How do French words like “cul-de-sac” and “hors d’oeuvres“ end up part of the English language without being translated to English words?

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How do French words like “cul-de-sac” and “hors d’oeuvres“ end up part of the English language without being translated to English words?

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Anonymous 0 Comments

The correct answer is that when cultures and languages mix, they share words and phrases.

That seems incredibly simple, but it really is that simple. You hang out with a new group of people, over time you start using some expressions they use and they start using some of yours. Then you go back to your family or workplace or other social circles and take those new expressions or words with you, and then they spread from you to other people, and phrases or words from those other people spread back through you to that first group.

That just is how people be. We like novel expressions and funs turns of phrase. Language is first and foremost functional, and anything that works, gets picked up.

Every language is littered with hundreds of loan words from other languages. The only languages that don’t are those that developed in relative cultural isolation, either imposed by nature or by choice.

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