and thus, the DRAE would have to add a new sense for this entry. The lexicalisation of this new meaning of secuela is a mere theoretical possibility, but one can put forward other cases in which this lexicalisation has been completely done. Thus, the original native term becomes a past relic. Therefore, in Spanish the «arma de fuego, portátil, destinada al uso de los soldados de infantería. Consta de un cañón de hierro o de acero, de ocho a diez decímetros de longitud ordinariamente, de un mecanismo con que se dispara, y de la caja a que este y aquel van unidos» (DRAE) has traditionally been named fusil, a borrowing from the French term fusil, which is currently considered as being genuinely Spanish. And the noun fusil is still being used in Spanish military jargon. For example, sergeants usually scold recruits when they call it rifle instead of fusil—at least they used to do it when I did my military service. But the noun fusil is becoming less and less frequent as time goes by, and it is being substituted by rifle, which is defi ned by the DRAE as «fusil rayado de procedencia norteamericana» [scratched riffle from an American origin]. The substitution of the Spanish noun fusil by the English noun riffle (or rifle) is so widely spread that they are no longer being considered false friends in related English-Spanish dictionaries—i.e. the excellent dictionary by Prado (2001) does not record them. However, if we stick to the DRAE’s defi nition of rifle and the OED’s one of riffle—«a fire-arm, esp. a musket or carbine, having a spirally grooved bore»—then both terms should be considered partial semantic false friends. The reason is that the Spanish term rifle is a hyponym of fusil, while the latter is a superordinate term that does not only include rifles but also other fi rearms with similar characteristics, although they do not need to be «de procedencia norteamericana» [from an American origin]. And this lexicalisation process has been fully completed in another paradigmatic case. The Spanish term hospital de campaña [field hospital] is a calque from the French term hôpital de campagne. Both terms are still considered semantic false friends (Cantera et al 1998: 57) because the Spanish equivalent for the French syntagm hôpital de campagne should be hospital de (primera) sangre [field hospital, literally ‘(fi rst) blood hospital’]. This is defi ned by the DRAE as «sitio o lugar que, estando en campaña, se destina a la primera cura de los heridos» and it was still in use during the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) at least. Furthermore, hospital de campaña is not included yet in the DRAE; however, its use has become so widespread to the extent that I am afraid that most Spanish native speakers do not know the meaning hospital de (primera) sangre, or think it is an archaism, at the most. In fact, the Google search tool displays about 600 references for the string hospital-de-sangre and no less than 10,000 for the string hospital-de-campaña, while only 11 for the string hospital-de-primera-sangre (accessed 12 October 2006). And even more, hospital de campaña is widening its original war-related meaning to go on to denote any hospital

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Clearing the Terrain 21 that is housed provisionally in order to assist in any disaster. Thus, when Madrid terrorist attacks took place on June 11 2004, José Luis Martín entitled his report on the criminal events for the newspaper El Mundo as «En el hospital de campaña de Daoíz y Velarde» [At Daoíz and Velarde field hospital]. Obviously, in this context, hospital de campaña means hospital provisional/móvil or hospital de urgencia [a mobile hospital or an emergency hospital], and not hospital provisional montado en el campo de batalla [a temporary hospital erected near a battlefield]. Up to now we have seen what happens with nouns, illustrated with the three cases. Now we will see that the same is true of proper names, when they are understood as such, although their corresponding nouns have not undergone the process of lexicalisation. Let us begin with an instance of a proper name, more particularly with the name of a war between Spain and France during the 17th century: La Guerra de Devolución, La Guerre de Dévolution and The War of Devolution, in Spanish, French and English, respectively. It might seem that all the three terms share the same reference, and in fact they do when they refer to that particular war. However, they do evoke very different things for any French, any Spanish or any English speaker. The reason is that the Spanish noun devolución, the French noun dévolution and the English one devolution are full semantic false friends. Although all the three derive from the Latin term devolutio, their respective meanings are completely different. Therefore, the Spanish noun devolución means «acción y efecto de devolver», and so, a return or a refund is basically the restitution of something, as when we refer to a devolución tributaria [tax refund], which is defi ned by the DRAE as a «restitución a los contribuyentes, por parte de la Hacienda pública, de las cantidades indebidamente ingresadas.» According to this general meaning of the Spanish noun devolución, the most adequate French synonyms might be remboursement, restitution, rétrocession or renversement. On the other hand, the French noun dévolution has a very specialised legal meaning and can be defi ned as «transfert, transmission d’un bien, d’une succession, d’un avantage, etc., d’une personne à une autre en vertu d’un droit. […] Spécialt. Droit coutumier qui, dans certains pays, en cas de remariage, attribuait les droits successoraux aux seuls enfants nés du premier mariage» [roughly, ‘inheritance’ or ‘legacy’] (DAF), which would be more or less equivalent to the Spanish noun phrase transmisión de un derecho [literally, ‘transfer of any right’] (Cantera et al 1998: 93). And eventually the English noun devolution means «the passing of any unexercised right to the one upon whom it devolves if allowed to lapse» or «the transfer of some powers from Parliament at Westminster to proposed Scottish or Welsh assemblies; also, the delegation of certain administrative functions from central government to provincial offices in Scotland and Wales»; which might be equivalent to Spanish transferencia de poderes or transferencia de competencias and to French transfert de pouvoirs. And that is the reason why, in coherence with this specialised meaning of the French noun devolution, the French

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22 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends called Guerre de Dévolution to the war declared to Spain (1667–1668) by Louis XIV in order to enforce the alleged rights of his wife, Marie Thérèse of Austria, over The Netherlands and The Franche-Comté. And, since the French term was directly translated into Spanish as Guerra de Devolución and into English as War of Devolution, the Spanish and English terms have become lexicalised and are used that way by historians. However, any Spanish speaker, who is not used to these issues, is likely to understand that Guerra de Devolución means War of Return and Guerre de Rétrocession or Guerre de Renversement, in English and French respectively. And any English speaker under the same circumstances might think it means War of Transfer of Powers. As we have already seen, the case of the Guerra de Devolución/War of Devolution has been a mistranslation derived from a false friend that has fi nally been lexicalised. But this can also be documented in other several cases. I will select three Spanish toponyms in which translation mistakes have fi nally lexicalised three different place names. The fi rst one is the Spanish toponym Canal de la Mancha [English Channel]. When Spaniards learn geography, the sea inlet dividing the British southern coasts and the French northern coasts is called the Canal de la Mancha, and it usually recalls the region which witnessed Don Quixote’s deeds. Yet, the Spanish noun for this geographical feature has nothing to do with the Spanish region of La Mancha. It comes from some translator falling into the trap of the French false friend Canal de La Manche or just La Manche (known as the English Channel by the Brits—so reputedly peculiar). The problem was that the mistake has many followers. Indeed, the French word manche [sleeve] is a chance false friend of the Spanish noun mancha [stain], which derives from the Latin word macula [stain]. The French noun manche comes from the Latin noun manica [a sleeve, serving as a glove; handcuffs, manacles] and can be generally defi ned as «partie du vêtement dans laquelle on glisse le bras, et qui le couvre en totalité ou en partie» (DAF). Thus, it is a synonym of the Spanish word manga [sleeve], «parte del vestido en que se mete el brazo» (DRAE), which derives from Latin manica as well. And from this general meaning and by means of an analogy-based metaphorical process, the French noun has also gone on to denote «étendue de mer resserrée entre deux côtes; bras de mer (vieilli). […] Spécialt. Avec une majuscule. La Manche, la mer séparant les côtes de France et d’Angleterre» [inlet, straits] (DAF); that is to say, in Spanish brazo de mar or estrecho. And if from this moment on someone falls again into the trap of the meaning this noun has in Spanish, the French term Canal de la Mancha might well be translated as Canal de la Tache [Stain Channel]. Not far from the English Channel we may fi nd a sea area called Gran Sol in Spanish. Its Spanish name is also the consequence of someone being tripped up by a false friend. Obviously, in this collocation to denote that sea area, the noun Sol [Sun] brings back to the mind of any Spanish speaker

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Clearing the Terrain 23 the well-known heavenly body. This is particularly shocking if we take into account that, precisely, the sun does not usually shine in Gran Sol. This area is usually called Sole and La Grande Sole in English and French, respectively. It seems that again the strange place name of this sea area is due to someone being the victim of the Spanish noun sol and the English or French noun sole are chance false friends. Let us focus on the case of the English noun sole. Among the many meanings this noun has—it is a clear case of homonymy—I will highlight four of them following the defi nitions provided by the OED: 1) «the under surface of the foot; that part of it which rests or is placed upon the ground in standing or walking», which would be equivalent to the Spanish term planta del pie; 2) «the bottom of a boot, shoe, etc.», which would be equivalent to the Spanish term suela; 3) «the under-side of a sedimentary stratum», which would be equivalent to the Spanish term subsuelo; and 4) «a common British and European flatfish (Solea vulgaris or solea), esteemed as food; one or other of the various fishes belonging to the widely-distributed genus Solea», which could be translated into Spanish as lenguado. The latter, lenguado, is defi ned by the DRAE as «pez teleósteo marino de cuerpo oblongo y muy comprimido, casi plano, y cabeza asimétrica. Vive, como otras muchas especies del orden de los Pleuronectiformes, echado siempre del mismo lado. Su carne es muy apreciada». However, the OED does not refer in any case to Sole being a toponym, and so, I have not been able to figure out which meaning was responsible for calling Gran Sol that North Atlantic area. In fact, the only bit of news I have been able to find about the English place name has been «Sole sea area. That laying south-west from Land’s End, and south of the Shannon and Fastnet sea areas. It includes the Sole banks» (Payton 1970: 466). Although it confi rms its meaning, it does not cast any light on its possible etymology. But, whichever the etymology of the English place name, we can only be sure that the false friend has fi nally become lexicalised and now the proper Spanish name for this North Atlantic area is Gran Sol; in spite of it literally means Big/Great/Grand Sun! And, fi nally, if we leave the North Atlantic and travel to the South Atlantic, we will fi nd another geographical feature whose Spanish name has an analogous origin to the two previous ones. It is the Cabo de Hornos [literally, ‘Cape Ovens/Furnaces/Kilns’], which names a place where neither ovens nor furnaces or kilns do seem to be particularly abundant. The Spanish place name is graphically similar to its name in other languages: Cape Horn in English, Kap Horn in German, Cap Horn/Cap de Hornes in French; and they all seem to come from the Dutch Kaap Hoorn. In fact, this seems that in 1616 the Dutch sailor Willem C. Schouten named this geographical feature after his birthplace, Hoorn. Nevertheless, hoorn is also a common Dutch noun to refer to the Spanish nouns cuerno [horn], auricular [headphone] or trompa [trunk, horn], but never horno [oven, furnace, or kiln]. And there are more geographical features named in Spanish with the word cuerno, such as El Cuerno de África [Hoorn van Afrika and Horn of

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24

Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

Africa, in Dutch and English, respectively]. This means that the place name will make sense in English or German, languages in which horn and Horn, respectively, also mean cuerno. However, when translating the Dutch Kaap Hoorn into Spanish as Cabo de Hornos, the result has been that for Spaniards this place name evokes a «fábrica para caldear, en general abovedada y provista de respiradero o chimenea y de una o varias bocas por donde se introduce lo que se trata de someter a la acción del fuego» or an «aparato culinario cerrado, en cuyo interior se asan, calientan o gratinan alimentos» (DRAE), but never a cuerno [horn]. As in the former cases, if we may ask someone to backtranslate the Spanish Cabo de Hornos into Dutch, the result might well be Kaap Ovens.

1.5. EXPLOITATION OF FALSE FRIENDS TO ACHIEVE COGNITIVE EFFECTS False friends are usually considered a problem when communicating between speakers of various languages, as well as an obstacle in translation depending on the traps that they may make speakers and translators fall into. Thus, as I have already shown, their research is usually meant to warn on the dangers they may cause in order to avoid potential mistakes. That is to say, the false friends phenomenon is usually regarded from a negative point of view. However, this phenomenon of linguistic interference may also be studied from a positive perspective insofar as the existence of false friends may be exploited—and in fact, it is exploited—to achieve certain humoristic and cognitive effects. This is particularly true of some particular literary works in which the author plays with the two codes. Let us begin with a quote from the novel La tesis de Nancy [Nancy’s Thesis], by Ramón Sender, where the main character—an American student named Nancy who is writing her doctoral thesis in Seville—clarifies a misunderstanding with her Spanish boyfriend, a Sevillian gipsy who is almost an illiterate but who sometimes seems to be a scholar, or at least Nancy thinks so. This misunderstanding was due to Nancy confessing her boyfriend that she was very keen on golfería [craftiness or prostitution], trying to mean she is very fond of playing golf. Obviously, her boyfriend understood this term as «conjunto de golfos (pillos, sinvergüenzas)» [gang of urchins] or as «acción propia de un golfo (pillo, sinvergüenza)» [piece of roguery or craftiness] (DRAE), or even, although not included in the DRAE, as prostitución [prostitution]: [20] «Yo le pellizqué en el brazo y él gritó y dijo que no le gustaban los cardenales. ¿Qué tendrá que ver lo uno con lo otro? Luego, un poco enfadado, añadió: –Tú puedes dedicarte a la golfería y yo no puedo decir un piropo, ¿eh?

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Clearing the Terrain 25 – ¿Y qué tiene que ver el juego del golf con los piropos, querido? Al oír esto, Curro se me quedó mirando como fascinado. Se levantó despacio de la silla y preguntó: – ¿Esa es la golfería tuya? –Sí. ¿Qué otra puede ser? Te digo, Betsy, que no acabo de entender a mi novio». [I pinched his arm and he shouted and said that he did not like cardinals/bruises. I wondered what cardinals had to do with bruises. Then, a bit angry, he added: - You are allowed to be crafty (or even, a protitute) but I cannot say a compliment, can I? - And what does golf have to do with compliments, my dear? After having heard this, Curro stared at me in shock. He slowly stood up from the chair and asked me: - Is this your craftiness/prostitution? - Yes. What else could it be? Believe me, Betsy, I cannot quite understand my boyfriend.] (Sender 1978: 141–142. Bold type is mine, original italics). In this text Sender plays with golfería and golf—which is explicitly and metalinguistically explained—but he also plays tacitly with the fact that the Spanish noun cardenal and the English noun cardinal are partial false friends. Thus, the Spanish reader is aware that the Spanish term cardenal is homonymous. As Nancy is not aware of this fact, she cannot understand what cardenales1 , «cada uno de los prelados que componen el colegio consultivo del Papa y forman el cónclave para su elección» [cardinal], and cardenales2 , «mancha amoratada, negruzca o amarillenta de la piel a consecuencia de un golpe u otra causa» [bruise, weal] (DRAE), have to do with bruises produced by pinches. The problem is that the English noun cardinal only refers to «one of the seventy ecclesiastical princes (six cardinal bishops, fi fty cardinal priests, and fourteen cardinal deacons) who constitute the pope’s council, or the sacred college, and to whom the right of electing the pope has been restricted since the third Lateran council in 1173» (OED), which, by the way, is an old-fashioned defi nition nowadays

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends

since the number of this sacred college and its layout was changed under Pope Paul VI’s pontificate. As can be seen in the example [20], the existence of false friends does not only need to be considered negatively as a source of mistakes and misunderstandings, but it can also be exploited; or, to be said in a precise way, just because false friends are a source of mistakes and misunderstandings they can be literarily exploited. In fact, it has been exploited to achieve cognitive and literary effects. In order to fi nish this chapter, I will refer to two cases where false friends have been exploited in two different ways in two different literary texts, each of them giving way to different implicatures. In the fi rst text the pun lies in the French verb râper [to grate, rasp or shred] and the English verb to rape being graphically very similar, although in this case they are chance false friends: [21] «Mrs Towle pushes the dog with her foot. It looks beatifically at her. ...must make you aware of the French verb raper (sic), to grate... Mrs Towle turns it [the television] up further. ...are you sure you didn’t mean ‘to rape’ in a French accent? ‘No no, that would be ‘violer’...» (Glyde 2000: 107–108). In [21] the author is playing with two codes. These codes, though, are showed to the reader in an explicit and metalinguistic way. Thus, readers are not required to make any especial effort to understand what is meant in the text. That is to say, as the text is written in English and English is used as a metalanguage, readers do not need to know French to notice that râper and to rape are false friends, and so, they should be careful with them. The second text shows a more complex pun and requires readers with a good command in both languages. The text plays with the French verbs s’introduire [gain admittance, be introduced] and se présenter [introduce, come up] and the English verbs to introduce (oneself) and to present. The aim is to achieve the contextual effects required to correctly understand what is going to be said in the rest of the work: [22] «Dès la première ligne, une discussion a opposé le Major à son collaborateur français. Celui-ci ayant voulu traduire le titre : ‘Puis-je me présenter ?’ le Major a insisté pour obtenir une traduction plus littérale. ‘M’introduire, me paraît plus exact. –On ne dirait pas cela en français, dit le Français. – Alors laissez les choses en anglais, dit le Major. Elles disent mieux ce que je veux dire.’ Le traducteur, ne voulant pas compromettre, dès l’entrée en matière, l’ensemble de l’entreprise, n’a pas insisté, mais fait remarquer que tous les autres titres, de même que

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Clearing the Terrain 27 la majeure partie de la traduction, sont rédigés en français. (Note du Traducteur.).» [From the fi rst line, the Major and his French collaborator had an argument. This one wanted to translate the title as: ‘May I present myself’? And the Major insisted in getting a translation much more literal. ‘Introduce myself, seems to me more precise. –One cannot say it in French, the Frenchman said. –Then keep things in English, the Major said. They say better what I want to mean’. Since the translator did not want to endanger, the venture’s whole from getting to the point, has not insist, but he stress that the rest of the titles as well as the majority of translation, have been written in French. (Translator’s footnote)] (Daninos 1990: 9. My bold type, original italics). In [22] two codes are also used, but in a very different manner as compared to [21]. In this second case neither of the codes has either explicitly or metalinguistically been shown; however, the author of the text takes readers’ competence in both codes for granted and, hence, they can understand the implicit allusions in the text. Consequently, Daninos manages to get a smile out of the readers because he relies on the readers being competent in both codes and knowing that present/présenter and introduce/introduire are partial semantic false friends. Furthermore, as I have already mentioned, this text gives way to some contextual effects that are essential for the right understanding of the multiple references and allusions that Pierre Daninos will be making along the rest of the novel. And that is particularly why the fi rst chapter is entitled with the sentence that triggers the argument between Major W. Marmaduke Thompson and his alleged translator into French—«May I introduce myself?»—that is, the author of the novel himself. This makes the implicatures achieved by the readers once read and understood [22] do not only affect such text, but also everything that is going to be said from then on. For example, from the very beginning of the novel, the readers should rely on: 1) Major Thompson is proud of his mother tongue, which makes English express things better than any other language; 2) consequently, the readers know from that moment on that, according to Major Thompson, the English language is axiologically preferable to any other language; and 3) Pierre Daninos himself is merely the “translator” of the Major’s English text, although he does not always agree with what is said by his character. Nevertheless and in spite of [22] appears at the very beginning of the novel and seems to me essential in order to achieve an adequate understanding of the rest of the novel, this text has not been translated into English in the English version I consulted (Daninos 1957). Since [22] is pretty difficult to translate into English, I dare to guess that the anonymous translator thought that a dead dog cannot bite, so to speak, and opted to not make life difficult to him/herself by dealing with it. But I now wonder whether English-speaking readers understand the rest of the novel.

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28 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends Finally, and in order to fi nish off this fi rst chapter, I would add that sometimes one can fi nd “true friends” in the most unexpected places as well. And, obviously, they also have been used in literature. This is the case in which the Chilean Nobel Prize winner Pablo Neruda tells the way how he discovered that Spanish tinta [ink] is said tinta in Malay language as well: [23] «Decidí enviar un telegrama al gobierno de Chile. Me faltaba tinta. Entonces fue cuando llamé al boy del hotel y le pedí en inglés ink, para que me trajera un tintero. No dio el menor signo de comprensión. Se limitó a llamar a otro boy […] para que lo ayudara a interpretar mis enigmáticos deseos […]. De una mesa solitaria tomé un tintero que estaba allí por milagro y blandiéndolo ante sus ojos asombrados, les grité: This! This! Entonces todos sonrieron y dijeron a coro: Tinta! Tinta! Así supe que la tinta se llama ‘tinta’ en malayo.» (Neruda 1976: 149-150. Original italics). [I had decided to send a cable to the Chilean government. I needed ink. So I called a boy from the hotel and asked him in English for some ink, hoping he’d bring me an inkwell. He didn’t show the slightest glimmer of understanding. He just called another boy […] to help interpret my baffling request […]. From the solitary table I took an inkwell that by sheer luck was there, and waving it in front of their astonished eyes, I screamed at them: ‘This! This!’ They all smiled and sang out together: ‘Tinta! Tinta!’ And that was how I learned that, in Malay, ink is called by the same name, tinta, as in Spanish (Neruda 1978: 106-107. Original italics)]. Since the Malayan Peninsula never has been a Spanish colony and, consequently, it is very difficult to explain these amazing “true friends” between Malay language and Spanish, it seems that the noun tinta has been borrowed, for its part, from Philippines where this borrowing can be explained by appealing to the four centuries of Spanish colonisation. In any case, Pablo Neruda’s worries were solved thanks to this unexpected event and this allowed him to write the witty and amazing story quoted in [23]. Nevertheless, it should be added that, unfortunately for Spanish speaking travellers to Malaysia at present time, it seems that the Spanish term tinta has been substituted nowadays by the English one ink in Malay language.

1.6. SUMMARY False friends are a phenomenon of linguistic interference which consists in two terms in two or more given languages having the same or very similar spelling and/or phonetic form, but whose respective meanings differ fully or partially. That is to say, false friends share their signifiers, but not their meanings. This derives in the following consequences:

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Clearing the Terrain 29 • False friends are the source of many misunderstandings between speakers of different languages. This is due to the extent that a given speaker, relying on the meaning a particular signifier has in his/her mother tongue, does not notice this signifier may have a very different meaning in any other language. • False friends are also the source of many mistranslations. In many cases, the existence of false friends derives in the existence of various alternative translations of the same text or original utterance. It may even be the case that they all can make sense in the TL and be coherent with the text or utterance in the SL. • However, the existence of false friends does not only conform an obstacle for communication between speakers of different languages and for translation. Furthermore, it is a phenomenon that can be exploited—and, in fact, has been exploited—to achieve literary, humoristic and cognitive effects. • This positive exploitation of false friends gives way to conversational implicatures and contextual effects, which could not be achieved by other means.

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2

Synonymy, Polysemy, Homonymy, Register and Diachrony

2.1. THEORY AND PRACTICE Identifying false friends in two given languages in order to avoid mistakes and misunderstandings in communication and translation is of exceptional practical interest for foreign language teachers and translators. That is precisely why this task has frequently been carried out, and thus, there is a good deal of literature from a practical perspective on this topic; be it considering two particular languages (Cantera et al 1998; Postigo Pinazo 1997 and 2005; Prado 2001; Szpila 2003 and 2005; Veisbergs 1993 and 1997), or considering various languages deriving from the same linguistic family, as it is the case of Buncic’s work (2000) for Slavic languages, or even considering a multilingual perspective as in Hill’s dictionary (1982). Either with the attempt of dealing with the entire language in question, or with the humbler attempt of dealing with a single particular jargon, as it is the case of Navarro’s work (1997) for medical language, or with the attempt of dealing with some instances of linguistic interference in two given languages (Mendiluce Cabrera and Hernández Bartolomé 2005). However, these compendia—whose practical usefulness cannot be denied—often lack some theoretical treatment on the issue. In fact, the result is that the question of false friends is usually presented as a synchronic phenomenon; thus, no linguistic or diachronic explanations are provided to account for the phenomenon in abstract. Furthermore, it is neither explained what causes in a particular synchronic moment have made two given terms become instances of false friends when, in the past, they were absolutely no false friends; or they have totally or partially stopped being false friends when they had been so in the past (Mendiluce Cabrera and Hernández Bartolomé 2005). Obviously, chance false friends are difficultly explained by means of synchronic explanations. However, phonetic explanations are plausible indeed, and they would be similar to what can be put forward in cases of homonymy within a single language. This makes the study of chance false friends become very interesting for phonetics and phonology researchers. Conversely, semantic false friends may be theoretically treated, because they involve meaning matters. Consequently, they are of paramount interest

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to general linguistics, philosophy of language, semantics and pragmatics, insomuch as they can cast light on the theory of meaning in general and on the different changes of meaning that signifiers may undergo. In addition to this interest, the reflection on the semantic changes that have originated false friends has the added value of requiring a very close collaboration of the reflection on different synchronic and diachronic aspects of languages. In other words, it does not seem possible to provide a semantic explanation of false friends in a particular synchronic stage without resorting to the diachronic aspects of the matter. Hence, in this work my synchronic semantic reflections should not be put apart from the diachronic allusions and explanations that explain the former ones. Some essential concepts, which have been widely discussed by linguists and philosophers of language, should be handled in order to address an explanation of the origin of false friends that goes beyond a mere more or less detailed identification. These concepts are synonymy, homonymy, polysemy, register, and diachrony. From these five concepts, one is both the most basic and based for the others and for any theory on translation: this is synonymy, which has also been the most strongly criticised one by linguists and philosophers of language, though. The notion of synonymy has tried to be philosophically backed up in four different ways that Th. Olshewsky (1969: 462–463) clearly summarised as follows: 1. «Essential equivalence. Two terms are synonymous if they denote or connote the same nature or essence.» 2. «Ideational equivalence. Two terms are synonymous if they stand for the same idea.» 3. «Extensional equivalence. Two terms are synonymous if substituting them for each other in a statement does not change the truth value of that statement.» 4. «Intensional equivalence. Two terms are synonymous if they have the same intension.» Yet, as all those defi nitions of synonymy pose particular problems when making them universal, the notion of synonymy itself continues to lack an ultimate foundation; however, it is particularly this notion that is the one which should, in turn, be the base for the concept of translatability. And in the same way that the notion of synonymy has been questioned by philosophers of language, it has also been questioned by linguists’ behalf. In fact, some of them have even proposed to eradicate this notion from the technical linguistic jargon due to its lack of operational capacity for language analysis (Casas Gómez 1999 and 2002). Despite all this criticism, some notion of synonymy is still basic in order to try to put some order both in this issue as well as in any other semantic matters. To put it in another way, although any defi nition of synonymy that we may reach poses

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some particular problems, there is no option but work with any concept of synonymy, even though this concept may be imperfect and criticisable. Consequently, in this study I will use the term synonymy in accordance with the defi nitions that manuals of linguistics usually provide, despite its theoretical limits.

2.2. SYNONYMY By synonymy we mean the «relationship between two predicates that have the same sense» (Hurford and Heasley 1993: 102). Then, it is possible that a given term may be substituted by any other with no change with regard to the references or the truth values of the sentences where such terms are substituted. Accordingly, two given terms will be synonyms if, in an adequate context, both denote the same object, quality, action or accident. Thus, sésamo and ajonjolí will be synonyms in Spanish if one can be substituted by the other with no change in the reference of both terms nor the truth values of the sentences where this substitution is done. In other words, sésamo and ajonjolí [both ‘sesame’] will be synonyms if ajonjolí means «planta herbácea, anual, de la familia de las Pedaliáceas, de un metro de altura, tallo recto, hojas pecioladas, serradas y casi triangulares, flores de corola acampanada, blanca o rósea, y fruto elipsoidal con cuatro cápsulas y muchas semillas amarillentas, muy menudas, oleaginosas y comestibles» (DRAE) and sésamo means «planta pedaliácea, de la especie del ajonjolí y alegría» (DRAE). Hence, the resulting truth values in sentences such as “La venta de sésamo aumenta en los meses previos a Navidad,” [Sesame sales increase in the months prior to Christmas] and “La venta de ajonjolí aumenta en los meses previos a Navidad,” should be exactly the same. And so in spite of the fact that the noun ajonjolí is mainly used by Spanish speakers when they refer to Christmas sweets while sésamo is mainly used when they refer to hamburgers. If, instead of studying one language, we study two different languages, then a given term in a given language will be synonymous with another given term in another given language provided that they are interchangeable and they keep the same reference and truth values of the sentences in the SL (source language) and TL (target language) where the replacement is carried out. Hence, should we have to summarise to the minimum what the task of translation involves, I cannot think of anything better than understanding translation as identifying synonyms in two given languages. If this intuitive opinion is right, then the notion of synonymy in itself and its analysis become cornerstones in order to perform any attempt for establishing a theory of translation. Accordingly, the Spanish nouns sésamo and ajonjolí and the English noun sesame will be synonyms, and thus, interchangeable with no change of references or the truth values of their respective Spanish and English sentences.

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Yet, if the identification of synonymies in two given languages were automatic, translation could become a mechanic task without further difficulties. This naïve notion of synonymy seems to be the one in Wittgenstein’s mind when he wrote: «Kenne ich etwa die Bedeutung eines englischen und eines glichbedeutenden deutschen Wortes, so ist es unmöglich, dass ich nicht weiss, dass die beiden gleichbedeutend sind; es ist unmöglich, dass ich sie nicht eneinander übersetzen kann» (Tractatus, 4.243) [If I know the meaning of an English and a synonymous German word, it is impossible for me not to know that they are synonymous, it is impossible for me not to be able to translate them into one another] (Wittgenstein 2003: 173). And in order to show that things are pretty more different than what Wittgenstein’s text seems to suggest, I would like to allude to a German noun used by Wittgenstein himself in his text. Yet, the German term translated here into English as meaning is Bedeutung. However, in other cases Bedeutung has been translated as reference, especially in the English translation of G. Frege’s «Über Sinn und Bedeutung» (1960). But translating Bedeutung as meaning or as reference involves in itself an interpretation on the part of the translator. And this happens because there are some terms which have meaning or sense, though not reference. Thus, the meaning of angel would be something like «a ministering spirit or divine messenger; one of an order of spiritual beings superior to man in power and intelligence, who, according to the Jewish, Christian, Mohammedan, and other theologies, are the attendants and messengers of Deity» (OED), but its reference is extremely doubtful inasmuch as we cannot attach any object to the term angel. But, as I have already indicated in the section above, the notion of synonymy itself is extremely problematic even within a single language, as both linguists (Casas Gómez 1999 and 2002) and philosophers (Quine 1960) have repeated over and over again. And given that the notion of synonymy is problematic, translation will also become problematic. Especially, when it comes to cases in which a particular language has a single term to designate something that cannot be designated by a simple term in another language, and this forces the term in question to be translated by a periphrasis that will hardly have the same connotations and implicatures as the SL term. Thus, for example, Keith Allan, in his excellent Natural Language Semantics, poses the following possibility: «In theory, there would be a language which has a verb meaning ‘marry a woman who is rich’ because this is a complete notion» (Allan 2001: 312). And for any Spanish speaker it is obvious that such a language does exist and it is precisely the Spanish language. Indeed, in Spanish, the referential meaning of the verbal syntagm dar/pegar un/el braguetazo is precisely «casarse por interés con una mujer rica» [literally, ‘marry selfishly a woman who is rich’] (DRAE), and so, in principle “marry a woman who is rich” might be plausibly considered a synonym of dar/pegar un/el braguetazo. And the Polish language goes even further into the issue. The phrases ożenić się bogato (when talking about a man) and wyjść za mąż bogato (when talking about a woman) mean

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to marry a woman/man who is rich, respectively, and they are both axiologically neuter. Conversely, wyjść za mąż/ożenić się dla pieniędzy [literally, ‘to marry a woman/man because of her/his money’] have a pejorative nuance, and so, they would be closer to the Spanish idiom dar/pegar un/el braguetazo. Nevertheless, if we turn back again to Spanish, translating [3] “Trinidad dio/pegó un braguetazo” as [3.1] “Trinidad married a woman who is rich,” would pose some problems which are worth mentioning. And this is because: 1) the assertion [3.1] can be axiologically neuter or, in other words, it does not necessarily have pejorative connotations; 2) the usual implicature of [3] is that Trinidad has not married in love, or rather, s/he has married in love with money; and 3) the conventional implicature of this sentence is that not long ago Trinidad used to designate a man, as he had been married to a woman, and, since Spain passed the law that allows same-sex marriage (2005), the implication of [3] may also be that Trinidad is a woman who has married to another woman or a man who has married to another man while the last possibility is completely impossible in [3.1]. On the other hand, although the referential meaning of [3] is often the same as [3.1], the Spanish assertion has some characteristics that are not present in the English one, so exact synonymy would be then broken: 1) the Spanish use of [3] is often pejorative and/or derogatory, although depending on the context, it might have an ameliorative or exclamatory meaning; 2) given that in Spanish Trinidad can designate both a man and a woman (as it happens with the English name Hillary), we could only know the sex of such person by the context; 3) another conventional implicature of the Spanish assertion is that Trinidad has less economic power or belongs to a lower social class than the person s/he has married to; 4) although dar/pegar un/el braguetazo preferably collocates with men, it also occasionally collocates with women; and 5) once the idiom dar/pegar un/el braguetazo is lexicalised, it can be even figuratively used in issues that have nothing to do with marriage. And this secondary metaphorical use may sometimes be found, as it is the case of the following parliamentary speech: «Hasta ahora los partidos políticos han utilizado a la mujer por su caudal de votos, porque estamos de moda; en defi nitiva, la tan cacareada paridad se ha reducido a un braguetazo electoral. Y ésta es nuestra oportunidad para establecer por ley que todos y todas seamos iguales» [Up to now political parties have used women for their prospect volume of votes, because we are in; ultimately, the so-much-trumpeted

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends parity has been reduced to a macho electoral manoeuvre. And this is our chance to establish by law that men and women are equal.] (Diario de Sesiones del Congreso de los Diputados, VIII Legislature, No. 45, p. 1981. My emphasis).

Despite all this, the introduction to the notion of synonymy in this work is essential in order to identify the cases in which two given terms in two given languages may be interchanged in the translation of an utterance, and that speakers provide the same truth values to the SL utterance and its TL translation. But, as also happens with the notion of polysemy, different attempts to refi ne the notion of synonymy have fi nally made it inoperational in many cases. The practical effect of expelling the notion of synonymy from the linguistic theory will not be anything but denying the mere possibility of translation, or at least its determination, and, consequently, giving up any attempt to establish an axiological criterion that allows us to choose between the different possible translations of a text or an utterance. Or, as the lesser of two evils, accepting the possibility of the existence of different alternative manuals to translate the same text, all of them compatible with the data recorded from native speakers and all of them incompatible among them, as Willard van O. Quine claimed: «Two translators might develop independent manuals of translation, both of them compatible with all speech behavior, and yet one manual would offer translations that the other translator would reject. My position was that either manual could be useful, but as to which was right and which wrong there was no fact of the matter» (quoted in Hookway 1997: 119). Indeed, there are many cases in which two or more alternative translations of the same text will be possible, all of them being coherent with the SL text because this text may be ambiguous and the context may not provide an ultimate reason for choosing one translation or the other (Chamizo Domínguez 2006b). If we now go on to consider more “normal” instances of translation in which the SL ambiguity has an easier solution or there is not any ambiguity at all, we will also need to handle some notion of synonymy to affi rm that a particular translation is preferable to any other alternative translation. Let us take into account a specific instance to see this. The English adjective blue is figuratively used as a synonym of obscene, indecent, coarse, risqué, bawdy, smutty or dirty (Fergusson 1986), especially when someone or a joke are labelled, for example; as well as synonym of unhappy, sad, melancholic or gloomy (Fergusson 1986). And departing from the fi rst metaphorical use of the adjective blue, the noun bluebeard has been lexicalised with the meaning of «a personage of popular mythology, so called from the colour of his beard. References are frequent in literature to the locked turret-chamber, in which hung the bodies of his murdered wives» (OED). And this is particularly why we can make allusions such as the ones in the following text, where it is stated that

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Henry VIII’s beard was red, although he had killed some of his wives and he was a reputed womanizer: [4] «Henry VIII was a strong King with a very strong sense of humour and VIII wives, memorable amongst whom were Katherine the Arrogant, Anne of Cloves, Lady Jane Austin, and Anne Hathaway. His beard was, however, red» (Sellar and Yeatman 1991: 61. My emphasis). Now, the allusion to the noun bluebeard which underlies [4] is not possible in Spanish because neither the Spanish adjective azul [blue] means obscene or bawdy nor the noun bluebeard has any plausible single synonym. Therefore, [4] makes no sense in Spanish if it is literally translated as: [4.1] “Enrique VIII fue un rey fuerte con un fortísimo sentido del humor y VIII esposas, entre las cuales destacaron Katherine la Arrogante, Anne Clavos/Dientes de Ajo, Lady Jane Austin y Anne Hathaway. Su barba, no obstante, era roja.” Such a translation makes no sense because the metaphorical role of the English adjective blue in obscene matters is played by the Spanish adjective verde [green]. And since, unfortunately, Henry VIII’s beard was not green, [4.1] makes no sense at all. In fact, when applied to jokes, people, or fi lms, the English adjective blue is not equivalent to the Spanish adjective azul, but to verde: «dicho de un cuento, de una comedia, de una poesía, etc.: Libres, indecentes, obscenos» and «dicho de una persona: Que conserva inclinaciones galantes impropias de su edad o de su estado» (DRAE). Regarding the transferred meaning adopted by the adjective blue, if we decide that the correct translation of [5] «She starred in dozens of blue movies before coming above ground» (Holder 2003: 34. My emphasis) into Spanish is [5.1] “Ella protagonizó docenas de películas verdes antes de hacer películas blancas (aptas para todos los públicos)” [Literally, ‘She starred in dozens of green movies before featuring white movies (G movies)’] and not [5.2] “Ella protagonizó docenas de películas azules antes de hacer películas blancas (aptas para todos los públicos);”

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is because we are (explicitly or implicitly) maintaining that blue does not mean azul in [5], although it is the usual meaning in most other contexts in which that English adjective may be used. Obviously, the English adjective blue and the Spanish adjective azul are not false friends because neither their form is similar nor they are etymologically related. Conversely, the English adjective is indeed a partial false friend with regard to the Catalan adjective blau/blava, since both are etymologically related. And this fact is because the Catalan adjective does not figuratively mean in any case obscene or indecent, nor sad or unhappy, but: 1) «mentider» [lying]; 2) «que no té diners» [broke]; and 3) «estupefacte, molt admirat» [amazed] (Alcover and Moll). As a result, blue and blau/blava would be partial synonyms, that is, they would be translatably interchangeable when they both refer to the colour, but not in other instances. And what is said in the case of Catalan would also be true of other languages, mutatis mutandis, as it is the case of the French adjective bleu: «Chez nous, par exemple, ‘voir tout en BLEU, c’est ‘voir tout en ROSE’ ; chez les Anglo-Saxons, au contraire, ‘a BLUE look-out’, c’est ‘une SOMBRE perspective’, et l’on sait dans quelles affres le ‘BLUE Monday’ (‘lundi NOIR’) de triste mémoire a plongé toute l’Amérique» [Amongst us (i.e. French speakers), for instance, ‘to see everything in BLUE’ is ‘to see everything in PINK’. By contrast, amongst the Anglo-Saxons ‘a BLUE look-out’ is ‘a DARK omen’, and it is well-known how ‘the BLUE Monday’, that one recalls with sadness, has effected the entire America so deeply] (Koessler 1975: LXXVIII. Original capitals). And using an acceptable and operational concept of synonymy is particularly important for the theoretical treatment of the current research, since this very concept of synonymy will be the one that enables the distinction between chance false friends and full semantic false friends, on the one hand; and partial semantic false friends on the other. Indeed, chance false friends and full semantic false friends will be those pairs of words in two languages which cannot be synonymous in any possible context; and therefore, they will not be translatable one by the other. On the other hand, partial semantic false friends are those pairs of words in two languages that may be synonymous or not depending on their contexts. In other words, if the translation of the German adjective alt [old] into Spanish by the adjective alto [tall, high] is considered incorrect, this is because both adjectives cannot be synonyms in any possible context. Conversely, if we take the German noun Ordinarius, the Spanish noun ordinario and the English noun ordinary, we will deal with an instance of partial synonymy that makes all the three nouns become partial semantic false friends. Indeed, all the three, the German noun and its Spanish and English cognates ultimately derive from the Latin adjective ordinarius, whose meaning was at fi rst axiologically neuter and simply implied order or

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organization. Yet, the German language has nominalised the Latin adjective with two different meanings: 1) «gekürzt aus Professor ordinarius» [tenured professor]; and 2) «zuständiger Bischof» [bishop] (Duden). On the other hand, the Spanish adjective has also adopted, among other archaic or outdated meanings, the sense of obispo [bishop]: «se dice del obispo diocesano.» Furthermore, it has also adopted the pejorative meaning of «bajo, basto, vulgar y de poca estimación» [despicable, rough, vulgar and of little esteem] (DRAE) and of persona obscena [obscene, bawdy person] or rijosa [indecent person], which is not recorded in the DRAE. The result of all this is that the German noun Ordinarius and the Spanish noun ordinario will only be synonyms in ecclesiastical contexts. Thus, in a German assertion as [6] “Herr Doktor Schmidt war ein Kölner Ordinarius” [Dr. Schmidt was a professor from Cologne], Ordinarius will not be a synonym of Spanish ordinario if we are referring to a teacher, and consequently, the following translation will not be possible: [6.1] “El doctor Schmidt fue un ordinario de Colonia.” Notwithstanding, while [6.1] will be a possible translation of [6] if we are referring to a bishop from Cologne, although it might well be possible that [6] would mean that Dr. Schmidt was both things at the same time, except if the context is particularly clear. By contrast, the current, salient meaning of ordinario in [6.1] is that Dr. Schmidt is a coarse, uncouth, or vulgar guy. As for the English noun ordinary is concerned, it should be recalled that its salient meanings are: 1) «one who has, of his own right and not by special deputation, immediate jurisdiction in ecclesiastical cases, as the archbishop in a province, or the bishop or bishop’s deputy in a diocese»; and 2) «a judge having authority to take cognizance of cases in his own right and not by delegation; spec. in Scotland, one of the five judges in the Court of Sessions who constitute the Outer House; in the United States, a judge of a court of probate». Consequently, the literal translation of [6] into English as [6.2] “Dr. Schmidt was an ordinary from Cologne,” might be understood as [6.3] “Dr. Schmidt was an archbishop/bishop from Cologne,” or as [6.4] “Dr. Schmidt was a judge from Cologne.”

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40 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends And again the German noun Ordinarius is a partial semantic false friend with regard to its English cognate. In short, Ordinarius, ordinario and ordinary are partial semantic false friends because, in spite of the fact that all the three share the meaning of bishop, they differ with regard to their other meanings. These things being so, I shall deal with a weak notion of synonymy for the purpose of this study. Accordingly, two terms would be synonymous if, in a given context, one can be substituted by the other with no changes in the truth values of the utterance in which the substitution takes place. Thus, we will disregard any other considerations such as register, the archaic flavour that may be present in one language but not in the other, the fact that a particular term is used in the jargon of a particular trade or profession, etc. Or, as Keith Allan (2001: 115) states, «A is synonymous with B (...) only if when A is true, then B is true, and vice versa. (It follows that if A is false, then B is false, and vice versa).» Furthermore, this notion of synonymy salva veritate will be also useful to identify false friends in two given languages. If neither of the synonyms of a term in a given language should be translatable by any other of the synonyms of its equivalent cognate in other given language, then we will deal with full semantic false friends. Conversely, provided that one of the synonyms of a term in a given language should be translatable by its equivalent cognate in other given language but not by other synonyms, then we will deal with partial semantic false friends. According to this weak notion of synonymy, hemorroides [haemorrhoids] and almorranas [piles] would be synonyms as long as a term may be substituted by other with no change in the truth values of the utterance in which the substitution is done. And this happens although hemorroides is considered to be the learned term and it is used in medical jargon, whereas almorranas is its vulgar equivalent and it is used in everyday language — although, surprisingly, they both share the same etymological origin (Corominas and Pascual 1984–87). This weak notion of synonymy is precisely what enables the writing of dictionaries of synonyms and antonyms of natural languages, despite the criticism received by such works (Casas Gómez 1999 and 2002). Contrariwise, a too demanding notion of synonymy will not enable even the conception of such works; and what is even worse, it would prevent any translation attempt. Nevertheless, these problems posed by synonymy in one language are multiplied when it comes to identifying synonyms in two given languages as a previous task to translation. And not only because—as Quine (1960) argued—the reference in itself is undetermined and no ostensive definition may provide the ultimate guarantee of the reference of two terms being the same, but also because in this case other issues come into play, such as homonymy, polysemy, register and diachrony.

