Xenophobia

[Dr. Goodword]

• xenophobia •

Pronunciation: zee-nê-fo-bee-yê • Hear it!

Part of Speech: Noun, mass (No plural)

Meaning: Fear or hatred of anything or anyone foreign, alien.

Notes: Apparently fear and hatred is a problem in America, judging from the list of phobias. This word is based on the noun xenophobe "someone who fears or hates anyone or anything foreign". The adjective accompanying today's Good Word is xenophobic.

In Play: The fear of immigrants is the sense in which xenophobia is used most commonly these days: "One would think xenophobia was sweeping America, judging from the 2016 elections." However, a recent Gallup poll reveals that Americans are more satisfied with immigration rates now that before the election. Of course, what is "foreign" is in the eye of the beholder: "Preston Starcht is so xenophobic, he won't talk to people from a different county."

Word History: Today's Good Word comes from the wonderful word in Greek, xenos "foreigner, (foreign) guest" + phobos "fear" + -ia a noun suffix. Xenos may also be used as an adjective meaning simply "foreign". The modern Greek tourist industry likes to tout that Greeks speak a language that does not differentiate between "foreigner" and "guest". Phobos originally meant "flight". It is related to phobein "put to flight, frighten"), inherited from PIE root bhegw- "to run". This word is also the source of Lithuanian bėgti "to flee", Russian begat' "to run", and German Bach "a stream, brook". (Let's all now thank Perry Lassiter, a non-xenophobe if not an anti-xenophobe, for submitting today's highly relevant Good Word.)

[George Kovac]

A lot of interesting (but depressing) vocabulary is being rediscovered as a result of the unconventional political arguments that are now being ventilated in 2017.

Unfortunately, “xenophobia” is one of those words.

Another such word deserving our attention today is “shibboleth,” which was already featured in 2009 as the day’s Good Word. The definition posted by Dr. Goodword at that time did not include this sense, which is the one that first comes to my mind: “a common saying or belief with little current meaning or truth.”

Shibboleths are powerful, and potentially dangerous. They are susceptible to cynical exploitation in order to manipulate credulous and incurious folks. Shibboleths can be expressed in fewer than 140 characters.

I am old enough to remember the odd political satire of the 1960s and 70s. Firesign Theater was a group of studio comedians who produced some offbeat stoner albums that nevertheless had biting political and cultural insight. Firesign Theater are an acquired taste, largely inaccessible to today’s audiences. One of my favorite of their sketch bits involved a roused crowd—highly animated but thoroughly confused by a mixture of aggressive religious and political bromides—who sang a marching hymn called “The Rough-as-a-cob March.” The crowd mistakenly believed Shibboleth to be the name of a Biblical city. The primary refrain of the choir in that faux hymn was “We’re marching, marching to Shibboleth/With the Eagle and the Sword!”

And may I suggest that the word I used above—“bromide”—also be analyzed as a Good Word some day? One of the delicious ironies (in the context of current political debate) is that “bromide” was a favorite word of Ayn Rand. She used “bromide” repeatedly in “The Fountainhead” to mock the hoi polloi—the masses whom the powerful, shrewd protagonists in the novel could manipulate by playing to their fears and assumptions.

Well, back to the Greeks. If we are to revisit today arguments framed by the vocabulary of the ancient Greeks, I would prefer circumstances under which we would be debating Zeno’s paradoxes rather than xenophobia.

[Perry Lassiter]

Zeno's paradoxes would solve our immigrant crises, because with Zeno one couod never get to the border, much less cross it.

Never heard shibboleth used quite that way, unless you mean repeating conservative or liberal mantras. In other words, can you speak the language authentically. HEbrew word by the way, not Greek in case someone doesn't know.

[damoge]

Thanks, Perry! "Zeno's solution" would keep all the immigrants inside the country inside! Brilliant!