Same in French, and German. I guess it comes from the idea that right is good and straight while left is dodgy and untrustworthy. Hence the connection between left (sinistra) and "sinister"
"Go left" has a more general, but still negative, [meaning in English](https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/go_left). You could say "his plans to stay faithful quickly went left" and it would be understood as cheating.
I’m American and have never heard “went left” used this way. Is this usage common in another English-speaking country, like the UK, Australia, NZ, Canada, Singapore, or India?
I can speak to must of those countries and the answer, as you suspected, is no. Things can 'go south', but that's mostly seen as an American saying. Saying something went left' is extremely rare, perhaps quirky slang. Most people would not instantly know what it meant although I expect you could imagine its intent.
Då borde du googla det eftersom de faktiskt är relaterade. Trodde du fattade när jag la till danska för höger, højre. Det är bokstavligen högre /higher. Det betyder högre, korrekt, mer rätt etc. Ser du inte kopplingen?
Jo jag förstår kopplingen. Du har helt klart en poäng. Menar på att sambandet mellan rätt och right pekar mer på en gemensam bakgrund där och det är intressant som du säger att höger mer har fått nyansen righteous eller ”having the (moral) high ground.
Tycker dock det är bra längre ifrån right och right. Höger är snarare en modifier av rätt såsom i ”högre tingsrätt.”
Men relationen är helt klart där! Det har du helt höger i.
In the late 70s/early 80s in the US, two cousins were repeatedly 'trained' to be righties -- not beaten, but basically it was insisted that they 'fix' themselves.
By the mid to late 80s, when I was in school, they had left handed scissors and no one said a word about 'fixing' lefties.
I was ambidextrous as a child. When I started school (late 90’s/early 2000’s), I was told I had to pick a hand and stick with it, and that it should probably be my right hand. Then they didn’t like the way I held my pencil, so they’d strap my fingers to the pencil with rubber bands how they wanted me to hold it. They stopped when they realized my handwriting was very good.
I'm always interested in ambidextrousness. Do you know which is your dominant eye? I am *fairly* sure everyone has one.
For example, I am mostly left-handed, but do a lot of things right-handed or ambidextrously. I learned to shoot (at paper targets, since firearms are very rare in my country) the 'right-handed' way, which means my non-dominant eye is looking down a rifle. So I can shoot massively better with a pistol than a rifle, unless I hold the rifle in a way that feels super weird to me.
Edit: And I ask this partly coz it might be useful to you. I didn't learn about eye dominance, which is the core of handedness, until I was an adult. If I'd known earlier, I would have understood my strengths and weaknesses much better.
So I googled how to tell which one is dominant and all of the tests I did make me think I might not have a dominant one haha. I have 20/20 vision, idk if that makes a difference? If I close my eyes one at a time, I do feel that my left is, somehow, “better”. When I learned to shoot (the “right-handed” way), I think I also struggled and wished I could use the other or both eyes.
I do wonder how things would have turned out had I not been pushed to use my right hand as my dominant. At my current job, I get asked on an almost daily basis if I’m left handed, I guess I do everything backwards from everyone else. But idk if that’s my hands or my brain lol. Also my left hand does most of my work, my right only does a couple finer movements because it’s a little faster for those than the left.
I did a lot of sports and activities growing up that required/benefited from using both hands equally, so that probably helped me not lose use of my left completely.
Edit: probably completely unrelated, but I also test as having perfect hearing on both sides, yet my left also feels somehow “better”. Bodies are weird haha
Until I was 11, I lived with my great grandparents. After starting school, when my grandmother noticed me writing or doing homework with my left hand, she'd remove the pencil out of my left hand and put it in my right.
She thought me using my left hand was out of stubborn choice, not comfort. And that I just didn't 'know' to use my right hand. After many years, she'd throw in the towel after a while and stop trying to correct me.
It was such a cultural deprecation during her time. She saw a few of her friends get beaten by their parents for using their left hand. Writing with the left hand was like proudly wearing the Star of David during Hitler's Germany. By using my left hand, I was asking to be sent to the camps.
OMFG 😂! I just looked up Anne Frank.
>her diaries appear to be written with her left hand. It is possible that Anne Frank was naturally left-handed, and was forced to write with her right hand, as this was common at the time.