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2.3. HOMONYMY I have previously pointed out that chance false friends are the equivalent in two given languages to homonymous terms within a single language. However, as many authors do not properly specify the limits of homonymy and the notion of polysemy, I will insist on the similarities and differences between them, insomuch as both notions are essential for the treatment and classification of false friends. From a synchronic point of view, polysemy might well be reduced to homonymy, if we also accept that speakers are not aware at all of the diachronic evolution of their own language. Nevertheless, if we introduce the diachronic consideration and we add the fact that speakers are usually aware that semantic changes have taken place in most words of their own language, then we cannot help delimiting as much as possible the homonymy and polysemy spheres. This will lead to establish within a language what signifiers have different meanings as the result of either a mere diachronic accident or a transference the speakers were aware of at some moment in the past, though most of them are not aware of at present. Even although there may be borderline cases in which speakers take for a polysemy what is in fact a homonymy, and vice versa, that they consider as homonymous terms that linguists classify as polysemous (García Yebra 1983: 79–90). And, if we consider two different languages, why some meanings have become false friends as a result of a mere phonetic accident and why others have become false friends because they have undergone certain semantic changes. Homonymy is defi ned as the linguistic phenomenon consisting of a listeme having two or more meanings which are not semantically interrelated: «A case of HOMONYMY is one of an ambiguous word, whose different senses are far apart from each other and not obviously related to each other in any way. Cases of homonymy seem very defi nitely to be matters of mere accident or coincidence» (Hurford and Heasley 1993: 123). These things being so, homonyms are ambiguous terms by defi nition and their possible disambiguation will depend on the context of use. For practical purposes, we may consider that «two listemes of the same form are HOMONYMOUS if they warrant separate lexicon entries because the identity of form is coincidental» (Allan 2001: 42). That is, homonymy takes place when a given form has two or more entries, and they are usually marked in dictionaries with subscripts or superscripts; i.e. the Catalan terms meta1 [fi nish line] and meta2 [‘boob’, in children’s language] (Alcover and Moll). However, as speakers do not frequently resort to subscripts or superscripts, homonyms are the best candidates to provide examples of ambiguity, whether consciously or unconsciously meant by speakers. Three are the outstanding consequences I want to discuss in this research about the homonymy between meta1 —1) «cadascun dels dos pilars o fites situats a un extrem i a l’altre del circ i que servien per a senyalar el lloc on

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havien de girar les quadrigues en una cursa» [also meta in English, which is defi ned by the OED as «one of the conical columns set in the ground at each end of the Circus, to mark the turning-place in a race»]; 2) «terme assenyalat a una cursa» [fi nish, fi nishing line]; and 3) «terme a què es deu arribar; fi que cal atènyer» [goal, aim]—and meta2 —1) «mamella, en el llenguatge infantile» [‘tit’, in children language]; and 2) «acció de mamar; la llet que es mama, en llenguatge infantil» [‘sucking’; ‘sucked milk’, in children’s language] (Alcover and Moll). The fi rst one lies in meta1 having an distinctive colloquial or dysphemistic flavour, and so, Catalans prefer its synonym arribada to refer to the finish line in sport events in order to avoid misunderstandings which may happen if meta1 were used. Secondly, meta2 has become a chance false friend of the Spanish noun meta: 1) «término señalado a una carrera» [fi nish line]; 2) «fi n a que se dirigen las acciones o deseos de alguien» [goal, aim]; and 3) «en el circo romano, pilar cónico que señalaba cada uno de los dos extremos de la espina» [meta] (DRAE). Thirdly, Catalan speakers may—consciously or unconsciously—exploit the ambiguity derived from this homonymy and achieve some particular humoristic and/or cognitive effects. Thus, a Catalan utterance such as [7] “He aconseguit dues grans metes a la meva vida,” may alternatively mean in Spanish and English [7.1] “He conseguido dos grandes tetas en mi vida” [I have achieved two great boobs in my life] or [7.2] “He conseguido dos grandes metas en mi vida” [I have achieved two great aims in my life]; thus, the ambiguity being lost in Spanish and English. Most times the possible ambiguity that a homonym may produce can be cleared out regarding the context, although, when homonymy is only present in a single language, the absent-minded translator may also fall into the trap of a false friend. There are some languages—such as Spanish or Italian—where homonymy is relatively scarce, which largely makes the translator’s and interpreter’s task easier. But, there are some other languages—such as English or French— where homonymy—and especially homophony—where is extremely frequent, a fact which is very often used by their speakers to achieve conscious ambiguities and double-entendres. This is the case, for instance, of the Irish music group named U2, which can phonetically be interpreted as U two or You too. This great amount of homonyms is usually exploited to achieve certain effects. Thus, for example, the

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homophony of the English terms too [‘también’, in Spanish] and two [‘dos’, in Spanish] is cognitively exploited in the following Spanish joke: [8] “King Don Juan Carlos, Queen Doña Sofía and the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs attended a funeral in Buckingham Palace. When they expressed their condolences, fi rstly Don Juan Carlos said Queen Elisabeth: ‘I am sorry very much, my dear cousin’. ‘Many thanks, my dear cousin’— Queen Elisabeth answered. Secondly, Queen Doña Sofía said: ‘I am sorry very much too, dear Elisabeth’. Many, many thanks, dear Sofía’—Queen Elisabeth answered. And thirdly the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs said: ‘I am sorry very much three’ (No answer provided at all!).” Although homonymy in Spanish is relatively unusual as compared to other languages, it can also create some problems to a slack translator; but homonymy can be used to achieve certain effects, too. A clear case of homonymy in Spanish takes place between the two meanings of the adjective real: Real1 derives from the Latin realis and means «que tiene existencia verdadera y efectiva» [real, actual] (DRAE); real2 derives form the Latin regalis and means «perteneciente o relativo al rey o a la realeza» [royal] (DRAE). These two meanings of the adjective real can usually be identified by the context. Accordingly, we may think that there are few Spanish native speakers that would think that “El Palacio Real es el Palacio de Oriente” [The Royal Palace is the Palacio de Oriente] means “El Palacio Verdadero es el Palacio de Oriente” [The Real Palace is the Palacio de Oriente]. But this is not always so and, in fact, we may fi nd some examples where the translator misunderstood the two meanings of the Spanish adjective real. Let us consider an exemplary case. The web page of Hostal Aliste (http://www.hotelsearch.com/madrid/aliste/index.spanish.html; accessed 20 November 2005) in Madrid can be read both in Spanish and English. Whereas the Spanish reads [9] «Sitio muy céntrico, entre La Gran Vía y Puerta del Sol. Cerca del museo de El Prado, La Plaza Mayor y el Palacio Real,» the English translation actually reads [9.1] «The best area of Madrid, between Gran Vía and Puerta del Sol. Near to the El Prado museum, La Plaza Mayor and the Real Palace.» When I read these texts for the fi rst time, my fi rst feeling was that the anonymous translator had been the victim—and he certainly was—of misunderstanding the Spanish homonymous adjectives real1 («que tiene existencia verdadera y efectiva») and real 2 («perteneciente o relativo al rey o a la realeza»). Given that this homonymy is not present in English, he would have fallen into the deceptive trap of a partial semantic false friend. As for the rest, it seems obvious, for anyone who knows Madrid, that real in [9]

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does not mean «que tiene existencia verdadera y efectiva» [real, actual] but «perteneciente o relativo al rey o a la realeza» [royal] (DRAE), although the former claim is also quite true—that is, the Palacio Real is not a fictional entity, but it has a real and tangible existence. Conversely, if someone does not know Madrid, it is also obvious that [9] may be understood in both ways, and thus, it can be translated as in [9.1] or as in [9.2] “The best area of Madrid, between Gran Vía and Puerta del Sol. Near to the El Prado museum, La Plaza Mayor and the Royal Palace.” What is more, my fi rst hypothesis was thinking that the translator must have been non-native and that a native speaker of Spanish would always have interpreted [9] as [9.1], but never as [9.2]. In order to prove this hypothesis right or wrong I made up a similar case to [9], which is particularly ambiguous. Then, I asked some translation students in third-year at my university to anonymously translate it into English. In all other respects, I chose advanced translation students on purpose expecting that the results would have a special evidential force, as they had specific academic training. The technical characteristics of my survey were as follows: 1) there was no prior notice; 2) the number of students surveyed were 26; 3) they were between 20 and 23 years old; 4) the sex ratio was similar; and 5) all of them were Spanish native speakers. The text was as follows: [10] “El Palacio de Oriente es un real palacio, mientras que La Zarzuela no pasa de ser un chalet grande” [The Palacio de Oriente is a real palace, whilst La Zarzuela is nothing but a mere big villa]. I presumed that most of my experimental subjects were going to interpret real in [10] as true or actual, or superb as opposed to the description of La Zarzuela as “un chalet grande” [a big villa]. However, only 4 of my experimental subjects (15.38%) translated the Spanish adjective real by the English adjective real. Conversely 18 translated the Spanish adjective real by the English adjective royal (69.23%) and the other 4 (15.38%) opted for nonliteral translations of the Spanish adjective, but all of them evoking royalty and not reality. Therefore, if we add the latter to the second group, we have no less than 84.61% students interpreting [10] in an unexpected way for me. Anyway, what I feel most important is that [10] can be interpreted as [10.1] “El Palacio de Oriente es un verdadero palacio, mientras que La Zarzuela no pasa de ser un chalet grande” [The Palacio de Oriente is a real palace, whilst La Zarzuela is nothing but a mere big villa]; [10.2] “El Palacio de Oriente es un magnífico palacio, mientras que La Zarzuela no pasa de ser un chalet grande” [The Palacio de Oriente is a superb palace, whilst La Zarzuela is nothing but a mere big villa]; or;

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[10.3] “El Palacio de Oriente es un palacio del rey, mientras que La Zarzuela no pasa de ser un chalet grande” [The Palacio de Oriente is the king’s palace, whilst La Zarzuela is nothing but a mere big villa]. Although the latter interpretation seems to me rather incongruous— especially if we known that the current king of Spain does not live in the Palacio de Oriente but in La Zarzuela —it is also true that Spanish native speakers have certainly translated [10] in more than one way, although [10.3] was particularly outstanding. Thus, native speakers may behave as in [9], which I deduced that it was translated by a non-native speaker and/ or someone less experienced in translation matters. In any case, what is sure is that homonymy also concerns the topic of false friends.

2.4. POLYSEMY There are some languages in which homonymy is relatively infrequent, while there are others where it is more frequent. However, polysemy is much more frequent and we should insist that most words of natural languages are polysemous—at least the languages I know. Polysemy may be defi ned as «A case of POLYSEMY is one where a word has several very closely related senses» (Hurford and Heasley 1993: 123. Original capitals). In practice this means that «a listeme is POLYSEMOUS if it has more than one meaning given within a single lexicon entry» (Allan 2001: 41. Original capitals). That is, polysemy occurs when a signifier has two or more meanings which are semantically related and which can be semantically explained from a diachronic point of view. Of these meanings, one is, or could be, the literal meaning or the fi rst order meaning for the corresponding signifier, whereas the other meanings are directly or indirectly derived from the former. Thus, the alien meaning of the Spanish term padre will be «varón o macho que ha engendrado» or «varón o macho, respecto de sus hijos» [father] (DRAE), while when padre is used as «para referirse a ciertos religiosos y a los sacerdotes» (DRAE), it will have a second order meaning which will be synonymous with cura or sacerdote [priest]. When a secondary meaning is so lexicalised as to be considered another literal corresponding meaning, the boundaries between homonymy and polysemy are blurred from a synchronic perspective. However, it is always possible to distinguish the primary meaning at a particular moment from its corresponding secondary meaning. That is particularly the reason why speakers distinctively distinguish the meanings of padre, as I have already mentioned, when they say maliciously or mischievously: [11] “Un cura es la única persona a la que todo el mundo llama padre, excepto sus propios hijos, que lo llaman tío” [A priest is the only person everybody calls father, except for his own children, who call him uncle].

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Consequently, [11] plays with the two meanings of padre, and at the same time tío [uncle] is provided with a figurative meaning of “cura con hijos engendrados por él” [a priest who has fathered children], which would be really impossible to be found in any other context; yet, native speakers understand it without any problem. And the fact that most words in any language are polysemous allows speakers to exploit these polysemies in order to attain certain effects which cannot be reproduced in other languages, such as meaning two or more things at the same time. I have already alluded to the different nuances of the English adjective blue, so I will now resort to another example where blues is used as a noun to denote two things at the same time. As a noun, blues basically means two things: 1) «policemen»; and 2) «a melody of a mournful and haunting character, originating among the Negroes of the Southern U.S.» (OED). And this term is used with this double meaning in the American TV series titled [12] «Hill Street Blues,» which was translated into Spanish as [12.1] «Canción triste de Hill Street» [literally, Hill Street Sad Song]. The English title of the TV series plays with the double meaning of the term blues because the series is about what happens in a New York police station, and the background music is playing a blues while the title credits are being displayed. Since this double meaning is not retained in Spanish, the translators chose [12.1]: although it evokes the musical background of the series, it does not refer to the fact that the series basically deals with what happens in a police station. Furthermore, blues was borrowed by Spanish with the meaning of «forma musical del folclore de la población de origen africano de los Estados Unidos de América» (DRAE), so it consequently became a partial semantic false friend of its English cognate. This literary and stylistic device consisting in appealing to polysemous words and their subsequent double-entendres is frequently used when entitling TV series, films, books, and so on, as well as headlines in newspapers. And these allusions, plays on words, and double-entendres are impossible to be translated in most cases. This is the paradigmatic case of the title of the recent Pedro Almodóvar’s film «La mala educación» (2004), which has been actually translated into English as «Bad Education». Now, the English translation does pay only half of justice, so to speak, to the original Spanish title. And so because the Spanish noun educación is a partial semantic false friend of English noun education, since Spanish educación means both «instrucción por medio de la acción docente» [education] and «cortesía, urbanidad» [politeness], while its English cognate only refers to «the process of educating or being educated» (OED). And, in my opinion, Almodóvar

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consciously played on both meanings when he entitled his movie in such a way. Accordingly, the Spanish reader reads both teaching and politeness at once where the English reader is permitted to read only teaching. The fact that at a particular synchronic moment both the primary and secondary meanings are understood as literal meanings of a signifier has led some philosophers to relinquish the concept of polysemy. Thus, they maintain that there is only homonymy, hence deriving into the following: if all the meanings of a signifier are their literal meanings, the obvious conclusion will be denying the existence of figurative meanings. The most outstanding case—which is the ultimately attempt to eradicate any dualism—may be D. Davidson’s reductionist view in his well-known article «What Metaphors Mean» (Davidson 1984: 245–264). To be honest, Davidson does not bother about even directly criticising the notion of polysemy, but he merely refers to homonymy with no further explanations. And the only aim seems to be denying the existence of metaphorical meanings in particular and figurative meanings in general. For this research purposes, and as I have already discussed Davidson’s paper elsewhere (Chamizo Domínguez 1998: 20–26), I will merely sum up his subsequent theses and hypotheses —according to the etymological meaning of the signifier hypothesis (see section 2.6). As regards our purposes for this discussion, Davidson’s essential theses are as follows: 1. Words only mean what they literally mean, and nothing else: «This paper is concerned with that metaphors mean, and its thesis is that metaphors mean what the words, in their most literal interpretation, mean, and nothing more» (Davidson 1984: 245). 2. Metaphor concerns only usage and not meaning: «My disagreement is with the explanation of how metaphors work its wonders. To anticipate: I depend on the distinction between what words mean and what they are used to do. I think metaphor belongs exclusively to the domain of use» (Davidson 1984: 247). 3. There are no such metaphorical meanings, but only different literal meanings of a word; that is to say, there is no polysemy, but only homonymy: «The central mistake against which I shall be inveighing is the idea that a metaphor has, in addition to its literal sense or meaning, another sense or meaning» (Davidson 1984: 246). Davidson’s denial to talk about metaphorical meanings—and I presume that, by extension, of any figurative meaning in general—departs from the real or methodological oversight of how signifiers attain new meanings, but they do not necessarily lose the former ones, and of how this process takes place in practice. The hardcore of this oversight resides in not distinguishing the three stages a metaphor, a metonymy, an irony, or a euphemism may undergo; e.g. novel, semilexicalised and lexicalised (Chamizo Domínguez 1998: 45–70).

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When a metaphor is proposed for the fi rst time (a novel metaphor) in a linguistic system, speakers understand the use of such term as a diversion from its literal meaning—a «flouting» or a «categorical falsity», as Grice called it (1989: 34). In this case the metaphor seems to be a usage matter, and its interpretation is occasional and limited to the moment of the utterance. Thus, the meaning of a novel metaphor would not go beyond its particular sense at the very moment of the utterance. Therefore, the example of metaphor that Grice himself provides, [13] «You are the cream in my coffee» (Grice 1989: 34), could be understood in Spanish without many difficulties if literally translated as [13.1] “Eres la crema de mi café.” This is because the English noun cream and the Spanish noun crema share the meaning of «the oily or butyraceous part of the milk, which gathers on the top when milk if left undisturbed» (OED) and «sustancia grasa contenida en la leche», or «nata de la leche» (DRAE), in English and Spanish, respectively. Consequently, in a context such as [13], cream may be replaced by crema with no changes in the truth values of the sentence involved. However, the translation of [13] into Spanish as [13.1] raises another interesting problem, despite not linguistic, but cultural. For cream is not frequently added to coffee in the Spanish culture, the translator of «Logic and conversation» into Spanish chose a different metaphor and translated [13] as: [13.2] «Eres la niña de mis ojos» [You are the apple of my eyes] (Grice 2005: 532). But when the metaphoric use of a term has lexicalised to the extent that speakers are not synchronically aware of the once literal meaning of the term—or even the co-existence of both the once metaphorical and literal meanings (lexicalised metaphor)—then we can reasonably claim that homonymy and polysemy are superimposed. This is due to the fact that the greatest success for a metaphor is precisely that its lexicalisation becomes as complete as speakers to be unaware of it ever being a metaphor. However, given that the lexicalisation process is not uniform in the different dialects of a language or in the different professional jargons or in the different cultural backgrounds of speakers of a language, it may well be always possible that certain speakers are aware of the former primary literal meaning of a term and of its former secondary metaphorical meaning. In these cases, and for these speakers, the metaphor will be kept semilexicalised, although most speakers of that language may consider it as a fully

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lexicalised metaphor. For example, most French speakers are very likely to think that the primary order meaning of grève is strike and many of them do not know that that word also means sand, sandy area or river beach; however, this was precisely the primary literal meaning of the word, so the meaning of strike was adopted by grève by means of a metaphor/metonymy from collocations as être en grève or faire grève. These collocations fi rst referred to stand on the bank of the Seine to look for a job and, later, stop working as a protest for or demanding better work conditions. However, for those speakers who know the two meanings of grève and are aware of the meaning transference produced at a certain moment, the metaphor will still be semilexicalised and they will be able to cognitively use it playing with both meanings of grève. Nevertheless, the most interesting stage of metaphors is semilexicalisation because speakers are aware of both the literal and the figurative meaning of a certain term. These metaphors allow us to establish conceptual nets and conform a system to conceptualise a particular reality in terms of another different reality (Lakoff and Johnson 1980). Let us look at a quote from the daily press to illustrate this point: [14] «La Plaza de las Ventas, primera en el mundo y cátedra del toreo, aguarda nueva gestión» [Las Ventas bullring, top of the world and bullfighting’s chair, is awaiting for new management] (M. A. C./L. M. “Las Ventas busca empresario”, in El País, December 1 2002, p. 41). If, after having read it, we look up the entry for cátedra at the DRAE, we will see that none of the nine senses and five collocations of this word makes reference to bullfighting at all. Hence, in [14] cátedra does not mean «aula» [classroom], «empleo y ejercicio del catedrático» [chairman’s position], or «facultad o materia que enseña un catedrático» [subject taught by a chairman] (DRAE), for instance. Consequently, in [14] we are providing a new transferred meaning for cátedra as a synonym of “lugar en que se practica lo mejor del toreo” [place where the best bullfighting is played] or “lugar en que se puede aprender lo mejor de la tauromaquia” [place where one can learn the best in bullfighting matters]. But when using cátedra as in [14], we are actually conceptualising bullfighting in terms of academy. Then, [14] is coherent with a wide conceptual network where we use terms with academic literal referents to denote and conceptualise the taurine domain. This network would enable the meaning of corrida as a clase [class] and a novillero [apprentice bullfighter] as a licenciado [graduate] and, consequently, recibir el doctorado [to become a doctor] is usually a synonym of recibir la alternativa [to make one’s début as qualified bullfighter]. All this conforms a determined way of understanding bullfighting as an academic activity, not only from a terminological point of view, but also—and more importantly—from a conceptual point of view. And even more importantly, conceptualising bullfighting will be very different

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50 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends if, instead of selecting academic domains, we select any other domain. That is, bullfighting in itself will be radically different if it is conceptualised from a festive domain, which is rather frequent. Moreover, in addition to theoretical reasons, there are also empirical reasons that may be argued against Davidson’s theses. The ultimate empirical reason to distinguish between the literal and figurative meaning of a signifier lies in speakers—who obviously have not read Davidson’s and, thus, they do not obey him—being usually aware that the figurative meaning of a signifier which derives from its literal or primary meaning, even when the figurative meaning has been lexicalised. That is particularly why speakers may refer to both meanings of a term to achieve certain cognitive or contextual effects. Thus, Spanish speakers would agree that the basic chronological meaning of the noun negro/negra is «dicho de una persona: Cuya piel es de color negro» [Negro/Nigger], whereas its meaning «persona que trabaja anónimamente para lucimiento y provecho de otro, especialmente en trabajos literarios» [ghostwriter] (DRAE) has later been acquired. And that is the reason why someone may refer to both meanings at the same time and say [15] «El negro no sólo escribe discursos, también escribe libros para otros (...) Paco Zamora no sólo escribió Memoria de laberintos, también ha escrito para otros. Pero su caso es más irónico, al fi n y al cabo él es literalmente negro (aunque dicho así parezca políticamente incorrecto)» [Ghostwriter does not only write speeches, but he also writes books for somebody else […]. Paco Zamora did not only write Memoria de laberintos; he has also written for somebody else. But his case is more ironical, as he is literally black after all (although it may seem politically incorrect, stated like that)] (Oriol 2001: 30, my emphasis). As a result, the lexicalisation of negro/negra with the meaning «persona que trabaja anónimamente para lucimiento y provecho de otro, especialmente en trabajos literarios» makes this noun become a partial semantic false friend of the English nouns Negro/Nigger: «an individual (esp. a male) belonging to the African race of mankind, which is distinguished by a black skin, black tightly-curled hair, and a nose flatted and lips thicker and more protruding than is common amongst white Europeans.» The Spanish noun negro/negra shares with the English nouns Negro/Nigger the meaning «dicho de una persona: Cuya piel es de color negro», but not the other meaning: «quien escribe para lucimiento de otro». For this other sense, the English language has resorted to a different metaphor: ghost, «one who secretly does artistic or literary work for another person, the later taking the credit» (OED) and «a writer whose work is published under another’s name» (Holder 2003: 163) or ghostwriter/ghost-writer, «a hack who does work for which another person takes the credit» (OED), coming from the

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domain of spirits. As a consequence, the Spanish noun negro has become a partial semantic false friend of the English terms negro/nigger. On the other hand, the Dutch noun neger and the German noun Neger also designate literally a black-skinned person. However, the Dutch and the German have borrowed the English term, ghostwriter and Ghostwriter, in Dutch and German, respectively. These words designate the person who writes for somebody else, but they did not derive into partial semantic false friends, at least from this point of view. These things being so, the English noun ghost has also become a semantic partial false friend of the German Geist. In fact, ghost and Geist are also false friends from other points of view. This is because Geist has kept the salient meaning of spirit, mind or soul, while the English word ghost does not carry those connotations, except perhaps for the collocation Holy Ghost. To take a case in point, let us simply remember that Hegel’s Phänomenologie des Geistes has been translated into Spanish as Fenomenología del espíritu and into French as Phénoménologie de l’esprit, but its fi rst English translation read Phenomenology of Mind (Hegel 1910).1 In theory, the title of Hegel’s work might be translated into English in three different ways as well as it has been translated in fact. Namely, as *Phenomenology of Geist/geist, *Phenomenology of Ghost and *Phenomenology of Spirit. And if the translator into English preferred mind instead of any of its other three possible synonyms, I dare to suggest that it could be explained because the other three alternative terms are false friends. Certainly, the German noun Geist/geist itself, whose salient meaning is «denkendes Bewusstsein des Meschen Verstandeskraft, Verstand» [thinking awareness of man’s intellectual power, reason] (Duden), also can be found in English as a borrowing. Even it is included in the OED and defi ned as «spirit; spirituality; intellectuality; intelligence» (fi rst quote 1871, last quote 1964). Anyway, since the German noun also means spectre, apparition and even goblin, the English translator probably disregarded this option in order to avoid misinterpretations. As for ghost, the English cognate of German Geist, it also could mean soul or spirit, as the seat of life or intelligence. And, according to such a sense, it has been occasionally used by philosophers, as it is the case of G. Ryle when he asserts «as thus represented, minds are not merely ghosts harnessed to machines, they are themselves just spectral machines» (Ryle 1984: 20). In fact, G. Ryle widely uses the noun ghost, particularly when he refers to the «dogma of the Ghost in the machine» (Ryle 1984: 15–16. See also 22, 27, 32, 35, 50 or 52), which Ryle himself considers «a categorymistake» (Ryle 1984: 16) and to which criticism is devoted The Concept of Mind. But in spite of this technical meaning of the noun ghost, its current salient meaning is «an apparition; a spectre» or «the soul of a deceased person, spoken of as appearing in a visible form, or otherwise manifesting its presence, to the living. (Now the prevailing sense.)» (OED); which makes it synonym of: 1) spectre, phantom, apparition or spook; and 2)

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glimmer, trace, shadow, suggestion or hint (Fergusson 1986). Accordingly, if we translate the title of Hegel’s work as *Phenomenology of Ghost, it would be probably misunderstood as Phenomenology of Phantom. And eventually the English noun spirit also means «incorporeal or immaterial being, as opposed to body or matter; being or intelligence conceived as distinct from, or independent of, anything physical or material» (OED) and, according to this meaning, spirit is, in principle, a plausible English term to translate German Geist. But, since spirit means «liquid such as is obtained by distillation; spec. that which is of an alcoholic nature» (OED) as well, the literal translation of title of Hegel’s work as *Phenomenology of Spirit would likely been misunderstood as Phenomenology of Alcohol.

2.5. REGISTER I have previously highlighted that two notions of synonymy are usually handled: a strong notion and a weak notion. According to the strong one, two terms would be synonymous in a certain natural language if their relation is not only that of identical meanings, but also of identical registers in their use. For example, the Spanish nouns ósculo [osculation] and beso [kiss] would be synonyms provided that in any given context their registers and the truth values of the statements they should become part of were the same. Thus, these terms would always be interchangeable in whatever the circumstances. The ultimate basis of synonymy would have to be searched in the linguistic behaviour of speakers (Quine 1960: 84). Accordingly, dictionaries would only record the linguistic behaviour shown by speakers. Still, if we notice the uses of ósculo and beso, we can observe that they may be interchangeable in most cases with no change in the truth values of their utterances; even though, ósculo is more prone to appear in learned and/or archaic contexts, and beso in more usual contexts. There are some contexts, however, where beso could not be substituted by ósculo and keep the same cognitive and register effects, although the truth values could be kept from a strictly referential point of view. This is because ósculo, «beso de respeto o afecto», is a hyponym of beso, «acción y efecto de besar» (DRAE). For instance, we are not likely to imagine the word ósculo in an erotic context. And were it indeed used in this type of contexts, the hearer would start an interpretative process in search for a reason. This process might result in the hearer inferring that the speaker intended to produce a humorous or ironic utterance, or any other nuance that would go beyond the referential meaning of the word ósculo. Therefore, to be accurate, an ósculo is in fact a hyponym of beso, for beso can substitute ósculo in whatever the context and maintain the same cognitive effects, but not vice versa. That is to say, the meaning of ósculo is included within that of beso, but not vice versa. As it happens with the notion of synonymy within a single language, the same is true when comparing two given languages. So in the end, if we consider

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that translating is nothing but searching and identifying synonyms in the TL for the SL, and that the notion of synonymy itself is problematic, then we should not be surprised how difficult—when not impossible—the task of translating is. In order to illustrate this point, let us consider two Spanish synonyms that might not seem problematic indeed: hemorroide and almorrana. If we look almorrana up in the DRAE, this dictionary does not provide any definition of the term or its register, but it just shows a cross-reference to its synonym hemorroide. On the other hand, if we look hemorroide up in the DRAE, this term is defined as «tumoración en los márgenes del ano o en el tracto rectal, debida a varices de su correspondiente plexo venoso», but does not mention that hemorroide is a synonym of almorrana. In this case, although both terms share the same reference and etymological origins (Corominas and Pascual 1984–87), it is obvious that any Spanish native speaker will find their registers different. That is particularly why, although we may interchange hemorroide by almorrana and keep the principle of substitution salva veritate, the implicatures of the sentences involved will be very different. Thus, the use of hemorroide often implies a certain cultural level of the speaker, while for almorrana the speaker’s cultural level is supposed to be lower. Yet, hemorroide and almorrana can be translated into English as haemorrhoid and pile: «a disease characterized by tumours of the veins about the anus» and «a disease characterized of the veins of the lower rectum; haemorrhoids» (OED), respectively, with no change in their registers and truth values. However, in languages in which there are no terms with equivalent registers for hemorroide/almorrana and haemorrhoid/pile, then we will deal with partial semantic false friends depending on the registers involved. That is the case of German and Polish, languages where there is only one term for the Spanish and English nouns, Hämorrhoiden and hemoroidy, in German and Polish, respectively. Nevertheless, Polish has an idiom for having haemorrhoids, dostać wilka [literally, ‘having the wolf’]. Then, these cases could also be considered as instances of partial semantic false friends, as long as neither Polish nor German can reproduce the register nuances of Spanish or English. Consequently, although the reference of all those terms is the same, the implicatures will vary depending on the case.

2.6. DIACHRONY Speakers are often aware of which one is the literal meaning and which one the secondary transferred meaning of a signifier. Furthermore, this distinction is also essential if we wish to fully understand texts from the past. This involves not only literary or everyday language texts, but also philosophical or scientific texts. In these cases, the distinction of the different meanings a term has been acquiring at every synchronic moment will be the key to understand what an author meant and to avoid interpretations s/he did not

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mean at all. With this idea in mind, we will depart from the current meaning of the signifier hypothesis. For us, a hypothesis is an idea, thesis, or opinion which is tentatively stated on some matter yet to be proved right or wrong, either by reason or by experience. Let us consider the following example: [16] “The hypothesis that there is water in Mars has recently been proved true.” In [26] the English noun hypothesis can be substituted by idea, thesis [thesis] or opinion, so the previous statement might be possible to be rephrased as: [16.1] “The idea/thesis/opinion that there is water in Mars has recently been proved true.” And the truth values of both utterances are not modified. Similarly, when chemists talk about Avogadro’s hypotheses, they postulate that gaseous elements are present as diatomic molecules and that equal gas volumes (at the same pressure and temperature) have the same number of molecules. Hence, the term Avogadro’s hypotheses means that we deal with two different ideas or opinions liable to be proved true or false. This meaning of hypothesis is likely to be its primary meaning, i.e. “the usual meaning of a term at a given time”. But surprising as it may be, from a diachronic point of view this is the last of the meanings that this signifier has had along time. And I will depart from the historical shifts of this noun to see how the different diachronic changes of a signifier may give way to semantic false friends within a single language and with any other language where its lexicalisation rhythm has not been analogous. In order to illustrate my purpose, let us consider the well-known quote from Isaac Newton’s Philosphiae Naturalis Principia Mathematica: [17] «Rationem vero harum gravitatis proprietatum ex phænomenis nondum potui deducere, & hypotheses non fingo. Quicquid enim ex phænomenis non deducitur, hypothesis vocanda est; & hypotheses seu metaphysicæ, seu physicæ, seu qualitatum occultarum, seu mechanicæ, in philosophia experimentali locum non habent.» So, if we translate literally into English the meaning of the Latin text by Newton as [17.1] «But hitherto I have not been able to discover the cause of those properties of gravity from phenomena, and I frame no hypotheses; for whatever is not deduced from phenomena is to be called an hypothesis; and hypotheses, whether metaphysical or physical, whether occult

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qualities or mechanical, have no place in experimental philosophy» (Newton 1988: 371); we may misunderstand Newton, and even some may think that Newton contradicted himself or lied when he wrote [17]. And this is because his work is laden with hypotheses according to its current sense: thesis or provisional opinion yet to be proved true or false, be it by contrast with experience or as a consequence of previously verified theses. And this is because hypothesis has had at least two more basic meanings along time, apart from its etymological meaning. This etymological meaning of hypothesis—literally, “what lies beneath the thesis”—refers to what is hidden, implied or underlies a thesis or may be inferred from it, or, as the OED defi nes it, «a subordinate particular thesis involved in a general thesis; a particular case of a general proposition», although the OED itself specifies that this sense is «obsolete». Anyway, this was the sense used by Plato and Aristotle, for instance, and which one should take into account when reads their texts. From this literal sense, the term hypothesis has developed two more basic meanings, which are defi ned by the OED as: 1) «a proposition or principle put forth or stated (without any reference to its correspondence with fact) merely as a basis for reasoning or argument, or as a premiss from which to draw a conclusion; a supposition. In Logic, the supposition or condition forming the antecedent or protasis of a conjunctive or conditional proposition»; and 2) «a supposition or conjecture put forth to account for known facts; esp. in the sciences, a provisional supposition from which to draw conclusions that shall be in accordance with known facts, and which serves as a starting-point for further investigation by which it may be proved or disproved and the true theory arrived at.» However, in Newton’s times (and before), hypothesis had the meaning the OED provides in 1), while its current one is usually 2). But were we not aware of this semantic shift in the noun hypothesis, we would then misunderstand Sir Isaac Newton’s text. And this very same meaning of hypothesis in Newton’s work is also present in Descartes’, who makes it explicit in the following text: «& afin que chacun soit libre d’en penser ce qu’il lui plaira, je désire que ce que j’écrirai soit seulement pris pour une hypothèse, laquelle est peut-être fort éloignée de la vérité ; mais encore que cela fût, je croirais avoir beaucoup fait, si toutes les choses qui en seront déduites, sont entièrement conformes aux expériences» [and in order to everyone is free to think what he pleases, I want to wish that what I will write is only taken as an hypothesis, which perhaps is very far from the truth; but even it could be so, I will think I made a great deal, if all things that will be inferred fully conform to experiments] (Descartes 1978: 123. I have updated the French spelling. Original italics, my bold type).

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And it will be in the 17th century when hypothesis starts to stop meaning what it meant in Descartes’ and Newton’s works, and begin to adopt the meaning it has at present. As far as I have been able to work it out, the fi rst person to use the term hypothesis with an extremely new sense is Blaise Pascal. In a letter to Father Noël, Pascal clarifies this point by bringing to his notice that his “vacuum hypothesis” is not a mere supposition regardless whether it is true or false, but a verifiable supposition—and, as a matter of fact, Pascal himself verified it in his experiment on Puy de Dôme: [18] «Mais je me sens obligé de vous dire deux mots sur ce sujet; c’est que toutes les fois que, pour trouver la cause de plusieurs phénomènes connus, on pose une hypothèse, cette hypothèse peut être de trois sortes. Car quelquefois on conclut un absurde manifeste de sa négation, et alors l’hypothèse est véritable et constante ; ou bien on conclut un absurde manifeste de son affi rmation, et alors l’hypothèse est tenue pour fausse ; et lorsqu’on n’a pu encore tirer d’absurde, ni de sa négation, ni de son affi rmation, l’hypothèse demeure douteuse ; de sorte que, pour faire qu’une hypothèse soit évidente, il ne suffit pas que tous les phénomènes s’en ensuivent, au lieu que, s’il s’ensuit quelque chose de contraire à un seul des phénomènes, cela suffit pour assurer de sa fausseté. (...) Car comme une même cause peut produire plusieurs effets différents, un même effet peut être produit par plusieurs causes différentes. C’est ainsi que, quand on discourt humainement du mouvement, de la stabilité de la terre, tous les phénomènes des mouvements et rétrogradations des planètes, s’ensuivent parfaitement des hypothèses de Ptolémée, de Tycho, de Copernic et de beaucoup d’autres qu’on peut faire, de toutes lesquelles une seule peut être véritable (...) Vous voyez par là qu’encore que de votre hypothèse s’ensuivissent tous les phénomènes de mes expériences, elle serait de la nature des autres ; et que, demeurant toujours dans les termes de la vraisemblance, elle n’arriverait jamais à ceux de la démonstration.” [I feel obliged to say a couple of words on this subject. Whenever one proposes a hypothesis to explain the cause of several known phenomena, that hypothesis is one of three kinds. Sometimes one comes up with a demonstration of its negation which is preposterous, and then the hypothesis is true and unquestionable. Alternatively, if affi rmation of the hypothesis is absurd, the hypothesis is taken to be false. And when neither its negation nor affi rmation can be proven absurd, the hypothesis remains uncertain. The upshot is, to make a hypothesis certain, it is not sufficient that all the phenomena follow from it, but rather that a contradiction to just one of the phenomena is sufficient to ascertain its falsity. [...] For just as the same cause can produce different effects, the same effect can arise from different causes. Thus it is when we mere mortals discuss movement, the earth’s stability, all the phenomena connected with the direct and retrograde motions of the planets, observing as faithfully as

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we can the theories of Ptolemy, Tycho [Brahe], Copernicus and many others, from all of which only one can be true. [...] Thus even if all the phenomena found in my experiments should follow from your hypothesis, the latter would still be of the same nature as all other hypotheses. It would remain within the terms of likelihood, but would nevertheless fall short of being true] (Pascal 1976a: 374–375. My emphasis). Now, in addition to [18] is an excellent account on the three basic meanings of the term hypothesis across the ages, it should be stressed that [18] has a markedly Popperian flavour avant la lettre as well. And, on the second hand, these being the diachronic ups and downs of the term hypothesis, the contemporary reader is likely to misunderstand [17] if translated as [17.1] with no further explanations; similarly, many texts of the transition period between the two last meanings of hypothesis will be liable to have two alternative interpretations, both being acceptable. Just to make things worse, the DRAE—in keeping with what Stephen Ullmann called «linguistic conservatism» (Ullmann 1957: 220)—defi nes the term hipótesis with the sense in Newton’s times rather than with the current one: «suposición de una cosa posible o imposible para sacar de ella una consecuencia» [supposition of any possible or impossible thing from which to draw any consequence]. In fact, the defi nition that would suit best with our current idea of hypothesis is provided under the subheading hipótesis de trabajo: «la que se establece provisionalmente como base de una investigación que puede confi rmar o negar la validez de aquélla». But in view of the fact that the OED defi nes hypothesis as «A supposition or conjecture put forth to account for known facts; esp. in the sciences, a provisional supposition from which to draw conclusions that shall be in accordance with known facts, and which serves as a starting-point for further investigation by which it may be proved or disproved and true theory arrived at», then, the Spanish and the English terms might well be considered partial false friends at present, if we confi ne to what they literally mean and not to how speakers actually use them. A similar case—albeit less complex—where the diachronic aspect may also pose some translation problems is the one between the French term abbé and the Spanish term abad [both ‘abbot’]. Both come from the Aramaic and Syrian word abba, via Greek and Latin. This word means father, and both French and Spanish translatingly used this term to denote «supérieur d’une abbaye» (DAF) and «superior de un monasterio de hombres, considerado abadía» [both ‘abbot’] (DRAE), respectively. And the sense superior de una abadía may probably be considered the primary meaning for the signifiers abbé and abad. Then, they can be interchanged with no shift in the truth values of the sentences involved. Once this meaning is lexicalised as primary, the French added another secondary meaning via a typical euphemistic resort consisting of raising the category of a profession, post or position (Chamizo Domínguez 2004). The result was the French

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secondary meaning of «titre donné par courtoisie à un ecclésiastique séculier» (DAF), which would be equivalent to and translatable by the Spanish term cura [priest]. This French defi nition does not exactly match with the secondary meanings developed by the Spanish word abad; except in the Argentinean dialect of Spanish, where abad seems to mean «cura párroco» [parish priest, vicar] (DRAE) as well. These things being so, none of these secondary meanings developed by the Spanish noun abad may coincide with the secondary meaning developed by the French noun abbé and, consequently, both terms would be partial semantic false friends. In fact, this is so to such an extent that the Spanish language had to borrow abate to denote «presbítero extranjero, especialmente francés o italiano, y también eclesiástico español que ha residido mucho tiempo en Francia o Italia» [foreign priest, particularly one who is French or Italian and also Spanish clergyman who lived a long time in France or Italy] (DRAE). Besides, abate also means «eclesiástico de órdenes menores, y a veces simple tonsurado, que solía vestir traje clerical a la romana» [minor orders clergyman, and sometimes an ordinary tonsured one, who used to wear Roman style, clerical dress] and «clérigo dieciochesco frívolo y cortesano» [18th century frivolous and courtier clergyman] (DRAE). Notwithstanding this fact, it should be stressed that the Spanish noun abad also meant cura [priest] in the past. And this may be the reason why some monographic works on Spanish and French false friends (Cantera et al 1998; or Pérez Velasco 2004) do not refer to abbé and abad being partial semantic false friends nowadays. And the meaning of cura for the signifier abad in the past, may be found, for instance, in Don Quixote, where Sancho advises his wife as follows: [19] «Advertid que Sanchico tiene ya quince años cabales, y es razón que vaya a la escuela, si es que su tío el abad le ha de dejar hecho de la Iglesia» [Remember that Sanchico is now full fi fteen, and it is right he should go to school, if his uncle the abbot has a mind to have him trained for the Church] (Cervantes 2004: II, V, 725). And since abad means cura here, the text could be translated into French with no further problems as [19.1] «Prenez garde que Sanchico a déjà ses quinze ans sonnés, et qu’il est temps qu’il aille à l’école, si son oncle l’abbé le fait entrer dans l’Église» (Cervantes 2005). Nowadays, French readers will not have great problems understanding that in [19.1] abbé is a synonym of curé or prêtre (Bertaud du Chazaud 1983: 2); however, that will not be the case for Spanish readers. That is exactly why the author of the notes to the aforementioned edition of Don Quixote, Joaquín Forradellas, must have added a footnote to [19] and write:

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«abad: ‘cura’. Ser de la Iglesia no significa necesariamente ‘ser clérigo’, pues mucho más probable puede referirse a algunos de los cargos que se comprendían bajo el denominativo genérico de sacristán» [abbot: ‘priest’. To be a member of the Church does not necessarily mean ‘to be a priest’; much more probably may refer to some of the posts included under the generic noun sacristan] (Original italics). Further, I heartily believe that if we asked someone to translate [19.1] into Spanish, s/he would back translate abbé as cura or sacerdote, with no suspicion that Cervantes had written abad in the Spanish original. It should be stressed that nowadays the French noun abbé and the Spanish one abad are actually partial semantic false friends and for such a reason they lead some translators into error. For instance, the wellknown French prehistorian and archaeologist Henri Breuil is introduced at the Spanish version of the Wikipedia as «arqueólogo, prehistoriador y abad francés» [French archaeologist, prehistorian and abbot] (Anonymous 1. My emphasis) in spite of the fact that he never was a real abbot (i.e. “a man who is the head of an abbey of monks”), but a secular priest, and he is commonly known in Spanish as El abate Breuil. By contrast, the French version of this article stresses the fact that in spite of the fact that he was «ordonné prêtre le 9 juin 1900 à Saint-Sulpice, l’abbé Breuil n’exercera jamais de sacerdoce» [ordained priest on 9th June 1900 at Saint-Sulpice, Abbé Breuil will never exercise priesthood], 2 (Anonymous 2); which is also confi rmed in the German version of the aforementioned article: «Er wurde am 9. Juni 1900 ordiniert, doch übte er das Priesteramt nie aus» [He was ordained (priest) on 9th June 1900, but never exercised priesthood] (Anonymous 3). Finally, although the notion of polysemy may be criticised and in many cases it might be substituted by that of homonymy from a strictly synchronic perspective, the use of a clear concept of polysemy is unavoidable. This is so inasmuch as the dividing line between diachrony and synchrony is not as well clear-cut as one might think. Furthermore, if we do not distinguish between the notions of homonymy and polysemy, the distinction between chance false friends (homonymy within two languages) and semantic false friends (polysemy within two languages) will make no sense. And if this distinction does not make any sense, the result will be denying any possibility of theoretical treatment of the linguistic and conceptual phenomenon of false friends, making this phenomenon chaotically indistinct.

2.7. SUMMARY Since translating is ultimately more than identifying synonyms within two natural languages, the notion of synonymy becomes the centrepiece for identifying false friends. And this happens even though any of the different defi nitions of synonymy proposed have some defects. But, for we cannot do without it when translating, I have chosen to understand synonymy as a meaningful identity that allows the substitution of a term in any language

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60 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends by another term in another given language when they both share the same reference and truth values of the utterances involved. Accordingly, two similar or alike terms in two given languages will be full false friends when they cannot be interchangeable because the truth values of the utterances involved change. Conversely, they will be partial false friends when they can be interchangeable (or not) regarding their context. Salva veritate, this interchangeability principle reasonably works well in most cases, but not in all. The reasons for this principle not being operational in all cases should be searched in other linguistic phenomena, such as homonymy, polysemy, register and diachrony. These linguistic phenomena work as obstacles for the interchangeability principle and for translation. In contrast, they are precious instruments when we want to cognitively exploit our utterances, because they allow us to make some implicatures and produce contextual effects.

