American Language

by H. L. Mencken

  e. Serbo-Croat

  In 1930, 30,121 persons living in the United States reported to the Census enumerators that Serbian was their mother-tongue, 79,802 reported that it was Croat, and 77,671 that it was Slovene. Serbian and Croat are identical, though the former is written in the Cyrillic or Russian alphabet and the latter in the Latin, and Slovene differs from the two, according to Louis Adamic,106 hardly more than the German of Vienna differs from that of Hamburg. There are twenty-two Serbo-Croatian-Slovene publications in the United States and Canada, including no less than seven daily newspapers. Mr. Adamic is the author of the only study of the changes undergone by Serbo-Croat in America that I have been able to find.107 He says that, as it is printed in the vernacular press, it remains virtually Standard Serbian. “So far,” he says, “I have noticed but a dozen or so of [loan-words] in the news and editorial colunms, e.g., majnar and majna, farmar and farma, štrajk and štrajkar, štor, viska and lota (lot). There are one or two humorous columnists who go further in this direction, but they are exceptions.” In the everyday speech of the immigrants, however, there is a much larger admixture of Americanisms. Says Mr. Adamic:

  The American Yugoslav is not likely to say Združene or Zjedinjene države, which are literal Slovene and Serbo-Croat translations of United States, but rather Unajne štec, or Jus (U. S.) for short. The holiday commemorating the birth of the nation becomes Ďzulajevo (July Day), after the manner of naming certain holidays in the Old Country. A house to him is hauz or gauz; a kitchen, kična; 2. bucket, boket; a stove, štof; a plate, plet; a pitcher and picture, pičer; a shovel, safla; a spoon, špuna; a fork, forka or forkla; a basket, bosket; a bowl, bol; a garden-gate, garten-gec; upstairs and downstairs, abštez and daštez; a bed, bet; a needle, nitl, and a car, kara. Shoes are suhi; house-slippers, hauz- or gauz-šlipari; bloomers, brumars; rubberboots, robarbuce; overalls, obergoz; a sweater, švidar, and a blouse, bluza.

  In the morning he brekfešta (breakfasts), picks up his lonč-boket (lunch-bucket), goes to the majna (mine), finds his partnar (partner), and then spends the rest of the day vurkati (working). In the mine there are all sorts of basi (bosses) who basirajo (boss) him. Every so often there is peda (payday) and he gets just enough moni to pay his bord (board), get a šat of viska (shot of whiskey), maybe go to a tenc (dance), and possibly put a few toleri (dollars) aside for a reni tej (rainy day) or the forthcoming štrajk (strike). In this kontri (country) a man must roslat (rustle) to make both ends meet.

  Should one accompany an American-Yugoslav housewife who, besides taking care of her hosban (husband) and having a new bebi (baby) once a year, keeps half a dozen bordarjev (boarders), on her daily trip to the market or štor (store), one will see her purchase potetus, redič, onjenc, keruc, epuls, pičus, kebič, kreps, vodamalone, and seleri (potatoes, radishes, onions, carrots, apples, peaches, cabbage, grapes, watermelons, and celery). On the way to the butcher’s she will probably remark that things are terribly spensif (expensive); that one had better watch these štorkiparje, for they are krukani (crooked) as a snake, always trying to slip one štuf that is bum or enži (n. g.), whereas she lajka to give her bordarjem gut štuf (likes to give her boarders good stuff). And at the butcher’s she gets some porčops (pork-chops), šteks (steaks), maybe a few rebec (rabbits) or a young luštar (rooster) or two, and a little ketsmit (cat-meat). At the društor (drug-store) she buys a fizik (physic) for the bebi and is half tempted to blow herself to an ajskrem soda (ice cream soda).

  Arriving home, she orders the wailing bebi to šerap (shut up), and tells two of her older children to cease their fajtanje (fighting) and garjep (hurry up) to the rejrod jards (railroad yards) with the biggest bosket in the house and see if they can’t pick up some kol (coal). And so on; there is, indeed, hardly an everyday word that is not thus taken from the English language and refashioned to fit the Yugoslav tongue.