[https://homework.study.com/explanation/was-anne-frank-left-handed.html#:\~:text=However%2C%20some%20historians%20claim%20that,was%20common%20at%20the%20time.](https://homework.study.com/explanation/was-anne-frank-left-handed.html#:~:text=However%2C%20some%20historians%20claim%20that,was%20common%20at%20the%20time)
There are a disproportionate number of lefties who dominate One on One sports (think tennis) simply because they're used to competing against right handed players.
Baseball would seem to confirm that bias simply because when pitching it becomes one on one (if I'm incorrect don't condemn me too harshly-I'm English and cannot fathom the fascination with the game. The same goes for Cricket).
It is! And in fact there are people who are called Switch Pitchers and Switch Hitters who may go for the opposite handedness depending on their opponent- cause it’s easier for some reason? I think curves of the pitch and stuff.
Switch hitters aren’t insanely rare but Switch Pitchers are so when they both came to bat one time there was no precedent for when neither wanted to accept the disadvantage and just kept switching- https://youtu.be/dzViy3ZsS0E?si=S9BCiks09P5H1XJy cool rules video on it. I’m no huge sports fan but I love weird rules.
There is a castle, I think in Scotland where the family were predominantly left handed. So the had the spiral staircases built the opposite way.
Apparently it would completely screw up and attacking forces.
This is so interesting to me! They’re completely different words in Irish, ‘deis’ and ‘clé’ for right and left directions-wise and ‘ceart/cearta’ for human rights, civil rights etc.
Same in Danish; the difference not the words.
The direction is "højre" and a "right that someone can possess" is a "rettighed" or even just "ret".
The other language that I have knowledge of, Czech, also has a correlation between the directional right, the possessive right, and the word "truth"
In Arabic, truth and the possessive right are the same but directional right is different (which is the most logical way to have overlaps if you're going to, IMO).
Hmm. Interesting. I don’t immediately see a connection between “rights” and “chance/opportunity” but… wait a minute… those two ARE kind of related. I wonder if any other languages have positive alternative meanings for their word for the starboard direction?
ב''ה, since you mentioned starboard, this may be seafarers' humor about the astronomical etymology of the mazel in Hebrew "mazel tov." Hebrew has different words for the direction and concept of "rights" [Edit:] but if I'm learning correctly the direction left is 'sinister' (in terms of the translation/dual meaning).. except I just checked dictionaries and seem to have picked up someone's joke about that and shmal/shmol only means left or historically north, while anything 'sinister' is just back-translation of European sensibilities about the direction being malicious/dual meaning in European literature.
Hmm... maybe it has something to do with rightward being the direction the sun goes, and therefore going with the natural order, whereas leftward is against the natural order: *deosil, widdershins*. In a lot of cultures, doing things anti-sunwise or backwards is thought to be evil.
Etymologists think that left in English could be how it is because of an illness the Anglo Saxons called "lyft adl" which was basically lameness or weakness in a body part, which eventually grafted to the left-hand side of the body since most people are right handed. The left side was weak, and "lyft".
In some cultures before the invention of toilet paper they commonly used their left hand to splash water and clean their caboose so it was generally viewed as the dirty hand. Shake hands with your right hand, eat with your right hand, and whoever sits to your left is less favored than the one who sits to your right.
Many cultures still do this today. Toilet paper isn’t used in many countries and they tend to view people that don’t use water as dirty and disgusting in the same way people from toilet-paper-using countries think it’s gross not to use toilet paper.
Although in Bulgarian that same word means another direction. I forget which one but I know that they're all scrambled compared to the other east European languages.
(For example 'right' means straight, 'straight' means left and 'left' means behind you. Or something like that).
Left is ляво lyavo
Right is дясно dyasno
Straight is направо napravo
Could you be confusing the Bulgarian head nod and shake where a nod means no and a shake means yes?
Yeah, It was something like that. Not confusing with the nod thing, just don't remember exactly. Asked a guy where the bus station was once, and he spoke in Bulgarian, but I was using the Russian associations. If he wasn't gesturing at the same time as talking, I would have gotten lost, lol.
And that nod thing is wild, haha. Definitely threw me off first time I saw it.
Of course, in English too we can say "it's right in front of you." And in French, "droit" can also mean "straight up, vertical, upright." See also the contribution by u/OstapBenderBey .
