[Mihalic] Maski etymology!

[Ross Clark (FOA DALSL)]

This is indeed an interesting item. As far as I know it is not in any
Pacific languages apart from TP and CPE. I think the source must ultimately
be Portuguese. 

My (standard) Portuguese-English dictionary has 

	mas 'but, yet, still, however, nevertheless'

The item we are interested in is usually said to come from a Port. phrase
"mas que", but I have no information on the specific meaning or usage of
that. 

Portuguese being the first European language widely used in South and East
Asia, there are traces of it widely diffused even in places where direct
Portuguese influence ceased long ago. Both Malay and Bengali are well within
that area of influence. There are, of course, still enclaves of creole
Portuguese here and there. Alan Baxter's grammar of Papia Kristang (Malacca
Creole Portuguese) (Pacific Linguistics,1988) has maski "although". Example:

	Maski eli kaninu, eli forsa.	Although he is small, he is strong. 

The Malay form is meski(pun) 'although; in spite of (the fact that)'.
Example:

	Meskipun hujan lebat, si Amat pergi juga.  Although it was raining
heavily, Amat went anyway.

Examples like the last get us close to the "never mind" or "doesn't matter"
sense that we find in TP and CPE. So I would say the Portuguese and Malay
theories are both correct -- the word is ultimately Portuguese, but reaches
TP via some form of Malay. 

Ross Clark


> -----Original Message-----
> From: Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies 
> [mailto:ipngs at global.net.pg]
> Sent: Monday, 4 August 2003 10:29 a.m.
> To: Tok Pisin List
> Subject: [Mihalic] Maski etymology!
> 
> 
> Mihalic attributes TP maski to German "es macht nichts" 'it doesn't
> matter'. However, just by accident I came across the 
> following in their
> discussion of Chinese Pidgin English (CPE).
> 
> Amongst a number of CPE words of "undetermined origin", Baker and
> Mühlhäusler (1990:100) note: "maskee (1769) 'never mind' which Hunter
> (1882:61) and Dalgado (1936) regard as Portuguese but for 
> which a possible
> Malay origin has also been identified (Clark 1979:59, note 
> 15; Ferreira
> 1978)". [I don't have any of the sources mentioned, but 
> include them below
> if someone has access to better library resources than I do 
> and can perhaps
> enlighten us on what they say]
> 
> Further, Ross (1992:371-72) provides an alternative 
> possibility: "Although
> the vague phonological similarity may have helped to 
> reinforce the term,
> thsi seems a phonologially unlikely source in itself. 
> Ramoaaina [=Duke of
> York] maadeki 'forget it! leave it!' (verb maadek + third 
> person singular
> object suffix -i) seems more likely." Note 22 on p. 372: 
> "There is also a
> Bengali term with similar form and meaning, but it is unclear how this
> might have found its way into Tok Pisin." However, since 
> maski existed in
> CPE, Ross's interpretation would have less weight, I assume. 
> Does maski
> exist in other Pacific pidgins too?
> 
> Don
> 
> Don Niles
> Head & Senior Ethnomusicologist
> Music Department
> Institute of Papua New Guinea Studies
> P.O. Box 1432
> Boroko 111
> PAPUA NEW GUINEA
> 
> tel.:	[675] 325-4644
> fax:	[675] 325-0531
> email:	ipngs at global.net.pg
> 
> 
> SOURCES
> Baker, Philip, & Peter Mühlhäusler
> 	1990	"From Business to Pidgin." Journal of Asian Pacific
> Communication 1/1: 87-115.
> 
> Clark, R.
> 	1979	"In Search of Beach-la-Mar." Te Reo 22: 3-64.
> 
> Dalgado, S. R.
> 	1936	Portuguese Vocables in Asiatic Languages. 
> Baroda: Oriental
> Institute.
> 
> Ferreira, J. D. S.
> 	1978	Papiá Cristám di Macau. Macao: Tipografia da Missão.
> 
> Hunter, W. C. J.
> 	1882	The "Fan Kwae' at Canton before Treaty Days. London:
> Keagan, Paul, Trench and Co.
> 
> Ross, Malcolm
> 	1992	"The Sources of Austronesian Lexical Items in 
> Tok Pisin."
> In The Language Game: Papers in Memory of Donald C. Laycock, ed. Tom
> Dutton, Malcolm Ross, & Darrell Tryon, pp. 361-84. Pacific 
> Linguistics, C
> 110. Canberra: Australian National University.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> _______________________________________________
> Mihalic mailing list
> Mihalic at anu.edu.au
> http://mailman.anu.edu.au/mailman/listinfo/mihalic
>