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3

Semantics of False Friends: Borrowings, Calques and Inheritances

3.1. BORROWINGS AND SEMANTIC FALSE FRIENDS Inasmuch as semantic false friends are always cognate terms which derive from a sole, original term after all, it is necessary to look for a comprehensive explanation of this linguistic interference phenomenon in order to show how false friends emerge. And such an explanation can be found in the fact that a given language’s words derive from other words in a different language by means of calques, borrowings or inheritances. A calque lies in borrowing a given collocation or term from a SL(source language) and translating them into a TL (target language) with a particular meaning, which sometimes is quite different of its literal meaning. So, the English language adopted the collocation love handles as a calque by translating it directly from French poignées d’amour; while Spanish also adopted as a borrowing from French the term michelines to mean the same object. Similarly, Spanish adopted the calque luna de miel by translating word for word the English collocation honey moon. Calques are not the main cause of false friends, but they must be carefully distinguished from borrowings and inheritances, which certainly are an inexhaustible source of false friends as we’ll see in this chapter. For its part, an inheritance is the natural way by which languages receive words from their parent languages, while borrowing is the analogous phenomenon when there is no fi liation relationship between two given languages. Anyway, this distinction is not as clear as it seems to be prima facie. For instance, one could discuss whether French words adopted by English after 1066 are borrowings or inheritances. Anyway, and in spite these special cases of fuzzy boundaries, the fact is that a borrowing could be plausibly distinguished from an inheritance most of the times. So, the Spanish noun hombre and the French one homme [man] seem to be clear cases of inheritances from Latin homo, and both Spanish and French nouns share the same referential meaning, «ser animado racional, varón o mujer» (DRAE) and «être humain de l’un ou l’autre sexe» (DAF), in Spanish and French, respectively. By contrast, the Spanish noun aguacate, «árbol de América, de la familia de las Lauráceas, de ocho a diez metros de altura,

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con hojas alternas, coriáceas, siempre verdes, flores dioicas y fruto comestible» [avocado tree] and «fruto de este árbol» [avocado] (DRAE), would be a borrowing from Nahuatl language, where the term ahuakatl itself was a metaphor built on a term which literally means testicle (Corominas and Pascual 1984–87). As a result of this borrowing Spanish aguacate is a partial semantic false friend with regard to the original term in Nahuatl language. And so because the Spanish term only connotes the fruit and the tree, but never evokes these oval “witnesses” of manliness or masculine gonads. From Spanish the term aguacate spread to various European languages such as French avocat or English avocado. Now, it should be stressed that the French noun avocat became a new partial false friend with regard to its Spanish cognate—in two senses. Firstly, because the French noun only means the fruit «fruit comestible de l’avocatier» (DAF), while Spanish aguacate means both avocado and avocado tree. In order to mean avocado tree the French language developed the derived noun avocatier, «arbre fruitier exotique, de la famille des Lauracées» (DAF); and, obviously, its consequence is that a new partial false friend emerged between Spanish and French. And secondly, the French language developed a particular case of homonymy, which has no equivalent either in Spanish or in English. Certainly, French avocat1 , meaning the fruit, is exactly equal, both graphic and phonetically, to French avocat2 , «auxiliaire de justice régulièrement inscrit à un barreau, et qui a pour profession d’assister ou de représenter les parties, de postuler et de plaider devant les tribunaux» [lawyer] (DAF). And as such a phenomenon did not happen either in Spanish or in English, we are before a new case of chance false friends, if we consider French language, on the one hand, and Spanish and English, on the other hand. However when a parent language and its offprint ones are considered as being different languages, borrowings are possible as well. In fact, we can fi nd both inheritances and borrowings between Spanish and Latin, for instance. So, the Spanish noun copla [song] (from Latin copula) is typically considered an inheritance, while the Spanish noun cópula [both ‘copula’ and ‘copulation’] is typically considered as being a borrowing. Cópula was adopted in Spanish in about the 15th century (Corominas and Pascual 1984–87), when Latin and Spanish were clearly considered as being two differentiated languages. Anyway, it should be taken on account that such a distinction is pretty contrived and depends much more on speakers’ feelings about their own languages than on objective criteria. For instance, Homeric Greek and current demotic Greek are as different as 1st century Latin and current Spanish are. We usually consider Homeric Greek and current demotic Greek as being “the same language”, while 1st century Latin and current Spanish are considered “differentiated languages”. In any case, what is relevant for the account of my topic is that the deeper reason for explaining false friends can be found in a transfer of signifiers from one language to another in two ways. Namely, 1) when such a transfer of signifiers does not involve an exact corresponding transfer of meanings;

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Semantics of False Friends 63 and 2) when, once a calque, borrowing or inheritance have been completely adopted and considered “native” or “aboriginal”, they start to develop one or more meanings which the original term did not have in its SL. When a given borrowing has been recently accepted by a given language and the speakers feel it is not a member of the system of TL, such a word is considered as being an alien term. But, when a borrowing becomes a member of the system of TL, such a word ceases to be felt as an alien term and starts to be considered as a native or aboriginal term as well. For instance, probably many Spanish speakers will be surprised if they realise that the Spanish noun jamón [ham], «pierna trasera del cerdo, curada o cocida entera» (DRAE), has been certainly a borrowing from French jambon, «cuisse de porc ou de sanglier, qui a été salée et préparée pour être conservée» (DAF), which originally is the augmentative of jambe [leg] and substituted the older Spanish term, much more authentic noun pernil. As a result of this substitution, Spanish noun pernil sounds archaic or dialectal for a long time. By contrast, since the Catalan language did not borrow the French noun jambon, the usual current Catalan noun for ham, which is defi ned as «cuixa d’un animal, especialment d’un porc; més especialment, cuixa o espatlla de porc salada per a esser conservada» (Alcover and Moll), continues being pernil. And one is surprised much more when, reading Francisco de Quevedo’s works, one discovers how many Latin borrowings used by Culteran writers were considered alien by Quevedo himself. Let us see, as an example, the well-known sonnet «Receta para hacer Soledades en un día» [Recipe to Make Solitudes in One Day], where Quevedo satirised this euphuistic way of writing by alluding directly to Soledades, a book by the Spanish, Culteran poet Luis de Góngora: [1] «Quien quisiere ser culto en solo un día, la jeri (aprenderá) gonza siguiente: fulgores, arrogar, joven, presiente, candor, construye, métrica armonía; poco, mucho, si no, purpuracía, neutralidad, conculca, erige, mente, pulsa, ostenta, librar, adolescente, señas traslada, pira, frustra, arpía; cede, impide, cisuras, petulante, palestra, liba, meta, argento, alterna, si bien disuelve émulo canoro. Use mucho líquido y de errante, su poco de nocturno y de caverna, anden listos livor, adunco y poro. Que ya toda Castilla, con sola esta cartilla, se abrasa de poetas babilones,

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends escribiendo sonetos confusiones; y en la Mancha, pastores y gañanes, atestadas de ajos las barrigas, hacen ya cultedades como migas» (Quevedo 1995: 595. Original italics). [He who would like to be learned in only one day, The following jar (shall learn) gon: Fulgors, to arrogat, youth, prescients, Candour, constructs, meter harmony; A little, much, if not, purpuraceous[ness] Neutrality, conculates, erects, mind, Pulsates, ostentates, to liberate, adolescent, Signs shifts, pyre, frustrates, harpy, Cedes, impides, incisions, petulant, Palaestra, sips, meta, argento, alterates, Although dissolves emulator canorous. Use much liquid and wandering, A little of nocturnal and of cavern, Be ready [to use] livor, aduncous and pore. Now all Castile, With only this primer, Is aflame with Babylonian poets, Writing sonnets confusions; And in the Mancha shepherds and rustics; Bellies packed with garlic Now create cultured writings like crumbs.]

And, if we did not count on the ironical evidence from Quevedo in [1], it would be extremely difficult to be believed that so many words were felt alien to Spanish language system even in 17th century. Among these words, candor [candour], conculcar [to conculcate], joven [youth], adolescente [adolescent], meta [meta, fi nish line, aim], poro [pore], fulgor [fulgour], presentir [to prescient], or neutralidad [neutrality] are being widely used nowadays; other words such a purpuracía [the quality of being purple] did fail in its lexicalisation; and, eventually, other terms such as argento [silver], «plata (metal de color blanco)» (DRAE), sound extremely archaic and/or poetic. In fact, this phenomenon of making Latin-like modern European languages, although with different fortunes and disparate results, can be found in English as well, as in the following two verses by William Dunbar, in his Ballad of Our Lady, which were not but Latin with English endings: «Hodiern, modern, sempitern,/ Angelicall regyne» (Quoted in Ullmann 1964: 306). Even, sometimes, a particular term has been so widely adopted by a given family of languages to such an extent that it seems to be impossible that such a word has been sometime in the past a borrowing from

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Semantics of False Friends 65 a different family of languages instead of an inheritance from the parent language of such a family. Actually a root which is present in all Romance languages – except in Romanian, where alb is used—is *blanc [white], either as an adjective or as a noun, or both: Spanish blanco/blanca, French blanc/blanche, Portuguese, branco/branca, Italian bianco/bianca or Catalan blanc/blanca. Such a root is so common in Romance languages that one could think it should be an inheritance from a hypothetical Latin term *blancus. However and surprisingly, Spanish blanco/blanca and its cognates in the rest of Romance languages is not a Latin term, but a Germanic one, which originally meant shining white and is still present nowadays in German, Dutch and English under the basic form blank. And even in Scandinavian languages—in Norwegian for instance—where white itself is said hvit, while the salient meanings of blank are bright, shiny or clear depending on the contexts (Lorentzen 2005). When such a term was taken as a borrowing by Romance languages—which in Spanish can be found as early as c1140 (Corominas and Pascual 1984–87)—it changed its original Germanic meanings of bright or shining white into the one of white by means of a metonymy and a subsequent amplification of meaning. Now, in some Germanic languages, and by means of another different metonymy, blank ended up getting the basic meaning of empty, even though it can have lots of other meanings. In any case, and as a result of these divergent chains of metonymies in both family languages, a complicated constellation of semantic false friends emerged. And so in two ways; namely, among Romance and Germanic languages on one hand, and inside Germanic languages themselves on the other hand. This means for instance that while “a blank cheque” is understood by English speakers as a literal expression, “un cheque en blanco” is understood by Spanish speakers as a metonymic expression. Similarly, “a blank sheet” literally means “an empty sheet” and not “a white sheet”, but “una hoja blanca” means only “a white sheet”, while “an empty sheet” would have to be translated as “una hoja vacía”. And what has been said about blank as an adjective could be said, mutatis mutandis, about blanco/blanca as a noun. Where Dutch and German languages are concerned, Dutch blank is also used to mean white in some contexts. In fact, although it does exist the word wit [‘white’, as well], blank in Dutch is both an adjective (e.g. “het blanke ras” [the white race] or “blanke slavinnen” [white slave trade]) and a noun used to refer to white people (e.g. “Hillary is een blanke” [Hillary is a white woman] or “Verboden voor blanken” [forbidden for white people]). And curiously enough, “een blanco (sic) cheque” means “a blank cheque”, while “een witte cheque” means “a white cheque”. And to complicate things a bit more, Dutch blank also has, among other rarer meanings, the colloquial one of flooded (e.g. “de straat staat blank” [the street is flooded]), another metaphorical meaning that is not present in the other languages. The same is the case in German, where one can use the expressions der Blankoscheck [blank check] or eine Blankovollmacht [‘carte blanche’, in

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English by means of a borrowing from French]. You can also use blanko alone when referring to plain paper. However, you cannot say ein blanker Scheck which would mean a brightly polished one - something more appropriate for a shiny coin than a cheque! You can however say metaphorically “Das ist eine blanke Lüge” [this is a bare-faced lie], a use of blank which might puzzle some translators. As for German blank, it only works as an adjective and had kept its original meaning of bright as well as other meanings such as shining, shiny, or polished. And, eventually, English blank works as an adjective as well as a noun. As an adjective, English blank never is synonymous with white, but mainly with empty or void, besides other specific meanings according to the context. Namely, 1) expressionless, deadpan, poker-faced, impassive, uninterested, indifferent, unmarked or apathetic; 2) confused, confounded, at a loss, perplexed, disconcerted, dumbfounded or uncomprehending; and 3) outright, absolute, utter, complete, unqualified or unmitigated (Fergusson 1986). And as a noun, English blank is synonymous with void, emptiness, vacuum, space or gap (Fergusson 1986), but never can be used neither to mean the colour nor people pertaining to white race. The result of all that is but a complicated galaxy of semantic false friends among Romance and Germanic languages. Even inside Germanic languages themselves blank is a semantic partial false friend as well. Very frequently languages use to take their borrowings from other languages which enjoy some special prestige in a given age in the fields of culture, art, technology, and so on; and so in spite of the fact that this prestige is not always going on a par with any political, economic or military superiority. Paradoxically, Latin borrowed most of its vocabulary in the field of culture from Greek, in spite of the fact that it is well-known that Greece was conquered by Romans and became a Roman province: Graecia capta ferum uictorem cepit [Captive Greece captured her savage conqueror] (Horace, Ep. 2 , 56). Even a dead language, as Latin itself is, can be an inexhaustible source of borrowings anywhere at every time. In this respect, Quevedo’s sonnet quoted in [1] is a paradigmatic example of how Latin exported lots of terms several centuries once it was considered a dead language. Similarly French became an international language in 18th–19th centuries and flooded with gallicisms most European and non-European languages. Nowadays this role of “linguistic exporter” is amply carried out by English (Lorenzo 1996; and Mendiluce Cabrera and Hernández Bartolomé 2005). And, as usual, borrowings from English frequently become an inexhaustible source of false friends anywhere. And so in two ways: 1) because a given borrowed word adds a new meaning to a signifier that already exists in TL; and 2) because TL takes from SL some signifiers for substituting other native signifiers. Let us consider both cases from the analysis of a real text where both cases appear in a frequency which would be difficult to be imagined even whether the text were written on purpose in order to illustrate my topic. This text has been found in a newspaper

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Semantics of False Friends 67 report and deals with Tim Collins’ statements, an ex-colonel who commanded British troops during Gulf War II: [2] «Creo que hay cada vez más evidencias de que la Administración de EE. UU había decidido ir a la guerra y nada iba a desviarles de ese camino […]. Tony Blair pensaba en el éxito de Margaret Thatcher como resultado de la guerra de las Malvinas y creyó que sería una buena cosa, una victoria fácil que le reportaría popularidad y le evitaría tener que centrarse en las cuestiones difíciles de la política doméstica […]. Ahora creo que las evidencias son lo bastante fuertes y que el impeachment despejaría el ambiente. Si el primer ministro ha intervenido en las evidencias, o ha conspirado para ello, o ha permitido que las evidencias fueran alteradas con su conocimiento, entonces es culpable». (Walter Oppenheimer, «El oficial que lideró la entrada de tropas británicas en Irak deja el Ejército y se convierte en feroz crítico de la invasión», in El País January 5th 2006, p. 4. Original italics, my emphasis). At the title of the article there are two terms which are worthy of consideration in order to illustrate my previous assertions: oficial and líder. And there are three more terms inside the text which are excellent examples for illustrating my topic as well. Inasmuch as [2] has been put in quotation marks in the newspaper report, I assume it is a literal translation of colonel Collins’ statements in English; while emphasised terms in the report title are not translations of English terms but originally written in Spanish by the journalist. In any case, four of these five terms I emphasised are considered cases of false friends between English and Spanish (Prado 2001). Let us start by commenting on both emphasised terms at the title of the report. The Spanish noun oficial has several meanings; some of them coincide with the English noun officer while others do not. In fact, we can fi nd 9 different senses of such a noun in the DRAE, not counting several senses more when this noun appears in some collocations. But, given that a British colonel is mentioned in [2], it is plausible to think that oficial is being used here according to its usual meaning in the military jargon. Accordingly, oficial should mean here «Mil. Militar de categoría intermedia entre las de suboficial y oficial superior o jefe, que comprende los grados de alférez, teniente y capitán del Ejército y los de alférez de fragata, alférez de navío y teniente de navío en la Armada» (DRAE). And, if so, our reporter “demoted” Colonel Collins at his own risk and he turned out to be only second lieutenant, captain or major. And this “demotion” of Mr. Collins from colonel to second lieutenant, captain or major has been possible because of the report’s author has been a victim of a partial semantic false friend and, for such a reason, has used the Spanish noun oficial according to the meaning that its English cognate officer has in English military jargon as «a person holding a military or naval command, or occupying a position of authority in the army, navy, air force, or mercantile marine;

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68 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends espc. one holding a commission in the army or navy» (OED). According to both defi nitions oficial and officer are partial semantic false friends because the meaning of the English noun is ampler than the meaning of the Spanish one; and this has been disregarded by our journalist. In fact, the Spanish noun oficial is a hyponym of the English noun officer, which functions as a superordenate term with regard to its Spanish cognate. In other words, the set of English officers is ampler than the one of Spanish oficiales. So that, if our journalist would not be a victim of this case of linguistic interference and would be aware of Spanish language, he ought to call Colonel Collins oficial superior, «Mil. jefe (militar)» (DRAE), or jefe, «Mil. Militar con cualquiera de los grados de comandante, teniente coronel y coronel en el Ejército, o los de capitán de corbeta, capitán de fragata y capitán de navío en la Armada» (DRAE). And in this way he would avoid the contradiction of calling a single person, and under the same circumstances, oficial [second lieutenant, captain, or major] and coronel [colonel] at once. Concerning the verb liderar, we are in the presence of the case of a pure borrowing where the TL took a signifier which had no cognate in it. Now, once the verb liderar has been accepted by Spanish linguistic system, it has substituted and consequently displaced other native terms. Certainly, liderar, «dirigir o estar a la cabeza de un grupo, de un partido político, de una competición, etc.» (DRAE), derives from líder, «persona a la que un grupo sigue reconociéndola como jefe u orientadora» (DRAE). Now, the Spanish verb liderar and its abstract derivatives liderato/liderazgo [leadership], «condición de líder» and «ejercicio de sus actividades» (DRAE), derive at a last resort from the English noun leader, «one who conducts, precedes as a guide, leads a person by the hand or an animal by a cord» (OED). Even though no Spanish speaker would call líder someone “who conducts or leads an animal by cord”! In any case, all three ended up substituting the native Spanish terms acaudillar, «guiar, conducir, dirigir», caudillaje, «mando o gobierno de un caudillo» and caudillo, «hombre que dirige algún gremio, comunidad o cuerpo» (DRAE). And what is more, since the borrowing líder and its derivatives have been introduced in Spanish, the other three original Spanish terms (acaudillar, caudillaje and caudillo) got a clear pejorative flavour, at least in peninsular Spanish; and even a dysphemistic and politically incorrect flavour. In fact, the lexicalisation of the borrowing líder in Spanish originated that such a word acted as a euphemism of caudillo or jefe [leader, chief]. And exactly for such a reason, no Spanish politician loves to be called caudillo, although all of them exceedingly love to be called líderes. And so perhaps because General Franco called himself «Francisco Franco, caudillo de España por la Gracia de Dios» [Francisco Franco, leader of Spain by the Grace of God]. This means that, while the original English text was not self contradictory, it’s Spanish translation actually is a self-contradiction. As for the noun evidencia, it is being used in [2] according to the meaning that the English noun evidence has, but not according to the meaning

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Semantics of False Friends 69 that this noun has in Spanish. Although evidencia probably will end up getting such a meaning if we take into account that the term appears no less than four times in [2] according to its English meaning. But, for the time being, Spanish evidencia and English evidence are semantic false friends. And so because Spanish evidencia is synonymous with certeza or claridad and equivalent to English nouns certainty, obviousness or clearness (Prado 2001: 199), while English evidence is synonymous with proof, verification, confi rmation, testimony, indication, sign, mark or demonstration (Fergusson 1986); and therefore equivalent to Spanish prueba, testimonio or dato, but never is equivalent of English evidence (Prado 2001: 199). With regard to Spanish adjective doméstico/doméstica, the DRAE only defi nes it as «perteneciente o relativo a la casa u hogar» [pertaining or relating to home]. Therefore its meaning in contexts such as [2] is clearly the case of a calque from the English meaning of domestic when it is synonymous with internal or civil and antonymous of foreign (Fergusson 1986). Accordingly, Prado (2001: 175) suggests nacional, interno/interna or interior as plausible Spanish equivalents for English domestic in contexts such as [2]. Spanish adjective doméstico/doméstica may be translated into English domestic in some contexts, as when speaking about domesticated animals or pets as opposed to wild ones, but Spanish doméstico/doméstica and English domestic have not equivalent meanings in contexts such as [2], since the context in which domestic appears is the one which deals with British internal political matters as opposed to foreign or international political matters. And eventually, impeachment is a paradigmatic example of a borrowing which is not even starting to be lexicalised yet. Anyway it is likely to that, since there is no Spanish term which has its exact English meaning of «the accusation and persecution of a person for treason or other high crime or misdemeanour, before a competent tribunal; in Great Britain, the judicial process by which any man, from the rank of a peer downwards, may be tried before the House of Lords at the instance of the House of Commons; in U.S., a similar process in which the accusers are the House of Representatives and the court is the Senate» (OED), it could end up being adopted by Spanish language. But for now impeachment is considered an alien term in Spanish and for such a reason the author of [2] wrote it in italics. If the reader allows me to make some “linguistic fiction”, I dare to guess that impeachment could be adopted by Spanish in the future under the form of *empichamiento or *impichamiento, either with its original English meaning, or with a different meaning, or both In short, if I am right, what the journalist tried to mean in [2] is: [2.1] “I believe that there is increasing evidences that the US Administration had decided to go to war, and nothing could divert them from this path [...] Tony Blair reflected on Margaret Thatcher’s success in the Falkland War, and believed that it would be beneficial: an easy victory

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70 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends that would increase his popularity while enabling him to avoid difficult issues in British domestic politics [...] Now, I think, the evidences are sufficiently overwhelming that only an impeachment would clear the air. If the Prime Minister had meddled with the evidences, or conspired to do so, or had knowingly permitted the evidences to be altered, then he is guilty.” (“The officer who lead the entry of British troops in Iraq leaves the Army and becomes a ferocious critic of invasion”). But what actually he meant is: [2.2] “I believe that there is increasing obviousness that the US Administration had decided to go to war, and nothing could divert them from this path [...] Tony Blair reflected on Margaret Thatcher’s success in the Falkland War, and believed that it would be beneficial: an easy victory that would increase his popularity while enabling him to avoid difficult issues in British domesticated politics [...] Now, I think, the obviousness are sufficiently overwhelming that only an impeachment would clear the air. If the Prime Minister had meddled with the obviousness, or conspired to do so, or had knowingly permitted the obviousness to be altered, then he is guilty.” (“The second lieutenant, captain or major who lead the entry of British troops in Iraq leaves the Army and becomes a ferocious critic of invasion”).

3.2. ROUND TRIP BORROWINGS From the beginning of this chapter I argue that borrowings, calques and inheritances are the most usual source for creating false friends and I even would dare to argue that all semantic false friends have been originated, after all, in borrowings or inheritances, although sometimes these processes of semantic change are extremely intricate. And even there are cases where a given borrowing comes back again to its SL with a new meaning after having changed its meaning in the TL. So, for instance, the English noun piercing derives as a last resort from French verb percer [perforate], but it is now coming back again to French language under its English form and according to the meaning of (body) piercing. In a similar way the Cypriot dialect of the Greek language borrowed the noun σιμιντίριν from Provencal cimenteri [both ‘cemetery’] (Varella 2006: 242) in order to mean “any large burial ground”. Now, it should be stressed that the noun cemetery and its cognates in other modern languages derives, via Latin coemeterium, from the classic Greek noun κοιμητήριον, where it was a euphemism coined from its literal meaning of bedroom. All this means that 1) Greek κοιμητήριον is a partial semantic false friend with regard to Latin coemeterium and its modern derivatives; 2) the word itself came back home under a different shape; and 3) its meaning slightly changed by means of a restric-

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Semantics of False Friends 71 tion. The phenomenon of round trip borrowings seems to be very frequent in Modern Greek (Magadán Olives 2003: 78–81), but it also can be found in other languages. Let us now analyse a particular case which has to do with Spanish language. The English noun army, the French noun armée and the Spanish noun armada derive, directly or indirectly, from a nominalisation of Latin adjective armatus. Now, the English and French nouns mean «an organized military force equipped for fighting on land» (OED) and «ensemble des soldats rassemblés et équipés pour faire la guerre» (DAF), respectively. So that, one may substitute the French noun armée by the English noun army, and vice versa, without any change in the truth values of the utterances where such a substitution is carried out, if we disregard that the notion of “on land” is not explicitly mentioned in the French defi nition. That is, both terms can be considered synonymous. By contrast, the Spanish noun, when used in a military context, means «conjunto de fuerzas navales de un Estado» or «escuadra (conjunto de buques de guerra)» (DRAE); that is, navy or fleet and flotte or force navale, in English and French, respectively. As a result of that, the English and French nouns become full semantic false friends with regard to their Spanish cognate. In such a way that, if one translates the English or French terms into Spanish armada, the resulting text in the TL will say something very different with regard to SL text really said. This is exactly what happens in the following example, where Spanish reader understands navy where the original text probably said army: [3] «[...] Berlín, primavera de 1945. Adolf Hitler vive sus últimos días encerrado en un búnker construido bajo los suelos de la cancillería, en el corazón de la capital alemana. [...] Mientras Hitler está bajo tierra, en la superficie la Armada soviética avanza inexorable desde el Este. Sus bombas caen sobre la capital, destruyéndola. [...] En las reuniones con sus oficiales [Hitler] se muestra titubeante, los dedos de sus manos tiemblan.» [Berlin, spring 1945. Adolf Hitler is living his last days shut in a bunker built under the floor of the Chancellery, at the heart of German capital. […] While Hitler is under the ground, outside Soviet Navy inexorably moves forward from East. Its bombs fall upon the capital, destroying it […]. At the meetings with his officers [Hitler] is faltering, the fingers of his hands quiver] (Quoted in Silva 2005. My bold type, original italics). According to what [3] “says” for any Spanish reader, the Soviet Navy was bombarding and, to add insult to injury, only the Soviet Navy was bombarding and laying siege to Berlin. And this is particularly shocking for anybody who knows that Berlin is placed neither at seashore nor at any lake shore, unless we imagine that “Soviet Navy” would sail up river Spree. As for the German noun Armee, it is a borrowing from French armée and, although both nouns have the same referential meaning, their registers

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differ one from another. In fact, the German noun works as a euphemistic substitutive for Wehrmacht, which became a politically incorrect term, or at least an inconvenient one, since Wehrmacht were used for naming Hitler’s army. By contrast, its French cognate armée is axiologically neuter. And that has two salient consequences with a view to my topic: 1) we may not translate German Armee into French armée and get exactly the same connotations and registers; and 2) German language can cognitively exploit this double register while French language does not. The result of previous considerations is that army, armée and Armee are full semantic false friends with regard to Spanish armada as long as their referential meanings are completely different and, accordingly, the Spanish noun cannot be substituted by any of its cognates in the other three languages without changing truth values of utterances where such a substitution is made. But since the German noun Armee works as a politically correct term for Wehrmacht, one can exploit it in a way which would be very difficult to be exploited in English or French. So, if any spiteful person wants to say that German army is not (enough) democratic nowadays and get such an implicature without being more explicit, suffice it to substitute the German term Bundesarmee [Federal Army] or Bundeswehr—which currently is the official name of the German Federal Armed Forces—for *Bundeswehrmacht, and such an implicature would be made in itself. And all that in spite of the fact that Wehrmacht, whose literal meaning is defensive force, was originally a euphemistic noun which substituted in 1935 the term Reichswehr. On the other hand, several languages (English, French, or German, for instance) have borrowed the Spanish noun armada in order to mean what is said in Spanish Armada Invencible [Invincible Armada]. And its outcome derived in a new case of semantic false friends. So that, if one translates the term armada/Armada from any of these languages into Spanish armada, TL text will mean something very different with regard to SL text did mean. Let us analyse an actual example in which this subject appears. On the occasion of the Ukrainian general election in the year 2004, its subsequent problems and the Orange Revolution which caused this election, the Spanish newspaper El País («Revista de prensa», November 28, 2004, p. 14) translated an article originally published in the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung (November 25, 2004). The Spanish translation of this article started with the following phrase: [4] «La armada de los demócratas se ha puesto en marcha y con toda la fuerza de sus argumentos ha puesto sitio a la porosa ciudadela de Kiev» [Literally, The navy of democrats started off and with all the strength of its arguments besieged the porous citadel of Kiev]. When I read [4] for the fi rst time three questions arose to me. Namely, 1) in such a context armada should be metaphorically used, all the more so

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Semantics of False Friends 73 one takes on account that Kiev has no harbour and, consequently, cannot be besieged by any “navy”; 2) this metaphorical use of armada, and in such a context, felt to me extremely odd in Spanish and perhaps the anonymous translator should have substituted this term for ejército de los demócratas [army of democrats] or muchedumbre de los demócratas [crowd of democrats]; and 3) that the anonymous translator—as in the case of [3]—could be a victim of the tramp caused by the fact that the Spanish noun armada [‘Kriegmarine’, in German] and the German noun Armee [‘ejército’, in Spanish] are paradigmatic cases of full semantic false friends. After asking myself these hypotheses, I got the original German text in order to verify or falsify them. And I surprisingly found that the term actually used in the original German text wasn’t Armee, but Armada, which is a borrowing from Spanish as I previously did mention. Really the original German text was as follows: [5] «Mächtig hat sich die Armada der Demokraten aufgebaut und mit der ganzen Kraft ihrer Argumente die poröse Festung in Kiew bedrängt» [Literally, The armada of democrats started off and with all the strength of its arguments besieged the porous citadel of Kiev] (My emphasis). If so, this translation of [5] as [4] seems to me to be as (or perhaps more) interesting as [3] is in order to illustrate my topic—false friends between German and Spanish emerged in this case from a borrowing from Spanish itself. As I previously argued, most of borrowings become false friends as words change their meanings in the TL with regard to the ones they had in SL (Chamizo Domínguez and Nerlich 2002: 1833–1849). Certainly French armada, English armada and German Armada have been taken as borrowings from Spanish Armada Invencible [Invincible Armada], although by means of eliminating the Spanish adjective. So that armada/Armada in any of these three languages is synonymous with Spanish proper name Armada Invencible but does not with regard to Spanish common noun armada. From this basic meaning armada/Armada has developed further second order meanings. This process can be followed at the DAF, where, in addition to its literal meaning as «flotte que l’Espagne arma sous le règne de Philip II pour envahir l’Angleterre et qui fut détruite en 1588», one can fi nd two more second order meanings for French armada: 1) «grande flotte de vaisseaux ou d’avions de guerre» [big fleet of warships or war planes]; and 2) «grande quantité de personnes» [crowd] (DAF). As a result of that, the French noun armada became a semantic false friend with regard to its Spanish cognate in three counts. And what is said about French language can be said, mutatis mutandis, about German language. Now, once the German and French languages lexicalised these peculiar meanings of armada/Armada, new translation problems arise. And so because [5] could be (correctly) translated into Spanish as

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends [6] «La Armada Invencible de los demócratas se ha puesto en marcha y con toda la fuerza de sus argumentos ha puesto sitio a la porosa ciudadela de Kiev.»

But, in such a case, the metaphorical meaning of German Armada in [5] would probably be understood in [6] as an irony instead of a metaphor; and so because, according to our historical knowledge, it is well-known that the Spanish Armada Invencible was actually defeated, either by the English fleet, as English people uses to say, or by the elements, as Spanish king Philip II said, or by both, as it seems to be much more plausible. And for closing the circle of that process of borrowings and their changes of meaning, the vicissitudes of the journey of armada from one language to another provide us with an eventual surprise. Armada has been lexicalised in English with the meaning of «the ‘Invincible Armada’ sent by Philip II of Spain against England in 1588» (OED); and, from this standard meaning the English term is occasionally used to refer, either as a compliment or sometimes as an irony, to any powerful or strong group, particularly in sports jargon. And, from such a transferred use in English, armada is coming back home and is being used from time to time to refer to any sports team which is (or is supposed to be) particularly powerful. In such a sense the magazine Universal (July, 6, 2005), which can be got for free when one fl ies with Iberia Airways, referred to Spanish national tennis team with the following headline: [7] «La ‘Armada’ retoma su nivel en el open de Bastad» [The ‘Armada’ takes up again its level at Bastad’s open] (My emphasis). And what the magazine intended to mean with [7], according to what one can read inside the body of the article, was that the Spanish national tennis team proved again its power in a competition celebrated at the Swiss town of Bastad. That is, Spanish is taking up again from English the noun armada, but according to an alien meaning till now. If this new meaning becomes usual and is accepted by the DRAE, perhaps one could fi nd in the future a new lexicalised sense for armada in Spanish. If so, armada could be defi ned as “equipo deportivo especialmente potente o poderoso” [sports team particularly powerful or strong]. In such a way that, if the English noun armada and the Spanish noun armada could be considered as full semantic false friends till now, they should be considered only partial semantic false friends in the future, provided that both were included in “official” dictionaries. In such a case, we’ll be faced with the paradox consisting in the fact that a term, which originally is a Spanish one, has taken in a new meaning thanks to its trip to Britain and its return home with new English clothes, so to speak.

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Semantics of False Friends 75 3.3. WAYS FOR CREATING FALSE FRIENDS We have seen in previous sections some examples of creation of false friends by means of borrowings. We are now to analyse in this section five various specific ways which originate the emergence of semantic false friends from a common shared ancestor. These ways basically involve either a restriction of meaning or an amplification of meaning and, occasionally, both. But theses changes of meaning in terms which have a common ancestor appear in various ways although its fi nal result is always the emergence of semantic false friends, either partial or full ones. As far as I have been able to discover, five different alternative ways can be found. Namely, 1. Restriction of the various meanings that the borrowed word has in the SL to only one or very few meanings in the TL. 2. Restriction of the meanings of the SL word and addition in the TL of new meanings which are absent in such language. 3. Preservation of the meaning of the SL and addition of new meanings in the TL. 4. Emergence of, at least, one new meaning in the TL which did not exist in the SL and sometimes including changes in grammatical categories. 5. Emergence of new and different meanings in two or more given languages from some common signifier in a third language. Let’s analyse one by one these five possible ways by appealing to concrete examples, some of them have been exploited literary and cognitively.

3.3.1. Restriction of meaning The French noun madame has been borrowed everywhere, but mainly according to its euphemistic second order meaning in the field of prostitution. Similarly, French nouns chef and maître have been borrowed by almost all European languages as well, but their original meanings have been restricted to the field of restaurants and kitchens. As far as the Spanish language is concerned, madame has been accepted as madama in order to mean «prostituta» [prostitute] and «mujer que regenta un prostíbulo» [female keeper of a brothel] (DRAE), although it also can be found according to its original French spelling (Casas Gómez 1986). But, surprisingly, neither the meaning of prostitute nor the one of female keeper of a brothel can be found at the DAF. In fact, only four salient meanings can be found at the DAF for madame and none of them alludes to the field of prostitution. Namely, 1) «titre qu’on ne donnait autrefois qu’aux femmes dites de qualité et que l’on a réservé ensuite à toute

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76 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends femme mariée (aujourd’hui, ce titre est étendu généralement aux femmes célibataires d’un certain âge)»; 2) «en France, il était d’usage de s’adresser à la reine en ces termes : Madame, si Votre Majesté... On usait du même traitement à l’égard des princesses étrangères»; 3) «titre qu’on peut donner aussi à une femme, qu’elle soit ou non mariée, notamment en considération de ses fonctions»; and 4) «à la troisième personne du singulier, dans des formules marquant la déférence, le respect». By contrast, this specific meaning of the French signifier madame in the field of prostitution can be documented in other sources. So, for example, the meaning of «patronne d’une maison close» [female owner of a red light house] can be found at Colin, Mével & Leclère (1994: 379), as well as the slang meaning of «la guillotine» [the guillotine] and the one of «les gardiens de la prison» [prison guards] for the collocation mesdames les gaffes. As for the English language is concerned, the French noun madame has been borrowed under the forms madam and madame, being both synonymous with lady and, consequently, both could coincide in broad terms with French meanings documented at the DAF, as well as the meaning of «the female keeper of a brothel» (Holder 2003: 245). If so, Spanish madama/madame will be a partial semantic false friend with regard to French madame and English madam/madame, while the French and English terms to each other do not. In other words, Spanish madama/madame usually has a derogatory or dysphemistic meaning, while their French and English cognates can be used either as derogation and/or compliment. Consequently, while English madam/madame can be ambiguously used and give rise to misunderstandings, Spanish madama/madame do not. In order to avoid these possible misunderstandings, or at least to reduce them to the minimum, the English noun madam is usually pronounced by stressing its fi rst syllable, while madame can be pronounced by stressing the second one. However, it is always possible to confuse both possibilities (or to act as one confuses them) because the speaker doesn’t be able to or cannot be cooperative. This allows exploiting cognitively the polysemy of the English noun, while it is not possible in the Spanish language. An example of this cognitive exploitation of madam/madame, where madam is understood as a synonym of prostitute or female keeper of a brothel and not as a synonym of lady or miss, can be found at the following text: [8] «‘What can I do for you, Madam?’ ‘Miss’, she said. ‘In my country a lady doesn’t like being mistaken for a madam.’» (Quoted in Holder 2003: 245. My emphasis). As for maître and chef, both spread among different languages as much as madame did, but, in this case, their meanings have been restricted to the field of both kitchens and restaurants. So, chef can be found in lots of languages, but mainly used in culinary field, although, exceptionally, the Polish noun szef continues having its general meaning of chief and for such

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Semantics of False Friends 77 a reason Polish szef is listed as a false friend with regard to English chef (Szpila 2003: 74). The French noun chef derives from the Latin noun caput [head] and, by means of a metaphor, got in French the general meaning of «personne qui a le premier rang dans une institution ou une association» (DAF). At fi rst, chef became an English noun under the form chief, «the head of a body of men, of an organization, state, town, party, office, etc.; foremost authority, leader, ruler» (OED), and a Spanish one under the form jefe, «superior o cabeza de una corporación, partido u oficio» (DRAE); sharing all three a same meaning. From this general meaning, French chef got in the second place the restricted meaning of «celui qui dirige les cuisines d’un restaurant.» And with this restricted meaning and its original spelling chef was taken again with the meaning of «jefe de cocina, en especial de un restaurante» (DRAE) and «the man who presides over the kitchen of a large household’s; a head cook» (OED), in Spanish and English, respectively. As a result of that, the French noun chef and its cognates in Spanish and English ended up being partial semantic false friends. As for maître, its story is analogous to the one of chef. The French noun maître derives from Latin noun magister [chief, schoolteacher] and has the general meaning of «titre en usage dans de nombreux domaines d’activité pour désigner une personne à qui l’on reconnaît une compétence particulière, une aptitude à diriger» (DAF). According to this general meaning the French noun was borrowed by English language as master at fi rst, «a man having control or authority» (OED), although the English language developed latterly other particular meanings which ended up converting the French and English nouns into partial semantic false friends. As far as the Spanish language is concerned, and since Spanish got the noun maestro directly from Latin with an analogous meaning to the one of French maître, French noun was not borrowed by Spanish language according to its general meaning as English language did. Later French noun restricted its general meaning and was used in the culinary field to mean «celui qui dirige le service de la table dans une demeure privée ou un grand restaurant» (DAF). And with this restricted meaning maître was borrowed by both languages under consideration, although maintaining its original French spelling, even its circumflex accent. Accordingly, maître means «a hotel manager; now usually the manager of a hotel dining-room, a head waiter» (OED) and «jefe de comedor en un restaurante» (DRAE), in English and Spanish, respectively. And, as usual, its result has been another series of new partial semantic false friends again. Accordingly, French maître can be substituted by English or Spanish maître when they used in the context of restaurants, but they cannot be substituted either when French is used according to its general meaning or when it is used according to the rest of its various meanings as «personne qui, ayant des hommes, des femmes à son service, a autorité sur eux» [landlord, boss], «personne qui possède quelque chose; propriétaire» [owner], «personne qui transmet un savoir, forme les autres à son modèle» [teacher], or «artisan, ouvrier qui, après avoir été apprenti

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78 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends puis compagnon, est reçu dans un corps de métier» [master], for instance. In such cases, French maître should be translated into English as chief, boss, owner, teacher, master, or into lots of other terms as well. But it is not the end of the story yet. Once master became an English term, such a noun has gained a new restricted meaning in academic jargon as «specific degree, originally conveying authority to teach in the university» (OED); and with such a meaning the English noun master has been borrowed by Spanish as máster, «maestría (título tras la licenciatura)» (DRAE), with which a new case of partial semantic false friends arose again between English and Spanish languages. And something similar does happen with other three English terms which have been borrowed anywhere but with restricted meanings in the field of sports and games. Let us focus on the case of the Spanish language. It is about nouns goal, penalty and corner, which have been hispanicised as gol, penalti and córner, respectively. And again its result is another series of partial semantic false friends. Certainly, the general meaning of the English noun goal is the one of «the object to which effort or ambition is directed; the destination of a (more or less laborious) journey» (OED); and, accordingly, goal is synonymous with aim, objective or target (Fergusson 1986). If so, English goal is equivalent to Spanish nouns objeto, objetivo or propósito, according to one of the various meanings of theses Spanish nouns. Now, from this general meaning, the English noun is restrictively used in sports as «in football, hockey, lacrosse, and similar games, the posts between which the ball is driven to win a point in the game […]. Hence to somebody has acquired the sense of: The winning of a goal, the point in the game scored for this», according to the defi nition provided by the OED. Now, according to the DRAE, Spanish gol only means «en el fútbol y otros deportes, entrada del balón en la portería», which is equivalent to the second part of the defi nition provided by the OED for English goal, but which is not valid for its fi rst part. In fact, the “the posts between which the ball is driven to win a point in the game” is said in Spanish meta or portería. As a result of all that, goal and gol are partial semantic false friends with regard to the general meaning that goal has, but they’re partial semantic false friends in the sports field as well. Similarly, the general meaning of the English noun penalty is the one of «a punishment imposed for breach of law, rule, or contract; a loss, disability, of disadvantage of some kind, either ordained by law to be infl icted for some offence, or agreed upon to be undergone in case of violation of a contract» (OED); and accordingly penalty is synonymous with punishment (Fergusson 1986). If so, English penalty is equivalent to the Spanish nouns castigo or pena. Now, from this general meaning English penalty is restrictively used in the sports field as «a disadvantage imposed upon to a competitor or a side (usually in the form of an advantage given to the opposite side) as punishment for a breach of rules […]. in Football (the award of) a free kick at goal» (OED). And since Spanish penalti only means «en

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Semantics of False Friends 79 el fútbol y otros deportes, máxima sanción que se aplica a ciertas faltas del juego cometidas por un equipo dentro de su área» (DRAE), both Spanish and English nouns are equivalent in the sports field, but they’re false friends in any other contexts. But, once the English noun has been hispanicised, the Spanish language has coined the idiom casarse de penalti, which means «casarse por haber quedado embarazada la mujer» (DRAE), and, consequently is equivalent to the English idiom to have a shotgun wedding/marriage, but whose literal translation into English would be meaningless. Finally, the general meaning of the English noun corner is the one of «the meeting-place of converging sides or edges […] forming an angular extremity or projection» (OED); and accordingly it is synonymous with angle, bend, join or junction (Fergusson 1986). If so, English corner is equivalent to Spanish esquina or rincón, depending on the contexts. Now, from this general meaning, English corner is restrictively used in sports field as «a free kick from the corner of the field obtained by the opposite side when a player sends the ball over his own goal-line» (OED). And again this last restricted meaning is the one of Spanish córner as «saque de esquina» and «lance del juego del fútbol en el que sale el balón del campo de juego cruzando una de las líneas de meta, tras haber sido tocado en último lugar por un jugador del bando defensor» (DRAE). And again, as it happens in both previous cases, English corner and Spanish córner became false friends in any contexts except in sports ones. Similarly, most of Hellenisms (or perhaps all of them) that can be found in other languages are used in a restricted way with regard to the various meanings that the Greek words have (Magadán Olives 2003). And, of course, the terms borrowed by Greek language from other languages usually become false friends in Greek language itself as well (Varella 2006). This is, for instance, the case of the Greek noun sýntagma [‘σύνταγμα’, in Greek], whose original Greek meaning is constitution as can be proved by appealing to the name of the most famous square in Athens: Plateía Syntágmatos [Constitution Square; ‘Πλατεία Συντάγματος’, in Greek]. Now, Ferdinand de Saussure coined, in his Cours de linguistique générale, the neologism syntagme, which Saussure himself defi ned as «D’une part, dans le discours, les mots contractent entre eux, en vertu de leur enchaînement, des rapports fondés sur le caractère linéaire de la langue, qui exclut la possibilité de prononcer deux éléments à la fois. Ceux-ci se rangent les uns à la suite des autres sur la chaîne de la parole. Ces combinaisons qui ont pour support l’étendue peuvent être appelées syntagmes» [In discourse, on one hand, words acquire relations based on the linear nature of language because they are chained together. This rules out the possibility of pronouncing two elements simultaneously. The elements are arranged in sequence on the chain of speaking. Combinations supported by linearity are can be called syntagmas] (Saussure 1978: 170. Original italics). And, thanks to Saussure’s influential work, the Greek term got a new technical meaning in linguistics. According to this technical meaning of syntagme

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in Saussure’s work, English syntagma and Spanish sintagma only mean «a syntactic unit comprising two or more linguistic signs or elements» (OED) and «Gram. grupo (conjunto de palabras)» (DRAE), respectively. So, the English, French and Spanish nouns are not false friends at all, but all three are partial semantic false friends with regard to the original Greek term sýntagma. Analogously, the Greek noun metaphorá [‘μεταφορά’, in Greek] can be found in Spanish as metáfora, in English as metaphor and in French as métaphore; and all the three share their meanings, which are, respectively «Ret. Tropo que consiste en trasladar el sentido recto de las voces a otro figurado, en virtud de una comparación tácita» (DRAE), «the figure of speech in which a name or descriptive term is transferred to some object different from, but analogous to, that to which it is properly applicable; an instance of this, a metaphorical expression» (OED), and «figure par laquelle, se fondant sur une comparaison implicite, on use, pour désigner quelque chose, d’un terme, d’une expression qui, au sens propre, s’applique à une autre réalité» (DAF). And again any of these terms can be substituted by any other without any change in truth values of the utterances where the substitution may be made. But, as it was to be expected, the Greek noun metáphora is extremely polysemous and has several meanings such as (bank) transfer, transport and even removal. As a result of that Spanish metáfora, English metaphor and French métaphore share their meanings and can be considered synonymous, but all three are partial semantic false friends with regard to the original Greek noun. Syntagm and metaphor share their meanings in the three languages as I previously did allude to, but one can fi nd other examples from Greek where a given term has different meanings in the target languages and all of them differ, fully or partially, with regard to the meaning of such a term in the SL. In order to show that, let us consider the Spanish nouns bodega and botica, the French noun boutique and the Catalan noun botiga. All of them derive from the Greek noun apotheke [‘αποθήκη’, in Greek] (either via Latin apotheca, for Spanish bodega, or via Byzantine Greek apothiki, for the rest). In any case, both Greek terms meant storehouse or warehouse. Now, each of these three languages adopted the Greek term, but according to different restricted meanings. So, the Spanish noun bodega, although can have much more meanings even the dialectal one of «C. Rica, Ecuad., Hond. y Méx. almacén (local donde se depositan géneros)» [storehouse] (DRAE), has restricted the general meaning of the Greek term to the wine field, in such a way that its current salient meanings are: 1) «lugar donde se guarda y cría el vino» [wine cellar]; 2) «almacén de vinos» [wine store]; 3) «tienda de vinos» [wine shop]; 4) «establecimiento, generalmente industrial, para la elaboración de vinos» [winery], and 5) «cosecha o mucha abundancia de vino en algún lugar» [generous wine harvest] (DRAE). As for botica, it also has restricted its original meaning to the pharmacies and medicines. Accordingly, its current meanings are: 1) «farmacia, laboratorio y despacho de medicamentos» [chemist’, pharmacy]; 2) «asistencia de medi-

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Semantics of False Friends 81 camentos durante un plazo» [medicine dose]; and 3) «medicamento, droga o mejunje» [medicine, drug, concoction/mixture] (DRAE). For its part, the French noun boutique has restricted the original meaning of the Greek term to «local dans lequel un marchand, un artisan expose sa marchandise et la vend au détail, ou vend ses services» [‘shop’ or ‘office’, depending on the contexts] (DAF). So, Spanish botica and French boutique are semantic false friends by now, at least in the European dialect of the Spanish language, although it seems to mean «tienda de mercader» [shop] (DRAE) in Argentina as well. From the aforementioned general meaning the French noun boutique has developed, by means of a new restriction, the meaning of de «magasin élégant où les grands couturiers exposent et vendent des vêtements et divers articles à leur griffe» (DAF); and according to this restricted meaning and its French spelling, it has been borrowed by Spanish, «tienda de ropa de moda» and «tienda de productos selectos» (DRAE), Catalan, «botiga elegant de roba de vestir i altres accessoris, sovint exclusius» (AA.VV. 1999), English, «a small fashion-shop or department that sells ready-to-wear clothes designed by a couturier; a small shop selling ‘trend-setting’ clothes or other articles, esp. for young or fashionable people» (OED), and many other languages as well. And, although not included in the DAF, French boutique also means «préfecture de police» [police station], by means of a metononymy; and «organes sexuels de l’homme ou de la femme, plus ou moins exhibés» [bulge], by means of a separate euphemism (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 82). And eventually, Catalan botiga generally means nowadays: 1) «magatzem» [storehouse, warehouse]; 2) «casa o habitació on es venen moltes coses» [shop]; and 3) «obrador; casa o habitació on s’exerceix un ofici» [office, workshop] (Alcover and Moll 1930). As a result of all that, Catalan botiga is currently a full semantic false friend with regard to Spanish botica and a partial semantic false friend with regard to French boutique. And to make things much more complicated, Catalan botiga also meant «apotecaria» [pharmacy, chemist’] (Alcover and Moll) in the past, which, as it has been said, is the salient meaning of Spanish botica, both in the past and at present time. In short, as a result of all that, a complicated network of false friends arose in the three Romance languages, both partial and full semantic false friends.