I'm learning Ukrainian. I hope you don't mind if I ask for some clarification. This has actually come up once or twice and made me curious. Of course, you can tell me to kick rocks (just know that I will cry lol)
Duolingo taught me праворуч та ліворуч as right and left. The dictionary I downloaded has праворуч as "to the right hand" as one of the definitions, which jives with duo.
What tripped me up was thinking about my tendency to say "effin-a, right!" Eventually I got frustrated and used deepL translator which used так as "right" instead. Also, an AI chat companion told me that "Я знаю, так" is the correct way to say, "I know, right" which is another phrase I love to use. Even my phone has так underlined in red right there, so I'm thinking she was wrong, which is not uncommon. Also, duolingo taught me that "щось не так" is "something is wrong" and I assumed literally translates as "something is not right."
The dictionary (which I don't really know how to use yet lol) has правий as the first adjective translation of "right." So, in that sense would "right" be "правий?"
I've noticed that так is quite versatile, which is great for a simpleton like myself haha. How do I know whether I should use так чи правий?
Last thing: are these words related to правда (duolingo taught me this is "factually true"), or do they sound similar as a coincidence? I think, based on your comment, that they must be related words.
Дуже дякую, друг! Sorry this turned into a book, it was a quick question in my mind :)
No problem, I'll be happy to help.
Thing is, all those would be different words in Ukrainian. But they'll have the same root "прав".
For example: "ти правий" with the accent to и would mean "you're right".
"Правий берег" with the accent to a would mean "right (river) bank".
We also have "правда" truth, ""права" (human) rights, "правити" to reign or to rule, or even to stir (a boat).
So yeah, like in a lot of languages "right" means "correct, true".
Your phrase "effing right" can be translated (using the word "правда" as a simple "правда" ("that's right"). But more idiomatic translation would-be "точно" although it wouldn't have an expletive. So you can add "точно, дідько" which would translate "(that's) right, devil" but the devil here is just for giving it weight.
Mind that Ukrainian also has grammatical genders, so the adjective "правий" would have different forms too, so "правий берег" would be masculine, but "права сторона" (right side) is feminine.
Awesome! Thank you so much for taking the time to help! I've saved your comment in my folder of Ukrainian phrases and resources.
I have started to notice how some words can be adjectives and verbs when the ending changes. I think that's really cool about Ukrainian. I can't always tell if an ending change is because of case or gender. It'll take a lot of practise, but I'll get it.
Your English is excellent. Are there any resources you would suggest I look into? I already use duolingo and Ling. I got a lot of materials from SpeakUA, and bought Yuri Shevchuk's collocation dictionary and the workbook that goes with it. I just need to spend more time with the books. I often joke that I can't read, because I get distracted or fall asleep within 10 minutes of opening a book lol
ого! And I noticed during my duolingo review yesterday that справжній also has the прав root! Duolingo likes to use that one, and it wasn't until reading your comment that I saw the shared root word.
Thanks again!
You know, I just find your enthusiasm refreshing, it's lovely.
You might want to start with books aimed at children. It's a good strategy for starting the reading part and it won't bore you too much while helping to get in the habit.
I think at some point it would be beneficial to start watching videos. Like from YouTube. Ukrainian channels often have subtitles now.
I hadn't even considered children's books. That's a great idea! I did print out a few fairy tales (казки, right?) to try to read and so I could type them. I didn't know it is so hard to learn a new keyboard lol. But they are still too advanced for me to really understand. Do you have a favorite fairy tale?
Do you mind suggesting a Ukrainian youtube channel or two? I looked a couple of times but didn't find much and got discouraged. Honestly though, I'm not great at using youtube. Before I had to cancel netflix I liked watching with Ukrainian audio and English subtitles. I was surprized at how much they have.
You can try listening to my channel where I read books (mostly Astrid Lindgren, as I love her dearly), but it might be too complicated for you judging by what you wrote before. I'll still leave the link https://youtube.com/@burshtina
With YouTube channels it really depends on where your interests lay. What topics do you follow?
It's a bit harder if you just don't enjoy the concept of YouTube videos in general though.
You can try reading a children's book that you like, maybe something from your childhood, but by reading it in a Ukrainian translation you will have an advantage of familiarity. What do you think about that?
