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Why ‘Mom’ and ‘Dad’ Sound So Similar in So Many Languages: Linguistic Coincidence?
The Atlantic ^ | 10/16/2015 | JOHN MCWHORTER

Posted on 10/16/2015 7:54:15 AM PDT by SeekAndFind

Is there anything inherently “doggy” about the word “dog”? Obviously not—to the French, a dog is a chien, to Russians a sobaka, to Mandarin Chinese-speakers a gǒu. These words have nothing in common, and none seem any more connected to the canine essence than any other. One runs up against that wall with pretty much any word.

Except some. The word for “mother” seems often either to be mama or have a nasal sound similar to m, like nana. The word for “father” seems often either to be papa or have a sound similar to p, like b, in it—such that you get something like baba. The word for “dad” may also have either d or t, which is a variation on saying d, just as p is on b. People say mama or nana, and then papa, baba, dada, or tata, worldwide.


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Anyone who happens to know their way around a lot of languages can barely help noticing this eerie similarity. But when it comes to European languages closely related to English, like the Romance and Germanic ones, this isn’t so surprising. After all, these languages are children of what was once one language, which linguists call Proto-Indo-European and was likely spoken on the steppes of what is now Ukraine several millennia ago. So if French has maman and papa, and Italian has mamma and babbo, and Norwegian has mamma and papa, then maybe that’s just a family matter.

But when we’re talking several millennia, even closely related languages have a way of morphing beyond recognition.

(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...


TOPICS: History; Science; Society
KEYWORDS: dad; epigraphyandlanguage; godsgravesglyphs; johnmcwhorter; language; linguistics; mom; theatlantic
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To: DeFault User
Oh the mammaries of my childhood.
21 posted on 10/16/2015 8:17:01 AM PDT by demshateGod (The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God.)
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To: chajin

Not to nitpick, but mother is “okaasan.”
“Obaasan” is grandmother.


22 posted on 10/16/2015 8:20:03 AM PDT by struggle
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To: demshateGod

Dogs must have been very cheap in Tsarist Russia. For one ruble you could get 100 kopeks.


23 posted on 10/16/2015 8:21:33 AM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: SeekAndFind
Ma means "mother" in Mandarin Chinese. Ma also means "horse." Fortunately they have different ideograms so they don't get confused. (Plus they have different tones.)

"Ma" meaning "horse" may be an Indo-European loanword, cognate with English "mare."

24 posted on 10/16/2015 8:24:55 AM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: DeFault User
I don’t think it’s a coincidence that “mama” is similar in many languages. Picture what a baby’s mouth does when nursing. It’s not much of a stretch to see how the infant would vocalize “ma-ma” when it wants to nurse. In fact, the word in Spanish for “nurse” is mamar.

Good observation...do the same thing with "papa"...the opposite...going off the nipple...and what could cause that? Papa comes into the room!

25 posted on 10/16/2015 8:25:04 AM PDT by DouglasKC (I'm pro-choice when it comes to lion killing....)
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To: SeekAndFind

Contrary to the delusions of the gender theorists, mothers and fathers are the most fundamental of human concepts.


26 posted on 10/16/2015 8:29:08 AM PDT by reg45 (Barack 0bama: Implementing class warfare by having no class.)
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To: Verginius Rufus
MA ( AS IN MOTHER ) IN CHINESE:


MA ( AS IN HORSE ) IN CHINESE:


Notice the right radical in the ideograms for Mother and Horse. They are similar. The only difference is the Left radical of "mother" in Chinese, which is the symbol for Woman.



Shhhh... Don;t let the gender neutral types know this in the USA, they might mis-educate Chinese foreign students who will go home and demand gender neutral idiograms :)
27 posted on 10/16/2015 8:29:53 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: cloudmountain

Is that “ummi” as in “yummi”?


28 posted on 10/16/2015 8:33:57 AM PDT by reg45 (Barack 0bama: Implementing class warfare by having no class.)
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To: struggle
Not to nitpick, but mother is “okaasan.” “Obaasan” is grandmother.

That's what I get for typing in between work :-( gomen-nasai, struggle-san

29 posted on 10/16/2015 8:43:47 AM PDT by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: SeekAndFind
Interesting; the Japanese kanji for "mother" is 母 , which is supposed to be a stylized rendition of breasts with nipples, as if the woman were lying down on her side (to nurse?).
30 posted on 10/16/2015 8:49:22 AM PDT by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: Verginius Rufus

Mother in Thai is Maa. Father is Paw. Both pronounced with a falling tone.

Ma (with an up tone) = Horse. Ma (with an down tone) = Dog.


31 posted on 10/16/2015 8:50:27 AM PDT by USMCPOP (Father of LCpl. Karl Linn, KIA 1/26/2005 Al Haqlaniyah, Iraq)
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To: DeFault User
In fact, the word in Spanish for “nurse” is mamar.

And in German: Amme (not etymologically related to the Latin "mamma" = "breast").

Regards,

32 posted on 10/16/2015 8:51:14 AM PDT by alexander_busek (Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.)
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To: chajin
RE: Interesting; the Japanese kanji for "mother" is 母 ,

They actually took that Kanji from the Chinese.

That's another Chinese character for mother.
33 posted on 10/16/2015 8:55:38 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: SeekAndFind
That's another Chinese character for mother.

I guessed that :-) I'd studied hanzi only to the extent that it informs kanji, so I'm always surprised when a given Chinese hanzi isn't in some form the one used for the same meaning in Japan, and until your message I didn't know that the combination of woman/horse meant "mother." Thanks

34 posted on 10/16/2015 8:59:07 AM PDT by chajin ("There is no other name under heaven given among people by which we must be saved." Acts 4:12)
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To: chajin
普通には細かいことを気にしない。 I usually don't pay attention to the details.
35 posted on 10/16/2015 9:21:44 AM PDT by struggle
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To: SeekAndFind

What? you mean the gender-binary is present in all languages in the world except in American colleges? You mean that people throughout the world refer to a mother and a father and they have since the beginning of language? You mean they don’t have 55 different words to describe the entire gender continuum?


36 posted on 10/16/2015 9:27:43 AM PDT by I want the USA back (Media: completely irresponsible. Complicit in the destruction of this country)
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To: SeekAndFind

It doesn’t take much imagination to see the ideogram for Horse as having originally been a drawing of a horse. In the simplified version of the ideogram adopted by Red China, the resemblance is lost.


37 posted on 10/16/2015 9:44:38 AM PDT by Verginius Rufus
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To: Verginius Rufus

38 posted on 10/16/2015 9:54:33 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
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To: reg45
Is that “ummi” as in “yummi”?

Lol. Good one.
It's ummi as in "ooomi."

"Ooom" is mother but children always say: "my mother," the 'i" as is eeee, is possessive for "my."

39 posted on 10/16/2015 10:03:59 AM PDT by cloudmountain
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To: SeekAndFind

Well, the first babble that came out from my daughter’s mouth was Da-Da.

*********************************************************************

The first whole sentence to come out of my oldest son’s mouth was, “Mom, I love dad”. This was while she was holding him.

His first word was da-da also.


40 posted on 10/16/2015 10:27:29 PM PDT by Graybeard58 ( Bill and Hillary Clinton are the penicillin-resistant syphilis of our political system.)
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