Yong Huang's Blog: Learning Spanish, French, and Italian Words Through Etymology and Mnemonics, page 5

Spanish sin embargo and non obstante

Spanish sin embargo and non obstante (or no obstante) both mean "however", but literally, "without embargo" and "no obstacle", respectively. Some articles such as this try to explain the etymology from the semantic perspective. For our purpose of learning the words and phrases, we can just analyze, i.e. decompose, the phrases into two separate words, and see if we can find a similar composition in English. And we can. English notwithstanding is almost a calque (loan translation, word-for-word or root-for-root translation). The word withstand is semantically linked to an obstacle, resistance, difficulty, and the word not in front simply negates that. If we were to insert a space after not, the phrase thus formed would match the Spanish phrases even better.

By the way, according to Cornell Law School's legal dictionary, non obstante veredicto or notwithstanding the verdict refers to "a decision of a judge to set aside a jury's decision when the judge is convinced the verdict is not reasonably supported by the facts or the law". So if you knew this legal term, you would sure know the Spanish phrase non obstante.

How to pronounce French prefixes in- and im-

In my Learning French Words Through Etymology and Mnemonics , I added one of these two notes to words like inouï ("incredible", "unheard-of"), immonde ("unclean", "foul"):

Note that in- is pronounced /in/, not /ɛ̃/, since it’s followed by a vowel.
Note that im- or imm- is pronounced /im/, not /ɛ̃/, since the /m/ sound is followed by a vowel (this rule has a few exceptions, though).

On the French Word Reference forum, someone asked "what is the pronunciation rule (if any) of the prefixes -im and -in in French words like inlassable [ɛ̃], innombrable [in], immangeable [ɛ̃], immature [im]."

My answer is as follows:

I find an article on the Lawless French website helpful:

--- begin quote ---
Pronunciation of in-
[in] in front of a vowel
[in] in front of n
[ɛ̃] in front of another consonant
Pronunciation of im-
[ɛ̃] in front of b or p
[ɛ̃] in the words immangeable, immanquable, immariable, and immettable
[im] in all other imm- words
--- end quote ---

I think the first two rules for in- can actually be merged, because inn- must be followed by a vowel (I mean vowel sound, not letter, the same hereinafter unless indicated otherwise). I can imagine that [in] in front of a vowel (optionally separated by letter -n-) and the root that follows it tightly form one phonological unit because the sound [in] by itself does not mean anything in French. But [ɛ̃] can stand alone as a word, so it and the root that follows it both can sound like separate words. Another way to look at this is to try grouping n of in- with the following root. If it can form a sound unit as in the case of the root being (or beginning with) a vowel, then in- is split, i of in- is left alone by itself and so is pronounced [i]. If the n cannot be grouped with the following root (e.g. in incapacité, *ncapacité is not phonologically possible), in- is left intact as one unit and is pronounced [ɛ̃].

Prefix im- can only be in front of b, p, or m. Since we explained in-, the first rule about im- ([ɛ̃] in front of b or p) is easy. The third rule is also easy; just realize imm- must be followed by a vowel. But the second rule cannot be explained. I suspect there are historical reasons for a few such words.

One person pointed out the word inhumain, which is pronounced with [in]. Again, since letter h is silent, the sound following in- is a vowel. This is easy to understand if you notice we say an hour but not *a hour in English. With this said, the article on "Lawless French" may be augmented with a rule about inh-; or better yet, just say in- followed by a vowel sound is pronounced [in].

How to remember Spanish words al*

Due to the significant Arabic influence during the period of Moors' occupation of the Iberian peninsula, there are lots of Spanish words borrowed from Arabic. Many of these words begin with al-, sometimes just a-. Unless you know Arabic, to remember these words, you either have to drill with rote memory, or, if you're like me, rely on mnemonics, but not etymology, at least in most cases. In the Introduction to Learning Spanish Words Through Etymology and Mnemonics, I gave an example of alfombra ("carpet", with mnemonic "Al found a bra on the carpet"). Here's a general idea that may be helpful: Since most of these Arabic loan words can be analyzed as al ("the"), plus the rest, a mnemonic should be created on the latter part instead of the whole word. Take alcantarilla ("sewage") as an example. Its root is from Arabic meaning "bridge". Although it can be further traced to Ancient Greek, that etymology doesn't appear to be helpful. So a mnemonic is the only option. After assessing a few choices, I think the Afghan city and province Kandahar is a good one, if you remove prefix al- and suffix -illa from alcantarilla. (Kandahar is heard a lot in news, at least in the past few years when US troops were actively fighting Taliban and other terrorists in that part of the world.) You can imagine the sewage system is well maintained in that city (or "is not"; either choice serves our purpose).

