www.alphadictionary.com

Does anyone know the Russian word for kadigan (or cadigan)?

Collins Russian Gem Dictionary suggests вязаная жакетка, which I slightly doubt. Going via Swedish kofta, which clearly is a cardigan, I think кофта will work.

Collins Russian Gem Dictionary suggests вязаная жакетка, which I slightly doubt. Going via Swedish kofta, which clearly is a cardigan, I think кофта will work.

Thank you for your response, but you mistook my question for asking about "caRdigan", which is a type of sweater.

I was asking about kadigan/cadigan, which is a term for a placeholder name. Here, let me give you some Swedish ones:
Sak, grej, pryl, mojäng/moj grunka
grejsimojs, grunkimojs, grejs tjofräs mackapär
tjafs vadhannuhette vaddetnuhette
den och den
Tjotaheiti
Långtbortistan, Farawaystan
Häcklefjäll
Jan Banan
Medel-Svensson

.....so you can see, these are "stand-in" terms for something or someone who you cannot specifically name.

Some people refer to such terms altogether as "cadigans/kadigans" and I am looking for the RUSSIAN word for such term. Perhaps a near synonym would simply be "placeholder names" and I cannot even find that term in Russian.

Thank you, I hope that clarifies that I was trying to find another word besides "sweater".

dsteve54

P.S. as of April 12, 2009, I still don't know the correct Russian term!!!

By the way, even though I am looking for the
RUSSIAN word for "cadigan/kadigan/placeholder name", let me give you some examples of such in USA:
John Doe
Jane Doe
thingamajig
doohickey
widget
Tom, Dick, and Harry
Joe Blow
"Joe the Plumber" ha ha ha ha
Joe Public
Tweedledum and Tweedledee
Anytown, USA
Bumf*** Egypt
The Boondocks
Upper B***crack
Hicksville
Timbuktu
Eleventh hour
two freckles past a hair (when asked for time and you look and your watch is gone)

God-thirty in the morning
Stone's throw

In case there are some Russians here, who can give me the overall name for such terms, here are some Russian ones

это самое
штука
бандура
тугрик
господин такой-то
Имярек
парень
чувак
у чёрта на куличках
Тьмутаракань
Урюпинск
Куда Макар телят не гонял
ское место
После дождичка в четверг
Василий Пупкин
Во времена царя Гороха
Ни свет ни заря
Когда рак на горе свистнет

I don't know if this website is helpful, but they say they a have a word for you:
Website: http://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/2490462
Word and examples:
* In Russian, fillers are called "слова-паразиты" (vermin words); the most common are "Э-э" (eh), "это" (this), "того" (that), "ну" (well), "значит" (it means), "как его" (what's it [called] ), "типа" (like).

I don't know if this website is helpful, but they say they a have a word for you:
Website: http://dic.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/2490462
Word and examples:
* In Russian, fillers are called "слова-паразиты" (vermin words); the most common are "Э-э" (eh), "это" (this), "того" (that), "ну" (well), "значит" (it means), "как его" (what's it [called] ), "типа" (like).

Well, it is a good try, but it does not quite fit the category I was after, although we may sometimes say "what's it" in a non-hesitating way as a placeholder, in the manner of the original question. But the others are words or phrases we use when stalling for a thought or "feeling like we need to fill space".

The category of words I am after are delivered assertively, maybe for local color, in order to demonstrate that you really cannot think of the word but there is always a mutually understandable placeholder at the ready.

Having said all this, thank you for your comment because I actually needed to know the term for the class of words you mentioned also, and "слова-паразиты" was a new term for me. So that is useful.

I have one contact in the Ukraine (a musician) who thought that
метка-заполнитель
was fine, but someone else in Moscow felt that such a word would only be known in technical circles, as "placeholder" in this sense, is generally used in computer programming. So far there does not seem to be a term in everyday life, though one other person is checking with professors.

It's very possible that ultimately there may not be an equivalent, and that's ok, though I would like to think in academic circles that philologists would say something other than a long phrase that amounts to a definition.

dsteve54
P.S. In an unrelated matter, I see that "weasel word" is
двусмысленное слово, which is like saying "two-edged", "double-barrelled", "ambiguous", "fuzzy", "ambiguous", etc.

