Gibberish

[Dr. Goodword]

• gibberish •

Pronunciation: jib-êr-ish • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun, mass

Meaning: Inarticulate chatter, jargon, gobbledegook, unintelligible verbiage belonging to no known language.

Notes: This word is derived from gibber "inarticulate speech" + -ish, a suffix associated with foreign languages, e.g. Turkish, Swedish, and Danish. It implies a language made up of inarticulate speech.

In Play: We usually use this word to refer to specialized language that is incomprehensible: "The doctor read something from a medical book on his desk that was all gibberish to me." However, we do have practitioners of gibberish: "Sarah Palin, the ex-semigovernor of Alaska, is known for her gibberish that many US voters find convincing."

Word History: As already mentioned, gibberish is based on gibber. Most dictionaries list it as imitative in origin; however, we find historical evidence of it in most Indo-European languages. It belongs to a class of human and loud bird noises that includes jabber, a synonym of gibber, and gaggle, the sounds geese make. Gaggle is a variant of cackle, the noise chickens make. This word is clearly pan-Germanic, for we find Dutch kakelen, Swedish kackla, Danish kagle, and German gackeln. But similar words also appear in ancient PIE languages like Latin cacabare "cackle", Greek kakkaxein "cackle", and Sanskrit kakas "crow, raven". These suggest all these words are derived from PIE. (Chris Stewart, our word-spotter in South Africa, speaks no gibberish when he recommends fine Good Words like today's.)

[George Kovac]

Dr. Goodword notes that “-ish” is “a suffix associated with foreign languages.”

True that, but “-ish” also does duty as a suffix used to form adjectives from nouns and other adjectives, with the sense of “somewhat” or “rather” as in these examples: "oldish"; "reddish"; "sweetish". (The latter word is not to be confused with “Swedish,” which falls under Dr. Goodword’s category).

Unlike the usage to which Dr. Goodword refers, these usages of “-ish,” at least to my ear, are tinged with a bit of irony or humor and indicate something less than serious commitment to the adjectives or nouns to which they are attached. For example, if someone extends a casual invitation to drop by for an informal party at their home, they may suggest arriving “sevenish.” There is a new television comedy about a suburban African-American family that needs remedial training to keep in touch with the stereotypes that others expect them to know; the show is called “Black-ish.” And, I see increasing use of this term (coined by the outré advice columnist Dan Savage) to describe the attenuated state of commitment of many married or partnered couples: “monogamish.”

[Perry Lassiter]

For the two or three dozenth time on these pages I am reminded of Pogo (rivaled only by the Alice characters). "Here comes a big gibber speaking gibberish!"