In the case alarde ("boast" n.; "large display"), my book suggests linking it to alarm, e.g. "What an alarmingly ostentatious show". Now I think it may better to link it to art if we imagine a big art show or exhibition.

After you get used to the fact that most Spanish words of Arabic origin begin with al- or a-, you can even intentionally strip that and analyze the rest of the word. For example, for aceite ("oil"), you can say “Oil comes from seed” after you drop a-. But of course you can also imagine “Acetic acid is vinegar, not oil”, although the truth is the opposite.

Of course not all words like al* are Arabic origin. According to Wikipedia, "alambre is a popular Mexican dish consisting of grilled beef ... The word alambre literally means 'wire' in Spanish. It is commonly believed that the name refers to the act of skewering the ingredients while cooking". The etymology of this word is traced to Latin, not Arabic. But the Latin origin doesn't help at all. For those not familiar with this Mexican food, a mnemonic has to be used. My book suggests treating it as if it was Arabic and linking the fake "root" *ambre to hambre ("hungry"), which may evoke an image of food. Although you still have to think of the skewer of the food, not food in general, it's getting closer. Or you can imagine “Al is hungry (Al tiene hambre) and wants to eat kebab roasted on skewers that look like wires”.

And yet there are some Arabic words that both Spanish and English borrowed, e.g. Spanish algodón and English cotton, Spanish azar ("luck", "chance"; "bad luck", "hazard") and English hazard, Spanish almacén ("warehouse") and English magazine (think of ammunition cartridge). But they are exceptions, not the rule. In my Learning Spanish Words book, I call these cognates, in a loose usage of the term.

falta de educación = bad manners

A Chinese friend of mine used to work at a small restaurant and made good friends with his coworkers, who are mostly from Mexico. Once he was just eating his lunch as usual and chatting with his buddies. But they said to him "No education! No education!" My college-educated friend thought for a second and realized it was because he talked with food in his mouth. He picked up a little Spanish from the coworkers but it was not nearly enough to communicate in it. So they had to talk in simplified English. "No education" is obviously a translation of Spanish "falta de educación", literally "lack of education". This phrase is better translated as "bad manners" here, which is the exact thing you would say when a child eats with food in mouth or making too much noise. Spanish "malos modales" will work, too, but "malas maneras", literally "bad manners", probably not at least in this situation.

My friend remembered that little incident ever since and made this faux pas no more! Incidentally, I know lots of my Chinese friends and coworkers here in the US still lack these table manners. One having this etiquette is often acutely feeling others' lack of it. But to point these things out to them would be rude and lack of respect. So bad manners or lack of education in the Spanish sense goes on unchecked forever.

compa* and campa*

Google Translate translates
company; companion; campaign; countryside
into three Romance languages as

English: company; companion; campaign; countryside
French: entreprise; un compagnon; campagne; campagne
Spanish: empresa; compañero; Campaña; campo
Italian: azienda; compagno; campagna; campagna

Other than company, which is interpreted as "commercial business" here instead of "companion", there is one pattern in the translations: com- (literally "together") for the sense of "companion" and camp- for the sense of "field" or "countryside". Knowing this helps distinguish Spanish compañía (both "company" as commercial business and "company" as companion) and campaña (two senses, "battlefield or political campaign" and "countryside"). Note other than the difference of the second letter, the first word also has í while the latter does not.

English company more commonly means "commercial business". In this sense, it's often translated as société in French, but entreprise and compagnie (note the second letter) will do, too. In Spanish, empresa is more common than compañía.

