Journal of Pragmatics 35 (2003) 18911902 www.elsevier.

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Animal names used in addressing people in Serbian

Sabina Halupka-Res etar*, Biljana Radic
Faculty of Philosophy, Department of English Language and Literature, a Stevana Music 24, 21000 Novi Sad, Yugoslavia Received 28 February 2002; received in revised form 28 February 2003; accepted 3 March 2003

Abstract The paper deals with combined metaphorical/vocative uses of animal names in Serbian in addressing people, both abusively and aectionately, thereby expressing the speakers attitude towards their addressee. The discussion is based on the results obtained in a survey conducted with some 100 university students of linguistics. The survey was organized in the following way: the students were given a questionnaire containing 40 animal names and were asked (a) to decide if they would use a given animal name to address a male or a female person, or both, (b) to determine if they would use the name abusively or aectionately, (c) to say how frequently they would use the name, (d) to give the morphosyntactic structure in which they would use the name, and (e) to describe a concrete situation in which they would use the name. The research shows that animal vocatives are usually used as human invectives, although a certain number of vocatives (mostly diminutives) are used to express aection. The results are further analyzed with respect to: (a) the typical morphosyntactic structures in which the animal names occur, (b) the typical situations that provoke such uses, and (c) semantico-pragmatic motivations for the choice of particular names. # 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Animal names; Addressing; Endearment; Abuse; Metaphor; Serbian

The present paper is an expanded version of the poster presented at the 7th International Pragmatics Conference in Budapest, 914 July 2000. The authors would like to thank Professor Tvrtko Prcic for his many insightful comments, as well as two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions on an earlier draft of this article. * Corresponding author. E-mail address: sabinah@eunet.yu (S. Halupka-Res etar). 0378-2166/03/$ - see front matter # 2003 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/S0378-2166(03)00052-3

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1. Introduction This paper explores the use of animal names in addressing people, both abusively and aectionately. These animal names occur in various morphosyntactic structures, the most frequent ones being vocatives. As Levinson (1983) points out, vocative forms in dierent languages tend to be highly idiosyncratic and complex. As a pragmatic category, they belong in the larger class of deictic expressions. They are divided into calls and addresses, the former being used to catch the addressees attention and the latter to maintain or emphasize the contact between the addressor and the addressee (Zwicky, 1974). It is this latter function that is observed in the use of animal names in addressing people. The Serbian nominal declension has seven cases, the Vocative being one of them (available for invectives and the like). As to morphological dierences, Nominative is unmarked, while the other cases are marked by various suxes, depending on the gender and number of the noun. Naturally, the same holds for the diminutive and augmentative forms of nouns. However, the present paper will not deal with morphology as such. The discussion is based on the results obtained in a survey conducted with 94 third and fourth year university students of linguistics whose native language is Serbian. The survey was conducted in the following way: the students were given a quesurka, kittionnaire containing 45 names of animals found in Yugoslavia (turkeyc tenmace, henkokoska, he-goatjarac, dogpas, ducklingpace, mousemis, cockroachbubasvaba, frogzaba, lambjagnje, donkeymagarac, tomcat macak, horsekonj, sowkrmaca, cowkrava, snailpuz, bearmedved, partridgejarebica, bitchkuja, marekobila, pigeongolub, carpsaran, ratpacov, chickpile, pigletprase, beepcela, calftele, catshsom, mulemazga, wolf vuk, puppykuce, rabbitzec, pigsvinja, she-goatkoza, butteryleptir, roosterpetao, catmacka, duckpatka, eweovca, oxvo, foxlisac, gooseguska, snakezmija, bullbik, vixenlisica) and were asked (a) to decide if they would use a given animal name to address a male or a female person, or both, (b) to determine if they would use the name abusively or aectionately, (c) to say how frequently they would use the name, (d) to give the morphosyntactic structure in which they would use the name, and (e) to describe a concrete situation in which they would use the name. Additional slots were provided for the students to supply animal names not listed, but normally used by them. The analysis of the data involved only those cases in which over 51%, i.e. over half of the testees chose to use a certain animal name in any situation. The research shows that animal vocatives are usually used as human invectives, although a certain number of vocatives (mostly diminutives) are used to express aection. The results are further analyzed with respect to: (a) the typical morphosyntactic structures in which the animal names occur (Sections 2.1 and 3.1), and (b) the typical factors that provoke such uses and the semantico-pragmatic motivations for the selection of particular names (Sections 2.2 and 3.2). What serves as a basis for the transfer of meaning is the metaphor people as animals, where characteristics of some animals (aggressive behavior, living place, etc.) are projected onto human

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characteristics (anger, meeting point, etc.) (Barcelona, 1998). As is the case with most other metaphors, these, too, seem to be culturally dependent, as dierent cultures have dierent conceptual systems (Lako and Johnson, 1980). Section 4 gives an account of the frequency of usage of the members of certain animal species in addressing people, and oers an overview of animal pairs as used in addressing men and women in similar situations. Finally, Section 5 gives a brief conclusion.