3.3.2. Restriction of meaning and addition of a new meaning A paradigmatic example of both restriction of meaning and addition of one new meaning at least is the case of the Spanish noun mitin. Certainly, the Spanish noun mitin derives from English meeting and can be documented as early as 1865 (Lorenzo 1996: 299). Now, the Spanish noun mitin has two salient meanings which are, in fact, restrictions of the general meaning of the English noun meeting as «an assemble of people for purposes of worship» (OED). Certainly, Spanish mitin restricted the original basic meaning

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82 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends of English meeting to only «reunión donde el público escucha los discursos de algún personaje de relevancia política y social» [political rally] and «cada uno de estos discursos» [political speech] (DRAE). And although not included in the DRAE, mitin has the meanings of lecture (when the English noun is used derogatorily; i.e. “a lengthy reprimand or warning”) and athletic meeting as well. From the senses of the Spanish noun mitin included in the DRAE, the Spanish language has developed the collocation dar el mitin with the meaning of «provocar, hablando intempestivamente, situaciones difíciles en una reunión» [scandal] (DRAE), perhaps because Spaniards think that political meetings are not but quarrels or arguments. And although neither is included in the DRAE, the collocation echar el/un mitin means to have somebody on the carpet or to tell off, and can be tested at the following excerpt from a parliamentary speech, which I will try to translate as ungrammatically as the original Spanish text itself is: [9] «Pero claro, mire, hoy ya, en esta segunda intervención suya, ya ha sido usted bueno tan duro como es habitual, pero, en fi n, ya no ha echado el mitin, yo se lo reconozco. Usted ha sido aquí muy serio, ha dicho cosas muy serias, que yo desde luego lo que le pido es que me las concrete» [But of course, pay attention, today now, in this second speech, now you have been well as severe as usual, but, in short, now you didn’t tell off, I admit it. You have been very serious, have said very serious things, that I of course what I ask you is that you concrete to me them] (César Gómez Benayas, in Diario de sesiones de las Cortes de Castilla-La Mancha, IV Legislatura, 85, March 3, 1998). And the story is not fi nished in this point. In fact, as it has been carefully studied by Larry W. Belcher (2004), mitin is also used in taurine jargon, where it has developed several particular meanings with the following characteristics: 1) the usage of the assimilate loan word does not correspond to any accepted use in the SL; 2) its usage within the genre of tauromachy rarely conforms to any “accepted” use in the TL; 3) the use of mitin has a high frequency of appearance in the taurine review or report; and 4) on a semantic level, it appears that the assimilated loan is evolving from a polysemous and general usage in the genre of tauromachy toward specific usage (Belcher 2004: 348). And, according to Belcher, mitin basically has two main meanings in taurine jargon—1) failure in general; and 2) disastrous use of the sword by a matador, particularly when he tries to kill the bull.

3.3.3. Preservation of the meaning of the SL and addition of new meanings in the TL This case can be paradigmatically shown if we take into consideration the evolution that the Spanish noun guerrilla suffered in the English language. Certainly, the English language borrowed the Spanish noun guerrilla

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Semantics of False Friends 83 according to the meanings «an irregular war carried on by small bodies of men acting independently» and «one engaged in such warfare» (OED); turning into polysemous a word which is not in its SL, where guerrilla only means «partida de paisanos, por lo común no muy numerosa, que al mando de un jefe particular y con poca o ninguna dependencia de los del Ejército, acosa y molesta al enemigo» (DRAE) [guerrilla band]. Not to mention that Spanish guerrilla is always a noun, while English guerrilla is both a noun and an adjective. As a result of that guerrilla means both guerrilla individual and guerrilla group in English. And, since English guerrilla is polysemous while Spanish guerrilla does not, one can fi nd ambiguities and misunderstandings in English which are not possible at all in Spanish. Precisely for such a reason and in order to reduce to the minimum any possible misunderstanding caused by the polysemy of English guerrilla, English speakers preferably use the collocations guerrilla band or guerrilla warfare (Prado 2001: 240) when they are particularly interested in making it clear that they mean the guerrilla group and not the guerrilla individual. All the same one always can imagine special assertions where it is not quite clear whether the speaker means the guerrilla group or the guerrilla individual; either because the speaker is not aware of this ambiguity, or because the speaker pretends to achieve such an ambiguity on purpose. So, a statement such as “Peruvian army has annihilated two guerrillas” could mean, given an especially opaque context, “Peruvian army has annihilated two guerrilla individuals” or “Peruvian army has annihilated two guerrilla groups”, as well. And such cases are not only theoretical ones, they also can be found from time to time in real texts. For instance, the sentence «terror has become the mark of guerrillas and the petty dictator» (Allan 2001: 156. My emphasis) can be understood as “terror has become the mark of guerrilla individuals and the petty dictator” as well as “terror has become the mark of guerrilla groups and the petty dictator”. And such a double interpretation, which is possible in English, is not possible in Spanish at all, where one is obliged to disambiguate it and write either “el terror se ha convertido en la marca de los guerrilleros y del dictador mezquino/insignificante”, if one tries to mean guerrilla individuals, or “el terror se ha convertido en la marca de las guerrillas y del dictador mezquino/insignificante”, if one tries to mean guerrilla groups. And things become much more complicated in English since, given that the English phonetics is particularly complicated, guerrilla and gorilla are pronounced in an exactly equal way. So, “Peruvian army has annihilated two guerrillas” also could be understood as “Peruvian army has annihilated two gorillas,” if one pays attention only to its phonetics. Moreover, the homophony of the English nouns guerrilla and gorilla can be, and in fact it has been, exploited in order to achieve some humorous and/or cognitive effects. This is the case of the following excerpt from classic English humour, where the history of England is narrated in a jocular and ironic way:

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84 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends [10] «The second part of the Napoleonic War was fought in Spain and Portugal and was called the Gorilla War on account of the primitive Spanish method of fighting» (Sellar and Yeatman 1991: 99). And, obviously, such a text cannot be translated into Spanish if one pretends to achieve the same humorous and cognitive effects and allusions as long as the alliteration aforementioned in [10] is not possible in Spanish at all. In a similar way, the members of the American group The Guerrilla Girls called themselves in such a way in order to play humorously upon the homophony of guerrilla and gorilla. In fact, the members of this group appear with gorilla masks at the posters that announce the group. So, The Guerrilla Girls’ posters show both “gorillas”, by means of their icon, and “guerrillas”, by means of their text. And again the cognitive/humorous effects of such a play on words and icons seem to me impossible to be reproduced in the Spanish language. The homophony of guerrilla and gorilla is not only exploited in texts originally written in English, it can be found in texts originally written in Spanish as well. This is the case of the following text, where Nancy, the main character in the novel, confesses her cousin Betsy she is disappointed because she did not fi nd gorillas in Spain: [11] «¿Sabes, Betsy querida? No hay gorilas en España. Cosa de veras inexplicable. No sé cómo han hecho su guerra de gorilas en el pasado por la cual son famosos los españoles en la historia desde el tiempo de los romanos» [You know, dear Betsy? There are not gorillas in Spain. A really inexplicable thing. I do not know how they (Spaniards) did their gorilla war in the past, given that Spaniards are famous in the history for such a thing from Roman times] (Sender 1978: 20. Original italics). Although, once she did her appropriate verifications, Nancy herself confesses her cousin Betsy her mistake in [11]. For such a reason she shall write a few pages later the following: [12] «Pero tengo que confesar que con lo de los gorilas estaba equivocada. Toda mi vida he oído hablar de la ferocidad de los gorilas españoles, sobre todo en tiempos de guerra. Ahora, al ver que no hay en España un solo gorila, y preguntar a los profesores de Sevilla, resulta que estamos pronunciando mal u oyendo mal esa palabra en América. No es gorilas, sino guerrillas, es decir, guerras pequeñas. A mis oídos y a los tuyos, y a los de nuestras amigas, ha sonado siempre gorila. Parece que los españoles son muy feroces en las pequeñas guerras y no tanto en las grandes. Por eso tal vez no han estado en las últimas guerras mundiales. Y les alabo el gusto» [But I have to confess that I was wrong with regard to the gorillas subject. I have heard all my life about the ferocity of Spanish gorillas, particularly in war times. Now, when I realised that there is not a single gorilla in Spain, and asked my teachers in Seville, it seems that we are pronouncing badly

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Semantics of False Friends 85 or hearing badly that word in America. It’s not gorillas, but guerrillas, that is, small wars. To my hearing and to yours, and to that of our friends, it always did sound gorilla. It seems that Spaniards are very ferocious in small wars, but they’re not so at the big ones. For such a reason perhaps (or ‘maybe’ since Nancy is American) they have not been present in the last World Wars. And I approve of their taste] (Sender 1978: 22. Original italics).

3.3.4. Emergence of new meanings in the TL This is typically the case of lots of English terms, which have been borrowed anywhere but with meanings which are unknown by English speakers themselves. Pierre Daninos humorously exploited them in his well-known novel Les carnets du major W. Marmaduke Thompson. Découverte de la France et des Français in such a way: [13] «Le Major fait allusion à des expressions telles que footing qui pour les Français veut dire footing, mais pour les Anglais rien du tout, ou smoking qui pour les Britanniques est ‘fumant’ et non pas dinnerjacket, sans parler de ces English tea rooms bien parisiens qui, comme cela peut se voir près de la Porte Maillot, affichent: Five o’clock à quatre heures. On peut également citer le cas de beaucoup de Français qui, ayant demandé à Londres qu’on leur indique les water-closets, s’étonnent d’être conduits alors à la cuisine, au fumoir ou dans le jardin d’hiver avant de découvrir le lavatory» [The Major is alluding to expressions like footing, which to the French means footing but means nothing at all to the English, or smoking which to the British means smoking and not a dinner-jacket, not to mention these English tea rooms so Parisian, which as can be seen near La Porte Maillot, put up: Five o’clock at four o’clock. In the same way one might cite the case of many Frenchmen/women who in England, having asked the way to the water closets, are surprised to be shown the kitchen, the smoking-room, or the winter garden, before discovering the lavatory] (Daninos 1990: 124–125. Original emphasis). And what Daninos says about French language can be exactly said about Spanish language, perhaps except about the “five o’clock” thing, which is said in Spanish el té de las cinco. In a similar way, Germans use the English adjective soft, in the collocation soft Eis, but in order to mean what English speakers call ice-cream, or, to be more precise, this collocation is used in German language when speakers exactly mean a special kind of ice-cream which is sold by vending machines. And, being the adjective soft, as it is, a word so British, Germans are amazed by the fact that English speakers do not understand the “obvious” meaning of soft Eis, in spite of the fact that they strive to say it in their

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“own language”. Similarly, the German language has recently nominalised the English adjective handy, as Handy, in order to mean mobile phone or cell phone (Buncic 2000). And something similar happens with the English adjective light when it qualifies the nouns of foods or drinks that have not added sugar or are low in cholesterol, for instance. Such an adjective can be found in lots of languages to the extent that Coca-cola light™ refers to the same object in Spain, Italy, Germany or Poland, except, as it was to be expected being an adjective so British, in the countries where English is the native language, where this beverage is called diet Coke™. In a similar way the Spanish and Polish languages borrowed from French the nouns michelín (mainly used in plural, michelines) and michelin (also mainly used in plural, micheliny), respectively. But the Spanish and Polish nouns have exactly the same meaning: love handles. And both derive from the name Michelin, which originally was the family name of the brothers who created this well-known trade mark of tires. Now, French name Michelin is in fact the diminutive of the proper name Michel and, as I did mention previously, a family name borrowed by Spanish and Polish to mean what in French language is called poignée d’amour. Therefore, in fact, the puppet, which is the symbol of the brand Michelin™, is made from pneumatic tires, but the Spanish and Polish people “saw” spare tires where there were actual pneumatic tires and the words michelín and michelin have become common nouns in Spanish and Polish. And, to complicate the things a bit more yet, the French noun micheline means in French railways jargon «autorail monté sur pneumatiques» (DAF), which in Spanish is said automotor and in English diesel train. And, according to the DAF, the French noun micheline shares its etymology with Spanish michelín and Polish michelin, although by means of a different figure of speech: «dérivé du nom de la fi rme Michelin, qui fabriquait ce type de véhicule» [derived from the name of the company Michelin, which manufactured this kind of vehicle]. And, eventually, let us consider two cases more, the fi rst one from English to Spanish and the second one from Spanish to English. The Spanish language has borrowed the noun slip from English in order to mean «calzoncillo ajustado que cubre el cuerpo desde debajo de la cintura hasta las ingles» [underpants] (DRAE), but, although the English noun slip has about 15 different senses, none of them coincide with the sense of Spanish slip (Prado 2001: 446). In fact, English slip refers to some female underwear while Spanish slip refers to some male underwear! And, fi nally, the English language has borrowed the noun wino from the Spanish one vino [wine], but in order to mean both inveterate boozer and cheap, low quality wine (Prado 2001: 505). That is, the English language has restricted the general meaning of the Spanish noun vino to only a particular kind of (low quality) wine, as well as has added new meaning which any Spanish speaker could imagine.

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3.3.5. Emergence of new and different meanings This is in all probability the case of the meaning that the English noun bigot, the French noun bigot/bigote and the Spanish one bigote acquired. All of them could derive from the Germanic exclamation bi God/bi Got, although their respective meanings diverge. Nevertheless I want to stress that such an etymology is not completely clear at all and, in fact, the dictionaries of the languages I am usually quoting do not coincide in it. So, according to the OED, such an etymology is completely erroneous, since «the legend that it originated in the refusal of Hrolf or Rollo to kiss the foot of Charles the Simple, when, in the words of the 12th c. chronicler, ‘lingua Anglica (!!!) respondit Ne se, bi got, quod interpretatur Ne per Deum’ (No by God!), is absurdly incongruous with facts.» By contrast, the DRAE and the DAF tend to favour such an etymology, although both consider it only probable: «quizá del alemán bei Got, por Dios» [perhaps from German bei Got, by God] and «probablement adaptation de l’ancien anglais bi god, «par Dieu», juron ou invocation en usage chez les Normands» [probably an adaptation of the old English bi god, ‘by God’, a swear word or invocation in use amongst the Normans], respectively. Given that the dictionaries do not coincide, I will apply the classical principle of in dubio pro reo and I will assume that English, French and Spanish nouns derive from the exclamation aforementioned; and, in any case, that all the three derive from a common ancestor, even if it is not this exclamation. Be that as it may, what is completely certain is that the meaning of the Spanish noun bigote is «pelo que nace sobre el labio superior» [moustache] (DRAE), what makes it a superordenate term with regard to the older Spanish noun mostacho, «bigote grande y espeso» [big and dense moustache]. As for the English noun bigot, its standard meaning is the one of «a person obstinately and unreasonably wedded to a particular religious creed, opinion, or ritual» (OED), what makes it a synonym of fanatic, zealot, dogmatist or sectarian (Fergusson 1986); and, eventually, the French noun bigot/bigote means «qui est d’une dévotion étroite, qui s’attache exagérément aux pratiques extérieures de la religion» (DAF), what makes it a synonym of bondieusard, cul-bénit, dévot, grenouille de bénitier, petit saint or punaise de sacristie (Bertaud de Chazaud 1983: 69). The result of all that is that, in principle, the English and French terms could be substituted one for each other in some contexts, what makes them only partial semantic false friends; but both are full semantic false friends with regard to their Spanish cognate. And, on the other hand, both the English and the French terms are mainly used in a derogatory way, while Spanish noun bigote is axiologically neuter. And this process of the creation of new, divergent meanings in several languages from an original common concrete ancestor not only works in terms which are usual in ordinary language or arose in it, but also in terms

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88 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends originated in any learned domain and, for such a reason, used in specific sociolects. So, for instance, the Spanish noun sodomía and its derivatives sodomita [sodomite] and sodomizar [to sodomise] emerged from an allusion to the biblical toponym Sodom (Sodoma, in Spanish); inasmuch as, according to the Bible, the inhabitants of this town were very fond of having anal coition, even going as far as to intend to abuse the angels hosted at patriarch Lot’s home (Gen. 19: 1–10). From this biblical story, Spanish sodomía got the meaning of «práctica del coito anal» (DRAE), which is shared with its cognates in many languages, as it is the case of the English noun sodomy, «an unnatural form of sexual intercourse; esp. that of one male with another» (OED). But, surprisingly, we also can fi nd that Spanish sodomía and English sodomy are false friends with regard to their German and Catalan cognates Sodomie and sodomia, respectively; although there is no direct or indirect reason in the biblical text that allows us explaining such an odd transfer of meaning, at least for Spanish and English speakers. Certainly, the German noun Sodomie does not refer to male homosexuality, but to «Sexualkontakt zwischen Mensch und Tier» [sexual contact between a human being and an animal] (Duden); what is called bestialismo, «relación sexual de personas con animales», or zoofilia, «bestialismo» (DRAE), in Spanish; and bestiality, «unnatural connexion with beast», or zoophilia, «attraction to animals that acts as an outlet for dome form of sexual energy, formerly not implying sexual intercourse or bestiality» (OED), in English. And as far as the Catalan language is concerned, the matter is a bit more complicated yet. And so because the Catalan noun sodomia is a partial semantic false friend with regard to its Spanish, English, and German cognates, but in different ways, given that the Catalan noun, apart from the meaning «homosexualitat masculina» [sodomy], also means «bestialitat» [bestiality] (AA.VV 1999). And, as usual, the defi nitions provided by other dictionaries are rather less explicit, as it is the case of Alcover and Moll’s dictionary, where sodomia is defi ned in an unspecific and euphemistic way as «unió carnal contra natura» [carnal union against nature]. So, if one did not know the meaning of the Catalan noun sodomia by other means, one never would be able to guess whether it means sodomy, incest, bestiality or everything intermingled. As a result of all that, Spanish sodomía and English sodomy are full semantic false friends with regard to German Sodomie and partial semantic false friends with regard to Catalan sodomia, while the Catalan noun is a partial semantic false friend with regard to its German cognate. And since this chapter is coming to an end by analysing a case of false friends excerpted from a biblical toponym, I will allude to another example which has its origin in another biblical name, although it is an eponym in this case. The Spanish name Rebeca, the French name Rébecca and the English one Rebecca derive, as a last resort, from the proper name of the

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Semantics of False Friends 89 biblical character Rebecca, the patriarch Isaac’s wife and mother of Esau and Jacob. Now, as a noun, Spanish rebeca has developed the meaning of «chaqueta femenina de punto, sin cuello, abrochada por delante, y cuyo primer botón está, por lo general, a la altura de la garganta» [cardigan] (DRAE), which, in spite of that defi nition, is used by men as well. In any case, the origin of this curious meaning can be explained because the main female character of the Alfred Hitchcock’s movie Rebecca (1940) was wearing a cardigan. For such a reason Spaniards started to call rebeca such a garment. As for the French noun rébecca is concerned, it means «protestation, opposition violente» [protest] (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 538) or «protestation, scandale» [protest, scandal] (Caradec 1989: 279); or «protester, regimber» [to protest, to resist], particularly in the idiom faire du/le/sa rébecca (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 538), although in this case, by means of a direct allusion to the biblical character. And, eventually, the English noun Rebecca means «the name given […] to the leader in woman’s attire of those riots who demolished toll-gates in South Wales in 1843–44» (OED). Accordingly, while the names Rebeca, Rébecca and Rebecca are mutually interchangeable, their corresponding nouns are not. And needless to say, the Hebrew language did not develop any meaning at all for such a signifier, which only works as a proper name in its original Hebrew language.

3.4. SUMMARY Borrowings, calques and inheritances are the three specific phenomena which originate the general phenomenon of the linguistic interference or influence of a given language on a different given language. The linguistic interference can appear on the phonetic, syntactic or semantic domains. But, when this linguistic interference appears on the semantic domain, the related linguistic phenomenon of false friends usually appears as well; and this in two different, basic ways: 1) because of a given borrowed word adds a new meaning to a signifier that already exists in TL, by means of any amplification, restriction or creation of a meaning which is not present in the SL; and 2) because of TL takes from SL some signifiers for substituting other native signifiers become old-fashioned or hyponyms of the loan word. So, the ultimate explanation of the phenomenon of false friends is this incessant process of export/import of meanings and signifiers among different languages. In theory, it is possible that there is a case in which a signifier may be imported with all its original meanings, but this case is quite unusual. Since most of the words in any language are polysemous ones and usually only one or a few meanings of the borrowed term accompany the signifier to the TL, borrowings become the inexhaustible source

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90 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends of false friends. There are cases in which a given signifier comes back again to a given SL with a new meaning after changing its meaning in a different language. In any case, false friends originated in borrowings, calques or inheritances are extremely tricky, particularly when a given signifier is equal or similar graphically and/or phonetically in two or more given languages.

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4

Semantics of False Friends Tropical False Friends

4.1. THE TROPES AND THE EMERGENCE OF FALSE FRIENDS As it can be inferred from what has been said in the previous chapter, full or partial semantic false friends have their origin in the fact that two cognates from two given languages have acquired distinct meanings because they have undergone semantic changes in one or in both of the languages in question. The main linguistic mechanisms that permit explaining that a signifier has been acquiring diverse meanings with the passing of time are the tropes or figures of speech, hence the title of this chapter. But it should be stressed that the English adjective tropical itself is a false friend vis-à-vis its Spanish cognate in the sense that the meaning which I am using here is not acceptable in Spanish according to the DRAE. In fact, the English adjective tropical is derived from two distinct nouns. When it derives from tropic it means, «pertaining to, occurring in, or inhabiting the tropics; belonging to the torrid zone» or «like the climate or growth of the tropics, very hot, ardent or luxuriant» (OED), and these meanings are equivalent, mutatis mutandi, to those that DRAE offers for its Spanish cognate «perteneciente o relativo a los trópicos» or «ampuloso, frondoso, exagerado.» But the English adjective tropical derives from trope as well and means, «pertaining to, involving, or of the nature of a trope or tropes; metaphorical, figurative» (OED). But regardless that this second derivation is not lexicalised in Spanish, the literal translation of the title of this chapter to Spanish as the Semántica de los falsos amigos: falsos amigos topicales would be unacceptable or, at least, understood in another sense and susceptible to the criticism on the part of some purist. In any case, the aim of this chapter is to explore some paradigmatic cases in which they have begun to create false friends because of certain figurative uses that have become lexicalised in some language while they have not done so in another or others.

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92 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends 4.2. THE METAPHOR AND OTHER TROPES Among all the tropes, the main one is the metaphor, a figure of speech for which the Aristotelian defi nition continues being basically valid: «Metaphor is the application of a strange term either transferred from the genus and applied to the species or from the species and applied to the genus, or from one species to another or else by analogy» (Aristotle 1932: 1457b). Currently and by influence of cognitive linguistics, the metaphor is usually defi ned as the application of terms that mean literally in one conceptual domain to another conceptual domain in which those terms are understood in a figurative manner. To this contemporary conception of the metaphor would correspond definitions like that of «a semantic mapping from one conceptual domain to another, often using anomalous or deviant language» (Crystal 1994: 249). But, whether or not we accept as a good defi nition either Aristotle’s or Crystal’s, the fact is that both are sufficiently ample as to include under the concept of metaphor the rest of the tropes. Thus, normally we would say that speaking about an academic discussion, the expression to make war is a metaphor of to discuss or to argue. While speaking about courtship we would say that the expression to make love is a euphemism of to fuck or to screw. In both cases one applies a term in a figurative sense from one domain to a different domain. And what differentiates the fi rst case from the second is no linguistic question but the fact that to fuck or to screw are considered dysphemisms. Therefore they are inconvenient or politically incorrect verbs, while to discuss or to argue are not. And what is said for the euphemism or dysphemism can be said about metonymy, synecdoche, irony, amelioration or pejoration, or any other tropes. Accordingly, and about his own theory of metaphor, Searle could maintain: «According to my account of metaphor, it becomes a matter of terminology whether we want to construe metonymy and synecdoche as special cases of metaphor or as independent tropes» (Searle 1986: 110). From the point of view of the contrast between the literal meaning of a term and the figurative meaning that we give to that term, the remaining tropes can be considered then as special cases of metaphors, or subsets included under the set of metaphor. Or said in another way, metaphor can be considered as a superordinate term, while metonymy, synecdoche, irony, euphemism or dysphemism would not be more than hyponyms of metaphor to the degree in which the meaning of metaphor includes the meanings of the other tropes, but not vice versa. Nevertheless, the specification of which will be the concrete trope that one will use in each case is of great use in the moment of getting a more ample understanding of the topic of study. Let us analyse the meanings of some of the principal tropes to see how all of them would be no more than hyponyms of metaphor: • Metonymy consists of «a figure of speech in which the name of an attribute of an entity is used in place of the entity itself» (Crystal

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1994: 250). According to this if we say, “Next year we shall study Molière” wanting to mean “Next year we shall study the works of Molière” and not “Next year we shall study the person of Molière,” we are giving Molière a meaning different from the habitual one. Synecdoche consists of «a figure of speech in which the part is used for the whole or the whole is used for the part» (Crystal 1994: 378). According to this, it is also obvious that upon using sail for ship, we are giving to sail a different meaning from its literal one. Euphemism consists of «the use of a vague or indirect expression instead of one which is thought to be unpleasant, embarrassing, or offensive» (Crystal 1994: 128); or, said more technically, «a euphemism is used as an alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of face either one’s own face or through giving offence, that of the audience, or of some third party» (Allan and Burridge 1991: 11). Accordingly, if we say to pass away instead of to die, we are referring to the fact of dying in a more socially acceptable way than vice versa. Dysphemism consists of «the use of an offensive or disparaging expression instead of a neutral or pleasant one» (Crystal 1994: 112); or, said more technically, «a dysphemism is an expression with connotations that are offensive either about the denotatum or to the audience, or both, and it is substituted for a neutral or euphemistic expression for just that reason» (Allan and Burridge 1991: 26). Accordingly, when we call someone a bastard with the intention of insulting him, we do not necessarily have to mean that s/he is «one begotten and born out of wedlock; an illegitimate or natural child» (OED). Irony consists of «language which expresses a meaning other than that literally conveyed by the words, usually for of humorous or dramatic effects» (Crystal 1994: 196). Accordingly, if we say about someone that s/he is having fun when we know that s/he is bored, anguished, feed up, or worried, we are giving to this to have fun the opposite meaning of «to enjoy» (OED). Amelioration consists of «a change of meaning in which a word loses an earlier unpleasant sense» (Crystal 1994:16). This change in meaning is shown paradigmatically in the case of the English adjective nice that had come to mean ignorant or stupid in the 14th–15th centuries. Its current meaning is agreeable, pleasant or pleasing (Allan 2001: 159). Pejoration consists of «a change of meaning in which a word develops a sense of disapproval» (Crystal 1994: 293). This change of meaning is shown paradigmatically in the case of the literal meaning in the past of the English adjective silly that originally meant happy or blessed as its German cognate selig continues to mean. In the same way we have the current meaning of the French noun crétin, «individu particulièrement inintelligent, incapable de comprendre et d’apprendre» [cretin]

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends (DAF). The noun crétin derives from the original meaning of Christian by means of pejoration, although it originally was a euphemism which meant anyone or poor fellow.

The linguistic mechanism of all these tropes is, therefore, the adjudication of a different meaning than normally a term or syntagm has, so that the terminological differences among them seem that, in principle, they would not go further than specifying what type of metaphor one treats in each case. Or to say it in Searle’s words: «In each case, as in metaphor proper, the semantic content of the P term conveys the semantic content of the R term by some principle of association. Since the principles of metaphor are rather various anyway, I am inclined to treat metonymy and synecdoche as special cases of metaphor and add their principles to my list of metaphorical principles. I can, for example, refer to the British monarch as ‘the crown’, and the executive branch of the US government as ‘the White House’ by exploiting systematic principles of association» (Searle 1986: 110–111). In spite of the above and with the purpose of carrying out a more detailed analysis, I shall present in the following sections some examples of diverse hyponyms of metaphor that have lead to full or partial semantic false friends in various languages. I shall use the term metaphor to mean any trope or to refer to cases of semantic transferences that do not have easy entry in any of the hyponyms of metaphor. And, for the purpose of what follows, I also want to make clear that in many of the cases that we shall see the semantic changes that some of the terms that we shall consider have undergone can be explained by other tropes, besides the one that gives title to the corresponding epigraph. But when one generalises that occasional use, the figurative meaning of one term can end by lexicalising itself by converting itself into a more literal meaning of the term in question. And, if it is the case that two given languages lexicalise different figurative meanings for an identical signifier, or one of them does it while the other does not, then false friends are served. On the other hand, figures of speech are the fruit of occasional use and can be understood also by the speakers of other languages if the context leaves it sufficiently clear that one term is not being used according to its literal habitual meaning but with any other figurative meaning. Also there can be the case in which one tends to think that a given term is being figuratively used when, in fact, it is being used literally. Let us consider a text of Discourse on Method by René Descartes, in which probably more than one person understands that Descartes is making a metaphoric use of the French verb digérer when, actually, what he is making is a literal use: [1] «Ceux qui on le raisonnement le plus fort, et qui digèrent le mieux leurs pensées, afi n de les rendre claires et intelligibles, peuvent toujours le mieux persuader ce qu’ils proposent, encore qu’ils ne parlassent que

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Semantics of False Friends 95 bas-breton, et qu’ils n’eussent jamais appris de rhétorique» (Descartes, A. T., VI: 7. My emphasis). According to the current, salient meaning of the French verb digérer as «transformer les aliments dans les voies digestives pour les rendre assimilables par l’organisme», one would tend to think that in [1] that verb is being used metaphorically as «assimiler intellectuellement» (DAF) and that Descartes would be transferring here to the domain of the mind a term that literally means in the bodily domain. I would dare even to think that a normal French speaker would tend to interpret [1] according to this explanation. This neither is excessively rare from the moment in which the majority of the terms that we use to refer to the domain of the mind are or have been metaphors which proceed from the bodily domain (Sweetser 1990; and Chamizo Domínguez 1998: 109–118). This would make this interpretation not only plausible, but rather, in addition, would be supported by many other analogous cases. In spite of this, this interpretation is erroneous from a diachronic point of view because, as a matter of fact, what has occurred here has been that digérer fi rst referred to the mental domain and later passed over to the bodily domain. To be precise, the French verb digérer— and also its Spanish cognate digerir and English to digest—derive from the Latin verb digerere which means literally to order, to assimilate or to classify. When the Latin verb passed over to French, it did it precisely with the meaning of «ordonner méthodiquement un sujet» (DAF), that now is considered «très vieilli» [very obsolete, very old-fashioned] by the DAF itself, but is the meaning that is in [1]. The same process of semantic change that the French verb digérer underwent also applies to its English cognate to digest. Among other things it means, «to divide and dispose or distribute,» «to dispose methodically or according to a system; to reduce into a systematic form, usually with condensation; to classify» and «to prepare (food) in the stomach and intestines for assimilation by a system» (OED); and again I dare to argue that the current, salient meaning of to digest is the last one. The things being thus, the translator of this work by Descartes from French to English could have translated the phrase «que digèrent le mieux leurs pensées» as “who most skilfully digest their thoughts” and maintain the English cognate of the verb which Descartes himself used. And, although I concede that the translator to English should have thought out all of this, also he should have thought that that literal translation gave itself to misunderstandings and, therefore, has in fact translated [1] as: [1.1] «Those who have the strongest power of reasoning, and who most skilfully arrange their thoughts in order to render then clear and intelligible, have the best power of persuasion even if they can but speak the language of Lower Brittany and have never learned Rhetoric» (Descartes 1989: 42. My emphasis).

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96 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends By contrast, [1] has been translated literally to Spanish as: [1.2] «Los que tienen más robusto razonar y digieren mejor sus pensamientos para hacerlos claros e inteligibles son los más capaces de llevar a los ánimos la persuasión sobre lo que se proponen, aunque hablen una pésima lengua y no hayan aprendido nunca retórica» [Those who have stronger power of reasoning and digest their thoughts better to make them clear and intelligible are those most able to communicate to others the persuasion about what they propose themselves, although they speak any dreadful language and have not ever learned Rhetoric] (Descartes 1968:32. My emphasis). And the result of having translated [1] as [1.2] to Spanish is that normally current Spanish readers will understand that digerir is here a metaphor of «convertir en el aparato digestivo los alimentos en sustancias asimilables por el organismo» (DRAE), because the reference dictionary does not indicate that today the Spanish verb can mean the same as to organise, assimilate or classify, but rather the defi nition cited before and the derivatives metaphorically of «sufrir o llevar con paciencia una desgracia o una ofensa» [to suffer or bear with patience a misfortune or an offence] and «meditar cuidadosamente algo, para entenderlo o ejecutarlo» [to meditate carefully something in order to understand it or to execute it]. By contrast, in spite of fact that the French verb digérer derives from Latin digerere, the translator into Latin (Étienne de Courcelles) of the Discourse on Method (Specimina philosophiae: seu, Dissertatio de methodo)1 avoided the aforementioned problem and, in fact, translated [1] as [1.3] «Qui rationem plurimum valent, quique ea quae cogitant quam facillisimo ordine disponunt, ut clare & distincte intelligantur, aptissime semper ad persuadendum dicere possunt, etiamsi barbara tantum Gothorum lingua uterentur, nec ullam unquam Rhetoricam didicissent» (Descartes 1973: 543. My emphasis). As a result of that, [1.3] is clearer than [1] and [1.2] were.

4.3. METAPHOR Perhaps two of the lexical fields in which metaphoric transfers are more clear are plantosemy, or the transfer of meaning from the domain of plants to the human one, and that of zoosemy, or transfer of meaning from the animal domain to the human one. These metaphoric transfers from the animal domain or from the vegetable domain to the human domain are perhaps two of the most universally outspread in all languages and in all cultures. This mechanism is so widely outspread in diverse languages and

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Semantics of False Friends 97 cultures that I would dare to describe it as a “linguistic universal” without running any serious risk of falling into error; because it seems that there is no human culture nor any language in which one does not make metaphoric transfers from the animal or vegetable domains to the human domain. And this is not only true with respect to domestic animals or plants or to those one can fi nd in the geographic area in which a given language is spoken but also with respect to wild animals or plants and to those that we can find in places most distant from those in which a given language is spoken. Precisely because of it, zoosemy is normally a highly studied subject by researchers of metaphor, both in a single language (Echevarría Isusquiza 2003) as well as contrastively in two or more languages (Martsa 2002; Kleparski 2002; Fernández Fontecha and Jiménez Catalán 2003; Chamizo Domínguez and Fuyin-Li 2005). Additionally, metaphors from the plant or from the animal domains in the human domain can be basically found in two ways: 1) a specific group of languages shares the literal meaning and the metaphorical meaning of a given term because all those languages share an identical cultural tradition; or 2) a specific language group uses metaphorically the nouns that literally mean the same animal or plant but with figuratively distinct meanings and even at times opposite ones. Let us consider these two possibilities in the plant domain and in the animal domain.

4.3.1. From plants to humans Although specialists of the metaphor have devoted less attention to plantosemy than to zoosemy, one can also adduce interesting examples of the former. Thus, for example, the Spanish noun laurel and the English laurel mean literally the same plant. Consequently, either of them can be substituted by the other without changing the truth values of the sentences where the substitution is made when referring to the plant. Since the laurel was the symbol of the prize in Classical culture and that the two languages in question share the same cultural tradition, in both languages laurel metaphorically also means «corona, triunfo, premio» (DRAE) and «laurelship» (OED) in Spanish and in English, respectively. Consequently, one also can substitute the Spanish noun for the English noun and vice versa when one uses them metaphorically without changing the truth values of the sentence in which the substitution is made. So that, English and Spanish laurel are cognates and synonyms both according to their literal and figurative meanings. Analogously although with some variant as we are going to see, the Latin noun ficus has passed to diverse modern languages with the same referential meaning to designate literally the same fruit. Thus the Spanish higo means «segundo fruto, o el más tardío, de la higuera. Es blando, de gusto dulce, por dentro de color más o menos encarnado o blanco, y lleno de semillas sumamente menudas; exteriormente está cubierto de una piel fi na y verdosa, negra o morada, según las diversas castas de ellos» (DRAE), the Catalan figa means «fruit de l’arbre Ficus carica, del qual hi

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ha nombroses varietats que es distingeixen principalment pel color de la pell i per la forma més o menys llarguera» (Alcover and Moll 1930), the French figue means «sorte de fruit charnu porté par le figuier, à la pulpe molle, granuleuse, sucrée» (DAF) and in English fig means «a soft pearshaped fruit with sweet dark flesh and many small seeds; the fruit of the figtree or Ficus» (OED). Accordingly any of these terms can be substituted by any other without changing the truth values of the sentences in which one completes the substitution. And also in these four languages one uses the same term to designate in the human domain the external female genitalia, although there is a different frequency of use and, in fact, only the Alcover and Moll’s dictionary specifies this metaphoric meaning as «parts genitals externes de la dona» [female external genitalia]. Therefore also metaphorically, any of these terms can be substituted by any other without changing the truth values of the sentences in which one makes the substitution. But, nevertheless, the French, besides the meaning of «vulve», has developed the meaning of «testicule» (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 261). This does not function in the other languages and has converted this term into a partial semantic false friend with respect to the other three when used metaphorically. Besides the form higo, the Latin noun ficus has created in Spanish the form higa, that has among others the meaning of «gesto que se ejecuta con la mano, cerrado el puño, mostrando el dedo pulgar por entre el dedo índice y el cordial, con el que se señalaba a las personas infames o se hacía desprecio de ellas» (DRAE), and that is equal to the Catalan figa «acció de cloure el puny i mostrar el dit polze sortint entre l’índex i el dit d’enmig, com a senyal grossera de burla i menyspreu» (Alcover and Moll), and that by means of a calque from Spanish also has passed to English in the form of fig and the same meaning of «a contemptuous gesture which consisted in thrusting the thumb between two of the closed fi ngers or into the mouth» (OED). The result of this is that also higa, figa and fig would be interchangeable when they mean a sign of contempt, although now figa and fig become partial semantic false friends related to the Spanish higo.

4.3.2. From animals to humans Concerning zoosemy and given that there are many cases of metaphoric transfers from the animal domain to the human domain, the examples can be multiplied while they acquire many more complex shade. Perhaps the clearest case of a zoosemic homogeneous transfer in the languages that participate in Western culture is the one that exists from the domain of pigs to the human domain. And we can document this transference already in Classical Antiquity when the very Latin poet Horace called himself «Epicuri de grege porcum» [a hog from Epicurus’ herd] (Horace, Epistles, I, 4 5–16). The result of this is that the Spanish cerdo (or any of its many synonyms) and the English pig (or any of its many synonyms) literally mean the animal, «mamífero artiodáctilo del grupo de los Suidos, que se cría

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Semantics of False Friends 99 en domesticidad para aprovechar su cuerpo en la alimentación humana y en otros usos» (DRAE) and «a swine of any age; a hog» (OED), and metaphorically «puerco (hombre sucio)» (DRAE) and «applied, usually contemptuous or opprobriously to a person or another animal» (OED) in Spanish or English, respectively. And the substitution of cerdo for pig (or any one of its multiple synonyms in both languages) will not present special problems, whether or not the term is used literally, or the term is used metaphorically. The problems of interpretation that this polysemy can create are not distinct from the problems that any other case of polysemy can create. So, to decide if the term in question is being used literally or metaphorically is a pragmatic question (Chamizo Domínguez 1998: 32–44). By contrast, the English noun bird and the Spanish pájaro/pájara mean literally the same thing. As long as the Spanish noun pájaro appears in a Spanish text and is used to mean literally a biped with feathers, one can substitute it for the English bird without changing the truth values of the statement in which it appears; although this is not the case vice versa because the English noun bird will mean literally pájaro/pájara or ave in function of the concrete species to which we are referring here. For instance, any speaker of Spanish will refer to a gorrión [sparrow] or a jilguero [goldfi nch] as a pájaro, while a gallina [hen] or an avestruz [ostrich] are typically considered aves. To be precise, pájaro/pájara is a hyponym of ave in Spanish, since all pájaros/pájaras are aves, but not vice versa. But in contrast, its metaphoric meanings are very different in English and Spanish. Thus, bird metaphorically means, «a maiden, a girl (...). In modern (revived) use: a girl, woman (often used familiarly or disparagingly)» (OED), while the metaphoric meaning of pájaro/pájara is that of an «hombre astuto y sagaz, que suele suscitar recelos/mujer astuta, sagaz y cautelosa» [nasty piece of work] (DRAE). Consequently, although bird can be translated literally as pájaro/pájara—or by ave—and vice versa when they are literally used, they cannot be translated interchangeably when they are metaphorically used. And from this meaning included in the OED, English has developed various ulterior euphemistic meanings for bird that would make still more complex the problems of translatability: 1) «a young female companion»; 2) «imprisonment»; and 3) «the vagina» (Holder 2003: 29). And if we descend to a special class of birds like the gallinaceae, we also fi nd ourselves in another domain in which one can fi nd multiple metaphoric projections in the human domain. The analysis of this domain will help illustrate some cases of false friends. The Spanish noun gallina [hen] means metaphorically, «persona cobarde, pusilánime y tímida» [coward] (DRAE), a meaning that its English synonym hen does not have because English has projected metaphorically the meaning of coward to chicken, «applied to one who is as timorous or defenceless as a chicken» (OED). And pollo, the literal Spanish equivalent of English chicken, means metaphorically in the human domain, among other things, «hombre joven, aludido o invocado por persona de mayor edad» [young lad, youngster] and

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«hombre astuto y sagaz» [sly old fox] (DRAE), while polla, the feminine of pollo which is defi ned literally as «gallina nueva, medianamente crecida, que no pone huevos o que hace poco tiempo que ha empezado a ponerlos» [young hen], has lexicalised in European Spanish the metaphorical meanings of «pene» [penis] and «mujer joven» [young lady] (DRAE). It should be stressed that the fi rst of these meanings to be extremely obscene and dysphemistic, although it is very common. And to complicate things even more, the Spanish noun gallo and the English cock both literally mean the same animal; but thus like the Spanish noun is metaphorically used with the meaning of «hombre que en una casa, pueblo o comunidad todo lo manda o lo quiere mandar y disponer a su voluntad» [cock of the walk] (DRAE), among others, the English noun means figuratively «penis» (OED). In addition the metaphorical meaning of cock has come to overshadow its literal meaning to such a point that American English has had to recur to the noun rooster to specify the animal and to avoid a term considered extremely obscene. But in Great Britain one can still use cock as a synonym of the Spanish noun gallo (Allan and Burridge 2006: 44–45). It is obvious that according to my defi nition of false friends none of these pairs would be an example of it. However there are very good examples of different metaphoric projections and of words of deceptive translation when they are used metaphorically. But, if we pass on now to consider the French noun coq and its English cognate cock, which derive from the former, we have a case of two paradigmatic partial semantic false friends. This bird is nothing less than one of the symbols of France and, obviously, it is not a bawdy term in French at all. Also the French noun coq means metaphorically, «chef» [chief] and «champion» (Colin, Mével & Leclére 1994:163) and, in fact, the French noun has ameliorative connotations. This does not occur in any case with the English term that always is a taboo or obscene term, at least in American English and from the early 19th century. The most common mechanism to carry out a metaphorical transfer from the animal domain to the human domain consists of highlighting a characteristic quality of the animal in question and to use the name of the animal to designate a human being in whom we believe that there is such a characteristic. That such a quality may be real in the animal or imagined by us is the least of the matter. In any case, the best proof that the outstanding characteristic that we attribute to the animal is a projection of human beings is the one that each culture believes to be a characteristic in a given animal that would be unimaginable to persons from another culture. And likewise the speakers of the same language who belong to the same culture project metaphorically the name that means the same animal in very different ways. For example, when two terms that literally designate animals in two or more given languages and in addition are cognates and all of them mean literally the animal that one is discussing, but, nevertheless their metaphoric meanings vary from one language to another, then the false friends are served when we use those terms according to their figurative meanings.

