cognates: the key to language acquisition
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Cognates – What are they?
Having the same origin. Related by borrowing, or descent. Related to a verb usually derivation and serving as its object to reinforce meaning. (Webster)
Descended from the same original language; of the same linguistic family. Of words: Coming naturally from the same root, or representing the same original word, with differences due to subsequent separate phonetic development. (Oxford English Dictionary)
Words that are orthographically and semantically similar in two languages because of a shared etymology.
False Cognates
Are pairs of words in different languages that appear to be or sometimes are cognates when they’re really not.
False Cognates are particularly common in core or common vocabulary. For an example when referring to kinship “mother” in Navajo the term that is shima can be related to the English term mama as well. When in fact that they are not similar or borrowed .
Sometimes not an accurate term to use it can also sometimes be described as a “false friend”. Though the “false friends” tend to mean the exact opposite. For an example is sin-song in Navajo and sin-transgression in English.
Spanish – English
English Spanish
Artist Artista
Intelligent Inteligente
Lamp Lámpara
Magnificent Magnífico
University
Universidad
French – English
English French
Artist Artiste
Intelligent Intelligent
Lamp Lampe
Magnificent Magnifique
University
Université
Is there a Difference between Cognates & Loanwords?
Loanwords: A word adopted from a foreign language with little or no modification.
Cognates are two words that derive from the same language.
Loanwords are borrowed from a different language.
Bibliography
Young, R. (1912). The Navajo Verb System.
Amengual, M. (March 30, 2011). Interlingual influence in Bilingual Speech: Cognate Status Effect in a Continuum of Bilingualism. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition. 15.3, pg. 517-530.
Montelongo, J. A. (2011). Spanish-English Cognates and the Dewey Decimal System. California Reader, 45(2), 11-16
http://neohumanism.org/f/fa/false_cognate.html
http://www.macmillandictionary.com/dictionary/american/false-cognate