2. Animal names used as terms of abuse 2.1. Structures As far as morphosyntactic structures are concerned, various patterns can be observed. These are given in Figs. 14, along with glosses and translation equivalents. Each structure in column 1 is followed by examples in column 2, illustrating negative usage. 1. Vocative, premodied or postmodied by a descriptive adjective and/or postmodied by the determiner jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut (one) (Fig. 1):

X! X You X! (Pridev) X (jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut)! (Adjective) X (one) You X!

Svinjo! pigvoc You pig! Matori oldmasc jarce! he-goatvoc

You old goat! Konju jedan!

horsevoc onemasc X (Jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut) (pridev)! X(one)(Adjective) You (Adjective) X!

Fig. 1.

Gusko jedna glupava! goosevoconefemstupidfem You stupid goose!

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2. Vocative of the augmentative (formed by various suxes), used exclusively in negative contexts, which can be postmodied by the determiner jedanmasc/ jednafem/jednoneut (one) and/or an adjective (Fig. 2): Xaugmentativ! (jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut)/(pridev)! Xaugmentative (one/Adjective) You (Adjective) X! Magarcino (jedna)! donkeyaug-voc (oneneut) You jackass! Kravetino debela! cowaug-voc fatfem You fat cow!
Fig. 2.

Besides these grammatical vocatives, there are also non-vocative structures used in addressing people. The latter can be classied as follows: 3. Simile, with kao/ko (like), occasionally elided (Fig. 3): (Pridev) si kao/ko X! (Adjective) are2dsg like X You are as (Adjective) as a(n) X! Kao/ko X si! like X are2dsg You are like a(n) X!
Fig. 3.

Spor

si

kao puz!

slowmasc are2dsg as snail You are as slow as a snail! Ko mazga si!

like mule are2dsg You are like a mule!

4. Emphatic structures (Fig. 4): Kakav/koji si ti X! what like/which are2dsg you X2dsg What a(n) X you are! Koji si ti magarac!

which are2dsg you donkey What a jackass you are! Kakav si jarac!

what like are2dsg he-goat What a goat you are!

(continued on next page)

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(E,) bas si/al si (ispao/ispala) (pravi/ prava) X! oh really are/how aresg (turned out) (real) X Oh, you really are/have become a(n) (real) X!

Bas si ovca! really aresg ewe You really are a sheep E, bas si prava svinja! pig

oh really aresg realfem Oh, you are a real pig Ispao si magarac!

turned our aresg donkey You have become a jackass! E, jesi X! oh aresg X Oh, you really are a(n) X!
Fig. 4.

E, jesi kokoska! oh aresg hen Oh, you really are a hen!

The analysis of the data points to the fact that the structures used most frequently (in 61.5% of the cases) are X! and X Adjective/ jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut!. Augmentatives are used somewhat less frequently (17.4%), occasionally postmodied by jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut and/or an adjective. Despite the fact that similes and emphatic structures occur even less frequently than augmentatives (six dierent structures in a total of 21.1%), they display more creativity and a wider variety of syntactic constructions. This may be due to various factors: on the one hand, the number of elements in these expressions allows for more combinations, while, on the other hand, the very length of these structures may decrease the frequency of their usage. Finally, the usage of certain constructions may also be characteristic of certain dialects or even idiolects (this could not be conrmed, as the questionnaires were anonymous). 2.2. Meaning As Miller (1993: 367) points out [i]f an author says that x is y when we know in fact that x is not y, we must try to imagine a world in which x is y.