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Semantics of False Friends 101 Things being the way that they are, the traps for the understanding of the metaphoric meaning of these terms can be particularly captious, especially when to one, aware of the apparent obviousness of a determined metaphor in his native language, it is difficult for him to conceive that another language has made a metaphoric transference distinct and incongruous with the one that has become habitual in his/her own language. Let us consider, then, some real cases of zoosemy whose result has been the creation of semantic false friends. The Spanish noun canguro, the French kangourou and English kangaroo have a common origin that, although it is not clear, could well be the following: «On their voyage of discovery to Australia a group of Captain Cook’s sailors captured a young kangaroo and brought the strange creature back on board their ship. No one knew what it was, so some men were sent ashore to ask the natives. When the sailors returned they told their mates, ‘It’s a kangaroo.’ Many years later it was discovered that when the aborigines said, ‘kangaroo’ they were not in fact naming the animal, but replying to their questioners, ‘What did you say?’» (Quoted in Hacking 1975: 150). In any case, the Spanish, French and English words mean literally the same object, an example of a particular species within the zoological group of the marsupials, that can be defi ned as, «mamífero marsupial, herbívoro, propio de Australia e islas adyacentes, con las extremidades posteriores muy desarrolladas, mediante las cuales se traslada a saltos. La cola es también muy robusta, y se apoya en ella cuando está parado» (DRAE), «grand mannifère australien de la sous-classe des Marsupiaux, herbivore, à la queue longue, aux pattes postérieures très développèes et aux pattes antérieures courtes, qui se déplace par bonds rapides» (DAF) and «a marsupial mammal of the family of Macropodidae, remarkable for the great development of the hind-quarters and the leaping-power resulting from this» (OED), in Spanish, French and English, respectively. From among the many particular characteristics of the kangaroos—that of making great leaps, that of resting on their tail and on their two rear legs, etc.—Spanish has emphasised that of holding its young in a type of bag or pouch. And consequently Spanish has transferred that noted characteristic of the kangaroos to the human domain to mean «persona, generalmente joven, que se encarga de atender a niños pequeños en ausencia corta de los padres» (DRAE). The result of this is that canguro has been converted into a polysemous word that literally means an animal and metaphorically a person who works taking care of someone else’s children [babysitter, in English]. In the case of French, although it is not included in the DAF, the singular kangourou has developed the meanings of «pour une prositutée, client qui ne se décide pas» [a prostitute’s hesitant client] and «Australien» [Australian], while the plural kangourous has developed the meaning of «menstrues» [menses] (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 354). For its part, the English noun kangaroo separately considered has not developed any metaphoric meaning, although it has developed a figurative meaning in

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102 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends the collocation kangaroo court, that means «an improperly constituted court having no legal standing, e. g. one held by strikers, mutineers, prisoners, etc.» (OED) and that Marcial Prado explains as «un tribunal improvisado, desautorizado e irresponsable, expresión que se aplica también a una comedia que es una sátira de la sociedad, al estilo de los sainetes de Carlos Arniches», 2 [an improvised court, unauthorised and irresponsible, an expression that is also applied to a comedy that is a satire on society, in the style of the teat one-act farce by Carlos Arniches] (Prado 2001: 282. Original emphasis), adding to it a new meaning not included in the OED. Robert W. Holder, on his part, (2003: 219) defines kangaroo court as a form somewhat different, «an ad hoc investigation» and explains its origin in the following manner: «A method of disciplining supposed offenders who fail to comply with unenforceable rules, instructions or customs. The practice is found in closed societies such as prisons, the [armed] forces, terrorist organizations, or trade unions. The offender is made figuratively to jump to it, like the marsupial. A prison kangaroo club is a clique of longserving inmates» (Holder 2003: 219. Original emphasis). Because now that these figurative meanings of kangaroo only function in these places, it is difficult to imagine a context in English in which the literal meaning and the figurative meanings of the noun kangaroo can be confused. On the other hand, it is easy to imagine contexts in Spanish in which it is not clear if we are using the noun canguro according to its literal meaning or according to its figurative meaning, which can be employed by speakers in order to get determined ambiguities and literary effects, either cognitive or humorous, of conscious or of unconscious forms. Thus a statement like “Ya he conseguido canguro para la cena” [Now I have obtained kangaroo for supper], can be interpreted the same in the sense that the speaker intends to mean that s/he is going to have kangaroo for supper that night or has obtained a person to baby-sit his/her children while s/he eats supper out. This ambiguity in Spanish can give rise to an inadequate interpretation on behalf of someone that proposes to translate that polysemy to another language in that the noun canguro is a partial semantic false friend, as it is the case of French and English languages. This is precisely what has happened with the noun camel, a word that has developed the most diverse figurative meanings in various European languages. The Spanish camello, the Catalan camel/camell, the German Kamel, the French chameau, the Italian cammello, the Portuguese camelo and the Swedish kamel literally mean the same animal, and all of them derive ultimately from the Aramaic gamla (via Greek and Latin), which also designated the same animal. Consequently all of them are interchangeable among themselves when they are used literally. But all of them also have developed transferred meanings that have converted them into partial semantic false friends among themselves and with respect to English camel that has not lexicalised any figurative meaning up to now. Stephen Burgen (1996: 196) makes reference to the multiple metaphoric meanings that the

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Semantics of False Friends 103 cognates of camel in the diverse European languages have acquired, the majority of which do not coincide from one language to another. Therefore the Portuguese camelo, which also is a chance false friend of the Spanish camelo [hoax], means metaphorically henpecked. The French chameau means metaphorically whore and, although Burgen does not allude to this extreme, also it can mean metaphorically «personne acariâtre» [cantankerous person] (Caradec 1989: 144) or «contrebandier» [smuggler] (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 124). In Italian the camel has become the paradigm of ugliness, and therefore the noun cammello means metaphorically ugly. In Swedish kamel means waiter. In German, Kamel —especially in exclamations such as, “Ich Kamel!” or “Du Kamel!” [What a dummy am I! or How dumb you are! respectively]—has come to mean metaphorically dumb or coarse, brute or animal; probably because camels are the paradigm of stupidity according to Germanic Weltanschauung. And, although not mentioned by Burgen, the Catalan camel/camell has the metaphoric meanings of «en l’argot de la droga, persona que comercieja amb droga a la menuda» [drug-pusher] (AA. V V. 1999) and «noi o noia que té les cames llargues» [boy or girl with long legs] (Alcover and Moll 1930). And eventually, the Spanish noun camello has acquired the metaphoric meaning in the human domain of a «persona que vende drogas tóxicas al por menor» [drug-pusher] (DRAE). So that it is not infrequent to fi nd in the press headlines that inform us that various “camellos” have been detained by the police in a roundup or that there is a notice such as «La Coordinadora Contra el Narcotráfico de Valladolid celebra hoy la Cabalgata de Reyes ‘sin camellos’» [The Coordinating Committee Against Drug Trafficking in Valladolid today celebrates the Ride of Kings, ‘without camels’] (Europa Press, March 1, 2006. My emphasis); where both the literal and figurative meanings of Spanish camello are alluded to. As for the English noun camel, it has not developed up to now any metaphoric meaning in the human domain, although it could easily be that it would develop it in the future. In fact, Robert W. Holder includes the euphemistic meaning of «a smuggler of illegal narcotics» (Holder 2003: 52). In this case and although Holder does not specify this extreme, it is probable that here we are dealing with a calque from Spanish; because the text that he cites to illustrate this meaning is precisely a text that makes reference to the Straits of Gibraltar: «Algeciras is known as ‘the marijuana gateway to Europe,’ being the unloading point from Tangiers and the Ceuta enclave for most ‘camels;’ the jeep and truck drivers of hash loads from the Rif» (Holder 2003: 52). The result of all these metaphoric changes has been, obviously, that the figurative meanings of the cognates of camel in all these languages not only designate distinct objects, but rather, also, have a marked disdainful or pejorative nature. I have just claimed that the Spanish noun camello has lexicalised the metaphoric meaning of drug-pusher. But this only has occurred in the peninsular dialect of Spanish. By contrast, in the American dialects of Spanish,

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the name of an animal is also used to designate this type of drug traffickers. But in those dialects «contrabandista de drogas en pequeñas cantidades» (DRAE) is called mula [mule]. In this case, the literal meaning and the metaphoric meaning of the Spanish mula would coincide with the meaning of French mule «petit passeur de drogue» (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 242) and of the English mule, «a carrier of illegal narcotics in bulk» (Holder 2003: 261). The result of it is that the Spanish mula in the American dialects of Spanish, the French and English mule would not be false friends. But now the false friends appear in the very dialects of Spanish because mula in the peninsular dialect of Spanish is the paradigm of roughness or stubbornness. Consequently its salient metaphoric meaning is that of stubborn. And to complicate the example a bit more, in Cuba mula means «hombre homosexual» [male homosexual] and, in Argentina and Uruguay, «mentira (expresión contraria a lo que se sabe)» [a lie (expression contrary to that which one knows)] (DRAE).

4.4. METONYMY AND SYNECDOCHE According to the idea of the metaphor that I am maintaining here, metonymy and synecdoche would not be more than special classes of metaphors. Thus when we use the noun government to refer to a minister in particular we are carrying out a metonymic transfer. And similarly to what we have seen in the previous section, when the metonymic transfers in two given languages are done in a different way, their results are semantic false friends, although the literal meanings of these terms continue to designate the same object in the languages at hand. Let us analyse now some paradigmatic cases in which the transference of meaning originated in a metonymy or in a synecdoche have given rise to false friends in two or more languages. Let us begin by considering the following text extracted from the translation to Spanish from a French book on entomology: [2] «Sin embargo, incluso para los especialistas, no siempre resulta fácil establecer el nexo entre formas larvarias y adultas, al haber sido elaboradas las claves de identificación únicamente a partir de los insectos perfectos» [Nevertheless, even for specialists, it is not always easy to establish the nexus between larva and adult forms, after having elaborated the identification keys only starting from exemplary/ideal insects] (Ferron 1994: 19. My emphasis). In this text the Spanish reader will be shocked that the state of exemplary insects is opposed to any other states in the process of metamorphosis, the larva in this case. And that is so because in Spanish, perfecto/perfecta only means «que tiene el mayor grado posible de bondad o excelencia en su línea» [that which has the greatest possible level of goodness or excel-

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Semantics of False Friends 105 lence in its line] or «que posee el grado máximo de una determinada cualidad o defecto» [that which possesses the maximum level of a determined quality or defect] (DRAE). And there is no reason not to consider that a larva or a pupa cannot be “impeccable”, “exemplary” or “ideal” as well because something could be considered “impeccable” in spite of the fact it is “unfi nished”. In fact, a melomane fan of Schubert’s music could (and also would) argue that his Unfi nished Symphony should be considered as being an impeccable model of the most excellent of symphonies, despite that fact that it is “imperfect” by defi nition, because it is “unfi nished”. Now, [2] here is a translation of the original French: [3] «Pourtant, même pour des spécialistes, il n’est pas toujours aisé d’établir le lien entre formes larvaires et adultes, les clés d’identification ayant été élaborées le plu souvent uniquement à partir des Insectes parfaits» (Ferron 1993: 17. My emphasis, original capitals). And if [3] makes sense in French while the Spanish text of [2] becomes shocking at least, it is because: 1) the author has probably written parfaits instead of adultes so as not to repeat the same word two times in a row; 2) parfait/parfaite ought to have in French some meaning more than the meanings that the Spanish adjective perfecto/perfecta has; and 3) one of those meanings ought to be synonymous with adulto/adulta [adult], completado/completada [complete] or terminado/terminada [fi nished]. If this is the case, the Spanish adjective perfecto/perfecta and the French adjective parfait/parfaite are partial semantic false friends. This is what would explain why the original French text makes sense while its Spanish translation does not, or, at least, it has a different meaning from the original text. Actually, both the Spanish adjective perfecto/perfecta as well as the French parfait/parfaite derive from the Latin adjective perfectus which, is related to the verb perficere [to fi nish, to terminate completely], so that the original meaning of the Latin adjective was that of finished or accomplished. Now, since what is fi nished could usually be considered “perfect”, perfectus acquired the second order meaning of impeccable, and both main meanings survived in English perfect. The same goes for the Spanish and French adjective that have come to mean model via a synecdoche. The difference is that French has continued maintaining the original meaning of the Latin adjective of completely finished while that has not been the case in Spanish. In fact, the French adjective parfait/parfaite, in addition to the shared meanings with the Spanish perfecto/perfecta, has the meanings of accompli/accomplie [accomplished], achevé/achevée [fully realised], complet/complète [complete, full] or fini/finie [achieved] (Bertaud du Chazaud 1983: 340). Things being as they are and regardless of the way metamorphosis is considered as a process that would go from the egg to the adult insect passing through the larva and pupa stages, French has given one step more from the meaning of finished to parfait/parfaite—at least in contexts

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like [3]—it can function, by means of a further synecdoche of the second order as a synonym of adulte. And, given that Spanish does not have this second step, parfait/parfaite and perfecto/perfecta have ended up as partial false friends. And the same goes for its negation, as it happens with the Portuguese adjective imperfeito/imperfeita. For this reason, when Spaniards travel to Portugal, they are is surprised that in the Monastery of Batalha— that was erected in memory of the Battle of Aljubarrota, a battle in which the Portuguese troops defeated the Spanish and that is normally considered as the point of no return for Portugal’s independence from Castile—there are Capelas Imperfeitas [Unfi nished Chapels], those chapels being considered as an impeccable example of the best Portuguese Gothic style. Spaniards, unacquainted with this Portuguese meaning, will, however, think that these chapels are “imperfect” and not “unfi nished”. Another paradigmatic case of false semantic friends as a result of a metonymic transference is the one that has come from the French word bagne [prison, dungeon] and the Spanish baño [bath, bathing house]. They have ended up being full semantic false friends from the synchronic current point of view although they were not so in the past. In fact, bagne and baño both derive from the Latin word balneum that literally used to mean bath. Now, Spanish has continued maintaining the literal meaning of the Latin term, while bath itself is said bain in French. But the Spanish baño also developed the meaning «(Por alusión a una antigua casa de baños de Constantinopla, que los turcos empleaban como prisión de los cristianos cautivos). Especie de corral grande o patio con aposentos o chozas alrededor, en el cual los moros tenían encerrados a los cautivos» [By reference to an old bath house of Constantinople that the Turks used as a prison for Christian captives. A type of large farmyard or yard with rooms or huts around in which the Moors enclosed the captives] (DRAE) by means of a metonymy. This is the meaning of baño in the title of the known work by Miguel de Cervantes, Los baños de Argel [The dungeons of Algiers]. Today this is unknown to the majority of Spanish speakers including many educated ones. With this metonymic, second order meaning, the Spanish word baño—or the Italian bagno, «XVIIe siècle. Emprunté de l’ítalien bagno, ‘bain’, aussi attesté pour désigner l’établissement pénitentiaire de Livourne, construit sur un ancien établissement de bains» (DAF) —passed over to the French as bagne (Cantera et al 1998: 37), being understood by French speakers as a literal meaning which, in fact, was a metonymic meaning in the Spanish word. Once acclimatised, the term bagne in French entered to form part of the French language system with the meaning of prison or dungeon: «établissement pénitentiaire où étaient détenus les prisonniers condamnés aux travaux forcés» (DAF). In French, the word in question has developed an entire very interesting chain of further metonymies. Thus, from its literal meaning which the French adjudicated to the word bagne, the following meanings have been developed: 1) forced labour, «la peine des travaux forcés elle-même» (DAF), by means of metonymy; 2) situation

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Semantics of False Friends 107 or labour especially hard, «situation astreignante, travail particulièrement pénible» (DAF), by means of a second metonymy with certain euphemistic and/or humoristic flavour, especially in exclamations such as “Quel bagne!” [What a cross! What a punishment!] (Cantera et al 1998: 37); and 3) a work place, «lieu de travail (atelier, bureau, école, etc.)» (Caradec 1989: 112), by means of a third metonymy, mixed this time with a certain irony. And, as a result of all these divergent metonymic chains, bagne and baño have ended up by changing into semantic false friends that can cause an error in the most perspicacious, especially when the context does not allow to detect that such words are not equivalent in their meaning. And, to complicate things more, English has borrowed the word bagnio, from the Italian bagno [bath], to mean: 1) «an oriental prison, a place of detention for slaves, a penal establishment» (OED) by means of metonymy; and 2) «a brothel, a house of prostitution» (OED) by means of a euphemism. Although I have already alluded to this case to illustrate another question, let us consider another example in which a metonymy has given rise to another pair of partial false friends. It is the French noun grève and the Spanish grava. Both terms derive from the prelatin term, *grava, that meant basically gravel. The Spanish grava has continued maintaining this basic meaning of «conjunto de guijas (piedras lisas y pequeñas)» [gravel] and «piedra machacada con que se cubre y allana el piso de los caminos» [chippings] (DRAE). By contrast, the French noun was at one time a synonym of gravier [gravel] and later, and by means of metonymy, a synonym of plage [beach] or «lieu uni et plat, couvert de sable ou de galets, que s’étend le long de la mer, d’un lac, d’un fleuve» (DAF). From this meaning grève was to mean a particular square of Paris by another ulterior metonymy: «À Paris, la place de Grève ou, absolt., la Grève, ancien nom de la place située en bordure de la Seine, devant l’Hôtel de Ville, où avaient lieu les exécutions capitales.» And fi nally because workers on strike used to gather on that square to be contracted, «du nom de la place de Grève, à Paris, connue pour être le lieu où se réunissaient les ouvriers que attendaient l’embauche,» grève has come to mean strike or, as the DAF defi nes it, «cessation collective, volontaire et concertée du travail, décidée par des ouvriers ou des employés pour fair aboutir leurs revendications.» The fi nal result is that grève can mean both gravel as well as strike while its Spanish cognate grava only means gravel or shippings. Normally, the context will permit us to decide which meaning of the French noun is clear each time. But always one can imagine contexts where the meaning the speaker intended is not clear or others where the speaker uses this term to mean gravel, beach, and strike at the same time. In these last cases these two partial false friends that can cause a problem for the translator. He will not be able to establish the concrete meaning that grève has in a given contexts or when grève is used by a speaker with more than one of its meanings. The translator cannot reproduce them in LT—even knowing this last fact.

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Therefore, for example, a translator to Spanish or English would fi nd it difficult to reproduce the cognitive effects of something like [4] “Aujourd’hui les grévistes sont en grève parce que il n’y a point de la grève à la Place de Grève” [Today strikers are on strike/gravel because there is no gravel at Gravel/Strike Square]. There is a special case of lexicalised metonymy in diverse manners and with different frequencies of use. It is the one that has produced with the Spanish noun americano/americana, the English American and the French Américain/Amércaine. The literal meaning of these three nouns would be «natural de América» (DRAE), «belonging to the continent of America» (OED), and «habitant du continent américain» (DAF), in Spanish, English, and French respectively. From this literal meaning the three languages have lexicalised, by metonymy, the axiologically neuter sense of “citizen of the United States”; and that reference dictionaries define as «estadounidense,» «belonging to the United States» and «personne qui habite les États-Unis d’Amérique ou en est originaire», in Spanish, English and French, respectively. In addition, French has developed a particular ulterior meaning to designate the American dialect of English as «forme prise par l’anglais écrit et parlé aux États-Unis d’Amérique» (DAF); proven, for example, in the credit titles of the French translation of the book by Jerrold J. Katz, The Philosophy of Language (Paris: Payot 1971), where it is specified: «traduit de l’américain par Janick Gazio» [translated from American by Janick Gazio]. Regardless of the fact that in Spanish that variety of English is called inglés americano and in English American English, the French noun américain has been converted into a partial semantic false friend with respect to its Spanish and English cognates. And what is said about the American noun, can be said about its African American and North American derivates as well. Consequently, African American means «an American of African origin» and functions as a euphemistic metonymy of black, something about which Holder comments with certain scorn: «Another twist in the tortuous path of evasion where skin pigmentation is concerned» (Holder 2003: 6). Thus, if one applies literally this defi nition, a Cuban black would not have the “privilege” of being qualified with that euphemistic metonymy. And, if I have said it, a white South African emigrant to the United States cannot be called African American, although the cited defi nition certainly would literally permit it. And in an analogous mode North American means, «a person from North America, especially a citizen of the US or Canada» (OED), in this vein a Mexican would also lack the right to say that he is a North American: something which would not occur in the case of the Spanish norteamericano/norteamericana, that is defi ned as a «natural de América del Norte» [native of North America] and «perteneciente o relativo a esta parte de América» [belonging or related to this part of America]; although it is also accepted «estadounidense» [citizen of the US] (DRAE).

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Semantics of False Friends 109 Another paradigmatic case of metonymy, that this time proceeds from a language that is not Indo-European, is one that was produced in the Arabic word zahr that literally means flower of a tree. By means of metonymy it began to acquire the meaning of die by the flowers that were painted with the faces of dice. From that second meaning the term zahr came to mean unlucky face of the die, a certain game that one used to play with dice, an unfortunate throw in the game of dice and, fi nally, unexpected misfortune or unforeseen risk; all of this by means of a complex chain of metonyms such as the ones studied by David Clarck and Brigitte Nerlich (2001) for other cases. From here on it is how the noun azar entered as a technical term in the language of philosophy and of physics in many languages (French hasard, English hazard or Polish hazard) in order to express the concept of chance or as the DRAE defi nes it, «casualidad, caso fortuito» [chance]. This philosophic and scientific meaning is shared by all the mentioned languages so that in philosophic or scientific contexts the Spanish term azar and its cognates in the other European languages are exactly equivalents: the English term hazard also functions as a verb in addition to the shared meaning with other languages of «chance, venture; a chance» (OED), while it is not the case in the other three languages. But, as a noun, English hazard has developed the metonymic meaning of danger, risk, peril, or vulnerability that seems to be the most salient meaning in the ordinary use of this meaning. And this meaning does not correspond with, for example, Spanish azar, because an azar does not necessarily have to be a danger. In addition, if I am pressed, when we seek danger we do it precisely because it is foreseen and not by chance. Independently, the Polish hazard has developed the axiologically neutral meaning of gambling [lottery] and danger, in addition to the ameliorative of good luck (Szpila 2003:163–164). As a result of all that, another series of partial semantic false friends emerged. Spanish azar and French hasard share the salient meanings of chance and both are synonymous. By contrast, since the salient meaning of English hazard is danger or risk, in spite it also could mean chance, the English noun is a partial semantic false friend with regard to its Spanish and French cognates. And eventually the Polish noun hazard has developed even an ameliorative sense which is absent in the other languages. Precisely in function of these divergent changes of meanings in the languages to which I am referring, and in order to avoid any misunderstandings, the title of the classical work Le hasard et la nécessité, of Jacques Monod, has to have been translated into English as Chance and Necessity and to Polish as Przypadek i koniecznosc, while the French title has been able to be translated literally into Spanish as El azar y la necesidad. In an analogous way, the Spanish adjective azaroso/azarosa does not necessarily imply the meaning of peligroso/peligrosa [dangerous], while the English adjective hazardous is the same synonym of uncertain or unpredictable or chancy, which corresponds to the meaning of the Spanish cognate, and of dangerous, risky, perilous, unsafe or insecure (Fergusson 1986),

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which does not. Consequently, we would fall in the trap of a false friend if, for example, we translated the English asseveration, “London is a hazardous place” into Spanish as “Londres es un lugar azaroso” [literally, ‘London is a chancy place’], if with the English asseveration the speaker wanted to say that in that city one runs certain dangers and not that that city is uncertain or unpredictable.

4.5. EUPHEMISM Euphemism is that kind of word meaning transfer according to which we substitute any given obscene, taboo or politically incorrect word by another word which has neuter or ameliorative connotations and, for such a reason, is used as an alternative to a dispreferred expression, in order to avoid possible loss of face, either one’s own face or, through giving offense, that of the audience, or of some third party. As metaphors do, euphemisms allow us to conceptualise systematically people and objects (Chamizo Domínguez 2005b). But, in addition to this salient and standard function, euphemisms fulfi l several, relevant social functions, which differ from the functions of metaphors as well. Their main function consists of concealing or disguising an unpleasant object or the unpleasant effects of that object. This general function covers a host of minor functions. Euphemisms can be used: 1. In order to be polite or respectful, e.g. lady wife for wife or spouse). 2. In order to convey dignity to a (menial) profession or job, e.g. Spanish barman for camarero [waiter]; English maître for head waiter; flight assistant for stewardess. Spanish barman and English maître are borrowings from English and French, respectively. And it should be stressed that borrowings are frequently used as euphemisms, particularly when the borrowed words are taken from a language, which is considered more cultured, elegant or refi ned (Sagarin 1968: 47–49). 3. In order to respect the dignity of a person who suffers an illness, e.g. Trisomic of the par 21 or Suffering of Down’s syndrome for mongol. 4. In order to respect the dignity of a person who suffers a painful situation, e.g. Third agers or senior citizens for olds. 5. In order to attenuate a painful topic, e.g. Sleep in the Lord or give up the ghost for die. 6. In order to be politically correct. So-called “politically correct language” is basically euphemistic, e.g. Negative increase for losses; zero tolerance for intolerance. 7. In order to be able to manipulate objects “ideologically”, e.g. Embryolike entity for foetus or embryo. This change in language makes it easier to manipulate embryolike entities, whereas you may not have wanted to manipulate a foetus.

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Semantics of False Friends 111 8. In order to avoid ethnic slurs, e.g. Afro-American/African American for black. 9. In order to avoid sexual slurs, e.g. gay for queer, lesbian for tomboy. 10. In order to name a taboo object or action. Namely, 1) God and religion, especially in order to avoid blasphemies, e.g. Gosh for God; 2) sexual objects or actions, e.g. to know, to bed, to be with, to spend the night with, to take or to have for to fuck; 3) bodily effluvia, e.g. perspire for sweat, expectorate for spit, roses for menstruation; 4) dirty or dangerous places, e.g. the classic western entitled The Cheyenne Social Club (1970, directed by Gene Kelly) for The Cheyenne Brothel; churchyard for cemetery; 5) death, e.g. pass away for die; and 6) maladies, e.g. forget-me-not for syphilis or gonorrhoea, social disease for venereal disease. A euphemistic meaning is, in principle, a matter of occasional use. But, when a given term is frequently used as a euphemism in a given natural language, its euphemistic meaning tends to become lexicalised and, as a result of this process of lexicalisation, the term in question becomes a false friend with regard to any cognate in a different natural language where the term did not suffer such semantic change or suffered a different kind of meaning transfer. Let us consider the cases of the Spanish noun individuo and the Spanish adjective regular with regard to their French and English cognates. Let us fi rst start with the Spanish noun individuo and its cognates individu and individual, in French and English, respectively. All three terms derive, in the last resort, from Latin individuum, which was a calque coined as an adjective by Cicero in order to mean in Latin what Greeks meant by the term atom [literally, ‘indivisible’] (Ullmann 1964: 267). Therefore in Latin, as it happened with Greek term atom [‘άτομον’ and ‘άτομος’ in Greek, as a noun and as an adjective, respectively], the noun individuum was fi rst applied to the field of matter or things and did not to the field of human beings. And so in order to mean what Democritus’ philosophy conceived as the smallest particle of matter which cannot be divided later into smaller particles. And according to this sense, the Latin noun started to be used in most modern languages in order to mean what nowadays is meant by the noun atom. Later on, and probably because of Boethius’ definition of person as «naturæ rationalis individua substantia» [an individual substance of a rational nature], individual ceased being applied to the field of objects and started to be applied to the field of human beings. And at that very moment individual started becoming synonymous with person, human or human being. Once the noun individual became synonymous with person or human being, Latin and modern languages borrowed again the Greek term atom in order to mean «the smallest particle of a chemical element, consisting of a positively charged nucleus surrounded by negatively charged electrons» (OED); and, from this very moment as well, the

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112 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends noun individual and the noun atom stopped being synonymous. So far the noun individual has experienced a parallel process of semantic change in all the three languages concerned. Consequently, individual, individu and individuo share their meanings as «a single member of a species; a single specimen of an animal or plant» (OED), «chacun des êtres vivants dont se compose une société, un groupe, une collectivité» (DAF) and «cada ser organizado, sea animal o vegetal, respecto de la especie a que pertenece» (DRAE), respectively. Any of them can be substituted by any other without changing truth values of utterances where such substitution is made. Now, Spanish and French languages have developed a euphemistic second order meaning for the signifiers individuo and individu as «persona cuyo nombre y condición se ignoran o no se quieren decir» (DRAE) and «personne qu’on ne connaît pas ou qu’on ne veut pas nommer» (DAF) [fellow, chap, bloke], respectively. And from this second order, euphemistic meaning, French individu has developed the pejorative sense of «homme qui a mauvaise réputation, qui a des antécédents fâcheux» [poor fellow] (DAF), which has been developed by Spanish language as well. In spite of this it is not explicitly included in the DRAE. As far as the English noun individual is concerned, it also has developed some pejorative meaning as «without any notion of contrast or relation to a class or group: A human being, a person. (Now chiefly as an alleged vulgarism, or as a term of disparagement» (OED). As a result of all that, the English noun individual, the French noun individu and the Spanish noun individuo share their literal meanings, their euphemistic, and their pejorative ones. Therefore Spanish individuo, French individu and English individual can be considered as being synonymous, both when they are literally and figuratively used. But the feminine Spanish noun individua is disparagingly used to mean «mujer despreciable» (DRAE) [despicable woman]; and, although not included in the DRAE, to mean whore as well (Casas Gómez 1976: 228). As a result of all that, while the masculine Spanish form individuo can be considered synonymous with its English and French cognates, the feminine form individua is a semantic partial false friend. In a similar way the Spanish adjective regular, the English adjective regular and the French one régulier/régulière became partial semantic false friends in some contexts because of their euphemistic uses. All three terms have their origin in the Latin adjective regularis, which fi rst meant “according to the ruler”, and secondly “according to the rule”. That meaning continues to be present when we speak of regular friar, a friar who lives according to the rule of a regular, monastic order, or of regular clergy, as opposed to the cloister; religious who follow a rule, especially those who have been ordained, while those who live in the world are called the secular clergy. Later the adjective regular became extremely polysemous although most of their senses are shared by the three languages in question. So, regular fi rstly could mean exact (e.g. regular clock as opposed to a clock which is slow or fast). Furthermore, regular could mean normal (e.g. regular army

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Semantics of False Friends 113 as opposed to guerrilla band), and finally, this adjective means periodic as well (e.g. regular flight as opposed to charter or occasional flight; or regular rhythm as opposed to irregular rhythm or arrhythmia, the condition in which the heart beats with an irregular or abnormal rhythm). So far the adjective regular has experienced similar processes of change in all three languages, and that is why all three can be considered both cognates and synonyms when dealing with contexts such as the aforementioned. But there are also differences because all of them have been involved with transferred meanings which make them partial semantic false friends. Spanish regular and French régulier, for example, are also nouns which used to mean a special kind of soldier in the Spanish and French armies in Africa. In addition, the French feminine noun la régulière, is also used in French to mean both «épouse ou maîtresse en titre» [wife or official mistress] (Caradec 1989: 280). As an adjective, regular/régulier also have different euphemistic meanings in all the three languages. The Spanish adjective regular has developed the euphemistic sense of «medianamente, no demasiado bien» [so-so] and «de tamaño o condición media o inferior a ella» [quite bad] (DRAE). And, although not included in the DRAE, regular has in addition another euphemistic meaning which makes it synonymous with bad or serious in many contexts. In fact, this euphemistic meaning of Spanish regular is its salient sense nowadays when such an adjective accompanies nouns as health, food, exam marks, and so on, and the usual implicature which is made by Spanish speakers when such objects are qualified as regular is that they are clearly bad. So, for instance, if a friend advises us not to go to a given restaurant because its food is “regular”, the salient implicature of such an utterance is that the aforementioned restaurant is not good or patently bad. Similarly, if, after an examination and appropriate tests, our doctor informs us that our health is “regular”, we will have not the slightest doubt that s/he is euphemistically speaking and telling us in a mild way that we are seriously ill. By contrast, the English language—particularly American English—uses very frequently the adjective regular and its derivatives as a synonym of normal or standard. And so in such contexts where Spanish speakers never would use it because its salient implicature in such contexts could be an euphemism of really bad or awful. For that reason, Spaniards travelling to the United States are surprised when they discover that the good, old British standard petrol has become only “regular” gasoline at U.S. petrol stations or “gas stations”. The fact that the Spanish adjective regular has lexicalised this particularly euphemistic sense, while it did maintain the other senses shared with its English and French cognates, allows Spanish speakers to get some cognitive effects by means of playing with the polysemy of the adjective regular. And needless to say, those effects cannot be achieved in the other two languages, where their cognates do not mean so-so or bad at all. So, for instance, if we count on any speaker who has a command of both Span-

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ish and American English, s/he will understand the sentence “La gasolina normal estadounidense es bastante regular” as “The American standard petrol is rather normal” and as “The American standard petrol is rather so-so (or pretty bad).” And because neither English nor French has developed this euphemistic sense for the signifier regular/régulier, my previous example might be understood as a truism or a tautology in both languages, if it is literally translated into English. Therefore, my example cannot be translated literally either into English or into French and continues being meaningful. As far as the French adjective régulier/régulière is concerned, in addition to the other senses shared with Spanish and English, it also has the meaning of loyal, noble or faithful, particularly when it qualifies people (Caradec 1989: 280). As a result of that, the French assertion “Jean est un ami régulier” might have very different implicatures if it is translated into English as “Jean is a regular friend” and into Spanish as “Jean es un amigo regular.” Consequently, the English reader/hearer would usually understand “Jean is a standard/usual friend,” while the Spanish reader/hearer would usually understand “Jean is a disloyal or unfaithful friend.” But even within the English language itself the adjective regular is quite problematic as well because regular has developed different meanings in American English and in British English. When speaking of persons, the salient meaning of regular in American English would be nice or agreeable as it is stated by the OED: «Regular fellow (or guy), an agreeable, ordinary, or sociable person. Freq. as a term of mild approbation; a ‘decent chap’. Colloq. (chiefly U.S.)». And in order to illustrate this rare meaning in British English, the OED itself alludes to the fact that «when G. K. Chesterton made his fi rst visit to the United States he was much upset when an admiring reporter described him as a regular guy.»3 As a result of all that, Spanish regular, French régulier/régulière and English regular share most of their respective meanings, but they are partial semantic false friends as well. And so because Spanish regular has developed a pejorative sense which makes regular a patent derogation when it qualifies people. By contrast, American English regular and French régulier/régulière have developed ameliorative senses which make them patent compliments when such adjectives are used to qualify people but in a different way though. And eventually, the salient sense of regular in British English is axiologically neuter. As a result, what could be a compliment in American English and in French, could be a derogation in Spanish and British English and vice versa. What actually is a derogation in Spanish will be certainly understood as a eulogy in American English. And, obviously, if the hearer/translator of a given utterance where “regular friend” or “regular guy” occurs is not aware of these divergent, tricky meanings, misunderstandings shall emerge in all probability. And this is not a mere theoretical case but a certain one as it is proven by Chesterton’s anecdote.

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Semantics of False Friends 115 4.6. DYSPHEMISM When the transferred meaning of a given term converts it into a forbidden word because the term in question is considered obscene, taboo, coarse, or politically incorrect, such a term becomes a dysphemism. And, as in previous figures of speech mentioned, dysphemistic meanings cause false friends as well. So, when a given term develops any dysphemistic meaning in a given language whose cognates in other languages do not, semantic false friends arise as well.4 The Latin noun latrina (which derives from the verb lavare [to wash]) was fi rst coined as a euphemism for substituting the dysphemistic noun cloaca [sewer]. So according to the same linguistic mechanism we substitute loo for bathroom or toilet. And the Latin noun latrina has been borrowed by most modern languages, under the form letrina in Spanish and under the form latrine in English, for instance. Now, because the noun latrine is mainly used in barrackroom contexts, all its modern descendents have a clear dysphemistic flavour, even though it is not clearly specified either in the Spanish defi nition of letrina as «retrete colectivo con varios compartimentos, separados o no, que vierten en un único tubo colector o en una zanja, empleado aún en campamentos, cuarteles antiguos, etc.» (DRAE), or in the English one as «a privy, esp. in a camp, barracks, hospital, or similar place» (OED). In spite of these defi nitions, and given the strong dysphemistic and derogatory flavour that have both the English term and its Spanish cognate, we certainly do not use them nowadays in order to refer to either our home’s bathrooms or far from referring to Buckingham Palace’s toilets or to Palacio de Oriente’s; except, obviously, whether we try to achieve some contextual and co-textual effects. So that, by using latrine instead of toilet, or any of its convenient synonyms, we achieve the implicature that a given place is dirty, inappropriate, or something similar. But surprisingly, the noun cloaca, the term which Romans themselves did avoid, acquired in modern languages a technical meaning—and, consequently, axiologically neuter and even cultured—of «porción fi nal, ensanchada y dilatable, del intestino de las aves y otros animales, en la cual desembocan los conductos genitales y urinarios» (DRAE) and «the common excrementary cavity at the end of intestinal canal in birds, reptiles, most fishes, and the manotremate mammals» (OED), in Spanish and English, respectively. The Latin dysphemism cloaca has been converted not only into an axiologically neuter term but even into a “technical” and scholar one. This in spite of cloaca continues having pejorative/dysphemistic connotations in ordinary language both in English and in Spanish as «a receptacle of moral fi lth» (OED) and «lugar sucio, inmundo» (DRAE), respectively. But now, and according to both defi nitions, two new partial semantic false friends arise. And this is so because Spanish cloaca mainly refers to physical, dirty places while English cloaca mainly refers to moral dirtiness.

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Similarly, the Spanish nouns macho and hembra can not be conveniently used in order to mean human beings, except in biological contexts. In fact, the DRAE only defi nes the noun macho with regard to animals and not to human beings as «animal del sexo masculino»; although the noun hembra could be applied to both female animal and women as «animal del sexo femenino» [female animal] and «mujer (persona del sexo femenino)» [woman]. Nevertheless, and in spite of the fact that the DRAE “allows” it, the noun hembra has become a dysphemistic/derogatory term nowadays when it is applied to women. In short, both macho and hembra can be considered dysphemisms or derogations nowadays. By contrast, their English cognates male and female, respectively, have axiologically neuter connotations and their use is strictly referential. Therefore, according to the OED, the nouns male and female mean «a male person; a boy or man» and «a female person; a woman or girl,» respectively. And just because male has a strictly referential sense and under no circumstances derogatory or dysphemistic, the English language borrowed from Spanish the term macho in order to mean «ostentatiously manly or virile» (OED). As for the Spanish noun hembra is concerned, it has been loaded with sexist dysphemistic and derogatory connotations to the extent that, if one refers in Spanish to a woman as a hembra, its implicature shall be always markedly sexual, derogatory, or dysphemistic. And so in spite of the fact that not long ago the noun hembra could be used in a neuter way. As a result of all that, Spanish nouns macho and hembra can be substituted by their English cognates male and female when speaking of animals, but they cannot when speaking of human beings, except in biological contexts. Thus, macho and hembra, and male and female are partial semantic false friends nowadays. And when it is the case of a signifier that acquired some dysphemistic connotations, although it originally had been introduced with the most noble of purposes, this signifier should be substituted by another that does not have such connotations. This is the case of the Spanish noun azafata [stewardess], which nowadays is usually substituted by auxiliar de vuelo or tripulante de cabina [fl ight assistant or air hostess]. Azafata derives from the Arabic noun safat [small basket], a meaning that one can use in Spanish as azafate [tray, small basket], «canastillo, bandeja o fuente con borde de poca altura, tejidos de mimbres o hechos de paja, oro, plata, latón, loza u otras materias» (DRAE), although this term is used very little nowadays. By contrast, the Catalan language borrowed the Spanish term as safata [tray] as «plat gran, molt planer, amb vores de poca altura, que serveix per a portar alguns objectes, com gots, tasses, etc., o per a presentar alguna cosa» (AA.VV. 1999) and it is widely used nowadays. Now the noun azafata originally meant «criada de la reina, a quien servía los vestidos y alhajas que se había de poner y los recogía cuando se los quitaba» [lady-in-waiting] (DRAE), and worked as a euphemism of camarera [waitress] or moza [maid]. Now the noun azafata has partially ceased to carry out these axiologically neuter functions and even amelio-

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Semantics of False Friends 117 rative ones beacuse it is used as a euphemism of puta [whore], particularly in erotic ads, although this sense is not included in the DRAE yet. Once azafata became a polysemous term it is used in order to achieve some humorous and cognitive effects as it happens in the following quote from El triángulo de las verduras [The triangle of vegetables/obscenities], by G. Plaza Molina: [7] «Una redada en el Barrio Chino abarrotó de súbito la Comisaría. Por pura formalidad, el inspector fue recorriendo la fi la de las atrapadas preguntando: –¿Usted a qué se dedica? –Yo soy azafata. –¿Y usted? –Azafata. –¿Usted, la pelirroja? –Azafata, como estas dos. –¿Usted, la que sigue, también es azafata? –No, yo soy puta. –Vaya, hombre, menos mal, ¿y qué tal marcha el negocio? –Bastante flojo desde que hay tanta azafata haciendo la competencia» [Suddenly a raid at the Red-light District filled up the Police Station. As a mere requisite the inspector went round the queue of caught women and asked: - What do you do for a living? -I’m a stewardess. -And you? -Stewardess. You, the red haired one? -Stewardess, as previous both. -You, the following, are you a stewardess as well? -No, I’m a whore. -Come on, that’s a relief, and how the business is doing? -Pretty bad, since there are so many stewardesses competing] (Quoted in Casas Gómez 1986: 230). The result of all this is that Catalan safata and Spanish azafata (azafata itself is said hostessa in Catalan) are full semantic false friends, whatever is the sense in which Spanish azafata is used; whereas safata and azafate can be substituted by one another, although the Spanish noun has some archaic flavour while its Catalan cognate does not at all. Sometimes the dysphemistic paths through which words go through to become semantic false friends are really unexpected. For instance, the Polish language lexicalised the meaning of procurer or pimp for the name Alfons, borrowing it from French Alphonse. But while French Alphonse is a euphemism whose equivalent dysphemisms could be maquereau [literally,

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118 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends ‘mackerel’] or barbeau [literally, ‘barbell’], and a learned term though, Polish Alfons became a bawdy word whose Polish euphemism is streczyciel. While the referential meaning of Polish Alfons and French Alphonse are equivalent, their respective registers differ when they are used figuratively. Such an unexpected meaning converts into partial semantic false friends Polish Alfons and French Alphonse with regard to Spanish Alfonso or English Alphonso. 5

4.7. IRONY When an ironic or linguistic mechanism is used to mean quite the opposite with regard to its literal, salient meaning, it may become a semantic false friend with regard to any cognate in any other language where such a word is not ironically used or where any occasional ironic use did not become lexicalised. So, for instance, the Greek term βάρβαρος was coined in order to mean derogatorily any foreign person who did not speak or, to be much more precise, who had a smattering of Greek language. But very soon and by means of a metonymy the Greek term started to acquire a much more derogatory sense by meaning any person who is particularly brutish, ignorant, or illiterate, whether or not such a person is literally “barbarous” or Hellenic as well. The Latin language borrowed the Greek term as barbarus and this term basically maintained its Greek meanings, both as an adjective and as a noun. And once the term barbarus became a Latin term it was used in order to refer to some Germanic tribes which invaded the Roman Empire from the 4th to 5th centuries A.D. Since such tribes were considered by Romans as being particularly inhuman or uncivilised, the term barbarus started to be used to name them by means of both an antonomasia and a restriction of meaning. And this is the fi rst, technical sense of the Spanish noun bárbaro/bárbara and the English one barbarian: «se dice del individuo de cualquiera de los pueblos que desde el siglo V invadieron el Imperio romano y se fueron extendiendo por la mayor parte de Europa» (DRAE) and «one living outside the pale of the Roman empire and its civilization, applied specifically to the northern nations that overthrew them» (OED), in Spanish and English respectively. According to both defi nitions the Spanish noun bárbaro/bárbara can be substituted by its English cognate barbarian because both have, prima facie, the same referential meaning. If so, bárbaro/bárbara and barbarian are not false friends at all. Anyway it should be noticed and stressed that, in spite of the fact that the Spanish and English nouns are technical terms used by historians, both defi nitions might be quite deceiving if one does not know by other means who the barbarians were in fact. According to the DRAE, barbarians invaded the Roman Empire, but this does not necessarily entail that they overthrew it as well. A country or empire can be invaded with-

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Semantics of False Friends 119 out a consequent overthrow of its political regime. In fact, both Napoleon and Hitler also invaded Russia. But none of them achieved his purposes of overthrowing the Tsarist Empire or the Soviet Union regime, respectively. By contrast, according to the OED’s defi nition, barbarians did overthrow the Roman Empire, but this does not necessarily entail that they previously had invaded it. We also know many examples of regimes which have been overthrown by other countries or nations, and they did not necessarily experience any previous invasion. For example, the Chilean military men who overthrew President Salvador Allende’s regime probably counted on the helpful, supposed support of the CIA. But no actual American “invasion” can be proven. So that, if one pays attention to what both defi nitions literally “say”, it is likely that somebody might think that they refer to different things or different historic events. Consequently they might be considered false friends in spite of they are not in fact. Now, since Spanish bárbaro/bárbara is an adjective as well, things are quite different if we compare the Spanish adjective with its English cognates barbarian/barbaric/barbarous because in this case we are dealing with partial semantic false friends. The Spanish adjective and its English cognates share the basic senses of «fiero, cruel» or «inculto, grosero, tosco» (DRAE) and «exceedingly cruel» or «primitive; uncivilised» (OED), whose salient meanings certainly have a derogatory flavour. But things widely diverge from this point, and consequently false friends emerge. And so because Spanish bárbaro/bárbara radically changed its literal meaning in the past by means of an irony which is fi rmly lexicalised nowadays and made it a complimentary term or eulogy. Really, as a result of the lexicalisation of such irony the Spanish adjective also means «grande, excesivo, extraordinario» and «excelente, llamativo, magnífico» (DRAE). Accordingly, the Spanish adjective cannot be substituted by its cognates barbarian/barbaric/barbarous when used according to its eulogistic sense, but of great, fantastic, terrific, super, excellent, wonderful or any other adjectives with similar eulogistic meanings because the English adjectives may not be used as eulogies in any case. So while qualifying something or somebody (e.g. a book, a masterpiece, or Attila) as bárbaro/bárbara it can be understood as a eulogy and/or as a derogation, according to the context of the utterance, qualifying something or somebody in English as barbarian/barbaric/barbarous is always an insult or a derogation. In short, bárbaro/bárbara can be used as a derogation or as a eulogy while its English cognates can not. And for such a reason both cognates are partial semantic false friends. I previously mentioned the English adjective terrific as a plausible equivalent to the Spanish adjective bárbaro/bárbara when the Spanish adjective is used as a eulogy. But because things are not what they seem to be, let me add that the English adjective terrific is a partial semantic false friend with regard to its Spanish cognate terrorífico/terrorífica, «que infunde terror» [frightening] and «espantoso (desmesurado)» [extravagant, exaggerated] (DRAE), which never can be used as a eulogy.

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120 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends And something similar happens with regard to the Spanish adverb bárbaramente and the Spanish abstract noun barbaridad. The Spanish adverb bárbaramente shares with its English cognate barbarously the pejorative/ derogatory meaning of «brutal o cruelmente» (DRAE) and «in a barbarous manner […] as to cruelty» (OED), respectively. Nevertheless, the Spanish adverb has developed, by means of an irony, the second order, ameliorative meaning of «muy bien, estupendamente» [very well, great, fine] (DRAE) as well, which its English cognate does not have at all. As for the abstract English noun barbarity, it shares its derogatory meaning of «extreme cruelty» (OED) with the Spanish noun barbarie, «fiereza, crueldad» (DRAE), and both can be considered as synonyms and consequently they are not false friends at all. But there also exists in Spanish the abstract noun barbaridad, which, in addition to its derogatory meaning of «dicho o hecho necio o temerario» [nonsense] (DRAE), has ironically developed the ameliorative senses of «exceso, demasía» [excess, surplus], «acción o acto exagerado o excesivo» [piece of nonsense], and «cantidad grande o excesiva» [a lot, an awful lot] (DRAE); although barbaridad could be substituted by barbarity in some contexts as well. And eventually, in spite of this sense is not included in the DRAE yet, barbaridad also means obscenity, particularly when speaking of obscene utterances or sayings. The result of all that is not but a new complicated galaxy of partial semantic false friends originated thanks to the figure of speech of irony. Obviously, the English terms concerned might be occasionally used in an ironic way and, in such cases, they could be translated as their Spanish cognates. But I am afraid that these occasional, possible ironies in English could be misunderstood most of the time, while this is not the case in Spanish language.

