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Atheist "God Bless You" (The Guardian) | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Cultural Experiences in Foreign Languages |  | |
| Bao Diglot Senior Member Germany tinyurl.com/pe4kqe5 Joined 5561 days ago 2256 posts - 4046 votes  Speaks: German*, English Studies: French, Spanish, Japanese, Mandarin | Message 17 of 33 29 September 2012 at 8:56pm | IP Logged | |||||
I personally feel uncomfortable with phrases that directly refer to a deity, at least in German. Basically, because those phrases trigger as response the same phrase in a reversed situation. Those rituals of exchanging set phrases are a way of creating bonds, but they also are a social control mechanism. I'm willing to participate in the game to a certain extent, to create an atmosphere in a group that makes it easy to interact with each other, but I'm not willing to subscribe to things I disagree with, just to keep the peace. Invoking deities is just one of those things. I'm okay with phrases that let everybody fill in their own agent, even when they originate from a certain religion. So, 'bless you' would be alright with me, 'god bless you' wouldn't. But there are people who do not want to strengthen interaction patterns that originate from religious social control, even if most people using them are neither aware of the origin nor feel controlled by them. Edited by Bao on 29 September 2012 at 10:39pm 4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| onurdolar Diglot Groupie TurkeyRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4447 days ago 98 posts - 147 votes Speaks: Turkish*, English Studies: Italian, German | Message 18 of 33 01 October 2012 at 9:56am | IP Logged | |||||
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It's not exclusively western; Turks say "Çok yaşa" when someone sneezes which means "Live long". Also there is a response phrase; the person who sneezed says "sen de gör" in response. Which means "You see it too" meaning i hope you see that i lived long. I think it's a secular "god bless you" if not atheist.
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| Ogrim Heptaglot Senior Member France Joined 4434 days ago 991 posts - 1896 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, Spanish, French, Romansh, German, Italian Studies: Russian, Catalan, Latin, Greek, Romanian | Message 19 of 33 01 October 2012 at 10:36am | IP Logged | |||||
Actually, in Spain most people seem to say "Jesús" rather than "Salud", so certainly a religious connotation there. And "Jesús" pronounced emphatically sounds very much like a sneeze. Apparently, in the Middle Ages people thought that sneezing could be fatal, as life was supposed to be tied to one's breath, so a blessing seemed to be an adequate reply. 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Eumaeus Groupie Australia Joined 5399 days ago 75 posts - 134 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian | Message 20 of 33 03 October 2012 at 7:47am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have heard that in times when the church held much greater sway ( commonly known as the dark ages for
obvious reasons) people thought that the soul was expelled from the body during a sneeze. Saying bless you was an antidote to this. I still say bless you just in case they were right. Lets face it, Christianity has been.....um....well...right before? I have, however, taken to exclaiming " oh my science!" when I'm surprised. As much as I love studying other languages, I am most pleased to have English as my mother tongue. And part of what I love about English are the leftover sayings from times past, like little historical markers on our language's DNA. Who cares if they originate from more superstitious times? It has only been the last few generations that most of us have been able to look at the world through any other framework than a religious one anyway, so its no surprise that our language is peppered with superstitious little sayings like bless you. I say let's keep them. They add to the richness of our beautiful language. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| hrhenry Octoglot Senior Member United States languagehopper.blogs Joined 4925 days ago 1871 posts - 3642 votes Speaks: English*, SpanishC2, ItalianC2, Norwegian, Catalan, Galician, Turkish, Portuguese Studies: Polish, Indonesian, Ojibwe | Message 21 of 33 03 October 2012 at 3:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
English really isn't unique in this respect. It's happened throughout history. Consider Spanish's "ojalá" or Italian's "magari". They both came to their respective languages via other contact languages with heavy religious connotations, and now have no religious basis for their usage. R. == 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Eumaeus Groupie Australia Joined 5399 days ago 75 posts - 134 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Italian | Message 22 of 33 03 October 2012 at 10:48pm | IP Logged | |||||
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You are completely correct of course hrhenry. I didn't mean to suggest that English was unique in this way.
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| atama warui Triglot Senior Member Japan Joined 4496 days ago 594 posts - 985 votes Speaks: German*, English, Japanese | Message 23 of 33 04 October 2012 at 4:54pm | IP Logged | |||||
When you need to talk to someone during sex, you're doing it wrong. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Josquin Heptaglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4639 days ago 2266 posts - 3992 votes Speaks: German*, English, French, Latin, Italian, Russian, Swedish Studies: Japanese, Irish, Portuguese, Persian | Message 24 of 33 04 October 2012 at 6:23pm | IP Logged | |||||
I think you didn't get the joke here. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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