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This act of imagination is facilitated if, in the real world, x is like y in some respects, for then we can take their similarities as the authors grounds for saying that x is y. The situations in which animal names are used to address people in an oensive way vary. Most often the metaphoric transfer is the result of the addressors reaction to the addressees behavior, such as a stupid remark or action, an insult, the addressees clumsiness, obstinacy, untidiness, malice, or appearance. The transfer of animal names onto people is usually motivated by the transfer of some animal characteristics onto human beings. Wierzbicka (1985) claims that folk genera can be dened in terms of the following ordered set of thematic parts: habitat, size, appearance, behavior and relation to people. Martsa (1999) modies this classication, pointing out that size should be integrated into appearance, since, by doing so, the complexity of the analysis is not harmed in any way. Thus, Martsas classication is reduced to the following four thematic parts: habitat (the place/circumstances of living, characteristic of the particular animal), appearance (typical size, shape, color of fur, etc.), behavior (idiosyncratic forms of behavior, movement, eating, etc.) and relation to people (dierent aspects of cultural utility of the particular animal from the point of view of a language community). Halupka and Prcic (1998), however, argue that not even Martsas classication can account for the data in Serbian and that the transfer of animal names onto humans is most frequently motivated by the following thematic elements: appearance, eating habits, intelligence and character. Using this classication as a starting point, in what follows we shall introduce modications where the corpus requires this, in Section 3 we shall expand the analysis and apply it to the aectionate use of animal names. The classication proposed by the present authors is the following: (a) APPEARANCE Typically, this includes size and body weight (e.g. Kobilo jedna! You mare!), as well as some other less prominent features, such as color of skin/fur (not found in the corpus). Large size most frequently implies increased body weight, which, in turn, results in gracelessness (e.g. Kravo smotana! You clumsy cow!), slow movements, etc. (b) EATING HABITS This refers to the manner of feeding characteristic of a certain animal (e.g. Svinjo (h)alava! You gluttonous swine!). (c) INTELLIGENCE Since this feature is based on traditional beliefs, the transfer is less obvious; still, the usage is widespread, therefore it cannot be considered idiosyncratic (e.g. Curko glupava! You stupid turkey!). (d) CHARACTER This, too, is based on traditional beliefs, thus the transfer is less obvious. The features that would belong here are carelessness (e.g. Gusko jedna! You goose!), indecency (e.g. Matori jarce! You old goat!), garrulousness (e.g. Kokosko brbljiva! You blabbering hen!), etc.

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3. Animal names used as terms of endearment 3.1. Structures The various structures that can be observed in the use of animal names in positive contexts overlap to a certain degree with the structures found in invective usage. Figs. 59 give an overview of the constructions used in addressing people aectionately, along with glosses and translation equivalents. Each structure in column 1 is followed by examples in column 2, illustrating positive usage. 1. Vocative, premodied or postmodied by a descriptive adjective and/or the possessive adjective mojmasc/mojafem/mojeneut (my) or the determiner jedanmasc/ jednafem/jednoneut (one): X! Xvoc You X! (Pridev) X jedanmasc/jednafemjednoneut! (Adjective) Xvoc one You X! X (Jedanmasc/jednafem/jednoneut) (pridev)! Xvoc (one) (Adjective) You (Adjective) X!
Fig. 5.

Misu! mousevoc You mouse! Pace jedno!

ducklingvoconeneut You duckling! Pile malo!

chickvoclittleneut You little chick!

2. Vocative of the diminutive (formed by various suxes), used exclusively in positive contexts, postmodied most frequently by the possessive adjective mojmasc/mojafem/mojeneut (my) and/or a descriptive adjective:

Xdeminutiv (mojmasc/mojafem/mojeneut)/(pridev)! Xdiminutive (my)/(Adjective) You (Adjective) X!

Fig. 6.

Jagnjesce moje malo! lambdim-vocmyneutlittleneut My little lamb!

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Besides these grammatical vocatives, there are also several non-vocative structures used in addressing people. The latter can be classied as follows: 3. Simile, with an occasional elided kao/ko (like): (Pridev) si kao/ko X! (Adjective) are2dsg like X You are as (Adjective) as a(n) X! Kao/k X si! like X are2dsg You are like a(n) X!
Fig. 7.

Spretna si ko macka! skillful are2dsg as cat You are as skillful as a cat! Ko prase si! like piglet are2dsg You are like a piglet!

4. Emphatic structures: Ti si (pridev) X (pridev)! you are2dsg (Possessive adjective) X (Adjective) You are a(n) (Adjective) X! Bas si/Pravi si/Bas si pravi X! really are/real are/really are2dsg real X You really are/are a real X!
Fig. 8.

Ti

si

! moj misic

you are2dsg my mousedim You are my little mouse! Bas si prase!

really are2dsg piglet You really are a piglet!