4.8. AMELIORATION When an amelioration, or linguistic mechanism by which a given word which has neuter or negative connotations is occasionally used for praising or paying flattering compliments to someone or something, such a term could be lexicalised and usually get positive connotations. The result of that could be a case of semantic false friends if any cognate of the word concerned in any other language is not used in an ameliorative way or any occasional ameliorative use does not get lexicalised. This is what happens with the divergent uses of the noun doctor in Spanish and English. The noun doctor both in Spanish and English, originally derives from the comparative of the Latin adjective doctus [learned], and its fi rst order meaning in modern languages refers to someone who holds the highest university degree. In fact the fi rst defi nition provided by the DRAE for the signifier doctor is «persona que ha recibido el último y preeminente grado académico que confiere una universidad u otro establecimiento autorizado para ello», which is equivalent to the English defi nition provided by the OED for doc-

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Semantics of False Friends 121 tor: «a person who holds the highest university degree.» Accordingly this referential meaning of the noun doctor is shared by Spanish and English and, consequently, the Spanish term can be substituted by the English one and vice versa. And so without introducing any change either in their references or in their registers. Secondly, doctor (of the Church) also means in Roman Catholic Church jargon «título que da la Iglesia con particularidad a algunos santos que con mayor profundidad de doctrina defendieron la religión o enseñaron lo perteneciente a ella» (DRAE) which also coincides with the English meaning of «certain early ‘fathers’ distinguished by their eminent learning, so as to have been teachers not only in the Church, but of the Church, and by their heroic sanctity» (OED); and again no false friends emerge between Spanish and English when speaking about eminent theologians or saints declared as sound expounders of doctrine by the Roman Catholic Church. And thirdly, the noun doctor also means physician by means of a typical case of euphemism pertaining to the type we use to convey dignity to a profession or job and which has been previously mentioned in section 4.5. Again, this phenomenon is shared by Spanish and English languages. In medical contexts both nouns share their referential meanings and, consequently, both are correctly translatable the one by the other. Now, some nuance differences emerge between Spanish and English from this point. Because the meaning of «a person who is qualified to practise medicine» (OED) for the signifier doctor is so fi rmly lexicalised in English to such an extent that probably the meaning of physician (which the OED defi nes as «a person qualified to practise medicine») or leech is the salient meaning of the signifier doctor in English nowadays. And this phenomenon is quite different in Spanish. In fact, the DRAE states that its use is «coloquial» [colloquial] when it means médico and, in addition, that doctor means médico «aunque no tenga el grado académico de doctor» [in spite of the fact that s/he may not have the academic degree of doctor] (My emphasis). And what is more, although the Spanish signifier doctor has reached a high degree of lexicalisation in order to mean médico and, in fact it is a polysemous term, the Spanish sentence “Ni todos los doctores son médicos, ni todos los médicos doctores” probably makes much more sense in Spanish than its English translation as “Neither all doctors are physicians, nor all physicians are doctors.” In fact, the polysemy alluded to has been exploited even in order to achieve legal consequences. A few years ago the Ilustre Colegio Oficial de Médicos de la Provincia de Málaga [Illustrious Official College of Physicians of the Province of Malaga] sued a male nurse from Marbella who practised medicine without having any MD certificate. During the trial the male nurse’s counsel for the defence—Juan María Bandrés, a well-known former politician—argued that his defendant really introduced and advertised himself as a doctor. But most physicians introduced and announced themselves in press as doctors as well even if they actually were not at all. By contrast, I dare to suspect that such a kind of defence would be highly

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improbable in any English speaking country since the meaning of physician is probably the (only) salient meaning for the signifier doctor, except perhaps when dealing with academic and/or ecclesiastical contexts. In fact, when medicine lecturers who are both doctors and physicians speak about themselves they call themselves “Professor Doctor” in order to emphasise that they really differ from ordinary doctors or mere physicians. On the occasion of my last visit to the United States to talk as visiting professor at Penn State University, I experienced it. Since I had an invitation from the Penn State staff, I showed it together with my passport to the US immigration officer. And, as usual in official letters among lecturers, my invitation letter started with the words “Dear Dr. Chamizo-Dominguez”. When the immigration officer read it, she kindly smiled and asked about my medical speciality; perhaps because she was suffering from some illness and tried to get a free consultation. Obviously, I had to make things clear to her that, although I was a real doctor, I was not a physician at all. On the other hand, Spanish speakers alternatively use doctor or médico depending on the contexts. And not always both terms can be substituted one for another in a plausible way. So, when patients talk among themselves—in the waiting room of their doctor’s office, for example—they preferably use the noun médico and not the noun doctor in order to refer to their practitioner. By contrast, patients always will (and probably shall) use the noun doctor and never the noun médico when they directly address their practitioner. That is, médico may not be used as an appellative or vocative in Spanish, while doctor does. And what is more, an utterance such as “*¿Qué me pasa, médico?” [What is wrong with me, physician?] is probably ungrammatical in Spanish. Or at least, I never heard it, and I would not use it at any rate. By contrast, the feminine form of médico, médica, has a marked cacophonic nuance, and even slightly dysphemistic; since, in addition to she-physician, it also means «mujer del médico» [male-physician’s wife] (DRAE). For such a reason Spanish speakers usually prefer the term doctora when they mean a female physician, both when patients talk among themselves and when they address her. So, if someone is waiting for the doctor and does not know whether s/he did arrive already, they alternatively ask “¿Ha llegado ya el médico?” [Did the male physician arrive already?] or “¿Ha llegado ya la doctora?” [Did the female doctor arrive already?], depending on whether they refer to a male doctor or to a female one, respectively. As a result of all that and in spite of the fact that Spanish doctor and English doctor share their referential meanings, they widely diverge with regard to their registers. Consequently they could be considered partial semantic false friends, or register false friends at least. Accordingly, the English noun doctor should be translated into Spanish as doctor or médico (or doctora or médica, in its case) depending on the contexts of the utterance. It goes without saying that one can avoid the gender marker when speaking English, while one does not when speaking Spanish. Not to mention, as well, that in some South American countries (particularly in

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Semantics of False Friends 123 Mexico) doctor/doctora is used as a courtesy treatment, even whether that person is neither a scholar, nor a physician nor, obviously, a doctor of the Church. And in order to add another example, I would refer to the adjective black. Usually the English adjective black, and its synonyms in other languages, mainly have a derogatory or pejorative sense when they are used in a tropical way and even when they are used according to their literal meaning. Accordingly, the English adjective black can be usually substituted by Spanish negro/negra while maintaining both their literal meaning and their pejorative or derogatory connotations. Now there is at least one counterexample for this general rule in both languages. This is the case of the collocation black label, which, when applied to whisky and other spirituous beverages, always have ameliorative connotations. So that, black label whisky is considered preferable to the red label one. Similarly, its Spanish synonym etiqueta negra has some ameliorative connotations as well. Accordingly, we can say that the literal meaning of black label and etiqueta negra mainly refers to whisky, although both the English and the Spanish collocation can be occasionally used—and so they are used in fact—in a eulogistic way in order to praise somebody or something, even though they are not literally whisky. And something similar happens with a particular Spanish collocation, in the Peninsular dialect of Spanish at least, which is frequently used and which probably could be misunderstood by any speakers of any other languages who do not have enough competence in Spanish. It is about the collocation (de) pata negra [literally, ‘(of/from) black leg’], which always has ameliorative and eulogistic senses. So an assertion as “Juan es (de) pata negra” [literally, ‘Juan is (of) black leg’] is always ameliorative and could mean, depending on the contexts, that Juan is top-class, genuine, faithful, loyal, honest, excellent in his profession or job and so on. Now, such a collocation is in fact an abbreviation of jamón de pata negra [ham of/from black leg], which literally means «el de cerdo ibérico, de pezuña negra» [the one from the Iberian pig, with a black foot] (DRAE). And because the meat from black pigs on the whole and the ham from black pigs in particular are much more appreciated than the ones from white pigs are, the collocation (de) pata negra has achieved the conventional, widespread implicature of being something excellent in any respect, even when speaking about people as it is the case of my example. And this is in spite of the fact that both pata [animal leg] and cerdo [pig], considered in isolation, always have pejorative and derogatory connotations when applied to persons. And if qualifying somebody or something as (de) pata negra always has markedly ameliorative or eulogistic connotations, its negation, obviously, has a markedly pejorative or derogatory flavour. This is really what is implied in the following quote, where a Catalan socialist politician is disqualified for being a plausible candidate for the presidency of the autonomous Catalan government just because of he was born in Cordova (Anda-

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lusia) and, consequently, he is not a pata negra Catalan at all; that is, he is not a true, genuine, authentic, proper, pure, or legitimate Catalan at all: [8] «Las reticencias del actual ministro de Industria tienen que ver con su origen cordobés. Montilla, en efecto, no es un catalán pata negra y, aunque habla un buen catalán, no con la fluidez suficiente como para desenvolverse ante determinadas situaciones tensas, caso de una sesión parlamentaria complicada o un mitin» [The current Minister of Industry’s reticence has to do with his Cordovan origin. Certainly, Montilla is not a black leg Catalan and, in spite of the fact that he speaks Catalan in an acceptable way, he does not it fluently enough as to deal with strained situations as is the case of a complicated parliamentary session or a political speech (or political meeting)] (elconfidencial.com, February 2, 2005. My emphasis). Obviously, pata negra is not a false friend with regard to its literal English equivalent black leg because neither the noun nor the adjective are cognates in both languages. By contrast, pata negra is an actual semantic false friend with regard to Romance languages which share cognates of pata and/or negro/negra, as is the case of French or Portuguese, where any literal translation of the Spanish collocation as patte nègre, in French, and pata negra, in Portuguese, respectively, would be meaningless or would be perversely misunderstood. So, it is highly probable that the conventional, widespread implicature which is made by Spaniards could be misunderstood by the speakers of other languages and consequently understood in a pejorative or derogatory way.

4.9. PEJORATION When pejoration, or the linguistic mechanism by which a given word which has neuter (and even ameliorative) connotations is occasionally used in order to disdain or scorn somebody or something, such a term could be lexicalised and usually pretty contaminated by negative connotations. The result of that could be a case of semantic false friends if any cognate of the word concerned in any other language is not used in a pejorative way or if any occasional pejorative occurrence does not get lexicalised. This can be paradigmatically illustrated by appealing to the case of the Spanish noun sujeto and the English one subject. Both nouns share their meanings in scientific contexts (e.g. sujeto experimental is equivalent to experimental subject when both mean cobaya and guinea pig, in Spanish and English, respectively), philosophical contexts (e.g. Spanish sujeto agente and sujeto paciente can be correctly translated into English as agent subject and patient subject, respectively; particularly in Scholastic/Aristotelic contexts), or linguistic ones (e.g. the subject of an utterance, assertion,

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Semantics of False Friends 125 or sentence). But the Spanish noun sujeto has also developed the pejorative meaning of «persona despreciable, gente de poca monta» [despicable person, third-rate people] (DRAE), which makes it synonymous of English noun (poor) fellow when the last is pejoratively used in legal or police contexts. On its part, the English noun subject has developed the axiologically neuter sense of «one who is under the domination of a monarch or reigning prince; one who owes allegiance to a government or ruling power, is subject to its laws, and enjoys its protection» (OED), which makes it synonymous of citizen; a meaning which has not been developed by its corresponding Spanish noun. As a result of this divergent process in both languages, an English utterance as “A subject of His/Her Gracious Majesty” is not equivalent to the Spanish utterance “un sujeto de Su Graciosa Majestad” [a despicable/third-rate fellow of His/Her Gracious majesty], but to “un súbdito de Su Graciosa Majestad.” And in a similar way the syntagm “un sujeto español” should be understood as “a Spanish, despicable fellow and not as “a Spanish subject”. Not to mention that, in “A subject of His/Her Gracious Majesty” there also appears another partial semantic false friend, since the salient senses of the Spanish adjective gracioso/graciosa are funny or amusing, comic and charming or cute. In fact, the Spanish adjective gracioso/graciosa almost never is synonymous with the English adjective gracious, except in the collocation mentioned above. Accordingly, given an adequate context, “His/Her Gracious Majesty” could be misunderstood and consequently translated into Spanish in four different ways. And needless to say, the mentioned polysemy of the Spanish adjective is usually exploited in order to get cognitive and humorous implicatures. But coming back to the subject matter, it should be added that one can fi nd in the technical, linguistic French jargon the syntagm le sujet parlant, which means what usually is meant in both Spanish and English linguistic jargons as el hablante and the speaker, respectively. So, for instance, the French syntagm le sujet parlant has been used by Ferdinand de Saussure when he defi ned what langue is: [9] «La langue n’est pas une fonction du sujet parlant, elle est le produit que l’individu enregistre passivement; elle ne suppose jamais de préméditation, et la réflexion n’y intervient que pour l’activité de classement» [Language is not a function of the speaker; it is a product that is passively assimilated by the individual. It never requires premeditation and reflection enters in only for the purpose of classification] (Saussure 1978: 30. My emphasis). And, given that le sujet parlant has been taken as a calque in Spanish, particularly when translating French writings on linguistics, le sujet parlant, in [9], it has been literally translated into Spanish as el sujeto hablante:

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends [10] «La lengua no es una función del sujeto hablante, es el producto que el individuo registra pasivamente: nunca supone premeditación y la reflexión no interviene en ella más que para la actividad de clasificar» (Saussure 1991: 78. My emphasis).

And I can testify that many of my students usually misunderstand [10] and assume that de Saussure used the signifier el sujeto hablante in a pejorative way and, consequently, he meant el fulano hablante [the speaking, despicable fellow]. In the previous section I mentioned the divergent lexicalisation ways of the noun doctor in Spanish and English, and the subsequent problems for translating this term from Spanish into English and vice versa. I will now allude to their corresponding verbs, to doctor and doctorar/doctorarse, which have developed much more divergent meanings as well. And consequently both verbs became examples of semantic false friends even much more complex and interesting than their corresponding nouns are. To doctor and doctorar/doctorarse share the same literal meaning as «to confer the degree or title of Doctor upon; to make a Doctor» (OED) and «graduar de doctor a alguien en una universidad» (DRAE). So, when these verbs are used in academic contexts, both can be (correctly) substituted by one another. In addition the English verb has developed some axiologically neuter senses such as «to treat, as a doctor or physician; to administer medicine or medical treatment,» «to practise as a physician» and «to take medicine, undergo medical treatment» (OED), which have not been developed by the Spanish verb at all. So, when to doctor means to treat as a doctor, it should be translated into Spanish as tratar, curar, or cuidar (Prado 2001: 175); when the English verb means to practise as a physician, should be translated into Spanish as practicar la medicina (Prado 2001: 175); and eventually, when the English verb means undergo medical treatment, it should be translated into Spanish as tomar una medicina. Furthermore, the English verb has developed the euphemistic meaning of «to castrate (an animal)» (OED), which is absent in Spanish as well. And fi nally, the English verb has developed the pejorative/derogatory meaning of «to treat so as to alter the appearance, flavour, or character of; to disguise, falsify, tamper with, adulterate, sophisticate, ‘cook’» (OED), which makes it synonymous with alter, tamper with, falsify, distort or adulterate (Fergusson 1986), and which, obviously cannot be imagined by any Spanish speaker in any way. So, we can say that the English verb to doctor has three, several neuter meanings, one euphemistic meaning, and one pejorative/derogatory meaning. By contrast, the Spanish verb doctorar/doctorarse, in addition to its literal meaning in the higher education field, has developed another ameliorative sense in the field of tauromachy as «dicho de un matador: Tomar la alternativa» (DRAE) [to make one’s début as qualified bullfighter], which, obviously, does not exist in English and that I dare to imagine that it could be hardly imagined by any English speaker. And, as usual, English to doc-

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Semantics of False Friends 127 tor and Spanish doctorar/doctorarse became partial semantic false friends thanks to their divergent, occasional figurative meanings which are lexicalised nowadays.

4.10. COLLOCATIONS AND PHRASEOLOGICAL UNITS As we have occasionally seen in previous sections and chapters, many words become false friends not when they are considered in isolation but according to the context where they are used (Szpila 2006). Interpreting and translating such words into other languages, where they are partial semantic false friends, needs particular interpretations and pragmatic strategies on the part of the translator, hearer, or reader; although it also should be stressed that in many cases any pragmatic strategy may guarantee that a given interpretation is the correct one. Now, when a given word is a member of a given phraseological unit (idiom, collocation, saying, aphorism, and so on), the transferred meaning that the word in question may have, could convert it into a false friend with regard to any cognate in any other language which has not the equivalent phraseological unit. And this is so even when the literal meanings of the words in question do not make them false friends at all according to the senses provided by the most authoritative dictionaries. This is the case of the English collocation kangaroo court which has been analysed previously. On the other hand, most collocations are occasionally changed (Naciscione 2001) and may be understood according to the literal meanings of their component words and according to any figurative interpretation. This figurative meaning becomes the most common and salient one when phraseological units are fully lexicalised. Let us analyse some examples of different collocations where a given word becomes a false friend with regard to any cognate in any other language, not because they are false friends in themselves but because the word in question is a member of a particular collocation. To start with, let us appeal to the concept of “groundless rumours”. The concept of “groundless rumours” is present everywhere because the reality of groundless rumours is perhaps as old as that of human speakers themselves. But this reality has been conceptualised in a different way in each language, using metaphorically for that purpose words that had a literal meaning already. A paradigmatic case of this transferred use is the one of the French collocation téléphone arabe in order to mean «propagation d’une rumeur de bouche à orielle» (Caradec 1989: 300). Now, neither téléphone nor arabe are false friends with regard to the analogous words in English, Spanish, or German. Furthermore, given that téléphone arabe could literally mean a telephone made in an Arabic country, a French assertion as “Il y a beaucoup de téléphones arabes à Paris” could be understood in the French language itself either as “Il y a beaucoup de téléphones à Paris qui ont été fabriqués dans un pays arabe” [There are many telephones

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128 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends made in an Arabic country in Paris] or as “Ils circulent des rumeurs sans fondement à Paris” [There are many grapevines in Paris]. In the fi rst case, téléphone arabe has been understood according to its literal meaning, and obviously it is not a false friend with regard to, say, Arabic telephone, teléfono árabe, or arabisches Telefon, in English, Spanish, and German, respectively. By contrast, in the second case, téléphone arabe has been understood as an idiom, having a metaphoric meaning and being used according to that second order meaning. As a result of that, while the literal interpretation of “Il y a beaucoup de téléphones arabes à Paris” can be literally translated into any of the other three languages to which I am alluding, the second interpretation cannot at all; or rather its literal translation is certainly an absurdity in any of the other three languages because such languages metaphorically conceptualise the phenomenon of “groundless rumours” in very different and divergent ways. Certainly, English speakers conceptualise the phenomenon in question in several ways, such as grapevine, gossip, rumour mill or hoax; being one of them the collocation bush telegraph, another metaphor from the field of telecommunications. And again telegraph is not a false friend at all with regard to French télégraphe, Spanish telégrafo or German Telegraf; but it becomes a false one when it is used in conjunction with bush and is a member of such a particular collocation. It should be pointed out that the German and Spanish languages have conceptualised the phenomenon of “groundless rumours” by dipping into the jargon of communications although in different ways. So, the German language has conceptualised the same phenomenon by borrowing from barrack room jargon. In fact, the German language has lexicalised Latrinengerüchte [literally ‘latrine rumours’, which also exists in English and is defi ned as «a baseless rumour believed to originate in gossip in the latrines» (OED)] and Latrinenparolen [literally ‘latrine sayings’] as words for “groundless rumours”. And again, in spite of the fact that neither German Latrine nor English latrine are false friends with regard to their Spanish and French cognates letrina and latrine, respectively, when they are considered in isolation, they become false friends in the context of rumours. And eventually, to express the concept of groundless rumours, the Spanish language has used words from the fields of both the barrack room and telecommunications. This means that the concept of “groundless rumours” can be expressed in two ways in Spanish: macutazo and radio macuto, «emisora inexistente de donde parten los rumores y los bulos» [non-existent radio station from where rumours and hoaxes come] (DRAE). Macutazo is an augmentative and derogatory form of macuto [knapsack, the sack typically used by soldiers], which means both big knapsack and a blow given with a knapsack. So, macutazo evokes automatically the barrack room field to any Spanish speaker, particularly to someone who has served in the army. And both conceptual fields, the barrackroom and the telecommunications one, are intermingled in radio macuto [literally, ‘radio

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Semantics of False Friends 129 knapsack’]. Again, although radio is not a false friend with regard to their cognates in the other three languages, it becomes one when it is used in conjunction with macuto. Anyway it should be stressed that the Spanish noun radio could be considered a false friend with regard to English radio under a different respect. To be precise, Spanish radio has several meanings. Its feminine form, la radio, means radio, but its masculine one, el radio, means both radium and radius. Finally, let us look at one more example: the French noun café. This noun is not a false friend at all with regard to Spanish café or English café when they mean «lieu public où l’on consomme du café et d’autres boissons» (DAF), «a small restaurant selling light meals and drinks» (OED) and «establecimiento donde se vende y toma esta bebida y otras consumiciones» (DRAE), in French, English and Spanish, respectively. Although it should be added that the noun café also means in American English «a bar or nightclub» (OED), which has some pejorative flavour. And this is not the case of French and Spanish cafés, which have traditionally been meeting points of artists and intellectuals. Spanish and French café are not false friends either with regard to English coffee when all of them mean the beverage: «a hot drink made from the roasted and ground bean-like seeds of a tropical shrub» (OED), «boisson obtenue à partir des graines de caféier préalablement torréfiées et moulues» (DAF) and «bebida que se hace por infusión con esta semilla tostada y molida» (DRAE), in English, French and Spanish, respectively. But, by contrast, French noun café becomes a false friend with regard to its English and Spanish cognates when the fi rst one appears in two specific collocations; namely, grain de café and (prendre) le café du pauvre. Grain de café literally means coffee bean and grano de café, in English and Spanish, respectively; and, obviously, all the three are not false friends at all when the French collocation is used according to its literal meaning. But the French syntagm means clitoris as well (Caradec 1989; Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994). And in this case the French collocation is a clear case of false friend with regard to English coffee bean and Spanish grano de café, which only have their literal respective senses. And what is more, in spite of the fact that neither in English coffee bean nor in Spanish grano de café work as euphemisms for clitoris, the euphemistic sense in French could be very old and could go back to the Egypt of the Pharaohs: [11] «Grain, *grain de café (1902), clitoris. Semen humanum, la graine des hommes; Plaute (eunuque), léger de deux grains au trébuchet d’amour (Blondeau). Les prêtres de la déesse Isis portaient dans les cérémonies le van mystique qui reçoit le grain et le son, mais qui ne garde que le premier en rejetant le second; les prêtres du dieu (Osiris) portaient le tau sacré ou la clef, qui ouvre les serrures les mieux fermées. Ce tau figurait l’organe de l’homme; ce van l’organe de la femme (P. Dufour, Histoire de la prostitution)» [Grain, *coffe bean (1902),

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130 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends clitoris Semen humanum, men’s seed; Plautus (eunuch), light of two beans in love’s scales. Priests of the goddess Isis carried in ceremonies the holy sieve which receives both the bean and the seed, but which only keeps the fi rst and disregards the second one; priests of the god (Osiris) carried the holy tau or the key that opens the best locked locks. This tau meant the man’s organ, this sieve (meant) the woman’s organ (P. Dufour, History of prostitution)] (Chautard 1992: 356. Original bold and italics). And if the collocation grain de café meaning clitoris seems to go back to Egyptian antiquity and to a religious domain according to what is stated in [11], the idiom (prendre) le café du pauvre, seems to be much more modern and derives from the domain of social protest. Really, the idiom (prendre) le café du pauvre literally means to have pauper’s coffee and, according to this meaning it is not a false friend with regard to its English and Spanish literal translations. But, as an idiom, it euphemistically means in a general way «faire l’amour» [to make love] (Caradec 1989: 136), and in a more restricted one «coït consommé juste après le repas» [to coit after lunch] (Colin, Mével & Leclère 1994: 99). Here again we have another peculiar case of false friends whose literal translation to any of the other aforementioned languages would be meaningless. As otherwise happens to most idioms since idioms always have two different meanings at least. Both senses of idioms are grasped at once by hearers, and for such a reason the hearer may interpret them according to their literal meaning or according to the transferred meaning, or both at once (Nerlich and Chamizo Domínguez 1999; Nerlich and Clarke 2001). And (prendre) le café du pauvre has another characteristic. We can see a clear social criticism behind this idiom, which emerged when coffee was such an expensive beverage that it was prohibitive for poor people to afford it. And because coffee was a prohibitive beverage for poor people, coition became its most pleasurable substitute.

4.11. SUMMARY Semantic false friends emerge when a given word in a given language lexicalises any figurative occasional meaning and consequently converts it into one literal meaning of the word in question. At the same time their cognates in any other language do not experience their corresponding changes of meaning or experience them in any different way. Among all the figures of speech, the most generally used is metaphor, trope which allows explaining most semantic false friends that could be found in two or more given languages. However, one can fi nd several and various examples of the rest of tropes as I think I have shown in detail. In fact, according to John R. Searle’s account on metaphor, I argued in this chapter that the rest of the

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Semantics of False Friends 131 figures of speech are not but hyponyms of metaphor and that, in turn, metaphor itself would be a superordinate term with regard to the rest of tropes. In any case, whether we agree with Searle’s account on metaphor or do not, the fact is that one can fi nd examples of semantic false friends which have emerged from any tropes. And probably my list could be multiplied and become much more exhaustive if one considers other languages whose skill unfortunately I do not have, and, therefore, have been not able to use. In short, if my account on the relationship between figures of speech and semantic false friends is considered correct—or reasonable at least—I expect that it could be applied to the most different languages and, if so, new and much more interesting analyses could be made.

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5

Pragmatics of False Friends

5.1. SPOTTING MISTAKES I occasionally alluded in previous chapters—particularly when dealing with partial semantic false friends—to the context as the key for detecting when and whether two given words in two given languages work as false friends or they do not. So, the French noun bagne and the Spanish one baño would not be false friends in 17th-century speech nor in a context dealing with captives and prisoners; and therefore, both could be mutually synonymous, while it is highly probable that both were false friends in any other thematic or synchronic contexts. This means that some dependence on the context is unavoidable in order to detect whether a given term did work or did not work as a false friend in a given time and under a given circumstance. For this reason some pragmatic strategies are needed in order to detect and, if so, to try to rebuild the sense of a text or an utterance in which one could suspect the existence of a false friend. In this respect there are three main contexts where mistakes and misunderstandings originated in false friends abound: 1. In the utterances of a foreign speaker who has not enough command on the language s/he is trying to speak and/or, even having an acceptable command, s/he has been deceived by the meaning which a given term has in his/her own mother tongue. 2. In texts which have been translated from other languages. 3. In borrowings and calques, which, as it has been argued previously, use to be an inexhaustible source of semantic false friends. The fi rst case can be explained by appealing to any lack of speaker’s expertise in the TL (target language); the second case can be explained by appealing to any lack of translator’s expertise in the SL (source language) and/or in the TL; and, eventually, the third case can be explained by appealing to any linguistic interference between two (or more) given languages. Now, if things were so easy and false friends’ problem could be reduced to achieving an adequate competence in both languages on the part of the speaker or both an adequate competence and expertise on the part of

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translator, this problem could be easily solved theoretically and practically. It would need only that the speakers/translators become equally competent in both languages and the problem should be solved and dissolved by itself. Nevertheless, in fact, things are much more complex; so that the topic is needed of some further explanations which go beyond the easy resort to the lack of speaker/translator’s expertise. And, with regard to the text or utterance where a (possible) false friend could appear, two different basic circumstances can be found: 1. That the resulting text in the TL makes sense in spite of the fact that the speaker has been a victim of the trap caused by any false friend. 2. That the resulting text in the TL does not make sense or one may detect something odd, incoherent and/or inconsistent in it. Nevertheless, in spite of this dichotomic classification and, as usual in human things, I would stress that some intermediate cases could be argued as well. I particularly mean the ones in which a given utterance could make sense or could not according to the different levels of competence on the part of hearers/readers, or according to a given sociolect, or because of any other reason. So, an exhaustive account of all these possibilities should be carried out from a more complex classification such as the one which could be provided by fussy logic. However, in order to make my account on the topic a bit quicker, I will methodologically work according to the two aforementioned alternatives and only allude to any intermediate cases on occasions. Thus, let us analyse both possible main alternatives by appealing to actual examples excerpted from newspapers and books.

5.1.1. The resulting utterance or text in the TL makes sense When the resulting text makes sense in the TL, it is highly probable that the false friend could be undetectable in spite of the fact that the speaker/writer wanted to mean anything different with regard to what the hearer/translator actually did understand. Let us consider, in order to illustrate this possibility, the different meanings of the French adjective spirituel/spirituelle. On the one hand, that adjective is synonymous with immatériel/immatérielle [immaterial], mental/mentale [mental], mystique [mystic, mystical] or religieux/religieuse [religious] (Bertaud du Chazaud 1983: 459); and, consequently, can be translated into English as spiritual, «of or pertaining to, affecting or concerning, the spirit or higher moral qualities, esp. as regarded in a religious aspect» (OED), or into Spanish as espiritual, «perteneciente o relativo al espíritu» and «dicho de una persona: Muy sensible y poco interesada por lo material» (DRAE). But, on the other hand and in addition to the meaning shared with its English and Spanish cognates, the French adjective has developed the second order meanings of amusant/amusante [amusing, funny], brillant/brillante [brilliant], fin/fine

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[subtle], humoristique [jocular, humorous], ingénieux/ingénieuse [clever, witty], intelligent/intelligente [smart, intelligent], malicieux/malicieuse [malicious, spiteful], piquant/piquante [spicy], plaisant/plaisante [pleasant, pleasing] or vif/vive [sharp, clever] (Bertaud du Chazaud 1983: 459); which probably are its most salient meanings nowadays. For such a reason the title of the Chapter V of the second part of Miguel de Cervantes’ Don Quixote, which in Spanish is «De la discreta y graciosa plática que pasó entre Sancho Panza y su mujer Teresa Panza, y otros sucesos dignos de felice recordación» [Of the shrewd and droll conversation that passed between Sancho Panza and his wife Teresa Panza, and other matters worthy of being duly recorded], has been translated into French as «Du spirituel, profond et gracieux entretien qu’eurent ensemble Sancho Panza et sa femme Thérèse Panza, ainsi que d’autres événements dignes d’heureuse souvenance.» Now, in many cases the salient meaning of the French adjective spirituel/spirituelle could be disambiguated when such an adjective is a member of a given idiom or collocation, or the possible salient meaning is demanded by the context because the others would make no sense in a given context. So, cases such as the collocations être spirituel, exercises spirituels, leader spirituel, père spirituel or vie spirituelle can be literally translated into English as spiritual being, spiritual exercises, spiritual leader, spiritual father and spiritual life, respectively, without taking the risks of being a victim of any mistake. And what is said about the English collocations can be exactly said about the Spanish collocations ser espiritual, ejercicios espirituales, líder espiritual, padre espiritual and vida espiritual. Nevertheless, since the French adjective is much more polysemous than its English and Spanish cognates are, some French utterances can be misunderstood when the French adjective is used in both senses either because the speaker wants to achieve any particular implicature or because s/he is not aware of it, or both. For instance, one can say in French “À dire vrai, les exercices spirituels ne sont point l’idéal d’une vie spirituelle” and means “To be honest, the spiritual exercises are not the ideal of a spicy life at all” or “To be honest, the humorous exercises are not the ideal of a spiritual life at all,” in spite of the fact that the standard salient meanings of exercises spirituels and vie spirituelle are spiritual excercises and spiritual life, respectively. And it goes without saying that this play on words seems to me impossible to be translated neither into English nor into Spanish. I assume that in this previous case the speaker is aware of the play on words in his/her utterance, but one also can imagine another example in which the speaker is trying to mean a single thing although the hearer can understand two different things, either alternatively or both at once. For instance, the French sentence “J’ai maintenu un long entretien spirituel avec lui” can be understood either as “I held a long spiritual conversation with him” or “I held a long witty (or agreeable) conversation with him.” In that case, if the speaker wanted to mean witty when s/he says “J’ai maintenu un long entretien spirituel avec lui,” and does not spiritual, the result

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is a misunderstanding, although “I held a long spiritual conversation with him” makes sense in English as well. And, if the context does not provide further data, the actual meaning of “J’ai maintenu un long entretien spirituel avec lui” will be impossible to be guessed. And even one can imagine that, as in the previous example, the speaker consciously wanted to play on both meanings of spirituel/spirituelle and tried to mean witty and spiritual at once, although the translator into English (or into Spanish) cannot translate but one of both possible interpretations, even whether s/he is conscious of the original polysemy. Previous examples have been imagined by me, but the problem stressed can be found in actual texts. Let us consider this matter by appealing to the actual Spanish translation of a text from a French 18th century-philosopher. This text has been excerpted from Claude-Adrien Helvétius’ book De l’esprit, which was originally published in 1758 and translated into English as soon as 1759 with the title of De l’Esprit: or, Essays on the Mind. And, as it was to be expected given the title of the book, the adjective spirituel/spirituelle is widely used according to its various senses. That obliges the translator into other languages to look for the most convenient term in the TL in each case to translate such an adjective. And unfortunately the choice is not always the best one. This is the case of the following quote where Helvétius refers to the language of lovers: [2] «Rien de plus insipide pour un vieillard que la conversation de deux amants. L’homme insensible, mais spirituel, est dans le cas du vieillard; le langage simple du sentiment lui paroît plat; il cherche, malgré lui, à le relever par quelque tour ingénieux qui décèle toujours en lui le défaut de sentiment» (Helvétius 1967-69: 148. My emphasis). [2] has actually been translated into Spanish as: [2.1] «No hay nada más insípido para un anciano que la conversación de dos amantes. El hombre insensible, pero espiritual, está en el caso del anciano: el lenguaje simple del sentimiento le parece monótono y, a pesar suyo, intenta siempre animarlo con algún giro ingenioso, lo que revela en él la falta de sentimiento» [There is nothing more insipid for an old man that the talk of two lovers. The insensible man, but spiritual, is in the case of the old man: feeling’s simple language seems to him monotonous and, in spite of him, always tries to liven up it with some witty expression, which reveals his lack of feeling] (Helvétius 1984: 465). It seems obvious, according to what the text itself says, that Helvétius is arguing in [2] that the insensible old man thinks that lovers’ talk seems to him monotonous and tasteless and that, for such a reason, he tries to liven up such a language by means of his wit. In such a context it is highly

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plausible to think that spirituel does not mean spiritual, but witty, brilliant or spicy. In any case, if we assume that the reader of [2.1] is not acquainted with French language and that, for such reason, cannot suppose that the original adjective in [2] is polysemous. If so, what the pretended reader will understand is something different with regard to what the text’s author actually meant when wrote [2]. And the problem previously described does not happen only when dealing with philosophical texts as [2] is, it happens in newspaper texts or in texts whose clarity should be an unavoidable and inexcusable condition as well. Let us analyse, in order to show that, both one text excerpted from the information to consumer about the ingredients of a given cold soup and several texts excerpted from everyday press. In all the cases it seems to be impossible that the reader imagines what actually the author of the original text wanted to mean, if the pretended reader only takes into account a pragmatic strategy and cannot check what is said in the TL against what actually was said in the SL. I will take my fi rst example from the contents description on a packet of a well-known brand of Spanish gazpacho (Alvalle™). That contents description is provided in several languages and, when some information is provided in several languages, one ought to assume that the standard customers will read such contents description in their own mother tongue. If so, we may methodologically assume as well that the pretended consumers only will understand the information which has been provided in their own languages. Well, among other languages, that information is provided in English, German and Spanish as follows: [3] «Ingredients: tomato, cucumber, pepper, onion, water, olive oil, wine vinegar, salt, garlic, and eventually lemon». [4] «Zutaten: Tomaten, Gurken, Paprika, Zwiebeln, Wasser, Olivenöl, Weinessig, Salz, Knoblauch, eventuell Zitrone». [5] «Ingredientes: tomate, pepino, pimiento, cebolla, agua, aceite de oliva virgen, vinagre de vino, sal, ajo y eventualmente zumo de limón». Now, what [3] means is very different with regard to what [4] and [5] mean as a result of the fact that the English adverb eventually is a full semantic false friend with regard to its German cognate eventuell and its Spanish one eventualmente; while, by contrast, the German adverb and the Spanish one are exactly synonymous between them and, therefore, the one can be substituted by the other and vice versa. But, given that the English adverb eventually is a full semantic false friend with regard to the German adverb eventuell and the Spanish one eventualmente, truth values of [3] should be very different with regard to truth values of [4] and [5], while truth values of [4] are equal than truth values of [5], provided that the rest

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of the terms in both phrases are synonymous as well. Although I will not develop this subject because it does not concern my main topic, I would point out that the rest of the terms are not exactly synonymous either. To be precise, Spanish «zumo de limón» [lemon juice] became, by means of a synecdoche, an entire lemon (even with its peel!) in English and German; and the quality of «virgen» [pure, high quality olive oil] is absent in English and German texts at all. Now, coming back to my topic, the English adverb eventually means «in the event, in the end, fi nally, ultimately» (OED) and therefore is synonymous with finally, ultimately, at last, in the end, in the long run or sooner or later (Fergusson 1986). By contrast, the German adverb eventuell and the Spanish one eventualmente mean «möglicherweise eintretend, für möglishe Sonderfälle bestimmt» (Duden) and «incierta o casualmente» (DRAE), respectively; and both ought to be translated into English as possibly, perhaps or maybe. If so, what the English reader will understand is that it is completely sure that the lemon juice has been added to the gazpacho—or the entire lemon, if what has been written in [3] is literally understood—while the German and the Spanish readers will understand that it is not sure that the lemon juice could be added. And again, if what is asserted in [3] is true, then what has been asserted in [4] and [5] may be true or false, depending on whether the cook thought fit to add lemon juice or did not. Obviously, one can verify whether what has been said in [4] and [5] is true or false by means of a chemical or organoleptic test; but, by contrast, this is impossible to be verified by means of a strict pragmatic strategy. In any case, if the German and Spanish texts were not accompanied by the English one, I probably did not realise the problem as long as both German and Spanish texts make sense, although a pretty different sense with regard to what is said in [3]. Now, the problem studied with regard to the lemon juice in question is not only a linguistic matter, more or less funny. It could have legal implications and complications as well. Let us suppose that the lemon juice does not appear after making some appropriate tests and a prickly, mischievous customer does realise it. In such a case, our prickly customer could sue company Alvalle™ company according to what the English text promised. By contrast, such a lawsuit would be inadmissible according to what the German and Spanish texts promised. But, in this last case, German and Spanish speakers could sue the company because of its information is deceitful. In other words, if the addition of lemon juice has been forgotten, the company could be prosecuted either by English speakers or by German and Spanish speakers, or both. And to add insult to injury, English and German speakers could sue the company if the entire lemon has been not added; Spanish speakers could sue the company if the olive oil has not the highest quality, while German and English speakers do not. And events with eventually and its cognates in other languages do not come to an end in this point. In fact, misunderstandings caused by the English adverb and its cognates in Spanish, French or German can be found

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very frequently and anywhere. Let us analyse a few further cases I found in newspapers. The rise of home prices all over the world and the fi nancial bubble caused by this alarming increase caused the Spanish newspaper El País to translate and publish an article on the topic which was originally published in The Economist. In this context, the Spanish translation asserted the following: [6] «La escalada actual de precios inmobiliarios es la mayor burbuja fi nanciera de la historia. Cuanto más se hinche, mayor será su eventual explosión» («Después de la caída», in El País, June 19th 2005, p. 14). Again, [6] makes sense in Spanish. Now, given that the Spanish adjective eventual means «sujeto a cualquier evento o contingencia» [possible, potential] (DRAE) and, consequently, is synonymous with English adjectives possible or potential, what the anonymous translator is asserting in [6] is that the fi nancial bubble only possibly shall exploit; that is to say, it might or might not occur. And that the size of such a possible/probable explosion will depend on the previous size of the fi nancial bubble. By contrast, what cannot be entailed in any case from [6] is that the anonymous translator is completely sure that such an explosion will happen unavoidably in fact. In other words, according to what [6] literally says, this bust may or may not happen; which, since it shall be true in any case, no fortune teller is needed to assert such a truism. If so, a plausible periphrasis of [6] in Spanish might be the following one: [6.1] “La escalada actual de precios inmobiliarios es la mayor burbuja fi nanciera de la historia. Cuanto más se hinche, mayor será su posible (o potencial) explosión” [the global housing boom is the biggest fi nancial bubble in history. The bigger the boom, the bigger the possible (or potential) bust]. Now, if the Spanish reader does actually understand [6] just as it has been previously and metalinguistically explained, s/he does understand [6] according to what the Spanish text itself says, although “eventually” s/he might understand something very different with regard to the original English text did actually say. The original English text actually and literally read as follows: [7] «The global housing boom is the biggest fi nancial bubble in history. The bigger the boom, the bigger the eventual bust» («After the fall», in The Economist, June 6, 2005). But, as the English adjective eventual means «occurring at the end of or resulting from a process or period of time» (OED) and consequently is synonymous with final, ultimate, resulting, consequent, prospective or inevita-

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ble (Fergusson 1986) and never with possible or potential, then the English adjective cannot be translated into Spanish as eventual without changing truth values of utterances where such a substitution is made. Furthermore, the salient implicature of the use of eventual in [7] is that the reader does understand that the text’s author is completely convinced that the fi nancial bubble will burst sooner or later, while such explosion is only a mere possibility in its Spanish translation. If so, while a plausible periphrasis of [6] might be [6.1], a parallel plausible periphrasis of [7] might be [7.1]: [7.1] “The global housing boom is the biggest fi nancial bubble in history. The bigger the boom, the bigger the inevitable (o final) bust.” In all events, what is relevant for my argument is that [6] and [7] make sense in both languages, although [6] is not synonymous of [7] just because the English adjective eventual and the Spanish adjective eventual are full semantic false friends. And, given that [6] makes sense in Spanish, it is highly probable that any Spanish reader could not realise that its meaning is actually completely different with regard to the one that the original text had in its SL, unless s/he might consult the English text itself, as I did. These divergent meanings that the English adjective eventual and the English adverb eventually have with regard to their Spanish cognates are on a par with the ones of the French adjective éventuel/éventuelle and the French adverb éventuellement. Accordingly, the Spanish and French terms may be considered synonymous and mutually translatable, while both Spanish and French terms are full semantic false friends with regard to their English cognates. The fact that the English adverb eventually and its French cognate éventuellement are semantic false friends allowed Pierre Daninos, counting on his readers were conscious of that, to exploit humorously and cognitively such a phenomenon from time to time, and ironically imitate Major Thompson’s way of speaking, being Major Thompson the main character of his novel Les carnets du major W. Marmaduke Thompson. Découverte de la France et des Français: [8] «Quand un Anglais croise une jolie femme dans la rue, il la voit sans la regarder, ne se retourne jamais et continue à la voir correctement dans son cerveau; très souvent, quand un Français croise une jolie femme dans la rue, il regarde d’abord ses jambes pour voir si elle est aussi bien qu’elle en a l’air, se retourne pour avoir une meilleure vue de la question, et eventually, s’aperçoit qu’il suit le même chemin qu’elle» [When an Englishman passes a pretty woman in the street he sees her without looking at her, never turns round and continues to see her correctly in his mind. Usually, when a Frenchman passes a pretty woman in the street, he fi rst looks at her legs to see if she really is as attractive as she looked; then he turns round to have a better outlook of the sub-

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ject, and eventually (both possibly and finally) realises that he is going the same way as she does] (Daninos 1990: 63-64. Original emphasis). [9] «En effet, l’émeute grondait à Calcutta, la police avait dû ouvrir le feu sur la foule et il y avait eu eventually deux cents morts» [Really, there were threats of a rising in Calcutta, the police had to open fi re on the mob, and eventually (both finally and possibly) there had been two hundred killed] (Daninos 1990: 142. Original emphasis). Obviously, any French reader, who is aware of both the French and the English codes, gives a faint smile when reading [8] and [9], or at least Daninos tried to get so. And such a smile is only possible as long as the reader “reads” finally and possibly at once in both cases. Now, if double entendres in [8] seem to be a mere straightforward witticism, in [9] Daninos reaches the irony, the sarcasm, and even the black humour, since it seems to be typical of the best black humour to lead the reader to read at once that these two hundred killed in question are actual and merely possible as well. And to come to an end this section, let us consider another case which can be checked in the Spanish translation of another two texts originally written in English. The fi rst text has been excerpted from an article published in a newspaper, the second one from a literary work. In both cases the translator has been a victim of the graphic similarity between the English noun extravagance and the Spanish one extravagancia, which, in spite of their similarity and their common etymological origin, are full semantic false friends as well. Really, both nouns are cognate since both derive from the adjective extravagante/extravagant, which, in turn, derives from the Latin adjective extravagans. Now, the Spanish noun extravagancia means «cualidad de extravagante» or «cosa o acción extravagante» (DRAE), which makes it synonymous with English nouns oddity or eccentricity; while the English noun extravagance means «the quality of being extravagant or of exceeding just or prescribed limits, esp. those of decorum, probability, or truth; unrestrained, excess; fantastic absurdity (of opinions, conduct, etc.); outrageous exaggeration or violence (of language)», «an instance or kind of extravagance; an extravagant notion, statement, piece of conduct, etc.; an irrational excess, an absurdity» or «excessive prodigality or wastefulness in expenditure, household management, etc.» (OED). Accordingly, extravagance is synonymous with 1) prodigality, lavishness, wastefulness, profl igacy, overspending, recklessness or improvidence; and 2) immoderation, unrestraint, excess, absurdity, wildness, folly, preposterousness or unreasonableness (Fergusson 1986). If so, English extravagance should be translated into Spanish, depending on the contexts, as derroche, prodigalidad or despilfarro and inmoderación, exceso, absurdo or locura. By contrast, the English noun extravagance cannot be (correctly) translated into Spanish as extravagancia or rareza. Since the English noun is never synonymous with

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oddity or eccentricity, it cannot be (correctly) translated as extravagancia, unless running the risk of leading the reader of the resulting text in the TL to understand something very different with regard to what the author of the text actually meant in the SL. And so in spite of, or just because of, the resulting text in the TL makes sense; and, since it makes sense, the reader shall not be able to detect any inconsistency or absurdity in it. This is the case of the following text: [10] «A la mayoría de los europeos corrientes les resulta ridículo e incomprensible que todo el Parlamento Europeo vaya y venga entre dos grandes edificios en Bruselas y Estrasburgo, un traslado que cuesta al contribuyente europeo más de 200 millones de euros al año. Es una locura que no se le habría ocurrido ni siquiera al cardenal Wolsey—el creador original de Hampton Court—en la cúspide de su extravagancia» (Timothy Garton Ash. «La UE necesita ampliar la investigación científica. El desafío a Europa de China e India» in El País, November, 30, 2005. Spanish translation by M. L. Rodríguez Tapia). The author of [10] is criticising the fact that the European Parliament has two different seats and that costs lots of money to the European taxpayer. Such wastefulness is considered by the text’s author a folly which might not even occur to Cardinal Wolsey—the well-known Henry VIII’s gobetween—on his oddity’s zenith. So, according to what [10] literally says, this text is calling Cardinal Wolsey a rare fellow whose delusions of grandeur led him to Hampton Court building up. And, of course, there is nothing incongruous or absurd in [10]. In fact, it might be possible and plausible that Timothy Garton Ash was alluding to Cardinal Wolsey’s oddity and, consequently, he actually wrote oddity or eccentricity in his original text. But, if the Spanish reader understands [10] according to such an interpretation, it has been possible because the translator has been deceived by the divergent meanings that Spanish extravagancia and English extravagance have. In any case, any Spanish reader will make sense of [10] and, probably, s/he will not realise that the original text criticised Cardinal Wolsey’s waste and not Cardinal Wolsey’s oddity by no means. So, the only way to discover this misunderstanding cannot be the one of carrying out any pragmatic strategy, but checking the original text, where, certainly, Cardinal Wolsey is called prodigal, spendthrift or wasteful. Although the fact that Cardinal Wolsey were prodigal, spendthrift or wasteful does not necessarily entails that, in addition, he were rare or odd as well. One can reasonably argue that Cardinal Wolsey might be considered odd just because he was wasteful and even though he was wasteful because he was rare, but such an argument cannot be inferred either from the original text or from its translation, since the original text literally says the following:

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[11] «It is ludicrous, and simply incomprehensible to most ordinary Europeans, that the entire European parliament still commutes between two vast buildings in Brussels and Strasbourg, at a cost to the European taxpayer of well over €200m a year. This is a folly that even Cardinal Wolsey, the original developer of Hampton Court, would not have contemplated, at the height of his wildest extravagance» (Timothy Garton Ash. «Europe must change to meet the competition from Asia. Closing the Strasbourg parliament might be one way to start» in The Guardian, November 27, 2005). And something similar happens with a passage from one of the translations into Spanish of Gilbert K. Chesterton’s Orthodoxy. Although in this case a slightly different nuance can be detected which could point to some incongruity. If so, this text could help me linking with the next section. Anyway it seems clear that its translator into Spanish did not notice anything rare or incongruous when s/he wrote the following: [12] «Mis sabios parecían jactarse de un despilfarro temerario. Yo me sentía como poseído de una sagrada codicia (porque la economía es mucho más romántica que la extravagancia). Para ellos, el torrente de estrellas era como una inacabable renta de piezas de a medio penique; yo, en cambio, con el oro del sol y con la plata de la luna sentía lo que sentiría un chico de escuela que se hallase un soberano y un chelín» (Chesterton, undated: 127. My emphasis). Gilbert K. Chesterton is speaking in this text about saving and waste and, accordingly, it seems hardly incoherent he compares “economy” and “oddity”. Although, even so, this text could make some sense yet if the reader assumes that economía means «administración eficaz y razonable de los bienes» [efficient and reasonable administration of goods] (DRAE) and extravagancia means any inefficient and unreasonable use of goods; which not necessarily could be any waste, but only any different use with regard to the standard one of goods in a given culture or society. In any case, [12] makes less sense than [10] does and, obviously, this scarce lack of sense is the result of the fact that this anonymous translator has been deceived by another couple of semantic false friends as well. And so can be verified by appealing again to Chesterton’s original text: [13] «They showed only a dreary waste; but I felt a sort of sacred thrift. For economy is far more romantic than extravagance. To them stars were an unending income of half-pence; but I felt about the golden sun and the silver moon as a schoolboy feels if he has one sovereign and one shilling» (Chesterton 1927: 113. My emphasis).

