Oct 23 2008
Word Meaning Change - From Macaroni to Macaroni Penguins
Words frequently change their meanings over time, and pursuing such change often illustrates cultural and historical shifts as well as changes in metaphors. The word macaroni has come down to us in its original meaning of a sort of pasta, but has also shifted its way down the garden path, now also appearing as part of the name of macaroni penguins.
Macaroni penguins are the most numerous penguin of all, there being an estimated nine million breeding pairs of them. They also might be the most colorful, but the reason for their name is what interests me most. Usually, the naming metaphor is obvious. When you hear of a chinstrap penguin, and see the black line ear to ear under its chin, the connection to a helmet with a chinstrap springs to mind immediately. But macaroni penguins?
When hearing the word, one thinks immediately about pasta, since macaroni is an English variant spelling of the Italian maccherone, (plural: maccheroni), referring to a pasta that technically must not contain eggs. Macaroni has been known in the US since none other than Thomas Jefferson introduced the first macaroni machine in 1789 on his return from serving as Ambassador to France.
But put pasta out of your mind. Even before 1789 the word macaroni was known in the US because of the macaroni fashion, which to me is the most interesting part of this story. And from the original use of the word to the point of naming penguins with the word come layer upon layer of metaphors and other associations.
In the 18th Century, maccherone in Italian also referred to a boorish fool. It is not unusual to use foods to describe people, and the foods need have absolutely nothing to do with the characteristic involved. Why do we call a nice person a good egg? Or an inactive person a couch potato? Years ago an attractive woman was called a tomato. So the first step in this separation of the literal meaning of macaroni as pasta from other uses of the word was calling a fool (in Italian) a maccherone.
Young men who had been on the Grand Tour to Italy adopted that word, as macaroni, to designate any fashion that was, foolishly perhaps, way over the top. They described such exagerated fashion as being very macaroni. These dandies or fops dressed in outrageous colors and stripes, had the highest powdered wigs (the fashion at the time) with long curls, possibly with a hat so high on the wig that you couldnt reach it, and they otherwise set themselves apart as being very noticeable and affected, in speech as well. They were the metrosexuals of their day, at very least. They may have used feathers, but that was not essential. These people willfully setting themselves apart as foolishly fashionable macaronis is the second phase of the genesis of the word.
The third phase of the story brings up the song Yankee Doodle, popular during the American Revolution, which makes fun of a Yankee who stuck a feather in his cap and called it macaroni. Unless one knows of the macaroni fashion, this line will never make sense. The song is laughing at a simple, nave Yankee who felt that nothing more than a single feather added to his cap would make him fashionable enough to be part of the macaroni fashion. These may have been alternative lyrics that started with the teasing of the British soldiers, but they were also enthusiastically taken over by the Yankees themselves, and incorporated into the song, possibly to boast that Yankees were indeed simpler, more basic folk than those across the Atlantic.
Only because of this song, where macaroni now became associated with a feather for the first time, we come to the fourth level of meaning shift, the macaroni penguin. Google the name and you will see that its another type of smaller penguin, distinguished by bright, thin, yellow and black feathers chaotically sprouting from above each ear. Knowing the full story of the changes in the word macaroni other than it referring to pasta, what more appropriate name could there be in this case than macaroni penguin?
2007 by Dr Vincent DiNapoli
Vincent DiNapoli has a Doctorate of Modern Languages from Middlebury College, speaks German, Spanish, and French, and has a working knowledge of five other languages. He has studied various languages in seven different locations in Europe and Mexico. A member of Mensa based in New York, he considers himself a Euramerican at heart, traveling extensively around the two continents, but has also traveled around the world by rail via Siberia, has visited Antarctica, and is a member of the Travelers Century Club, 107 of whose listed destinations he has visited so far. He is the essayist for his travel-and-language website http://Travelanguist.com , which he invites you to visit.
Madagascar Party Games - Have Fun in the JungleIf your child likes Madagascar, why not throw a Madagascar party, games and all, for their next birthday? This is a party the...
Learning the Spanish AlphabetIn order to learn the Spanish alphabet, you only have to add three more letters to the English alphabet. So if you teach your...
Space Themed Birthday Party Ideas for KidsSpace themed birthday party is not difficult to organize. Depending on your budget, a number of great ideas can be put into p...
How to Understand Symbolic and Figurative English ExpressionsLiteral English word use and meaning has very structured formats and can be used to function efficiently if one desires to be...
Learning To Speak ThaiThe main problem with learning to speak Thai is that the basis of the language is not European-based. English and the other E...
6 Ways of Creating Chinese CharactersDid you know there are only 6 ways of forming Chinese characters?Yes, 6 kinds of Chinese characters make up the 50,000 Chines...
7 Common Resume Cliches To AvoidWriting a rsum isnt easy. To your reader this one piece of paper is you, and he or she is going to give it about 20 seconds o...
Online Degree Programs - Are They Worth The Money?Today, in the comfort of your own home, it is practical and economical to pursue that long sought after degree you've desired...
How Tarot Cards Can Help You - Really!What Are Tarot Cards?Made up of no less than seventy-eight cards, each deck of Tarot cards are all the same. Tarot cards com...
Using a Free Baby Shower Word Scramble GameFinding baby shower games is often pretty easy if one has access to the internet. A fun and free baby shower game is a word ...
Finnish Language - An Overview from a Translation AgencyFinnish belongs to the Finno-Ugric family of the Uralian group of languages."Suomi", as the natives call it, has shared with ...
Comprehensive Translation ServiceTranslation is the interpretation of the meaning of a text in one language and the production, in another language of an equi...
Japanese WordsMost people know that geisha, kimono and haiku are Japanese words, but did you know that typhoon, tsunami and tofu are also J...
The Meaning Behind Astrology SymbolsAstrology symbols are not the discovery of the century. People knew about the astrology symbols for many years. For many year...
The Astrological Concepts Of ZodiacThe Astrological Concepts Of ZodiacThe word Zodiac comes from the Latin zodiacus, and from the Greek word whose meaning is l...
Craft Ideas for Birthday PartiesWhat theme you want for your kids birthday can be determined by the time of the year. For example, if it is near to Christmas...
Improving Vocabulary - Seven Ideas for ESL StudentsDo you want to improve your command of the English language? Many English as a Second Language (ESL) learners reach a point ...
Learn & Use German FillersThe German language has its own and many expressions and fillers. In German, words that are called particles or fillers are c...
Subject to Interpretation: How Stories MeanThe title is not a misprint. The question is not what does a story mean, but how does it have meaning? The answer is not simp...
Remember To Pronounce Your French Words RightA distinct characteristic about the French language is the way it is pronounced. Within the French language itself; rules in ...
Comments Off