  In gauz (house), obergoz (over(h)alls) and garjep (hurry up) the commonly Slavonic tendency to turn h into g is visible. Other nouns in common use are dzez (jazz), salun (saloon), bara (bar), džhumper (jumper), vikend (week-end), boom (bum), boj or poj (boy), ledi (lady), štrita (street), karpet (carpet), park (park), vošinmašina (washing-machine), redietor (radiator), penta (paint), livirum (living-room), lampa (lamp),šo (show), pajpa (pipe), šrickara (street-car), pence (pants), tutbroš (tooth-brush), rog (rug), papir (writing-paper or newspaper), pauder (powder), fekteria (factory), mila (mill), sajdvok (sidewalk), štepce (steps), porě (porch), redjo (radio), polisman (policeman), major (mayor), kort (court), taksa or teks (tax), džuž (judge), džail (jail), tičar (teacher), pokbuk (pocketbook), džuri (jury), pučer (butcher), stejž (stage), noors (nurse), senvič or šenič (sandwich), štajl (style) and sajn (sign),108 and, among the Croats, unij (union), masina (machine), boykotirat (boycott), raketir (racketeer), situaciya (situation) and garaž (garage).109 Most loan-nouns are given grammatical gender and declined according to the Serbo-Croatian system, but some, e.g., karpet and park, are taken in unchanged and not so declined. These last are commonly thought of as masculine. Very few adjectives have been incorporated, and not many verbs. A number of phrases and idioms have been adopted, e.g., majgundeš (my goodness), gerarehir (get out of here), and the expletives dži (gee) and džizakrajst (Jesus Christ). Yes has displaced the Slavic da, and often appears as yah or yeah. A number of Americanisms have returned to the Old Country and are in common use there, e.g., džež (jazz), salun (saloon), bos (boss), nigr (nigger) and probišn (prohibition).

  f. Lithuanian

  The only study so far undertaken of the changes undergone by the Lithuanian language in the United States is that of Dr. Alfred Senn of the University of Wisconsin, made on a Sterling research fellowship from Yale. Dr. Senn is a Swiss and his monograph was written in German and printed in Rome110 — a combination that bears striking witness to the opportunities overlooked by American scholarship. His investigation was chiefly made in Connecticut, where there are several Lithuanian colonies, but he also extended it to New York City and Chicago. The first Lithuanians came to the United States before the middle of the last century, but there was no considerable immigration until 1863, when an unsuccessful rebellion against Russian rule drove many thousands into exile. It has been estimated that fully a third of all the patriots who survived the rebellion came to this country, and that there are 1,000,000 persons of Lithuanian blood, either pure or mixed, in the population today. The Census of 1930 unearthed less than half that number (193,606 born in Lithuania, 221,472 born in this country of Lithuanian parents, and 24,117 born here of partly Lithuanian parentage, or 439,395 in all), but it is possible that the returns credited many Lithuanians to Russia or to Poland. In Chicago, says Dr. Senn, the Lithuanian colony numbers at least 80,000. In Waterbury, Conn., there is another of 15,000, and yet others are in New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and Maryland. The Lithuanians in the United States support fourteen newspapers, of which four are dailies — three in Chicago and one in Brooklyn.

  From 1864 to 1904 the Russian government made violent efforts to Russify the Lithuanians remaining in Lithuania. Their schools were closed and the printing of books in their native tongue was forbidden. Thus the colonies of exiles became centers of Lithuanian culture, and publishing houses were set up in Chicago, Boston, Shenandoah, Pa., and other American towns. In 1904 the interdict on Lithuanian books was removed by the Russians, and there began a great cultural revival in Lithuania. One of its fruits was an effort to purge the language of the Polish and Russian elements that had invaded it. This movement gathered fresh impetus after the World War, and so effective has it been that a young Lithuanian of today finds it difficult, on coming to the United States, to understand the speech of his compatriots here, which still retains most of the old loan-words. Even the names of the days of the week differ in the two forms of the language. In addition, American-Lithuanian has taken in a large number of American words and phrases, so the difficulty of intercommunication is really formidable. Meanwhile, the variou
s Lithuanian dialects tend to disappear in this country, and all Lithuanians move toward a common speech. It consists, says Dr. Senn, of “a disorderly mixture of dialects, old Slavic loan-words brought from home, and new English loan-words picked up in America. It is a Pidgin-Lithuanian.”