5. Other structures: Gde si, X? where are2dsg X Whats up, X?

Fig. 9.

Gde

si, macko?

where are2dsg catvoc Whats up, pussy cat?

The most frequent structure in the positive usage is the vocative postmodied by the possessive adjective mojmasc/mojafem/mojeneut (my) (63.2%). Less frequently, the vocative of the diminutive can be found (22.5%), but the frequency of the use of diminutive forms in positive contexts is greater than the frequency of the use of

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augmentative forms in negative contexts (22.5% versus 17.4%). As far as various diminutives are concerned, in quite a number of cases several dierent forms of one , ; animal name were found (e.g. golubic golupcic jagnjesce, jagnjence; maca, mace, mackica). The usage of these forms mainly depends on students dialects and idiolects; again, their origins could not be veried. 3.2. Meaning Animal names are used as terms of endearment less frequently than as terms of abuse. In addition, fewer animal names occur in positive usage, i.e. as terms of endearment than as invectives. The metaphoric transfer exemplied in the data in Section 3.1 is based on the addressors aectionate feelings toward the addressee and is most frequently motivated by the appearance of an animal. Typically, it is the names of young animals that are used here, due to the fact that they are small, helpless, and cuddly. Thus, of the four points of metaphoric transfer given in Section 2.2, only appearance occurs as a clear basis of transfer of animal names in this usage: (1) APPEARANCE With animal names used as terms of endearment, it is size that matters more than anything else. Thus, the names of the osprings of many animals that people do not usually like are nevertheless used aectionately, e.g. Misu moj mali! My little mouse!. Small size, immaturity and helplessness motivate the protective attitude toward these young animals; this, in turn, provides a basis for metaphoric transfer and the addressors use of these names as terms of endearment, e.g. Mace moje! My kitten!. In some cases, e.g. Prase jedno! You piglet!, it is ultimately also the appearance of the addressee that provides a basis for the metaphoric transfer, although appearance is the result of behavior (e.g. getting dirty, burping, etc.) In this case, the negative motivation is overridden by the addressors positive feelings towards the addressee, typically a young child or a loved person. It is interesting to note that here the young of svinja pig is chosen; in all other contexts, this animal name is used invectively.

4. Animal species and pairs In this section, we would like to explore, rst, the relationship of the members of certain animal species with respect to the way/situation in which they are used, and second, the animal names used for male and female addressees in situations where the usage of these names is motivated by the same characteristics. The animal species given in the questionnaire were macakmackamace tomcatshe-catkitten, petaokokoskapile roosterhenchick, jarackoza billy-goatshe-goat, paskujakuce dogbitchpuppy, ovcajagnje sheep lamb, konjkobila horsemare, svinjakrmacaprase pigsowpiglet, vo

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bikkravatele oxbullcowcalf, patkapace duckduckling, and lisac lisica foxvixen. Of the rst animal species, only mackamace she-catkitten are used frequently (by 80% of the testees), both with a positive connotation: the rst one in addressing good-looking girls/women; the second as a term of endearment, just as was the case with all the other names of young animals listed above. Petao rooster is rarely used (by a mere 6% of the testees) and thus cannot be taken into consideration, but kokoska hen is a widespread term of abuse for garrulous and stupid women, used by 85% of the testees. Jarac billy-goat is the animal name one would use in addressing an indecent male, whereas koza she-goat is a term used of stupid women. The dog species is used extremely rarely in vocatives; hence it will be omittted here. A stupid and naive woman can be called an ovca sheep, while the animals young, jagnje lamb, is used for gentle, lovable children. A konj horse is a stupid and clumsy man, and its female counterpart is a kobila mare. This is one of the very few cases in which men and women with the same characteristics are addressed by the names of the members of the same animal species. While both men and women who eat like pigs or are vulgar or dirty can be called svinja pig, only women of this kind are called krmac sow, while prase piglet is used for a children (or even beloved grown-ups of the same ilk), but only aectionately, as a term of endearment. Curiously enough, neither bik bull nor tele calf is used, whereas krava cow is quite a widespread way of addressing fat, clumsy and stupid women, just as vo ox is said of stupid and rude men. Patka duck is rarely used, but its young, pace duckling, is a usual way of addressing likeable and cuddly children and loved grown-ups. The members of the pair lisaclisica foxvixen are used too infrequently for us to be able to provide a sound analysis of their usage. A detailed analysis of the corpus reveals that while stupid men are usually called magarac donkey, konj horse, som catsh and vo ox, stupid women are typically urka turkey, kokoska hen, koza she-goat, ovca sheep or guska addressed as c goose. Similarly, whereas clumsy men are normally called konj horse, women are krava cow or kobila mare. Finally, whereas krmaca sow is used for untidy women, svinja pig tends to be used of both sexes equally. On the other hand, animal names used as terms of endearment are not distinguished according to the sex of the addressee, since the names of young animals are used for both sexes indiscriminately when aection is being conveyed.

