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Definition:
In linguistics, a word or expression (such as glasnost or in medias res) that has been imported from another language to create a particular effect or serve a special semantic function.
To indicate that a foreignism (unlike a loanword) has not been fully assimilated into the native language system, it is usually printed in italics.
See also:
Examples and Observations:
- "I can't understand why we've never been burgled. It's common knowledge that I have some very valuable objets d'art."
(Patricia Routledge as Hyacinth Bucket in "A Picnic for Daddy." Keeping Up Appearances, 1991) - "Now it was serious. A double-dog-dare. What else was there but a 'triple dare you'? And then, the coup de grâce of all dares--the sinister triple-dog-dare."
(A Christmas Story, 1983) - "Then this description, passing from auctoritas to auctoritas, was transformed through successive imaginative exercises, and unicorns became fanciful animals, white and gentle."
(Umberto Eco, The Name of the Rose, trans. by William Weaver. Harcourt, 1983) - "Three weeks after the university opened, the head of the department asked Elwood to dine with him. Elwood felt that the acceptance demanded something unusual. He bought a book of etiquette and there read that full dress was de rigueur at dinner. He looked up de rigueur in his dictionary, and then looked up straightway a ready made dress suit."
(Gertrude Adams, "The Dean's Mistake," 1901)
- "'Why don't you go at some more serious work; some magnum opus that would bring your whole strength into play?'
"'A magnum opus, my dear fellow!' replied Clay, with a shade of irritation in his voice. 'You talk as if a magnum opus could be done for the wishing. Why don't you do a magnum opus, then?'
"'Why don't I? Oh, I'm not a literary fellow--never professed to be. What a question!'"
(Henry A. Beers, "Split Zephyr," 1904) - "Foreign expressions in English (as opposed to borrowings or loanwords proper) are generally used for special effect, for 'local colour,' or to demonstrate special knowledge. . . . There tends to be a gradation in English from less to more foreign expressions [ranging] from the integrated (but variously pronounced) garage through elite/élite and coup d'etat/état to fin de siècle and pâtisserie. In such a spread, it is difficult to specify precisely where the 'properly' foreign begins: all the items are foreign, but some are more foreign than others, and more foreign for some than for others. Non-native words are used in English to a vast an unmeasurable extent. Many varieties of the language have everyday usages that in others would be foreignisms: Maori expressions in NZE, Hawaiian elements in AmE, and Gallicisms in the English of Quebec."
(Tom McArthur and Roshan McArthur, Concise Oxford Companion to the English Language. Oxford University Press, 2005) - "Words and phrases that have become part of the English language cover a wide range of ?elds: entertainment (anime, ?amenco, soirée), food and drink (blini, ?lo, goulash, latte, stollen), language and literature (litotes, portmanteau, Sturm und Drang), law (force majeure, tort, virgo intacta), music (allegro, nocturne, tabla), politics and economics (arbitrage, glasnost, laissez-faire, ombudsman), and religion and philosophy (chi, Corpus Christi, Diwali, Koran, Rosh Hashanah)."
(Martin H. Manser, The Facts On File Dictionary of Foreign Words and Phrases, 2nd ed., Infobase Publishing, 2008) - Usage Guide
"Use a foreign expression only if no English expression seems quite right (Weltschmertz [roughly, weariness of life], for instance, seems to have no exact English equivalent) and if your readers almost certainly know what it means. Put a foreign word into italics or within double quotation marks unless English has fully taken it over (as it has à la carte, for example). Be sure to preserve any diacritics . . . that the word may have."
(Martin Steinmann and Michael Keller, Grammar Without Grief: The Ultimate A to Z for the Stylistically Clueless and the Grammatically Challenged. NTC/Contemporary Publishing, 1997)
"When a naturalized or quasi-naturalized foreignism appears in an English-language context, the surrounding words--with a few exceptions, such as hoi polloi--should be English. Thus, one refers to finding the mot juste, not finding le mot juste (a common error among the would-be literati)."
(Bryan A. Garner, A Dictionary of Modern Legal Usage, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 1995) - Foreignisms in Literature
"Latin foreignisms have been adapted into English both by those who know and by those who are ignorant of Latin. Though Byron, for example, takes care to use a verb of motion with 'in medias res' ('Most epic poets plunge in 'medias res,"' Don Juan, i.6), the phrase is now often used without regard to Latin syntax, occurring in expressions like 'to begin in medias res.' The Oxford English Dictionary lists the form 'strictu sensu' in addition to the correct Latin, 'stricto sensu.' Those usages reflect the extent to which Latin has been assimilated into normal English usage."
(Kenneth Haynes, "Multilingualism in Literature." English Literature and Ancient Languages. Oxford University Press, 2005)
Pronunciation: FAWR-uh-niz-um
Also Known As: peregrinism