  But this American-Lithuanian, though it may sound barbaric to a Lithuanian scholar, yet preserves most of the forms of the mother-tongue. The loan-noun, for example, is inflected precisely as if it were a native word. Thus bòmas (from the American bum) takes the masculine gender, is put into the second accent class, and undergoes the following changes for case and number:

  Singular Plural Dual

  Nominative bòmas bòmai dù bomù

  Vocative bòme bòmai

  Genitive bòmo bòmų

  Dative bòmui bòmams dvíem bòmam

  Accusative bòma bomùs dù bomù

  Instrumental bomù bòmais dviຽ;m bõmam

  Locative bomè bòmuose

  Save it be feminine logically, an American loan-noun usually takes the masculine gender, which may show any one of five endings in the nominative singular —as, -ỹs, -is, -us or -uo. The ending attached is determined to some extent by the meaning, and by the form in English. Most names of inanimate objects seem to be given the -as ending, e.g., Amèrikas (America), háuzas or áuzas (house), bàksas (box), bólas (ball), divòrsas (divorce), fréntas (friend), fòrnisas (furnace), kãras (car), káutas or kótas (coat), kìsas (kiss), krýmas (cream), lãtas (lot), mùnšainas (moonshine), òfisas (office), pòket-bukas (pocketbook), rèkordas (phonograph-record), saliúnas (saloon), sáidvokus (sidewalk) and štòras (store). But agent-nouns in -er take the -is ending, e.g., békeris (baker), gròseris (grocer), blòferis (bluffer), bùtlegeris (bootlegger) and làbsteris (lobster in the opprobrious sense), and so, by analogy, do most other nouns in -er, e.g., bòmperis (bumper) and fénderis (fender). So, also, do nouns whose ending suggests -er to the Lithuanian ear, e.g., dóleris (dollar) and mūvingpìkčeris (moving-picture). So, finally, do nouns in -le, e.g., báisikelis (bicycle) and tròbelis (trouble). One English noun, business, seems to the Lithuanian to have an -is ending ready-made, so he leaves it bìznis. When the last part of a compound word has already come into American-Lithuanian with an -as ending, e.g., štòras (store), the compound itself sometimes takes the -is ending, e.g., drùgštoris (drug-store). A few American loan-words take the -(i)us ending, chiefly by analogy. Thus redietorius (radiator) is suggested by the Lithuanian word dirèktorius (director). When the singular form of a loan-noun can’t be fitted into the Lithuanian system of declensions, the plural is used as a singular, e.g., bòisas (boy) and šúsas (shoe). The relatively few loan-words that take the feminine endings, -a and -e, not being themselves feminine in significance, usually do so because their English forms show those endings, or something approximating to them, e.g., ambrèla (umbrella), pãre (party), balióne (bologna) and pédė (pay-day). Sínka (sink), krèkė (cracker), bètspredė (bedspread) and hėmė (ham) are probably made feminine because they suggest the Frauenzimmer, and Dr. Senn says that šapà (shop) may be influenced by shoppe. The nouns lòkė (luck) and fònė (fun) were plainly suggested by the adjectives lucky and funny rather than by the corresponding English nouns. Even proper names are given Lithuanian endings, and regularly inflected. Thus New York, in the nominative singular, becomes Nãjorkas, New Haven becomes Najévenas, Waterbury (Conn.) becomes Vòlberis, Vòrberis, Vòrbelis or Vòterburis, and Grand avenue, a street in the last-named, becomes Grináunė.

  But some of the commonest coins of American speech, e.g., yes, no, well, sure and O.K., are taken into Lithuanian bodily and without substantial change, and this is true also of most adjectives, e.g., busy (bìzi), particular (partìkli), nice (nais), ready (rèdi), big (big), crazy (kréize), good (gud). Dr. Senn says he knows of but two loan-adjectives that are regularly declined, to wit, dórtinas (dirty) and fòniškas (funny). Lithuanian is extraordinarily rich in diminutives; the word brother alone has fifteen.111 Some of these are attached to loan-words; thus, lady has produced leidùke, and miss has produced misẽle. A few masculine loan-nouns have feminine forms, e.g., bùtlegeris-bùtlegere (bootlegger-ess) and týčeris-týčerka (teacher-ess). When English combinations of sounds happen to be difficult to Lithuanian lips they are sometimes changed. Thus picnic becomes pìtnikas, order becomes òrdelis, and dóllar is often dórelis instead of dóleria. Loan-verbs, avoiding the complicated conjugations of correct Lithuanian, are all conjugated like jùdinu (to move). Among those in most frequent use are álpinu (to help), dòrtinu (to dirty), dráivinu (to drive), júzinu (to use), láikunu (to like), mùvinu (to move), pùšinu (to push) and tròstinu (to trust). But to fix becomes fìksyt, and to spend is spéndyt. When an English verb ends in a vowel it presents difficulties. Sometimes it is fitted with the -inu ending notwithstanding, e.g., trãjinu (to try); at other times it is given a final n and some other ending, e.g., pléinina (to play) and mònkina (to monkey). The verb lúzinu (to lose) becomes lòstinu in the past tense, obviously under the influence of lost. A few loan-verbs take the -uoti ending, e.g., bãderiuoti (to bother), čenčiúoti (to change) and faitúotis (to fight). American-Lithuanian has borrowed many English and American idioms, e.g., to catch cold, half past six, and I have got, and they are translated literally. Other phrases are taken over bodily. Thus gudtaim is good time, big sur-praiz is big surprise, and kréizauze is crazy-house, i.e., lunatic asylum.112