5. Conclusion In Serbian, animal names are more frequently used as terms of abuse than as terms of endearment. In invective usage, the motivation for the metaphoric transfer of meaning is in the size, eating habits, character and/or intelligence of the addressee. The prototypical invective structure is the vocative (postmodied by jedanmasc/ jednafem/jednoneut one and/or an adjective) or, somewhat less frequently, the vocative of the augmentative. Very often, men and women with the same characteristics are addressed by names of animals from dierent species.

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The use of animal names as terms of endearment is typically motivated by the size of the animal (which need not be connected with its youthful age) or the immaturity or helplessness of the animal. Prototypically, it is the vocative (postmodied by the possessive adjective mojmasc/mojafem/mojeneut my) or the vocative of the diminutive. Since the osprings of the animals are unspecied for gender, their names are used indiscriminately in addressing both men and women.

AppendixAbbreviations used in the glosses in subscript aug=augmentative dim=diminutive fem=feminine masc=masculine neut=neuter sg=singular pl=plural 2d=second person voc=vocative

References
Barcelona, Antonio, 1998. The state of the art in the cognitive theory of metaphor and metonymy and its application to English studies. The European English Messenger 7 (2), 4550. Goatly, Andrew, 1997. The Language of Metaphors. Routledge, London and New York. Halupka, Sabina, Prcic, Tvrtko, 1998. Krokodilu moj kontrastivni: od zivotinja vokativi za ljude invektivi [Oh, my contrastive crocodile: animal vocatives as human invectives]. In: Zbornik radova sa VI sim pozijuma Kontrastivna jezicka istrazivanja, Novi Sad: Filozofski fakultet: Jugoslovensko drus tvo za primenjenu lingvistiku, pp. 295300. Lako, George, Johnson, Mark, 1980. Metaphors We Live by. University of Chicago Press, Chicago/ London. Levinson, Steven C., 1983. Pragmatics. CUP, Cambridge. Martsa, Sandor, 1999. On exploring the conceptual structure of folk knowledge: the case of animal terms. Linguistica e Filologia 9, 7387. Miller, George, 1993. Images and models, similes and metaphors. In: Ortony, Andrew (Ed.), Metaphor and Thought, second ed. CUP, Cambridge, pp. 357400. Nesi, Hilary, 1995. A modern bestiary: a contrastive study of the gurative meanings of animal terms. ELT Journal 49, 272278. Palmatier, Robert, 1995. Speaking of Animals: A Dictionary of Animal Metaphors. Greenwood Press, Westport, Connecticut. Stanojcic, Zivojin, Popovic, Ljubomir, 1995. Gramatika srpskoga jezika. Zavod za udzbenike i nastavna sredstva, Beograd. Wierzbicka, Anna, 1985. Lexicography and Conceptual Analysis. Karoma, Ann Arbor. Zwicky, Arnold M., 1974. Hey, whatsyourname! In: Proceedings from the 10th Regional Meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, Chicago, pp. 787801. Sabina Halupka-Res etar, born 26 September 1972, graduated from the Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Philosophy, Novi Sad, in September 1995. She became MA in linguistics in

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February 2000 with a thesis entitled Wh-questions in English, Serbian and Hungarian: a Generative Approach. Currently she works as a Teaching Assistant in two undergraduate courses, Generative syntax and Morphology with Lexicology, and is doing research for her PhD thesis. She has attended and participated in various linguistic conferences at home and abroad, and has published several papers. She speaks, reads and writes Hungarian, Serbian and English uently, and reads German and Spanish. Biljana Radic, born 7 April 1975, graduated from the Department of English Language and Literature, Faculty of Philosophy, Novi Sad, in April 1998. Currently, she works as a Junior Teaching Assistant in an undergraduate course, Discourse Analysis with Essentials of Translation, and is writing her MA thesis on the language of the Internet. She has attended and participated in various linguistics conferences at home and abroad, and has published several papers. Her elds of interest include discourse analysis, lexicology and morphology. She speaks, reads and writes Serbian and English uently.