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144 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends And as well as the translator of [12] allowed himself to be deceived by graphic and etymological similarity of Spanish extravagancia and English extravagance, another later translator did (correctly) translated English extravagance as Spanish despilfarro: [14] «Los materialistas se mostraban con ella de una lúgubre prodigalidad; yo la sentí como una especie de ahorro sagrado. Porque la economía es mucho más romántica que el despilfarro. Para ellos, las estrellas eran una entrada sin fi n de medios centavos; pero yo, por el sol dorado y la luna de plata, me sentí como se siente un escolar que tiene en su haber una esterlina de oro, y un peso plateado» (Chesterton 1986: 40-–41. My emphasis). Obviously, [14] makes much more sense than [12] does, even though one could argue that waste is much more romantic than economy is, although such an objection should concern what Chesterton himself said, not what his translator says.

5.1.2. The resulting utterance/text does not make sense in the TL All the examples of (erroneous) translations analysed in previous section make sense, although their senses in TL are pretty different with regard to the senses that the original texts have in their SL. And the fact that the alluded translations make sense although such a sense may be pretty different and sometimes contradictory with regard to the senses of the original texts, allows the translator to be seduced by the hidden tramp of false friends. And for that reason the reader is not able to detect any incongruence or default when reading the texts; since it easily might be true that the text’s author actually did not mean what his/her translator makes him/her to mean. But, when there is something odd or incongruous in the resulting text of the TL and/or the context suggests that the utterance in question does not seem to be the most adequate, then a pragmatic strategy might be started on the part of the reader/hearer in order to rebuilt what the speaker/ writer meant or the precise term which deceived him/her and which makes that the utterance/text is incongruous or senseless. Although, obviously, in order to carry out such a strategy some command on the SL is needed on the part of the reader/hearer. If the reader/hearer has not such a command, s/he might detect any incongruence or lack of sense, but s/he will not be able to explain him/herself the reason which allows him/her to explain the incongruence detected, nor, therefore, discover what the speaker/author actually tried to meant with him/her utterance/text. Again the newspaper El País makes me another priceless gift in order to illustrate this subject. Recently this newspaper published an article where it was discussed whether, during World War II, British Government did assure the Spanish Government starting talks on the tiresome matter of

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Gibraltar when the war were fi nished, on the purpose of giving back the sovereignty on the Rock to Spain. And so in order to safeguard the Spanish neutrality during that armed conflict. In such a context the author of the article asserted the following: [15] «Los españoles también han reclamado que, o bien en julio, o bien en octubre de 1941, el duque de Alba recibió seguridades de que ‘el Gobierno de Su Majestad podría eventualmente considerar la reclamación del Gobierno español sobre Gibraltar’» (Walter Oppenheimer. «El ‘dossier’ secreto sobre Gibraltar», in El País, January 2, 2005, p. 10. My emphasis). Which literally means: [15.1] «Spaniards also claimed that, either in July or in October 1941, Duke of Alba received assurances about the fact that ‘His Majesty’s Government might possibly/perhaps think over Spanish Government’s claim about Gibraltar’» (Walter Oppenheimer. «The secret ‘dossier’ on Gibraltar»). Well, the author of the text asserts, on the one hand, that duke of Alba “received assurances,” that is, that the British Government guaranteed duke of Alba that talks on Gibraltar will start when the war were fi nished; and, on the other hand, that such assurances lied that the subject of Gibraltar “might be possibly” think over, this is, that it might be or might not think over. And since one only can grant certainties or give assurances on what one undertakes to carry out for certain, again the incongruence of that text appears after the most superficial of examinations as well. How is it possible to “receive assurances” about something which only is eventualmente glimpsed, that is, «incierta o casualmente» [uncertain or by chance] (DRAE)? Even if one takes into account that diplomatic jargon is characteristically ambiguous, vague, and euphemistic. This lack of sense of [15] could be avoided if the journalist were conscious of the meaning that the Spanish adverb eventualmente actually has, which does not coincide with the one of the English adverb eventually at all, and, consequently, would write something similar to: [16] «Los españoles también han reclamado que, o bien en julio, o bien en octubre de 1941, el duque de Alba recibió seguridades de que ‘el Gobierno de Su Majestad podría finalmente (o a la postre) considerar la reclamación del Gobierno español sobre Gibraltar’». The incongruence of [15] consists in asserting at once that someone receives assurances and that such assurances are only possible. Although I tend to think that [15] is a translation from English and, if so, it is a clear error, it also could be a case of linguistic interference where the Span-

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ish adverb eventualmente is getting the meaning which its English cognate eventually has. If so and if the Spanish adverb ends up getting the sense that the English adverb has, we are witnessing a change of meaning as has happened in other cases, such as the ones fastidiously studied by Mendiluce Cabrera and Hernández Bartolomé (2005); including the case of the noun evento, which did not officially get the meaning of acontecimiento [event] to 1984 (Prado 2001: 198–199).

5.2 MAKING SENSE OF (APPARENTLY) SENSELESS UTTERANCES When the hearer/reader senses that there is something odd or incongruous about the text/utterance, s/he will start a pragmatic strategy which allows him/her to rebuild what the speaker/author tried to mean with his/her text/ utterance. That strategy is basically the same as the one used by hearers to follow in their own mother tongue when they try to identify any new figure of speech which has been heard for the fi rst time or is few lexicalised yet (Chamizo Domínguez 1998: 31–44). Really, when any metaphor (or any other figure of speech) is proposed for the fi rst time, and, since any new figure of speech entails some deviation from the literal or standard meaning of a given term in a given synchronic stage of the language in question, the hearer must calculate the possible meaning(s) of the term used in a transferred way. Analogously, when a translator or a foreign speaker are victims of the phenomenon of linguistic interference in which false friends consist, the reader/hearer must calculate the possible meanings of the speaker/translator’s utterance, which, prima facie, is not but an absurdity or a patent “flouting” or “violation” of the standard meaning of the utterance in question, as the case of metaphor is (Grice 1989: 34). Since, according to Grice, the use of any figure of speech seems to be a flouting, contravention or violation of the literal meaning of words, a pragmatic strategy is needed on the part of the hearer in order to correctly understand what the speaker tried to mean. Let us see it by appealing to an example which may be interpreted depending on several figures of speech. In the main, for the correct interpretation of a speaker’s utterance, knowledge normally shared by the speaker and the hearer in a natural way, carries a certain immediate contextual knowledge; the interpretative instructions provided by the speaker is usually sufficient. Under normal circumstances, keeping one (or all three) of these criteria in mind, enables the process of communication to be performed with reasonable fluency. Let us consider a concrete case which may serve as a model for many other cases. Let us suppose that someone says to us: [17] “This morning I met Dr. Martin.”

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On the assumption that all the terms in [17] are being used in accordance with their most obvious and literal meaning and that, both the speaker and the hearer know who is identified by the name Martin, there are two possible interpretations: 1) that it is true that Mr. Martin is a doctor, that is, «a person who holds the highest university degree», and/or «a person who is qualified to practise medicine» or «certain early ‘fathers’ distinguished by their eminent learning, so as to have been teachers not only in the Church, but of the Church, and by their heroic sanctity» (OED), although we may methodologically disregard this last sense so as not to complicate the example more than is necessary and because one tends not to meet doctors of the Church very often; or 2) that, quite the contrary, the speaker is mistaken and Mr. Martin has not received such a high academic honour, professional qualification or ecclesiastical honour. In the fi rst case, the communication will take place fluently without any kind of interference and the speaker will be able to proceed by adding more information on the same topic or by changing the topic. In the second case, the hearer, on the assumption that the Neil L. Wilson, Willard van Orman Quine, and Donald Davidson’s Principle of Charity is applied and s/he assumes that the speaker is not deliberately lying him/her and, therefore, s/he is constrains to maximizse the truth or rationality in the speaker’s sayings, will understand [17] as a mistake, and will probably point out the speaker’s mistake to him/her with statements like: [17.1] “Martin isn’t a doctor” or [17.2] “I didn’t know that Martin was a doctor”. With [17.1] the hearer states categorically that Martin neither posses the academic degree of doctor nor is a physician and informs the speaker as much. If the speaker has no contrary evidence, s/he will have to recognise his mistake with no more ado. With [17.2] the hearer introduces a restrictive clause, “I didn’t know,” which implies that it might be the hearer who is mistaken about Mr. Martin’s doctorate. In that case, the speaker can confi rm what s/he said in [17] and specifies it with a statement like [17.3] “Martin defended his thesis only yesterday,” [17.4] “Martin was licensed to practice as a physician/surgeon/dentist/veterinarian only yesterday”. Or, on the contrary, s/he might recognise that s/he was the one who had made a mistake about Martin’s academic degree. In any case, in all these examples, the term doctor is used literally and the decision about whether is stated in [17] is true or not does require any subsequent pragmatic analysis of any substance. Now, if we assume that both the speaker and the hearer know expressly that Martin is not a doctor, then further prior contextual assumptions are

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required for the hearer to attribute the exact meaning to what the speaker meant when s/he uttered [17]. Should, then, both the speaker and the hearer know that Martin is not a doctor (and each knows that the other knows), the hearer has to begin an interpretative process leading him/her to think that the speaker wanted to state something beyond the patent falsity of what [17] literally means. In other words, an interpretative process is triggered off in the hearer leading him/her to understand [17] as a figurative utterance in which doctor may be the focus of one of the following three figures of speech—a metaphor, an irony or a euphemism. Let us see what steps the hearer must take in each of these cases to unravel the possible figurative meanings which the speaker may have used when uttering [17], and to discover the truth that is concealed behind the patent falsity of that utterance, if it is interpreted literally. When the hearer knows that the speaker knows that [17] is literally false, an interpretative process is triggered in the hearer, on the understanding that the speaker is cooperating with him/her, to reach the point where s/he can postulate some other meaning of [17] which is different from the literal one and which fits the knowledge and beliefs that the speaker and the hearer share about Mr. Martin. It is in this process that the hearer must give a figurative meaning to doctor. The process of assumptions that the hearer must initiate must contain, basically, the following steps: 1) the speaker cannot mean that Martin is literally a doctor, because we both know that he is not; 2) however his/her utterance seems to be an assertion constructed in accordance with the rules of English syntax, and there is no reason to believe that his/her utterance is anything but a statement in which s/he is trying to communicate with me some truth about Mr. Martin; 3) it is possible that the speaker does not have a sufficient command of English and is mistaken about the usual meanings of the terms used is his/her statement, but, so far, s/he has conversed in such a way that I have no basis for supporting that hypothesis; 4) it could be that the speaker has decided to utter meaningless words and that s/he does not want to cooperate with me, but neither do I have any reason to believe that s/he is not cooperating with me, that s/he wants to tease me or deceive me; 5) the most reasonable thing in these circumstances is to think that the speaker is trying to tell me something that should make sense to both of us on the basis of our beliefs, convictions, linguistic usage and on the basis of the social relationship that exists between us and of the prior knowledge that we both share about Mr. Martin; 6) as I have discarded the literal meaning of his/her statement, as being highly improbable, I am obliged to think that the speaker must believe that I have enough ability to attribute some meaning to his/her statement that is different from the literal one; 7) there are times when, to highlight some defect or quality of the object, we do not usually refer to it with the term that literally denotes it, but resort to some figure of speech and confer a figurative meaning upon one or more words; 8) a figure of speech that is quite common is metaphor; 9) I shall try a metaphorical interpretation of

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[17]; and 10) since the speaker and I both know that Martin is a bullfighter and that the higher degree in bullfighter’s art is usually referred to metaphorically as receiving the doctorate, the speaker must want to convey to me with his/her utterance [17] something along the lines of [17.5] “This morning I met the bullfighter Martin”. All this interpretative process is obviously subject to restrictions, believes, knowledge, opinions and social usage of the participants in the linguistic exchange, so that failings or misunderstandings in interpreting metaphors correctly—analogous, moreover, to those which commonly arise when we use words in their literal meanings—are due to the fact that one of the participants does not share the same knowledge and beliefs as the other. Furthermore, for the figurative meaning of an utterance to be triggered in the hearer it does not have to be semantically anomalous. For the interpretative process to be triggered it is enough for the literal interpretation to be improbable in a given context. In other words, as we shall see shortly, each specific context makes one of the several possible interpretations of an utterance more likely than the rest. In view of the fact that [17] is open to both a literal and a metaphorical interpretation, let us now see in which context a euphemistic interpretation of [17] is more likely and what pragmatic strategy the hearer will have to employ to arrive at an ironic interpretation. If, for instance, the speaker and the hearer know that Martin is completely illiterate, the literal, and metaphorical interpretations of [17] will be plausibly disregarded and, in that, case, the interpretation that will be most reasonable and plausible in such a context will be the one that makes [17] ironic. To arrive at an ironic interpretation of [17] the process of the pragmatic strategy will be the same as in the previous case up to and including assumption 7. From that point, the assumptions will have to be as follows: 8’) a figure of speech frequently used when one wants to say something impolite about someone without meaning it literally is irony; 9’) I will attempt an ironic interpretation of [17]; and 10’) in accordance with the ironic interpretation of [17], the speaker must meant exactly the opposite of what his/her utterance literally means, that is, his/her utterance must mean something like: [17.6] “This morning I met Martin, the illiterate”. By resorting to irony, the speaker can afford to express his/her true beliefs or feelings with respect to the hearer and/or third persons, as in this case, without having to do so literally, since [17.6] is a stronger, more aggressive statement about Martin that the ironic interpretation of [17], to a certain extent, irony is the reverse of metaphor, for, while metaphor tends, though not exclusively, to have a complimentary function for the

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target of the metaphor, irony usually has a critical or censorious function towards its target. And eventually, if the speaker and the hearer know that Martin is neither a doctor (in any of the literal senses of the noun doctor), nor a bullfighter, nor an illiterate, but that he usually speaks in a pompous manner, employing overblown vocabulary, then the most likely and plausible interpretation of [17] is euphemistic. And, by using euphemism, the speaker is able to make fun of Martin’s pomposity when s/he utters [17]. For the hearer, the process of assumptions will be identical to the earlier cases up to and including 7). From that point, the assumptions will take the following slant: 8’’) a figure of speech frequently used when one wants to mock someone or something is euphemism; 9’’) I will try a euphemistic interpretation of [17]; and 10’’) in accordance to a euphemistic interpretation of [17] the speaker must want to convey to me his/her mocking of Martin, so that [17] must mean something like: [17.7] “This morning I met that pompous jerk Martin”. The dividing line between irony and euphemism is not always clearcut. In fact, more often than not, irony and euphemism are superimposed on each other in the same utterance. In these cases, the expression on the speaker’s face or the tone of his/her voice usually enables the hearer to decide which interpretation to opt for. But, despite this, the communication process is performed quite fluently and the hearer has a method available to identify the figure of speech which the speaker used in each case. So far as we have seen how it is the context which, to a certain extent, requires of the hearer that a certain interpretation of the term in a given utterance be regarded as more plausible than any of the alternatives. Something similar happens when any foreign speaker or any translator is a victim of any false friend, particularly when a partial false friend is concerned since, as it has been previously stated, the emergence of partial semantic false friends can be diachronically explained by appealing to figures of speech. The basic steps which the hearer/reader will follow in order to rebuild what the speaker/translator tried to mean, when a possible false friend has been used and his/her utterance resulted incongruous in its context, could be the following ones: 1. It is impossible (or highly improbable at least) that the speaker would mean what his/her utterance actually means in the TL. 2. Since s/he has not got a good command of my language s/he probably means something else. 3. Most of the words in his/her utterance seem to make sense, although there is one at least which seems to be odd or incongruous in such context.

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4. Perhaps s/he uses the word in question incongruously/oddly because s/he has in mind any given, similar word in his/her own language, although such a term in his/her mother tongue means something different than the one s/he actually used in the TL. 5. Since I know/suppose that the word in question is a false friend, s/he probably would mean that other thing. 6. I will try to verify this by asking the speaker for a further explanation. 7. According to his/her new explanations, I now realise that s/he has been a victim of a false friend. 8. So, I should rebuild his/her utterance according to what I think s/he tried to mean. Let us consider some real examples in order to illustrate how these pragmatic strategies have actually been carried out. The protagonist of the fi rst case was a Spanish dean who resigned from his post. After his resignation the ex-dean met an English speaking friend, who without knowing that the dean resigned a few days before their meeting—and just because he did not know it—asked the dean for his work as dean. And the ex-dean answered his friend “I’ve recently dismissed” (sic), having in mind the Spanish utterance “He dimitido hace poco.” Now, although Spanish dimitir and English to dismiss derive in the last resort from the Latin verb dimittere, both the Spanish verb and the English one are full semantic false friends inasmuch as the salient meaning of the Spanish verb is «renunciar, hacer dejación de algo, como un empleo, una comisión, etc.» [to resign] (DRAE), while the English verb means «to send away or remove from office, employment, or position; to discharge, discard, expel» [‘destituir’ or ‘ser cesado/destituido’, in Spanish] (OED). In both cases the verb’s action suggests that someone abandoned a post; but, in to dismiss, one is obliged to such an abandon because committed any fault or crime, while, in dimitir, one abandons the post by oneself because one is tired, ill, sick, and so on. That is to say, the salient implicature of the use of the English verb to dismiss concerns with the fact that any person who acts as direct agent of the verb’s action committed any fault, crime or any inappropriate action at least. By contrast, the salient implicature when the Spanish verb dimitir is used is not that the concerned subject of the utterance committed any crime, although that implicature might be inferred in some contexts as well. Accordingly, needless to say, the ex-dean’s friend showed interested in the ex-dean supposed crime and asked him: “I cannot believe it. Which has been your crime?” And just at this very moment our ex-dean realised he had been the victim of a pair of false friends and, for such a reason, led to his friend to get such an (erroneous) implicature. And also needless to say that at this very moment our ex-dean had to retake the talk and make clear his friend that, actually, he voluntary abandoned his post without being guilty of any crime.

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152 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends The previously mentioned case takes place in the sphere of an informal talk between friends and could be explained by appealing to the lack of an adequate reflection which is usual in informal talks. But other cases concerning much more transcendental subjects can be alleged as well. This is what happened with the almost general blunder of the press in Romance speaking countries when the last will and testament (a kind of diary, to be precise) of Pope John Paul II was published on occasion of his death. As it is well-known, for a few years and as long as the Pontiff’s health was worsening, the press made a recurrent topic of his possible resignation. In fact, I am of the opinion that the newspapers carried so much on the matter of the possible resignation of the Pope—or perhaps journalists wished so intensely that such an event would occur in order to have something to be written about—that they were eager to fi nd the slightest evidence of it. And, since it is a chance you cannot let go by, they “found” such desired evidence when the Pope’s last will and testament was eventually published after his death. And the “evidence” did appear in a passage written in the year 2000, where Pope John Paul II himself spoke about his “resignation” with the following words: [18] «In accordance with the designs of Providence, it was granted to me to live during the difficult century that is passing, and now, in the year during which my age reaches 80 years (octogesima adveniens), it is necessary to ask if it is not the time to repeat the words of the Biblical Simeon, Nunc dimittis» (Original italics). Since the publication of [18], the press hastened to maintain that the Pope’s testament corroborates the hypothesis about the his resignation. And it happened not only in the Romance speaking countries, but in the English speaking countries as well. In fact, the Timesonline’s headlines (April, 7, 2005) read «Last will reveals Pope’s resignation dilemma» (http://www. timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,20709-1558834,00.html; accessed 8 April 2005); and BBC News’s headlines (April, 7, 2005) read «Pope ‘considered standing down’. Pope John Paul II’s last will and testament indicates that he considered resigning in 2000, when he reached 80» (http://news.bbc. co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4420879.stm; accessed 8 April 2005). Although all of them should recognise that they were wrong because they committed two consecutive mistakes: 1) they misunderstood the Latin sentence «Nunc dimittis» as “resign now”; and 2) they did not realise that «Nunc dimittis» is actually a quote from the beginning of a well-known passage in Gospels called Simeon’s Song (Luke 2: 29), according to its Latin version provided by the Vulgate: [19] «Nunc dimittis servum tuum, Domine, secundum verbum tuum in pace».

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In fact, I am of the opinion that this general blunder might have originated in the Italian verb dimettersi [to resign (oneself)]. And what is said about the meaning of the Italian verb dimettersi can be said about its Spanish cognate dimitir, although the Italian verb is reflexive while the Spanish one is intransitive. In any case, both derive from the Latin verb dimittere. If we focus on Spanish dimitir, it should be stressed that it only means «renunciar, hacer dejación de algo, como un empleo, una comisión, etc.» [to resign] (DRAE) and always is intransitive; while the Latin verb is widely polysemous and means, among other things, to allow, to let, to send, to disperse, to discharge, to grant permission, to forgive, to free, to emancipate, to resign or to abandon; and therefore it can be either transitive or intransitive. And with regard to the second mistake, since «Nunc dimittis» has a direct agent, «servum tuum» [your servant], it is clear that it should be understood as meaning to allow or to let, which is as usually has been understood such a passage and, consequently, translated. By contrast, English language is not concerned with such a problem because the Latin verb dimittere may be translated into English as to dismiss when it is synonymous with to let or to allow; and, in fact, many English versions of the Bible do so. For instance, the New Revised Standard Version, which translates [19] as «Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word»; the Douay-Rheims, which provides «Now thou dost dismiss thy servant, O Lord, according to thy word in peace»; or eventually, the New International Version, which does it as «Sovereign Lord, as you have promised, you now dismiss your servant in peace» (My emphasis in all the three cases). And this phenomenon can be found even in the most attentive, wise, and brainy translations of philosophical, scientific or literary texts, where the translator has been deceived by any deceitful false friend. So, in the otherwise excellent translation into Spanish of John L. Austin’s Philosophical Papers (1961), the following assertion can be found: [20] «Puedo muy fácilmente arruinarlo, y lo haré si soy extravagante» [Literally, “I may very easily ruin him, and I shall if I am rare/odd/ queer”] (Austin 1989: 198). This, surprisingly, translates the following original English assertion: [21] «I may very easily ruin him, and I shall if I am extravagant». Now, while [21] makes sense in English because somebody may be ruined if I am wasteful, [20] makes no sense in Spanish because it may not be entailed that someone might be ruined because I am rare, queer or odd. And, given that [20] makes no sense, the reader is obliged to start with a pragmatic strategy in order to explain him/herself why [21] makes sense

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154 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends while [20] does not. And the result of such a pragmatic strategy is the discovery that the Spanish adjective extravagante is a full semantic false friend with regard to the English adjective extravagant. The salient meaning of the Spanish adjective extravagante is «raro, extraño, desacostumbrado, excesivamente peculiar u original» [rare, strange, unusual, excessively peculiar or original] (DRAE), while the salient meaning of its English cognate in a context where the ruin of someone is concerned should be «exceeding the bounds of economy or necessity in expenditure, mode of living, etc.; profuse, prodigal, wasteful» (OED). And therefore the second one is synonymous with prodigal, lavish, wasteful or spendthrift (Fergusson 1986), but never with odd or rare; which, as it has been previously alluded, are the exact English equivalent meanings of the Spanish adjective in question. And, what is said about these Spanish and English adjectives can be said about their derivatives extravagantemente and extravagantly or extravagancia and extravagance as well (Prado 2001: 208–209). And not only with regard to Spanish language, but with regard to other languages as well, as it is the case of Polish language (Szpila 2003: 141–142). The case previously studied can be detected as long as the Spanish translation makes no sense, but the hidden mousetraps of the English adjective extravagant seem to know no bounds, since it can be documented in various places. And so it is with regard to its other two main meanings— immoderate and costly. In order to illustrate that, let us consider a further example in which the meaning of immoderate is concerned and which adds a new nuance to the previous case. When I read for the first time «por considerar que trataba el tema confuciano de la lealtad con una emoción extravagante» (Venuti 1998: 144. My emphasis), I was not be able to detect anything anomalous in this utterance. Although it is not usual to call emotions “rare”, it might be that the original text’s author wanted to refer to any odd or eccentric emotion and, in fact, would write «He believed it treated the Confucian theme of loyalty with odd/eccentric emotion» or any other adjective which might be synonymous with Spanish extravagante. And however, when I checked the original text, I realised that its translator into Spanish was again a victim of the same trap than the translator of [20] was. And so because what actually and originally Venuti wrote was «He believed it treated the Confucian theme of loyalty with extravagant emotion» (Venuti 1998: 144. My emphasis). Now then, this case differs from the previous one, inasmuch as the Spanish translation could make some sense and inasmuch as extravagant is not here synonymous with prodigal or spendthrift, but with immoderate, excessive, exaggerated, preposterous, absurd or foolish. If so, a plausible (correct) translation of Venuti’s text could be “por considerar que trataba el tema confuciano de la lealtad con una emoción excesiva, inmoderada, exagerada o absurda”, instead of the one I am criticising. And, since the English adjective extravagant may be also synonymous with costly, dear, expensive, overpriced or exorbitant (Fergusson 1986), I

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do not give up hope of fi nding one of these days an example of this last as well. In fact, I have found in South American press the syntagm precios extravagantes with the meaning of extravagant/costly prices, but I am not able to assure whether these cases emerged from a misunderstanding of the English adjective or whether it is a particular meaning of the Spanish adjective in South America. The unusual syntagm precios extravagantes can be found as well in the writings of an excellent writer as Pablo Neruda was. In that respect, he wrote the following when speaking of his library: [22] «Premios literarios contantes y sonantes me ayudaron a adquirir ciertos ejemplares de precios extravagantes. Mi biblioteca pasó a ser considerable» [Ready cash from literary prizes helped me to buy some editions at extravagant/expensive prices. My library grew to a considerable size] (Neruda 1976: 374. My emphasis). But, in spite of the fact that [22] has been written by a writer whose mastery on Spanish language is beyond any reasonable doubt, I am afraid that Neruda’s assertion shall hardly understood—and even misunderstood—by any native speakers of Spanish if they do not know English language as well, at least by speakers of European dialect of Spanish. In any case, such a meaning is not documented in the DRAE. Perhaps the best evidence about the extreme oddity of the meaning of expensive for the Spanish adjective extravagante can be found by means of contrasting [22] with its English translation. Actually [22] has been translated into English as [22.1] «Ready cash from literary prizes helped me to buy some editions at outlandish prices. My library grew to a considerable size» (Neruda 1978: 272. My emphasis). Accordingly, the English translator has misunderstood what Neruda really meant and [22.1] says something quite different with regard to what [22] actually said. And, if someone back translates [22.1] into Spanish without knowing [22], the resulting text probably could be something like: [22.2] “Premios literarios contantes y sonantes me ayudaron a adquirir ciertos ejemplares de precios raros/desacostumbrados. Mi biblioteca pasó a ser considerable” [Ready cash from literary prizes helped me to buy some editions at odd/unusual prices. My library grew to a considerable size]. Anyway and in defence of the English translator, it should be stressed that any speaker of the European dialect of the Spanish language could misunderstand Neruda’s text as well. In short, if one takes into account the meanings of the Spanish adjective provided by the DRAE and its actual use in European Spanish, it is a real, full semantic false friend with regard to the three salient meanings of the English adjective extravagant,

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namely, prodigal, immoderate, and expensive. By contrast, if one takes into account its meanings in South American Spanish, Spanish extravagante is only a partial semantic false friend with regard to its English cognate extravagant, since the Spanish adjective also means expensive or costly, as Neruda’s text witnesses. Consequently, I dare to guess that the English translator of [22] fell victim to an exercise of her competence in Spanish; and so because «Mistakes are exercises of competences. Misinterpretations are not always due to the inexpertness or carelessness of the spectator; they are due sometimes to the carelessness and sometimes to the cunning of the agent or speaker. Sometimes, again, both are exercising all due skill and care, but it happens that the operations performed, or the words spoken, could actually be constituents of two or more different undertakings» (Ryle 1984: 60).

5.3. THE RECONSTRUCTION OF THE ORIGINAL TEXT A possible way for dealing with false friends and their subsequent misunderstandings when reading a translated text where the translator might be victim of any false friend is to try to fi nd into various readers understand it about. The most obvious way to do that is to ask them to explain the meaning of such a text by means of any gloss or by means of substituting the term in question by any of its possible synonyms in the TL. But, as this process could be complicated and tiresome and many times there are not plausible synonyms for a given term in a given language, a subtler and workable method could consist in asking the reader/hearer to provide a back translation of the text from the TL to SL as well. That is, that the reader/hearer tries to rebuild the text in its original language. Obviously, this second method is only possible when the reader/hearer has enough mastery in both the SL and the TL. But, since any translation entails an interpretation of the text, which is previous to, and conditio sine qua non of, the translation itself (Chamizo Domínguez 2006b), such a method is particularly convenient by virtue of, indirectly, it shows us how the reader/hearer did actually understand what is asserted in the text or utterance in question. In order to check the viability of such a method I tried to test it by appealing to the translation into Spanish that Manuel Sacristán did actually provide of a text from Willard van O. Quine’s From a Logical Point of View: [23] «Una de esas mentes es, pongamos, el señor Y Griega. Pegaso, sostiene Y Griega, tiene el ser de un posible no actualizado. Cuando decimos que no hay tal cosa Pegaso, decimos más precisamente que Pegaso no tiene el atributo especial de la actualidad. Decir que Pegaso no es actual es lógicamente paralelo a decir que el Partenón no es rojo; en ambos casos decimos algo acerca de una entidad cuyo ser no se discute. El señor Y Griega es naturalmente uno de esos fi lósofos que se han con-

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fabulado en la empresa de arruinar la buena y vieja palabra ‘existir’. A pesar de su adhesión a los posibles no actualizados, Y Griega limita la palabra ‘existencia’ a la actualidad». (Quine 1962: 27. My emphasis). When I fi rst read this text in its Spanish version, without being familiar with the original, the fi rst thing that caught my attention was that the translator seemed to use the Spanish terms actual, actualidad, and actualizar in a way that did not make sense. The salient current meanings of the three Spanish terms are, respectively: actual, «dicho del tiempo en que actualmente está alguien: presente» or «que existe, sucede o se usa en el tiempo de que se habla» [current, present] (DRAE); actualidad, «tiempo presente» [present time] or «cosa o suceso que atrae y ocupa la atención del común de las gentes en un momento dado» [news; current affairs, current situation] (DRAE); and actualizar, «hacer actual algo, darle actualidad» or «poner al día» [to update; to bring up to date] (DRAE). Accordingly, a plausible periphrasis of [23] might be something like thist: [24] “Una de esas mentes es, pongamos, el señor Y Griega. Pegaso, sostiene Y Griega, tiene el ser de un posible no puesto al día. Cuando decimos que no hay tal cosa Pegaso, decimos más precisamente que Pegaso no tiene el atributo especial de estar en el tiempo presente. Decir que Pegaso no está en el presente es lógicamente paralelo a decir que el Partenón no es rojo; en ambos casos decimos algo acerca de una entidad cuyo ser no se discute. El señor Y Griega es naturalmente uno de esos fi lósofos que se han confabulado en la empresa de arruinar la buena y vieja palabra ‘existir’. A pesar de su adhesión a los posibles no puestos al día, Y Griega limita la palabra ‘existencia’ a la actualidad”. Since such an interpretation seems to make no sense in Spanish, my following hypothesis was to think that Manuel Sacristán had fallen into the insidious trap of the false friend, such that the Spanish terms actual, actualidad, and actualizar could be the translation of the English terms actual, actuality, and actualise, whose salient current meanings are «existing in act or fact; really acted or acting; carried out; real; -opposed to potential, possible, virtual, theoretical, ideal», «the state of being actual or real; reality, existing objective fact», and «to make actual, to convert into an actual fact, to realize in action» (OED), respectively. And indeed, this is what I discovered when I consulted the original text, which literally says the following: [25] «One of those subtler minds is named, let us say, Wyman. Pegasus, Wyman maintains, has his being as an unactualized possible. When we say of Pegasus that there is no such thing, we are saying, more precisely, that Pegasus does not have the special attribute of actuality. Saying that Pegasus is not actual is on a par, logically, with saying that the Parthenon is not red; in either case we are saying something about an entity

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158 Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends whose being is unquestioned. Wyman, by the way, is one of those philosophers who have united in ruining the good old word ‘exist’. Despite his espousal of unactualized possibles, he limits the word ‘existence’ to actuality» (Quine 1996: 2–3). Accordingly, this would mean Sacristán, through his translation, would cause the Spanish reader to make an interpretation error by having fallen into the insidious trap of the false friend. However, though this hypothesis might have been plausible and reasonable, to have let himself been seduced by the trap of the false friend seemed to me something unworthy of a translator of such prestige as Manuel Sacristán, and of an expert in philosophical jargon in general, and the works of Quine in particular; since Manuel Sacristán translated into Spanish other works by Quine as well, such as Palabra y objeto [Word and Object] (1968) and Las raíces de la referencia [The Roots of Reference] (1977). That is why I tried a second explanation supposing that Manuel Sacristán had before him the possibility of choosing between various manuals (according to the sense in which Quine himself uses the term manual in his writings on the indeterminacy of translation theory, which is synonymous with instruction booklet or instruction manual and not exactly with textbook or handbook) for translating Quine’s text, and, if he opted for one, and not another, it had to be for some worthwhile reason. In this way the quote of Sacristán’s translation offers a very appropriate example for analysing the possibility of the existence of various alternative manuals for translating the same text. And this because the Spanish adjective actual has two different meanings. The fi rst meaning of actual, which is the most common and the one that would fi rst occur to any Spanish speaker, is the one included in the DRAE and previously quoted. But there is a second meaning, not included in the DRAE and belonging to philosophical jargon of Aristotelic/Scholastic inspiration, not used outside philosophical circles. In accordance with this second sense, Spanish actual means genuine or real. On the other hand, the English word actual, which is used by Quine in his text, has maintained its Aristotelic/Scholastic meaning in ordinary language, such that it always means real and never at this very moment. Therefore, while it is difficult to imagine English contexts rendered ambiguous through the use of the word actual, it is very easy to imagine such contexts in Spanish. Nevertheless, although the DRAE does not include this second sense, other dictionaries do so. For example, Julio Casares (1979), in addition to the meaning «que existe, sucede o se usa en el tiempo de que se habla» [that which exists, happens or is used at the time speaking], adds that of «genuino, verdadero, real» [genuine, true, real]. And something similar happens with the noun actualidad and the verb actualizar. As far as actualidad is concerned, the DRAE includes the technical meaning in philosophical jargon of «Fil. Acción del acto sobre la potencia» [actuality] in addition to its salient ones as «tiempo presente»

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and «cosa o suceso que atrae y ocupa la atención del común de las gentes en un momento dado» [present time or current affairs]. As for actualizar, the meaning of «poner en acto, realizar» [to actualise, to realise] in addition to its more salient meaning as «hacer actual algo, darle actualidad» and «poner al día» [to update or to bring up to date]. It should be stressed that these second order, technical meanings are very difficult to be understood. The proof of this is that even a technical dictionary of philosophy as complete and documented as is that of José Ferrater Mora (1994) includes the entries acto [act], and actualidad [actuality], but neither the entry actual nor actualizar are included. And what is said about the Spanish terms can be said about their French cognates actuel/actuelle, actualité, and actualiser, respectively; although the DAF also provides their technical meanings in philosophical jargon as «qui est en acte, et non en puissance ou virtuel; qui se réalise en passant de la puissance à l’acte», «qualité de ce qui, de virtuel qu’il était, est devenu actuel, existe en acte», and «faire passer de la puissance à l’acte», respectively. But, these senses seem to be so infrequent in everyday, ordinary French language, that even a specialised dictionary, as the one by André Lalande (1976) is, makes the following explanation in the entry actuel: «L’anglais a conservé à l’adjectif actual et à l’adverbe actually un sens à la fois très usuel et très voisin du sens aristotélique» [English language has maintained for the adjective actual and for he adverb actually a sense which is both very usual and very neighbour to their Aristotelic sense] (Original emphasis). Therefore, while it is difficult to imagine English contexts rendered ambiguous through the use of the English terms actual, actuality, and actualise, it is very easy to imagine such contexts in Spanish and French when their respective cognates appear.

5.3.1. One text and several (possible) manuals for translating it All this causes Sacristán’s version of Quine’s text to make the Spanish reader possibly interpret Quine’s thoughts in a manner quite distant from what he actually wanted to say. And that, because Sacristán had to adhere to a certain manual, will in turn condition the access the Spanish reader will have to Quine’s thinking. However, it could be that my hypothesis is mistaken and that Spanish readers do not actually understand what I would have liked them to understand. So, I did an experiment, asking several people without previous knowledge of the original to translate Quine’s text back into English. The experiement was to confi rm how Spanish readers understand what the text “says” and followed the suggestion of Quine himself of translating «perversely into English by translating it into Jungle by one manual and then back by the other» (Quine 1990: 48). The result was that I got three different interpretations of the Spanish version of Quine’s text. I elected my “experimental subjects” according to seven basic criteria:

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1. That they agree with being my “experimental subjects”. 2. That there was a group of scholars and another group of standard speakers in order to contrast two possible, different options according to their different education levels. 3. That all of them have enough command of both Spanish and English languages in order to be able to translate in a reasonable way from Spanish into English. 4. That there were both native speakers of English and native speakers of Spanish as well. 5. That their linguistic and philosophical knowledge were higher than the standard speakers are supposed to have. 6. That none of them previously knew Quine’s text. 7. That none of them were aware that, in addition to their usual, salient meanings, actual, actualidad, and actualizar, respectively mean real, realidad, and realizar in Spanish philosophical jargon as well.

5.3.2. Two (possible) manuals Two of my “experimental subjects”, namely, Tony Dawson and Carmen María Bretones Callejas translated the text on the basis of two different hypotheses and according to two different manuals. In accordance with the fi rst manual, Manuel Sacristán would have fallen into the trap of the false friend when he translated the English terms actual, actuaty, and actualise into Spanish. If that is so, it is the job of the back translator to reinterpret the Spanish translation and reconstruct the original English text in light of this supposition. In accordance with that, what Quine would have liked to have said would have been something like this: [26] «One of those minds, let us say, is Mr. Y. Pegasus, Mr. Y claims, has the being of a non-actualised possibility (possible?). When we say that there is no such thing as Pegasus, we are saying more exactly that Pegasus doesn’t have the special attribute of actuality. To say that Pegasus is not actual is logically parallel to saying that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases we are saying something about an entity whose being is not in dispute. Mr. Y is naturally one of those philosophers who have conspired to ruin/wreck the good, old word ‘exist’. In spite of his adherence to non-actualised possibilities (possibles?), Y limits the word ‘existence’ to actuality» (Anthony S. Dawson, native speaker of English and lecturer at the University of Seville). [27] «One of those minds is, let’s say, Mr. Y. According to Y, Pegasus has the self of something possibly not actual. When we say that there is not a thing such as Pegasus, we more precisely say that Pegasus has not the special attribute of being actual. To say that Pegasus is not actual is logically parallel to say that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases

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we say something about an entity whose self is not discussed. Mr. Y is naturally another one of those philosophers who plots to spoil the good and old word ‘exist’. In spite of his adhesion to anything possible that is not actual, Y limits the word ‘existence’ to what is actual» (Carmen María Bretones Callejas, native speaker of Spanish and lecturer at the University of Almería). However, there is also the possibility of disregarding the aforementioned supposition and translating back what the Spanish text “says” for the normal reader. In accordance with this, the translation back into English from Spanish should be something like this: [28] «One of those minds, let’s say, is Mr. Y. Pegasus, Mr. Y claims, has the being of an out-dated possibility (possible?). When we say that there is no such thing as Pegasus, we are saying more exactly that Pegasus doesn’t have the special attribute of being up-to-date/current. To say that Pegasus is not current is logically parallel to saying that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases we are saying something about an entity whose being is not in dispute. Mr. Y is naturally one of those philosophers who have conspired to ruin the good, old word ‘exist’. In spite of his adherence to outdated possibilities (possibles?), Y limits the word ‘existence’ to the here and now» (Anthony S. Dawson). [29] «One of those minds is, let’s say, Mr. Y. According to Y, Pegasus has the self of something possibly not updated. When we say that there is not a thing such as Pegasus, we more precisely say that Pegasus has not the special attribute of being updated. To say that Pegasus is not updated is logically parallel to say that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases we say something about an entity whose self is not discussed. Mr. Y is naturally another one of those philosophers who plots to spoil the good and old word ‘exist’. In spite of his adhesion to anything possible that is not updated, Y limits the word ‘existence’ to what is updated» (Carmen María Bretones Callejas).

5.3.3. First manual: The reconstruction of Quine’s thought By contrast, Rafael Rocamora Abellán and Rosario Caballero Rodríguez translated back the text on the base of a single hypothesis. Since none of them gave the translator the benefit of the doubt, and accordingly thought that Manuel Sacristán was a victim of a false friend, they tried to rebuild the original text. Thus, both tried to “guess” what Quine’s text really said: [30] «One of those minds is, let us call him, Mr Y. Pegasus, as Mr Y states, is an unactualised possible being. When it is argued that there is no such Pegasus thing, it is particularly meant that Pegasus does not posses the special feature of actuality. Stating that Pegasus is not actual is just like

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maintaining that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases something is said about an entity whose being is not questioned. Mr. Y is obviously one of those philosophers who has undertaken the task of ruining the old good term ‘to exist’. Despite his support to unactualised possible beings, Mr. Y constraints the term ‘existence’ to actuality» (Rafael Rocamora Abellán, native speaker of Spanish and lecturer at the University of Murcia). [31] «One of those minds is, say, Mr. Y. Mr. Y claims that Pegasus has an unrealised but possible essence. When we say that there is no such thing as Pegasus, we actually say that Pegasus lacks the attribute of factuality. Saying that Pegasus is not real logically equates to saying that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases we say something about an entity whose being is not under discussion. Mr. Y is, of course, one of those philosophers who has set to the enterprise of spoiling the old good term ‘being’. In spite of his adherence to the possible unrealised, Y narrows the meaning scope of ‘existence’ to factuality» (Rosario Caballero Rodríguez, native speaker of Spanish and lecturer at the University of Castilla-La Mancha).