% menores a los de

A PijamaSurf.com article Las mujeres han tenido un lugar de mucha relevancia en la lucha por los derechos laborales (Women had a very important place in the fight for labor rights):

"No obstante su número significativamente menor, estas obreras decidieron comenzar una huelga que duró 3 semanas y a través de la cual exigieron sobre todo igualdad salarial, pues sus salarios eran 92% menores a los de los trabajadores varones."

The last part would be literally translated as "their salaries are 92% less than those of the male workers". That sounds ridiculously low. According to Ford sewing machinists strike of 1968, "the strike ended three weeks after it began, as a result of a deal that immediately increased their rate of pay to 8% below that of men". Apparently "92% menores a" in the PijamaSurf article really means "8% menores a".

Praising etimologias.dechile.net

I have no personal relation with the website etimologias.dechile.net. But I want to recommend it and praise their work. It's a website I missed when I wrote my Learning Spanish Words book. I don't know why I missed it back then. If I had known it, I think a great number of words in my book might have been explained better. Take comarca ("district") as an example. Wiktionary simply gives etymology "From co- +‎ marca". Isn't that obvious? But why do prefix co- ("together") and marca ("mark"; "brand") combined lead to the meaning of "district"? Well, according to etimologias.dechile.net/?comarca, the word comes from Latin in the Medieval time, when people from various places mixed. Germanic mark means "border of a territory", and con- implies they came together, in spite of the border(s). Now you see. Etymology is not just how a word form came about, which is the phonological part of this study, but in some, in fact, many cases, it's also about semantic evolution. And in this latter aspect, etymology has been and is still weak.

By the way, if you wonder why you can't highlight and copy text on their website, that's because this mouse action is disabled by their Javascript. I feel sorry and also guilty to say that you can bypass that restriction by turning off Javascript. But be honest and never copy a significant amount and paste it somewhere else without getting their permissions.

Remember conjugations by drills

One donor to my French word project (see Availability near the bottom of yong321.freeshell.org/lfw/) asked me if I had a good way to learn/remember French verb conjugations. Unfortunately, no, I said to him. The answer would be the same if the language was Spanish (or another language). Just like other students, I learn the conjugations by drills. Sorry. Etymology and mnemonics won't help. To learn conjugations for an exam, you can learn them by heart in drills, even though you know the memory won't last. To aim for keeping them in your brain for a long time, just do a lot of reading, and/or listening. Mnemonics may be useful in very limited cases. For example, if you aim for mid-term memory, without much exposure to the language, and with no exam coming soon. But if you think about it, variation of verb conjugtions is so limited compared to vocabulary, so using mnemonics is not really worth it. Irregular verbs may benefit from mnemonics because each form is like another word. I could start to amend my book maybe with an appendix on that. But most irregular verbs are frequently used words anyway, and be aware of the fact that using mnemonics drags down fluency, at least at the beginning. Considering pros and cons, I'm not sure if creating mnemonics for them is really a good thing.

Politically correctly

When Ed Roberts, Professor Emeritus of Central Michigan University, reviewed an early draft of my Learning French Words, he suggested I remove the wording to the effect that noir ("black") is related to negro and niger. I happily accepted; it's not very helpful to the learners anyway, due to too big a difference in sound (unless you're trained in historical linguistics). An early draft of the same book about the word
tromper to deceive, to cheat; (reflexive) to be wrong.
explicitly mentions the current president. I later removed that verbage, and added "To balance that joke, though, also learn the less common word berner, which has the same meaning." After all, getting involved in politics is neither my interest nor helping anyone in any way. But if something piques the reader's interest which may help him remember the word, I won't hesitate to include it as a joke.

Myetymology.com and its replacement

When I wrote the Learning Spanish Words book, myetymology.com was one of the websites I frequently consulted. It presented a word in its genealogical hierarchy in a semi-graphical way. I really enjoyed reading the "graphs" and missed it when the site was gone. I don't know what the author of the website was thinking. His software or code is at least worth something. Why not set up another site to host the same content, even for free at e.g. freeshell.org, nyx.net?

The good news is that when Wiktionary shows the reconstruction of an unattested word, it gives a similar semi-graph presentation (see e.g. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/werd%CA%B0h%E2%82%81om, where indentations indicate hereditary relationships). But it seems to have these "graphs" only on the Reconstruction pages of the website.