  g. Polish

  In September, 1933, at a meeting of the Syndykatu Dziennikarzy Polskich w Ameryce (Society of Polish-American Journalists) at Chicago, Mr. Ernest Lilien read a paper on “The Polish Language and Polish-American Writers.” It was devoted mainly to the sins of the speaker’s fellow-journalists, and was full of amusing stories. There was the one, for example, about the Polish-American telegraph-editor who received a press dispatch one night (in English, of course) about a storm that had knocked over fifty telegraph-poles, and who translated poles as Polacks, to the consternation of his Polish readers. And there was the one about the other Polish-American editor who, trusting the dictionary too much, translated sewer as szwacska (seamstress, i.e., sew-er). Mr. Lilien handled these brethren somewhat roughly, but his very exposure of their crimes also revealed their defense. For they have to work at high pressure translating the words and idioms of American-English into a quite unrelated and far more formal language, and it is no wonder that they occasionally perpetrate astonishing howlers, and deface Polish with fantastic new growths. All the foreign-language editors of the United States labor under the same difficulty, and fall into the same snares. They try to follow the canons of the language they are writing, but only too often it is impossible, and in consequence they promote the development of a bilingual jargon.

  The Polish-American journalists are rather more careful than most, but, as Mr. Lilien showed in his paper, their writings are full of Americanisms, in both word and idiom. Instead of writing obchód or šwięcenie they turn the English celebration (a term they have to use incessantly) into the facile celebracja, instead of zderzenie (collision) they write kolizja, and instead of wypytywać or przesluchi-wać (to question) they make it kwestjonować. In Polish the word for street (ulica) should precede the proper name, e.g., Ulica Kościuszkowska or Ulica Kościuszki, but in American-Polish it is usually Kosciuszko ulica (or sztryta), and that is what it promises to remain. The American-Polish housewife, on setting out for the grocery-store, never says “Idę do sklepu korzennego (or kolonial-nego),” which is Standard Polish; she says “Idę do groserni,” with groscernia correctly inflected for case. Other nouns that have thus come into the language, displacing Polish terms, are szapa (shop), sztor (store), buczernia (butcher), salun (saloon), salwak or sajdwok (sidewalk), pajpa (pipe), kołt (coat), owerholce (overalls), pajnt (paint), strytkara (street-car), wiska (whiskey), trok (truck) and piciosy (peaches).113 In sklad-departamentowy the first half is good Polish for a large store, but the second half is the English department, outfitted with a Polish tai
l. To Mr. Adam Bartosz, editor of Jednosc-Polonia (Baltimore), I am indebted for the following account of a Polish immigrant’s rapid introduction to American-Polish:

  When he arrived in this country he had little money and his clothes were old and out of the American fashion, but he brought with him a pair of strong shoulders and a willingness to work. So after a day or two of rest he went out to look for a dziab (job). They told him he must go to the fekterja (factory) and see the forman or boss. He got the dziab and worked hard, thinking of his first pejda (pay-day) on Saturday. Out of his first pay he had to pay for his bord and rum (room), and buy himself new siusy (shoes), for he would not dare to go to church in his Polish boots. When Sunday came his first duty was there. He wondered why he had to pay at the entrance, but some friend explained that it was for the zytz (seat). Then he wondered why they had a kolekta in the church, and the same friend explained that it was different here than in the Old Country. There the people paid teksy (taxes) and the priests were paid by the government, but here the priests got nothing from the government, so they had to have kolekta.

  After Mass the newcomer went home to enjoy his rokinch (rocking-chair), or perhaps he would get acquainted with some bojsy (boys) and go with them na rajda (for a ride), or to a piknik. He would come home all tired, and go to his bedrum to get a good night’s sleep — providing his matras was free of bedbogi. With time, if he happened to be a young man, he would find himself a sweetheartke, take her to muwing-pikciesy (moving-pictures) and buy her ajskrym (ice-cream). Some time later he would go to a photographer and send a pikciur to the old folks at home.