5.3.4. Second manual: What the Spanish text might say Now, as the four alluded persons are scholars, teachers of English, and were able to guess from the very beginning that the Spanish text had some problems, I also asked some philosophy students for translating into English the text in question; and thus under the same circumstances in which the four lecturers did translate our text. Well, none of them detected the possibility the existence of any false friend in the Spanish translation. This is particularly relevant in order to confi rm my initial hypothesis on the possibility that the Spanish translation could lead the Spanish reader into mistaking what Quine actually tried to mean. And since not even philosophy students knew the technical meanings that the Spanish terms actual, actualidad, and actualizar, have in philosophical jargon, one may not reasonably expect that common speakers, who supposedly are layer in such a particular sociolect, do know them. Thus, the rest of my “experimental subjects” only translated back what the Spanish text literally “says” for a normal Spanish reader. The results were the following: [32] «One of those minds is, let us say, Mr. Y. Pegasus maintains Mr. Y, is a non-present possibility. When we say that there is not such thing as Pegasus, we mean, more precisely, that Pegasus does not have the special attribute of being present. To say that Pegasus is not present is logically parallel to saying that the Parthenon is not red; in both cases we say something about an entity whose existence no one disputes. Mr. Y is naturally one of those philosophers who have conspired in the business of ruining the good old word ‘exist’. In spite of his acceptance of

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non-present possibilities, Y limits the word ‘existence’ to the present» (David Kramer, Canadian student and native speaker of English). [33] «One of those minds is, as an example, Mr Y. Pegasus, Mr Y maintains, has a non up to date essence. When we say that there is nothing of that sort Pegasus, we want to say more accurately that Pegasus has not the present time, special attribute. Saying Pegasus is not up to date is logically parallel to saying the Parthenon is not red. In both cases we reveal something about an entity whose essence is not discussed. Mr Y is naturally one of those philosophers who have plotted on the matter of ruining the good and old word ‘exist’. In spite of their adhesion to the possible non up to date ones, Y limits the word ‘existence’ to the present time» (Antonio Jesús Guzmán Molina, Spanish student and native speaker of Spanish). [34] «We could say that one of these great minds is Mr Y. Mr Y stands that Pegasus is a potential, non existing being. When we say that there is no Pegasus, we mean more accurately that Pegasus does not possess the special feature of present. Saying that Pegasus is not real is equivalent, logically, than saying that the Parthenon is not red, in both cases we say something about an entity which being ability can not be questioned. Mr Y, obviously, is one of these philosophers who have schemed against the good and old expression ‘to exist’, with the intention of spoiling it. In spite of his commitment to the potential, non existing beings, Mr Y limits the word ‘existence’ to the present time» (Ana Belén Riveiro Valdivia, Spanish student and native speaker of Spanish). [35] «One of those minds is, let us take him as an example, Mr Way. Pegasus, Mr Way maintains, has the being of a possible not updated. When we say that such thing Pegasus doesn’t exist we say more precisely that Pegasus has not the special quality of being updated. To say that Pegasus is not current is logically parallel to say the Parthenon is not red, in both cases we say something about an entity whose being has not argument. Mr Way is naturally one of those philosophers who have conspired to destroy the old and good word ‘to be’. In spite of his support to the possible not updated, Mr. Way limits the word ‘being’ to the update» (Miguel Rodríguez Fernández de Quincoces, Spanish student and native speaker of Spanish). Putting things like that, I understand that Manuel Sacristán, to whom I concede was conscious of the problem when he translated the cited text, had before him two different Spanish manuals by which to translate from English, each with its advantages and disadvantages. In accordance with the fi rst, he could have translated the English terms actual, actuality, and actualise with the Spanish terms real, realidad and realizar, respectively, or

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with some other synonyms thereof. With this option the Spanish text would have gained in clarity and lost its flavour of Aristotelic/Scholastic jargon. On the other hand, following the second manual, which is obviously the option the translator chose, Quine’s text gains in Aristotelic/Scholastic flavour though it runs the risk of being misinterpreted by Spanish readers who introspectively trust in their Spanish competence and do not guess what the original English terms were, or are not familiar with Aristotelic/Scholastic jargon; as a matter of fact, this is what occurred in all of the above cited translations. This is what I believe to have been demonstrated with the translations of Quine’s text that Spanish readers have converted back into English. And the problem of a variety of possible manuals for the translation of a single text seems to lie, in this case, mainly in the fact that the possibilities of expression of one language do not coincide with those of another. In these cases, although the translator may know that the manual he chooses has flaws, and that other manuals exist (which also contain flaws), he has to choose one of them, perhaps the one he considers least faulty. Taking all of that into account, most of translations we can provide shall reveal some aspects of the original text and hide many others as well because, as Quine himself asserts «the radical translator is bound to impose about as much as he discovers» (Quine 1990: 49). What Quine says about the radical translator, can be said, mutatis mutandis, about the normal translator, as shown throughout this book, and particularly in this chapter.

5.5. SUMMARY The existence of a false friend in the utterance of a foreign speaker, who tries to express him/herself in a language other than his/her own language (or in a translated text) can be detected when the hearer/reader suspects that there is something strange or incongruous in them. In such cases, the hearer/reader shall start a pragmatic strategy in order to guess which has been the term in the SL which the speaker/translator had in mind or did appear in the original text. By contrast, when the text in the TL makes sense, such a pragmatic strategy does not trigger, and what the hearer/ reader shall understand is something very different with regard to what was meant in the SL. In order to verify how a given translated text, in which the translator could fall victim of any possible false friend, has been actually understood, a plausible way to proceed consists in asking the hearer/reader for a gloss or for a synonym of the term in question. And, when this is not possible, perhaps the best pragmatic strategy consists in asking the reader/hearer for a back translation from the TL to the SL again. In this last case, we achieve both how the text has been understood and the various different possible understandings of a single original text according to the various possible manuals used for translating the text in question.

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Main Theses Exposed and Conclusions

The main theses of my account on false friends presented in this book can be summarised as follows: 1. As a phenomenon of linguistic interference, the topic of false friends is as old as languages themselves. This is true at least since Babel, when God condemned humankind to speak several languages. The term false friends (faux amis, in French) is only found in the 20th century. It was suggested by Koessler and Derocquigny in their seminal work on the topic (1928). Nowadays the term false friends has become a technical one and is widely used in linguistics and translation studies. 2. From a synchronic point of view the linguistic phenomenon of false friends can be defi ned as the fact that two given words are similar or equivalent (graphically and/or phonetically) in two or more given languages but have different meanings. In other words, false friends share their signifiers, but they do not share their meanings. For that reason false friends are extremely insidious traps for translators and for foreign speakers when trying to express themselves in a language which is not their mother tongue. 3. False friends can be divided into two groups: chance false friends and semantic false friends. Chance false friends are those words that are similar or equivalent in two or more given languages, but without there being any semantic or etymological reason for this overlap. They can be compared to homonyms in a single natural language. Semantic false friends are those words that are similar or equivalent in two or more languages because they are etymologically related. That is, semantic false friends have the same etymological origin but have developed different meanings in each language. For that reason semantic false friends could be considered the equivalents, in two or more given languages, of polysemous words in a single natural language. 4. Semantic false friends can in turn be divided into two groups: full false friends, which are those words that have completely different meanings (e.g. English lecturer is a full false friend with regard to

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5.

6.

7.

8.

Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends Spanish lector [reader]); and partial false friends, which are those words that have several senses, some of which coincide in both languages while others do not (e.g. English adjective actual can be translated into Spanish as real or actual depending on the context). The phenomenon of false friends must be distinguished from two linked phenomena, viz. false cognates and deceptive words for translation and communication. It should be stressed that false cognates are only a special kind of false friends, the one I called chance false friends (e.g. English son is a false friend and a false cognate with regard to Spanish son [sound, rumour, manner, reason or song]). By contrast, semantic false friends are true cognates since they derive from the same word (e.g. English lecture is a true cognate with regard to Spanish lectura [reading] even though both are false friends). With regard to the concept of deceptive words for translation and communication, it should be stressed that almost all words are problematic ones for translation and communication, since almost the complete vocabulary of a given language is polysemous and rarely does this polysemy coincide with the polysemy of a another given language whose vocabulary is polysemous as well (e.g. American collocation white waters [‘rapids’, in British English] can be deceptively be translated into Spanish as aguas blancas, but it is not the case of a false friend because neither white nor water are cognates of Spanish blanco/blanca and agua, respectively). In short, the set of false friends is wider than that of false cognates, while the set of false friends is smaller than that of deceptive words for translation and communication. Since translating is just identifying synonymous words, and partial false friends are partially synonymous in two given languages, a workable notion of synonymy is needed in order to make possible translation itself. This is the case despite criticisms of the notion of synonymy by linguists and philosophers of language. For that reason the notions of synonymy as meaning similarity and/or interchangeability salva veritate, have been used in order to make possible both translation and a reasonable account of my topic. Semantic false friends involve three different linguistic interference phenomena. Namely, borrowings, calques and inheritances. To a large extent both calques and inheritances can be considered as special kinds of borrowings. Borrowings are the main source of false friends amongst living languages. It is highly probable that any borrowed word could become a false friend in relation to the original meaning of the same word in the SL (source language). There are five different ways for originating false friends:, 1) restriction of the various meanings that the borrowed word has in the SL to only one or very few meanings (e.g. French noun madame has been borrowed everywhere, but mainly according to its euphemistic second order meaning in the field of prostitution); 2) restriction of meanings

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9.

10.

11.

12.

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of the SL word and addition of new meanings which are absent in such a language (e.g. Spanish borrowed the noun mitin from English meeting, but restricting its original polysemy only to political meetings and creating new meanings in the field of bullfighting); 3) preservation of the meaning of the SL and addition of new meanings in the TL (English has borrowed guerrilla from Spanish, by preserving its original meaning of guerrilla warfare and adding the new meaning of individual guerrilla [‘guerrillero/guerrillera’, in Spanish]); 4) emergence of, at least, one new meaning in the TL which did not exist in the SL and sometimes including changes in grammatical categories (e.g. German noun Handy [mobile phone] has been borrowed from English adjective handy); and 5) emergence of new and different meanings in two or more given languages from some common signifier in a third language (e.g. probably both Spanish bigote [moustache] and English bigot could derive from Germanic exclamation Bi Got/God!). As happens when words change their meanings inside a single language, emergence of false friends can be explained by appealing to the different figures of speech. False friends emerge when a given term in a given language changes its meaning by means of any figure of speech, while its cognate in another language does not, or does it in a particular way by means of a different figure of speech. There is no possible theory of false friends without taking into account a previous theory of figures of speech. Being deceptive words, false friends cause, to a large extent, problems in translation and communication. They are even the cause of diplomatic incidents from time to time. False friends can be considered from a positive point of view. They can be exploited, and have been, in literature and jokes, for both getting cognitive and contextual effects and allowing the reader/hearer to make implicatures. This exploitation has been carried out in two different ways: by showing both codes explicitly and metalinguistically, and by alluding to both codes and assuming that the intended reader/hearer must be acquainted with the two codes so as to understand exactly what is being said and the reasons for what has been written or said. Since false friends typically appear in translations and utterances of foreign speakers who have not enough competence in the language they are trying to communicate, some pragmatic strategies have been suggested in order to explain how the reader/hearer can guess what the original text said or the speaker had on mind. When a given translation or utterance of a foreign speaker makes no sense in the TL, the reader/hearer will start with a pragmatic strategy that allows him/ her suppose or guess what the translator/speaker was trying to mean with his/her text or utterance. Success in communication depends on an adequate pragmatic strategy carrying to replace speaker’s errors

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Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends caused by false friends. In the case of translations, the best way to proceed, when a possible error caused by the existence of false friends is detected, consists in asking any reader whose mother language is the TL for providing a back translation from TL to SL again. Anyway, when the text translation or speaker’s utterance make sense, even though this sense differs from the one in the original text or from what the speaker would try to mean, no pragmatic strategy will be possible and the error could remain undetected.

Although a cross-linguistic examination of false friends should be of interest in itself to anyone concerned with linguistics, the philosophy of language, the sociology of language, and the psychology of language. Such an analysis has wider implications for other fields of language study, especially: • For translation studies: since false friends are perhaps the main enemy of translators, they must know their enemies thoroughly so as to be able to beat them. • For avoiding misunderstandings when a foreign speaker tries to express him/herself in another language than his/her own language. • For language teaching, and this in two ways: knowledge about false friends is obviously necessary when teaching a foreign language, but it is also necessary when teaching their own language to native speakers, so that native speakers become aware of the different aspects and nuances of their own language. • For any theory of semantic change: since emergence of semantic false friends entails a change of meaning, when reflecting on them one necessarily reflects on semantic change as well. In fact, one becomes aware of the history of one’s language when studying this topic and realises how much one’s own language diverged from other neighbour and related languages. • For analysing the many ways in which speakers of different languages and from societies conceptualise reality by means of words that had the same meaning in the past. • For analysing the various figurative networks and chains (most of them completely unpredictable a priori) used by the speakers of different languages (even the most related ones) to conceptualise reality. • For a pragmatics of cross-linguistic double-entendres, understandings, and misunderstandings.

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Notes

CHAPTER 1: CLEARING THE TERRAIN 1. It should be stressed that Buncic’s list is not intended to be exhaustive and other denominations can be found from time to time, for instance, the term falsos primos [false cousins] have been used as well (Magadán Olives 2003). 2. To be precise, Spanish and French inflecting words derive from the Latin accusative case. By contrast, Italian and Rumanian inflecting words derive from the Latin nominative case. I will conventionally refer to Latin nouns and adjectives according to their nominative, masculine, singular form. Consequently, I will disregard their feminine and neuter forms.

CHAPTER 2: SYNONYMY, POLYSEMY, HOMONYMY, REGISTER AND DIACHRONY 1. Given that the English noun mind itself has slightly changed its meaning since 1910, the title of a second English translation of Hegel’s work reads The Phenomenology of Spirit (Hegel 1977); what is explained and justified by Jonathan Rée is as follows: «One of the main problems with Baillie was that he translated Geist as ‘mind,’ which may have been good enough in 1910, but after half a century of linguistic change, the word was too intellectual and too psychiatric, and by the 1970s Miller’s ‘Spirit’ was undoubtedly preferable.» (Rée 2001: 254. Original italics). 2. The French sentence «l’abbé Breuil n’exercera jamais de sacerdoce» is ungrammatical. I dare to suggest that the grammatically correct form of this sentence would be “l’abbé Breuil n’exercera jamais le sacerdoce”.

CHAPTER 4: SEMANTICS OF FALSE FRIENDS: TROPICAL FALSE FRIENDS 1. It should be stressed that Descartes himself knew and agreed with Courcelles’ translation. And, although it does not affect my topic, that French bas-breton [Lower Britanny] has become pésima lengua [dreadful language] in Spanish and Gothorum lingua [the language of Goths] in Latin.

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Notes

2. Carlos Arniches (1866–1943) was a Spanish playwright, whose work, drawing on the tradition of the grotesque, came to dominate the Spanish comic theatre in the early 20th century. 3. Given that the English language is particularly economic with gender markers, one cannot guess, according to this quote, whether we are dealing with a male or a female admiring reporter. The same anecdote can be found in Koessler (1975: 45) where it is clear that it is about «une journaliste» [a female journalist]. 4. In spite of the fact that I am mainly considering semantic false friends, I would like to stress that cases of chance false friends also can be found, both inside a given language and between two languages (Allan and Burridge 2006: 242–243). 5. It originated in an allusion to the main character of A. Dumas Junior’s novel Monsieur Alphonse (1873), whose name now means procurer or pimp by antonomasia in both languages. It should be stressed that the meaning of procurer or pimp for the signifier Alphonse had been documented before the publication of Dumas’ work (Colin, Mével, and Leclère 1994: 9). It also might be true—or plausible at least—that the French writer entitled his novel in such a way just because Alphonse meant pimp before 1873. In any case, what we may take for granted, on the one hand, is that Alfons and Alphonse mean pimp or procurer in Polish and French, respectively. And, on the other hand, that both Alfons and Alphonse are polysemous terms in Polish and French, while their cognates Alfonso and Alphonso are not, given that they only work as proper names and never as nouns.

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Bibliography 175 Mendiluce Cabrera, Gustavo and Ana I. Hernández Bartolomé. (2005) ‘English/ Spanish False Friends: a Semantic and Etymological Approach to Some Possible Mistranslations’, Hermeneus, 7: 131–157. Montaigne, Michel de. (1962) Essais, in Œuvres Complètes, edited by Albert Thibaudet & Maurice Rat. Introduction and notes by Maurice Rat. Paris: Gallimard [1580–1595]. Naciscione, Anita. (2001) Phraseological Units in Discourse: Towards applied stylistics, Riga: Latvian Academy of Culture. Navarro, Fernando A. (1997) Traducción y lenguaje en medicina, Barcelona: Fundación Dr. Antonio Esteve. Nerlich, Brigitte and Pedro J. Chamizo Domínguez. (1999) ‘Cómo hacer cosas con palabras polisémicas: El uso de la ambigüedad en el lenguaje ordinario’, Contrastes, IV: 77–96. Nerlich, Brigitte and David Clarke. (2001) ‘Serial metonymy: a study of referencebased polysemisation’, Journal of Historical Pragmatics, 2/2: 245–272. Nerlich, Brigitte and Pedro J. Chamizo Domínguez. (2003) ‘The use of ‘literally’. Vice or virtue?’, Annual Review of Cognitive Linguistics, 1: 193–206. Neruda, Pablo. (1976) Confi eso que he vivido: memorias, Barcelona: Seix Barral. Neruda, Pablo. (1978) Memoirs, English translation by Hardie St. Martin, Hardmondsworth: Penguin. Newton, Isaac. (1998) Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy, Translated by Andrew Motte and revised by Florian Cajori, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press [1687]. Olshewsky, Thomas M. (ed.) (1969) Problems in the Philosophy of Language, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Oriol, Edith. (2001) ‘Escribir, opinar... tal vez forrarse’, El Semanal, 710, July, 3–9: 30–33. Oxford English Dictionary. (1989) The Oxford English Dictionary, edited by J. A. Simpson and E. S. C. Weiner, Oxford: Clarendon Press. Pascal, Blaise. (1976a) ‘Réponse de Blaise Pascal au très Révérend Père Noël’, in Œuvres complètes, Edited by Jacques Chevalier, Paris: Gallimard, pp. 370– 377 [1647]. Pascal, Blaise. (1976b) Pensées, in Œuvres complètes, Edited by Jacques Chevalier, Paris: Gallimard. Payton, Geoffrey. (1970) The Penguin Dictionary of Proper Names, Revised edition by John Paxton, Hardmondsworth: Penguin. Pérez Velasco, Juan Manuel. (2004) Falsos amigos: Estudio lexicográfico contrastivo francés-español, Salamanca: Universidad de Salamanca. Postigo Pinazo, Encarnación. (1997) Estudio contrastivo de los falsos amigos en inglés y español. Málaga: Universidad de Málaga. Postigo Pinazo, Encarnación. (2005) Diccionario de falsos amigos inglés-español. Infolingua. Online. Available http://www.iberolenguas.com/Falsos_Amigos/ Index.htm (accessed 13 May 2005). Prado, Marcial. (2001) Diccionario de falsos amigos: inglés-español, Madrid: Gredos. Quevedo y Villegas, Francisco de. (1995) Poesías completas, II, Edited by José Manuel Blecua, Madrid: Turner. Quine, Willard van Orman. (1962) ‘Acerca de lo que hay’, in Desde un punto de vista lógico, Spanish translation by Manuel Sacristán, Barcelona: Ariel. Quine, Willard van Orman. (1968) Palabra y objeto, Spanish translation by Manuel Sacristán, Barcelona: Labor. Quine, Willard van Orman. (1977) Las raíces de la referencia, Spanish translation by Manuel Sacristán, Madrid: Revista de Occidente.

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176 Bibliography Quine, Willard van Orman. (1990) Pursuit of Truth, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Quine, Willard van Orman. (1996) ‘On What There Is’, in From a Logical Point of View, Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Real Academia Española. (2001) Diccionario de la lengua española, Madrid: Real Academia Española-Espasa Calpe 22nd edition. Rée, Jonathan. (2001) ‘The Translation of Philosophy’, New Literary History, 32: 223–257. Rey-Debove, Josette (ed.). (1990) Dictionnaire méthodique du français actuel, Paris: Robert. Ryle, Gilbert. (1984) The Concept of Mind, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press [1949]. Sagarin, Edward. (1968) The Anatomy of Dirty Words, New York: Lyle Stuart. Santoyo, Julio César. (1989) El delito de traducir, León: Universidad de León. Saussure, Ferdinand de. (1991) Curso de lingüística general, Spanish translation by Amado Alonso, Madrid: Alianza Editorial [1916]. Saussure, Ferdinand de. (1978) Cours de linguistique générale, edited by Tullio de Mauro, Paris: Payot [1916]. Searle, John. (1986) Expression and Meaning. Studies in the Theory of Speech Acts, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sellar, Walter C., and Robert J. Yeatman. (1991) 1066 and all that. A Memorable History of England comprising all the parts you can remember including 103 Good Things, 5 Bad Kings and 2 Genuine Dates, London: Methuen [1930]. Sender, Ramón J. (1978) La tesis de Nancy, Madrid: Magisterio Español [1969]. Silva, Gustavo A. (2005) ‘Perlas de la traducción. La armada ‘terrestre’’, Panace@, 6–19. Online. Available at http://www.medtrad.org/panacea/IndiceSecciones.htm (accessed 25 March 2005) Steiner, George. (1975) After Babel. Aspects of Language and Translation, Oxford University Press: Oxford. Sweetser, Eve. (1990) From Etymology to Pragmatics. Metaphorical and cultural aspects of semantic structures, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Szpila, Grzegorz. (2003) An English-Polish Dictionary of False Friends, Cracovia: Wydawnictwo Egis. Szpila, Grzegorz. (2005) Make Friends with False Friends, Cracovia: Wydawnictwo Egis. Szpila, Grzegorz. (2005) ‘Collocational Aspects of False Friends’, in Lesniewska Justyna and Ewa Witalisz (eds.), Language and Identity. English and American Studies in the Age of Globalization. Volume 2: Language and Culture, Cracovia: Jagiellonian University Press, pp. 231–239. Trup, Ladilav. (1998) ‘Problemas de la interferencia y otros escollos entre el eslovaco y el español’, in Actas del II encuentro de profesores eslovacos de español, Bratislava: Embajada de España, pp. 46–62. Ullmann, Stephen. (1957) The Principles of Semantics. A Linguistic Approach to Meaning, Oxford: Blackwell. Ullmann, Stephen. (1964) Language and style, Oxford: B. Blackwell. Valdés Villanueva, Luis Ml. (2002) ‘Introducción’ to Wittgenstein (2003), pp. 13–80. Varella, Stavroula. (2006) Language Contact and the Lexicon in the History of Cypriot Greek, Oxford-Berlin: Peter Lang. Veisbergs, Andrejs. (1993) Latviesu–anglu, Anglu–latviesu Viltus Draugu vardnica/Latvian–English, English–Latvian Dictionary of False Friends, Riga: Izdevniecibas fi rma «Sl».

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Bibliography 177 Veisbergs, Andrejs. (1997) ‘Translator and False Friends Dictionaries–Current Problems’, in Veisbergs, Andrejs et al (eds.), The First Riga Symposium on Pragmatic Aspects of Translation/Pragmatische Aspekte der Translation 1es Rigaer Symposium, Riga: University of Latvia/Universität Lettlands, pp. 145–156. Venuti, Lawrence. (1998) ‘Lin Shu: Traducir para el emperador/Lin Shu: Translating for the emperor’, Original English text and Spanish translation by Juan Jesús Zaro, Trans 2, pp. 143–150. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1922) Logische-Philosophische Abhandlung/ Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, Bilingual edition (German-English) by C. K. Ogden and F. P. Ramsey, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1957) Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, Bilingual edition (German-Spanish) by Enrique Tierno Galván, Revista de Occidente: Madrid [1922]. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1961) Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, English translation by D. F. Pears and B. F. MacGuinness, London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. [1922]. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1972) Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, French translation by Pierre Klossowski, Gallimard: París [1922]. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1989) Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, Catalan translation by Josep Maria Terricabras, Laia: Barcelona [1922]. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (1993) Tractatus Logico-philosophicus, French translation by Giles G. Granger, Gallimard: París [1922]. Wittgenstein, Ludwig. (2003) Tractatus logico-philosophicus, Spanish translation by Luis M. Valdés Villanueva, Madrid: Tecnos [1922]. Zybert, Jerzy. (1997) ‘Peligros lexicales’, Neofilolog, 5: 78–87.

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Index

The terms English, Catalan, Dutch, French, German, Greek, Latin, Polish, Spanish, have not been listed, since they appear everywhere in this book. Nor do I list the main dictionaries quoted; namely, DRAE (Spanish), OED (English), DAF (French), Duden (German), Alcover and Moll (Catalan). Abad/abbé/abbot, 57–58 Abate, 58–59 Abbreviation, 4 123 Acronym, 4–5 Actual/actuel, 156–164 166 Actualise/actualizar, 157 159 161 Actualidad/actuality, 157 159 161 Aguacate/avocado/avocat, 61–62 Aichinger, Wolfram, ix Alb, 65 Alba, Duke of, 145 Alberte González, Antonio, ix Alfons/Alphonse, 117–118 170 Algiers, 106 Aljubarrota, Battle of, 106 Allan, Keith, ix 4 34 40–41 45 83 93 Allende, Salvador, 119 Allusion, 1 7 27 32 36–37 46 84–85 88–89 Almería, 161 Almodóvar, Pedro, 46 Almorranas/hemorroides, 40 53 Alt/alto, 38 Ambiguity/ambiguous, 12 14 18 36 41–44 76 83 102 Amelioration/ameliorative, 7 35 93 120–123 Américain/American/americano, 108–109 American English, xii 100 113–114 109 166 Amsterdam, ix Aphorism, 127 Apotheke/bodega/botica/botiga/ boutique, 80–81 Arabic, 6 109 128 Aramaic, 57 102 Archaism/archaic, 20 39–40 42 63–64 117

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Argentinean, 58 Arniches, Carlos, 102 170 Aristotle/Aristotelian/Aristotelic, 7 55 92 125 158–159 164 Armada/Armee/armée/army, 71–74 Asia, 143 Athens, 79 Atom, 111–112 Attila, 119 Auge/auge, 4 Austin, John, 153 Australia, ix Austria, ix Avogadro’s hypotheses, 54 Axiology/axiological, 12 18 35–38 72 87 108–109 114–116 125–126 Azafata/safata, 116–117 Azar/hasard/hazard, 109 Azaroso/hazardous, 109–110 Babel, 165 Baillie, J. B., 169 Balzac, Honoré de, 3 Bandrés, Juan María, 121 Bagne/bagnio/bagno/baño, 106–107 135 Bárbaro/barbarous, 118–119 Barbaridad/barbarity, 120 Bas-breton, 95 Bastad, 74 Batalha, monastery of, 106 BBC, 152 Beckford, William, 13 Belcher, Larry W., 82 Berlin, 71 Bertaud du Chazaud, Henri, 58 87 105 134–135 Beso/ósculo, 52 Bible, 88 152–153

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180

Index

Bigot/bigote, 87 167 Bird/pájaro, 99 Black, 50–51 108 111 123–124 141 Blair, Tony, 67 69–70 Blank/blanc/blanco/bianco/branco, 65–66 Blue, 36–38 46 Bluebeard, 37 Blues, 46 Bona mens/bon sens, 16 Bonn, ix xii Borges, Jorge Luis, 13 Borrowing, 6 9 19–20 28 51 61–90 110 117 133 166 Braguetazo, 34–36 Bretones Callejas, Carmen, 160–161 Breuil, Henri, 59 169 British English, xii 114 166 Brown, Paterson, ix Brussels, 143 Buckingham Palace, 43 115 Bullfighter/bullfighting, 49–50 149–150 Buncic, Daniel ix x xii xiv 2 4 31 169 Bundeswehr, 72 Burgen, Stephen, 102–103 Burridge, Kate, 93 170 Caballero Rodríguez, Rosario, 161–162 Café/coffee, 129–130 Calcutta, 141 California, ix Calque, 2 9 61 70 166 Camel/camello/camelo/cammello/ chameau/kamel, 102–102 Canguro/kangaroo/kangourou, 101–102 127 Cantera Ortiz de Urbina, Jesús, 9 20 21 31 58 106–107 Caradec, François, 89 103 107 113–114 127 129–130 Cardenal/cardinal, 24–25 Carroll, Susan, 4 Casares, Julio, 158 Casas Gómez, Miguel, 32 34 40 Castile/Castilian, 5 106 Castilla–La Mancha, 162 Cátedra, 49 Categorical falsity, 48 Cazo/cazzo, 3 Cemetery, 70 Cervantes, Miguel de, 58–59 106 135 Ceuta, 103

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Chamizo Domínguez, Pedro J., 4 8 12 36 47 57 156 Charity, Principle of, 147 Chautard, Émile, 130 Chef, 75–77 Chesterton, Gilbert K., x 114 143–144 China, 142 Chile/Chilean, 28 119 Chumbo, 4 CIA, 119 Cicero, 111 Clarke, David, 130 Clitoris, 129–130 Cloaca, 115 Coca–cola, 86 Cock/coq, 100 Code, 24 26–27 141 167 Cognate, x xi xii 10 46 7–8 10 19 65 defi nition, 2–3 61–62 false cognates, 2–3 166 Cognitive, 42, 50–52 76 83–85 92 102 108 113 117 125 167 Colin, Jean–Paul, 76 81 89 98 100– 104 129–130 170 Collins, Tim, 67 Collocation, 3 51 82–83 85 123 127–130 166 Cologne, 39 Competence, v xi 27 123 133–134 156 164 167 Confucian, 154 Connotation, 34 51 72 93 116 120 Constantinople, 106 Context/contextual, 3 38 41–42 48 60 116 124–125 133–136 139–141 145–154 158–159 166–167 Cook, Captain, 101 Cooperation/cooperative, 76 148 Copernicus, 56–57 Copula/copulation, 62 Cordella, Marisa, ix Cordova, 123 Corner/córner, 78–79 Corominas, Joan, 4 40 53 62 65 Courcelles, Étienne de, 96 169 Cream/crema, 48 Crystal, David, 92–93 Cuban, 108 Culteran, 63 Cypriot, 70 Daninos, Pierre, 27 85 140–141 Daoíz y Velarde, 21 Davidson, Donald, 47 50 147

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Index Dawson, Anthony, 160–161 Democritus, 11 Derivation/derivative, 2 68 70 88 91 96 108 113 154 Derocquigny, Jacques, 1 166 Derogation/derogatory, 35 76 82 87 114–116 119 124 Descartes, René, 14–18 55–56 94–96 169 Devolución/devolution/dévolution, 21–22 Diachrony/diachronic, xiii 9–10 31–32 53–59 95 Dialect, xii 9 48 58 70 81 103–104 108 123 155 Digérer/digerir/digest, 94–96 Dimitir/dismiss, 151–153 DNA, 4 Doctor (noun), 49 120–123 146–150 Doctor/doctorar/doctorarse (verb), 126–127 Domain, 47 49–51 77 88–89 92 95–103 Domestic/doméstico, 69–70 Double-entendres, 42 46 141 Dufour, P., 129–130 Dumas, Alexandre (Jr.), 170 Dunbar, William, 64 Dysphemism/dysphemistic, 42 68 76 92–93 100 115–117 122 Echevarría Isusquiza, Isabel, 97 Economist, The, 139 Educación/education, 46–47 Egypt/Egyptian, 129–130 Epicurus, 98 Eponym, 88 Esau, 89 Etymology/etymological, 3–4 23 38 40 47 53 55 86–87 141 144 165 European Parliament, 142–143 Event/evento, 156 Eventual, 139–140 Eventually/eventualmente/eventuell, 137–141 145–146 Evidence/evidencia, 68–69 Euphemism, 2 10–11 47 57 68 70 72 75 81 88 defi nition and examples, 92–94 false friends, 107 112–118 121 129–130 functions, 110–111 148 150 Expressivity Principle, 8 Extravagance/extravagancia, 141–144

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181

Extravagant/extravagante, 153–156 Eulogy/eulogistic, 114 123 Fairbanks, Douglas, 19 False friends, passim addition of meaning, 81–85 134 158–160 160 amplification of meaning, 65 75 89 chance, 3–6 22–23 26 31 36 38 41–42 59 62 103 165–166 coinage, 1 165 classification, 3–12 165–166 cognitive and literary exploitation, 24–28 76 167 defi nition, 1 165 emergence of new meanings, 75 85–89 165–166 full, 6–9 12 18–21 38 40 60 71–75 81 87 106 117 137 140 141 151 154–155 homonymy, 41–45 lexicalisation, 18–24 48–50 54 68 111 126 partial, 3 5–9 12 14 17–20 25 27–28 38 40 43 46 50–53 57–60 62 66–70 74–78 80–81 87–88 98 100–102 105–127 134 150 156 166 preservation of meaning, 75 82 restriction of meaning, 70 75–82 86 89 118 130 166–167 semantic, 3–8 10–14 17 19–21 31 38–40 43 54 58 61–62 65–81 87–88 91–118–131 165–166 168 synonyms and hyponyms, 2–3 vagueness in translation, 12–18 Syntagm/syntagma, 20 34 79–80 94 125 Fastidieux/fastidiós/fastidioso/ fastidious, xi–xii 10–12 Female/hembra, 116 Fernández Fontecha, Almudena, 97 Fergusson, Rosalind, 9 10 19 36 66 87 109 126 138 141 154 Ferrater Mora, José, x 11 159 Ferron, Pierre, 104–105 Fig/figa/figue/higo, 97–98 Figure of speech, xiii 92–94 146 148 150 Finish, 3 Forradellas, Joaquín, 58 France, 5 100 Franche-Comté, 22 Franco, Francisco, 68

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182

Index

Frege, Gottlob, 34 Frondizi, Risieri, 14–15 Fusil, 20 Fussy logic, 134 Fuyin-Li, Thomas, 97 García Morente, Manuel, 14–15 García Suárez, Alfonso, 14 García Yebra, Valentín, 41 Garton Ash, Timothy, 142–143 Gazio, Janick, 108 Gender marker, 122 170 Geist/ghost, 50–52 169 Germanic languages, 65–66 Germany, ix Ghostwriter, 50–51 Gibraltar, 103 145 Glyde, Tania, 26 Goal/gol, 78–79 Golf/golfería, 24–25 Gómez Benayas, César, 82 Góngora, Luis de, 63 Google, 20 Gorilla, 83–85 Gorilla Girls, The, 84 Gothorum lingua, 96 Gracioso/gracious, 125 Granada, ix Grava/gravel/grève, 49 107–108 Greece, 66 Grice, Henry Paul, 48 146 Gruszczynski Wlodzimierz, 1 Guerrilla, 82–85 167 Gulf War II, 67 Gutiérrez Rodilla, Bertha, ix Guzmán Molina, Antonio, 163 Hacking, Ian, 101 Haemorrhoids/piles, 40 53 Hampton Court, 142–143 Handy, 86 167 Hayward, T., 1 Hazard-hazardous, 109–110 Heasley, Brendan, 33 41 45 Hebrew, 6 89 Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich, 12 51–52 169 Hellenism, 79 Helvétius, Claude–Adrien, 136 Henry VIII, 37 142–143 Hernández Bartolomé, Ana, ix 31 66 146 Hill, Robert, ix 10 11 31 Hintikka, Jaakko, 14

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Hitchcock, Alfred, 89 Hitler, Adolf, 71 119 Holder, Robert W., 37 76 99 102–104 108 Homograph, 3 Homophony/homophone, 4 42–43 Homonymy/homonymous, 4–5 23 25 31 41–45 62 165 Hoorn/horn/horno, 23–24 Hookway, C. J., 36 Hôpital de campagne/hospital de campaña, 20–21 Horace, 66 98 Hostal Aliste, 43 Humour, 37 85 141 Hurford, James, 33 41 45 Hyponym, 3 20 52 68 89 Hypothesis, 54–57 73 Hyppolite, Jean, 12 Iberia Airways, 74 Idiom, 35 53 79 127–128 130 135 Illiterate, 149–150 Impeachment, 69 Implication, 35 138 Implicature, 26–27 29 34–35 53 60 72 112 115 124 135 140 151 Incongruence, 144–145 India, 142 Individual/individu/individuo, 111–112 Inexcusable, 7–8 Inheritance, 61–65 70 89–90 166 Interchangeability, interchangeable, 33 36–38 52–53 60 89 98–99 102 166 Interest principle, 8 Interference, 1 24 28 31 89 133 145 166 Interpretation, 6–14 45 47–48 53 58 83 95 99 102 127–128 136 142 146–150 156–159 Introduce/introduire, 26–27 Italian ix xi 3 5 42 65 102–103 106 153 169 Irony/ironic, 47 52 74 83 93 118 141 148–150 Jacob, 89 Jambon/jamón, 63 Jargon, 4 7 19 31–32 48 74 82 145 158 160 162 164 Jiménez Catalán, Rosa María, 97 John Paul II, 152 Johnson, Mark, 49

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Index Joke/jocular, 43 83 167 Juusto/juusto, 9 Katz, Jerrold J., 108 Kelly, Gene, 111 Kentucky, ix Kiev, 72–73 Kleparski, Grzegorz, 97 Koessler, Maxime, 1 5 38 165 170 Korning Zethsen, Karen, 6 Krakow, ix Kramer, David, 163 Kruck, William, 11 Lakoff, George, 49 Lalande, André, 159 Langue, 125 Larsson, Lennart, 1 Lateran council, 25 Latrine/letrina, 115 128 Latvia, ix Laurel, 97 Leader/líder, 68 League of Nations, x Leaman, Oliver, ix Leclère, Christian, 76 81 89 98 100–104 129–130 170 Lectura/lecture, 82 166 Lector/lecturer, 165–166 Lexicalisation, 18–24 48–50 54 63 68 111 Linguist, 1–2 32 34 41 166 Linguistic, 1–3 19 24–28 31–33 36 41 48 52 57–61 66–69 89 91–92 94 124–125 146–149 165–168 Linguistics, 2 32–33 79 92 125 165 168 Lipczuk, Ryszard, x xii xiv Listeme, 41 Litotes, 18 López Carrillo, Rodrigo, ix Lorentzen, Lise, ix 65 Lorenzo, Emilio, 66 81 Lot, 88 Louis XIV, 22 Lower Brittany, 95 Macho/male, 116 Madame, 75–76 166 Madrid, 43–44 Magadán Olives, Teresa, 71 79 169 Maître, 75–77 Malaga, ix 5 121 Malay/Malaysia, 28

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183

Mancha/manche, 22 Manual, 32 36 158–164 Marie Thérèse of Austria, 22 Martín, José Luis, 21 Martsa, Sándor, 97 Meaning, passim ameliorative, 120 change, 6–9 32–33 41 53–54 60 65 70–75 91–95 103 109–113 121 130 146 167–169 conceptual, 49 59 96 current, 7 10 19 39 51 54–55 57 80 93 95 157 derogatory, 115–120 123–124 126 divergent, 3 17 65 87 107 109 114 120 125–128 140 142 etymological, 47 53 55 141 144 165 euphemistic, 72 75 78 93 99 103 107–108 110–114 126 129–130 145 149–150 figurative, 97 102–103 148 literal, 97 103 112 146 149 pejorative, 112 120 primary, 9 45–50 54 57 referential, 118 121–122 salient, 39 51 95 104 109 118 122 135 151 155 157 160 second order, 45 73 75 105–106 109 112 120 128 134 158–159 166 Meeting/mitin, 81–82 167 Meiosis, 18 Mendiluce Cabrera, Gustavo, ix 31 66 146 Meta, 41–42 Metalanguage/metalinguistic, 1 25–26 139 Metamorphosis, 104–105 Metaphor, 47–50 62 65–66 74 77 80 92–104 146–150 Metonymy, 47 49 65 92–94 104–109 118 Mével, Jean–Pierre, 76 81 89 98 100–104 129–130 170 Mexico/Mexican, 108 123 Michelin, 61 86 Miller, A. V., 169 Mind, 12 34 51 64 95 136 157 160–163 169 Misa, 4 Mistake, v 2 5 8 22 24 26 31 47 51 84 133 135 147–148 152–153 156 Mistranslation, 8–9 11–12 22 29 Misunderstanding, v xi 11 26 28 31 42 76 83 95 109 114 133 136 138 142 149 155–156

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184

Index

Molière, 93 Monod, Jacques, 109 Montaigne, Michel de, xiv Montilla, José, 124 Mother tongue, 2 27 29 133 137 146 151 166 168 Moulin, A., 1 Mula/mule, 104 Murcia, 162 Naciscione, Anita, ix 127 Nahuatl, 62 Napoleon, 19 Navarro, Fernando, 2 31 Negro/negro, 50–51 Nerlich, Brigitte, ix 4 8 130 Neruda, Pablo, 28 155–156 Netherlands, The, ix 22 New York, 46 Newton, Isaac, 54–55 Noël, Father, 56 Norway/Norwegian, ix 65 Nottingham, ix Officer/oficial, 67–68 Olshewsky, Thomas, 32 Oppenheimer, Walter, 67 145 Ordinario/Ordinarius/ordinary, 38–40 158 Oriol, Edith, 50 Osculation/kiss, 52 Osiris, 130 Padre/père, 3 45–46 País, El, 49 67 72 139 142 144–145 Palacio de Oriente, 43–45 115 Pan/panne/pun, 4 Panza, Sancho, 58 135 Panza, Teresa, 135 Parent language, 61 62 65 Parfait/perfect/perfecto, 104–106 Paris, 107 127–128 Pascal, Blaise, 16 18 56–57 Pascual, José, 4 40 53 62 65 Pata negra, 123–124 Paul VI, Pope, 26 Payton, Geoffrey, 23 Pejoration/pejorative, 7 35 39 68 92–94 115 120 123–126 129 Penalti/penalty, 78–79 Peña Martín, Salvador, ix Pérez Velasco, Juan Manuel, 4 58 Periphrasis, 34 139–140 157 Philip II (of Spain), 73–74

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Philosopher/philosophy, 13 17–18 32–34 47 51–55 108–111 136 158–163 166 Phonetics, phonetic, 1 3 6 28 31 83 89–90 Phonology, 31 Phraseological unit, 127–130 Physician, 121–123 126 Pig, 98–99 Pimp, 170 Plantosemy, 96–97 Plato, 55 Plautus, 130 Play on words, 10 25–26 37 46–47 49 84 113 135 Plaza Molina, G., 117 Poland, ix Polysemy/polysemous, 8 45–52 Pompous jerk, 150 Popperian, 57 Portugal/Portuguese, ix xi 4 65 84 102–103 106 124 Postigo Pinazo, Encarnación, ix 31 Prado, Marcial, ix 3 19 20 31 101 126 154 Pragmatic strategy, 127 133–164 167–168 Preservative/preservativo, 10–11 Procurer, 170 Ptolemy, 56–57 Purist, 9 91 Puy de Dôme, 56 Quevedo, Francisco de, 63–64 66 Quine, Willard van Orman, 34 36 40 147 156–164 Quixote, Don, 22 58 135 Radio/radium/radius, 128–129 Racional/raisonnable/rational, 14–18 Rationality, 14–16 Rape (noun), 5–6 Rape/râper (verb), 26 Real/royal, 43–45 Realise/réaliser, 9 Reality, 44 Reasonableness, 14–16 Rebeca/Rebecca/Rébecca, 88–89 Rée, Jonathan, 169 Reference, 21 33–36 40 49 53 55 60 96 102–104 106 108 121 158 Register, 31–32 40 52–53 60 71–72 118 121–122 169 Regular/régulier, x 112–114

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Index Rhetoric/rhetorician, 7 95–96 Rifle, 20 Riveiro Valdivia, Ana, 163 Rocamora Abellán, Rafael, 161–162 Rodríguez Fernández, Miguel, 163 Rodríguez Serón, Alicia, ix Rodríguez Tapia, M. L., 142 Roman Catholic Church, 121 Romance languages, ix 65–66 Romanian, 65 169 Rumour, 127–128 Russia/Russian, v 119 Ryle, Gilbert, v xi 51 156 Sacristán, Manuel, 156–163 Sagarin, Edward, 110 Salamanca, ix Salva veritate, 40 53 60 166 Santoyo, Julio César, 5 Sarcasm, 141 Saussure, Ferdinand de, 79 125–126 Scholar/escolar, 2 8–9 Scholastic, 124 158 164 Schouten, W. C., 23 Schubert, Franz, 105 Scotland, 21 39 Searle, John R., 94 130–131 Secuela/sequel, 19–20 Seine, 49 107 Sellar, Walter, 37 84 Semantics, 32 Sender, Ramón, 24–25 84–85 Sense, 7–11 15–20 33–34 37–41 45–59 62 67 74 78 82 86 91–93 102 105 108–130 133–159 166–168 Sesame/sésamo, 33 Seville, 24 84 160 Silva, Gustavo, ix 71 Signifiant, 2 Signifié, 2 Signifier, 6 32 41 45–47 54 62 94 114 165 Slip, 86 Slovakian, 4 Sociolect, 6 9 88 134 162 Sodom, 88 Sodomía/Sodomie/sodomy, 88 Soft Eis, 85 Sol/sole, 22–23 Soler, Jordi, 19 Solipsism/solipsist, 13–14 Son, 166 Source language/SL, 12, 33 133–134 137 167–168

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185

South America/South American, 155–156 Spa, 4–5 Spain, ix 21–22 35 45 68 74 84–86 145 Spirit/spiritual/spirituel, 51–52 134–137 169 Spree, river, 71 Steen, Gerard, ix Steiner, George, 12 Strasbourg, 143 Subject/sujet/sujeto, 124–125 Süddeutsche Zeitung, 72 Superordinate term, 3 20 92 131 Supposition, 56 Sussex, ix Synchrony/synchronic, xiii 11 18–19 31–32 165 Synecdoche, 92–94 104–106 138 Synonymy/synonymous, 8–12 14 16–22 32–40 59–60 66 69 71 73 76–80 87 97–100 105–115 120 123–126 133–134 137–142 153–158 164–166 Syrian, 57 Swedish, 1 102–103 Sweetser, Eve, 95 Swiss, 74 Szpila, Grzegorz, ix 4 31 109 127 154 Taboo, 100 110–111 115 Tangiers, 103 Target language/TL, 12 33 133–134 137 167–168 Tauromachy, 82 126 Tautology, 114 Telecommunication, 4 128 Téléphone arabe, 127–128 Terrific/terrorífico, 119 Thatcher, Margaret, 67 69–70 Thompson, Major, 27 85 140 Timesonline, 152 Tinta, 28 Topic/tópico, 7 Topical, 7 Toponym, 22 88 Translation, xi 1–2 5 11–18 24 29 31–40 133–164 Translator, x 1–2 8 12–14 16–18 22 24 27 31–36 42–44 95–96 133–164 Trondheim, ix Trope/tropical, 91–92 94 131 Truism, 114 139

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186

Index

Trup, Ladilav, 4 Truth values, 9 36 40 48 57 60 97–98 137 140 Tycho [Brahe], 56–57 UK, ix Ukrainian, 72 Ullmann, Stephen, 57 64 111 United States/US/USA, ix 39 108 112–114 122 Universal, 97 Use, 7 9–10 20 35–36 41 47–49 52–53 56 59 66 73–74 82 85 91–94 97–99 108–112 116–121 140 Utterance, 6–8 29 36 40 42 58 52 54 60 71–72 80 112–114 119–125 133–135 140 144–146 148–154 167 U2, 42 Valladolid, ix 103 Van, 3 Varella, Stavroula, ix 70 Veisbergs, Andrejs, ix 31

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Venuti, Lawrence, 154 Vienna, ix Vulgate, 152 Wales, 21 Warsaw, ix Washington, ix Wehrmacht, 72 Weiner, Jack, ix Westminster, 21 White House, 94 White waters, 166 Wilson, Neil L., 147 Wino, 86 Wittgenstein, Ludwig, 13–14 34 Wolsey, Cardinal, 142–143 World Wars, 85 144 Yeatman, Robert J., 37 84 Zamora, Paco, 50 Zarzuela, La, 44–45 Zawislawska, Magdalena, ix Zoosemy, 96–98

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