Mao Kun Map (attributed to Zheng He's voyages)

Question

Explain how the concept of 'Hobson-Jobson' words, as described by the 17th-century Surat Factors and R. Verstegan, highlights a fundamental tension between linguistic purity and the natural evolution of language through cultural contact.

Synthesized answer

The passages do not directly discuss the concept of 'Hobson-Jobson' words as described by the 17th-century Surat Factors and R. Verstegan, nor do they explicitly address a tension between linguistic purity and natural evolution. However, they do define 'Hobson-Jobson' as a "typical and delightful example of that class of Anglo-Indian argot which consists of Oriental words highly assimilated, perhaps by vulgar lips, to the English vernacular" [5]. This implies a natural process of linguistic adaptation through cultural contact, where foreign words are reshaped to fit English patterns.

The passages also illustrate how language evolves through contact, noting that many words used in Chinese ports, such as "mandarin," "junk," and "pagoda," are actually of Indian or Malay origin, "precipitated in Chinese waters during the flux and reflux of foreign trade" [1]. Similarly, English words in India have received "a special stamp of meaning" or formed "new compounds applicable to new objects" [2]. These examples show language changing naturally through cultural exchange, but the passages do not contrast this with any ideal of linguistic purity or reference to Surat Factors or Verstegan.…

Synthesized from the book passages below. Chat with the book on Feynman for follow-up.

From the book

ts which have been imported, such as loquot , leechee , chow-chow , cumquat , ginseng , &c. and (recently) jinrickshaw . For it must be noted that a considerable proportion of words much used in Chinese ports, and often ascribed to a Chinese origin, such as mandarin , junk , chop , pagoda , and (as I believe) typhoon (though this is a word much debated) are not Chinese at all, but words of Indian languages, or of Malay, which have been precipitated in Chinese waters during the flux and reflux of foreign trade. Within my own earliest memory Spanish dollars were current in England at a…
Passage [36]
ng; whilst in other cases our language has formed in India new compounds applicable to new objects or shades of meaning. To one or other of these classes belong outcry , buggy , home , interloper , rogue (-elephant), tiffin , furlough , elk , roundel ('an umbrella,' obsolete), pish-pash , earth-oil , hog-deer , flying-fox , garden-house , musk-rat , nor-wester , iron-wood , long-drawers , barking-deer , custard-apple , grass-cutter , &c. Other terms again are corruptions, more or less violent, of Oriental words and phrases which have put on an English mask. Such are maund , fool's rack ,…
Passage [37]
dilemma, or bifurcation, i.e. on two or more sources of almost equal probability, and in themselves ​ entirely diverse. In such cases it may be that, though the use of the word originated from one of the sources, the existence of the other has invigorated that use, and contributed to its eventual diffusion. An example of this is boy , in its application to a native servant. To this application have contributed both the old English use of boy (analogous to that of puer , garçon , Knabe ) for a camp-servant, or for a slave, and the Hindī-Marāṭhī bhoi , the name of a caste which has furnished…
Passage [40]
dem est; VOCEM sic semper eandem Esse, sed in varias doceo migrare figuras." Ovid. Metamorph. xv. 169-172 (adapt.). "... Take this as a good fare-well draught of English-Indian liquor ."— Purchas , To the Reader ( before Terry's Relation of East India), ii. 1463 (misprinted 1464). "Nec dubitamus multa esse quae et nos praeterierint. Homines enim sumus, et occupati officiis; subsicivisque temporibus ista curamus."— C. Plinii Secundi , Hist. Nat. Praefatio, ad Vespasianum . "Haec, si displicui, fuerint solatia nobis: Haec fuerint nobis praemia, si placui." Martialis , Epigr. II. xci.…
Passage [4]
which has been given to this book (not without the expressed assent of my collaborator), doubtless requires explanation. A valued friend of the present writer many years ago published a book, of great acumen and considerable originality, which he called Three Essays , with no Author's name; and the resulting amount of circulation was such as might have been expected. It was remarked at the time by another friend that if the volume had been entitled A Book, by a Chap , it would have found a much larger body of readers. It seemed to me that A Glossary or A Vocabulary would be equally…
Passage [10]

More questions about this book