It seems to me that kadigan/cadigan is a recently coined technical term in English. I personally have never encountered it before, and the term are not defined in any of the major dictionaries (Webster's et al.). The internet suggests it was coined in the 1960's and used to denote a sematic category, so I would guess that a corresponding term in another language would be similarly technical and obscure.

Since the Good Dr. Goodward is an expert in Russian, maybe we could get him to put in his two bits.

It seems to me that kadigan/cadigan is a recently coined technical term in English. I personally have never encountered it before, and the term are not defined in any of the major dictionaries (Webster's et al.). The internet suggests it was coined in the 1960's and used to denote a sematic category, so I would guess that a corresponding term in another language would be similarly technical and obscure.

Since the Good Dr. Goodward is an expert in Russian, maybe we could get him to put in his two bits.

Yes, I think "similarly technical and obscure" would the operative words here.

I actually did ask Dr. Goodward in the past about both the Russian and English terms such, and he was not able to shed any light, after a time, I just posted here.

I actually was able to contact someone in Kazakhstan who is in a university there and he is going to ask some of his philologist professors. So by hook or crook, I will find something out, if not on this forum, then maybe from ex-Soviet bloc resources.

The one term I originally posed was known by a musician friend of mine in the Ukraine, and she thought it would be appropriate. But another person in Moscow had NOT heard the term and thought it was a technical term used in computer programming (perhaps when describing C programming rules in meta-language).

It may eventually be borne out that there just is not a single all-encompassing phrase for such words, and that's okay. As you pointed out, even in English, "[k/c]adigan" is sort of obscure, so maybe the entire topic does not come up often enough to have special labels.


But thanks for all you have offered thus far.

Thank you to both of you for posting this info here. It's been educational and interesting to me.

One thing I came up with is that cadigan appears to be itself. The only definition I found is that it is a word for thingamabob, which makes it a tautology, no? A word can't be its own definition, can it?

One thing I came up with is that cadigan appears to be itself. The only definition I found is that it is a word for thingamabob, which makes it a tautology, no? A word can't be its own definition, can it?

Well, I've always favored this particular definition:

loop n. for definition of loop see: loop.

Here we go loopty-loo ...

Shoot, Stargzer, that's not a definition, that's a demonstration!

One thing I came up with is that cadigan appears to be itself. The only definition I found is that it is a word for thingamabob, which makes it a tautology, no? A word can't be its own definition, can it?

I did NOT know that about so-called "cadigan", and as such, I would agree with you. My friend in Kazakhstan took the whole issue to his university and tried, but here is his response (then I will translate as best I can for you)
".....Я побеседовал с разными людьми по Вашему вопросу, но никто не знает аналогии термину placeholder name. Ни с кафедры русского языка, ни с иностранного. Скорее всего, у нас действительно просто нет такого термина для слов из Вашего ряда. Все понимают, что это означает, но термина этому никто не давал "

If you know Russian, you can,of course, read verbatim. If not, I am paraphrasing below:
{
"I had a talk with different people on your question (dsteve54 - meaning the whole issue on this thread), but nobody can come up with an analogy (dsteve54- in Russian) for "placeholder name". Not from the faculty in the Russian department, nor with same in Foreign Language faculty. Most likely, we simply do not have a term for such collections of words (dsteve54- I am paraphrasing to complete the intended meaning). Everyone understands what the concept means (dsteve54 -implied "by looking at the collection of terms"), but nobody can come up with an overall term for such.
}

So based solely on this, along with other input on this thread, it appears that "there is no such all-encompassing term for such phrases". If contributor Slava is correct, then "kadigan/cadigan" is an INSTANCE of one of these types of words and not a descriptor. That's not going to cut it.

So in essence, it appears that when we are talking about these structures we have to say something like ".....And then there is the category of words that we use when we cannot think of specifics, like blah, blah, blah (examples)...".

It seems cumbersome to me, BUT I am not sure "placeholder word" would be universally understood in this context.

Well, so far, we "gave it the old college try". Maybe something will surface.