WHAT do they call a computer mouse in Urdu? ‘Chooha’? Definitely not, as ‘chooha’ literally means ‘rat’ in Urdu and it would sound funny in technical context.
A computer mouse is simply ‘mouse’ in Urdu, with a slightly different pronunciation. In some languages, as Persian and Arabic, computer mouse has been translated almost literally. But we have not bothered to translate ‘mouse’ (computer) and have simply borrowed the word from the English language as we have been doing very ‘generously’ for about two centuries now. Rarely would one find such ‘generous’ borrowers.
So what exactly is a borrowed word? A borrowed word or loanword is a word borrowed from one language (often called the source language or donor language) and incorporated into another language (often known as the recipient language or borrowing language) without any translation. Philip Durkin in his book Borrowed Words: A History of Loanwords in English (Oxford: 2014) has noted an interesting aspect of loaned or borrowed words: “In linguistics, the term ‘borrowing’ describes a process in which one language replicates a linguistic feature from another language, either wholly or partly. The metaphorical use of the word ‘borrowing’ to describe this process has some well-known flaws: nothing is taken away from what is termed the donor language, and there is no assumption that the ‘borrowing’ or ‘loan’ will ever be returned.” So a loanword is a loan that is never repaid.
Aside from thousands of English loanwords that have become an integral part of Urdu, a few of them are assimilated into Urdu with a slight phonetic or semantic variation. Some of them are listed here:
•lot: usually pronounced as ‘laat’ in Urdu, as in ‘laat ka maal’, to refer to something being sold in heaps and at low cost.
•general: often pronounced ‘jernail’ to refer to a high-ranking military officer.
•colonel: pronounced ‘kernal’ to refer to a military officer.
•lantern: has simply been adopted by Urdu as ‘laaltain’.
•recruit: in Urdu, it has become ‘rangroot’ and is used derisively to refer to a novice or new entrant in some trade.
•spanner: has become ‘paana’ in Urdu to refer to the implement, since for a native it is a bit difficult to pronounce ‘spanner’ the way the British do as they drop the final ‘r ’ in pronunciation.
•pliers: in Urdu, it is known by the name ‘plaass’.
•toast: it is pronounced and spelt as ‘tos’.
•ticket: pronounced ‘tikat’, the word is used for a ticket and for a postage stamp, too.
•fees: is used as singular in Urdu and the ‘s’ at the end is pronounced as ‘s’ and not as ’z’.
Sometimes a word is translated literally into another language instead of being borrowed. A word or phrase or idiom translated literally into another language is known as loan translation. In linguistic terms, a loan translation is known as calque. Loan translations are words or phrases borrowed from another language but are in fact word-for-word translations. There are some interesting English loan translations, too, commonly used in Urdu. Let us have a look at some of them:
•on the same page: ‘aik safhe par’. The use is very common in political context these days in our country to express mutual understanding between the ruling party and the powers that be.
•sacred cow: ‘muqaddas gai’. It is often used to refer to some sections of the society which are above criticism or above the law (even naming them here may have its consequences). Interestingly, the usage has its roots in Hinduism as cow is held in high esteem in a Hindu society. The concept was borrowed by the English language and was, in turn, literally translated into Urdu.
•white elephant: ‘safed haathi’. It refers to some big-budget project or government institution that fails to deliver.
•poverty line: ‘ghurbat ki lakeer’. Sometimes another coinage, in a literary style with a Perso-Arabic literal translation, is used: ‘khatt-i-aflaas’.
•bookworm: ‘kitaabi keera’. It is often used derogatively in Urdu.
•migratory birds: hijrati parinde.
•skyscraper: falak bos, literally, kissing the sky. The Persian equivalent ‘aasmaan kharaash’ is an exact literal translation, though the Urdu coinage is soft and more romantic.
And then there are some hybrid coinages that sound funny to those learning Urdu as a foreign language but our ears are so attuned to these crossbreed phrases that we rarely notice their incongruity:
•double roti: ‘roti’ is bread in Urdu, but the English ‘double’ is retained.
•ticket ghar: It means ticket booth. ‘Ghar’, or house, is Urdu and blending it with ticket is considered valid.
•lathi charge: In Urdu, a lathi is a stick or cudgel. But the English ‘charge’ goes quite smoothly with it. Some newspaper reporters use the expression ‘baton charge’ to refer to the act of beating the general public with batons or clubs to disperse them, a hangover from the colonial days.
•jail khana: ‘Khana’ means ‘house’ and is used with the English word ‘jail’ to refer to prison.
•rail gaari: ‘Gaari’ is a vehicle or means of transportation in Urdu and blends perfectly with the English ‘rail’.
Published in Dawn, April 21st, 2020
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