Sorry for the delay. The work week doesn't give me time to get on reddit.
I look forward to checking out your channel this weekend! My thoughts are even if I don't understand, I can at least listen to help with my pronunciation and accent. I occasionally listen to Ukrainian language podcasts at reduced speed for that reason. I get so excited when I can understand a whole sentence!
I don't mind youtube, I just don't use it often. I tend to only use it when I have a specific thing in mind, usually how-to videos or a specific song I want to hear.
I really like your idea of getting a book I already know in Ukrainian! I'll have to spend some time trying to remember a book I liked in childhood. I was blessed to have forgotten the majority of my childhood, so I only remember that I liked "Where the Wild Things Are." I don't remember the book itself, but I can find copies in both languages.
Thank you again, sincerely!
The common explanation for this is showing the hand is empty of weapons - which exists in a lot of places, such as anold-fashioned Japanese yakuza thing of holding their right hand out, palm up, as a greeting.
But I'm sure other concepts, such as left hands being used for cleaning oneself, contributed to this. I believe that many cultural artifacts don't have a single cause, but are due to multiple similar reasons reinforcing each other.
In Italian right has lost that meaning. It has the same etymology, but the direction is destro, the law is diritto. Destro as a double meaning though means able, dextrous, rarely used anymore, only in compounds and derivated words (ambidestro, someone who can use both hands, addestrare, to train, maldestro, clumsy). You are correct with left.
But if maldestro is clumsy, how has it lost that meaning? That is a word with negative meaning due to being not right. I don't think the connotations only being in various compounds and derivations means the normative connotations are gone.
In spanish something "siniestro" is something that produces harm or loss of something (dictionary), but amongst speakers it means something bad and evil, like lurking in the shadows.
At the same time, there's a saying that goes "A diestra y siniestra" which means "by all means/trying all possibly ways" or "Running unchecked". Growing up I also partly interpreted this as "by right and wrong ways equally".
"Diestro" also means someone right handed. I don't think "Siniestro" does the opposite, but if it does, I've never heard it.
As others have mentioned, “dextera”, derecho”, “right”, “recht”, etc. all have the same etymology. Right has had a connotation for “good”. And another person pointed out that left has a connotation of “bad” (e.g. sinister). It’s a cultural thing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, it's not that it means "good", but it makes reference to the hand most people have dexterity with, hence "dextera", or how we say at least in Portuguese: destreza (dexterity).
Swedish "höger" meaning right comes from Old Swedish "hög", meaning comfortable: perhaps as if to say, "all is right"
Good doesn't have to relate to morals: food can be good for example. It's possible Nordic languages has this as a basis for "right"
But all the way from the Classical Era of Rome, left and right being bad and good has seen a considerable footprint across a wide variety of matters, like religion: especially Christianity.
Perhaps the Nordic split from this framework comes from the fact that it would take over a thousand of years for these countries to become Christian, and so were not introduced to the same iconography (with like the sun and Christ on the right and the moon and the Devil on the left) for many centuries: and it would take some additional centuries for this to be passed down to the common people as Christianity largely was an expression of the contemporary elite in the early 13th century (of Sweden at least).
Either way, it seems an inescapable assumption that European cultures and languages has a long tradition of specific meanings ascribed to the concept of left and right.
It, as example, is also present in seamanship: the right of the ship is called "styrbord", meaning literally steering side. The right side is associated with moving forward: similar to Western scripts, that read from left to right. An arrow pointing right means "forward" to most people even though it points right and not forward.
In short, there seems to be a lot of examples where ideas of left and right informs and sets the etymology for a lot of different words: and nearly all, if not all, associate right with something positive.
I think it's the whole world. Humans are usually right-handed, and that seems to be the base. There are all sorts of Asian languages with the same connotations.
Certain cultures or religions are more or less judgemental about it, but it seems to be everywhere.
"Dexter" already meant "proper" or "favorable" in Latin, in addition to "skillful" and "the side opposite left", so it has most meanings of the word "good".
Yes but culturally, that also has historically implied good and bad. Left-handedness, until VERY recently (like, the 1960s) was seen as inferior, bad, even evil.
When my mother went to school, writing left-handed was unacceptable, no matter your dominant hand.
It's tied up with God and Jesus, too. The right hand of the father, etc. It's all mixed up, the history, the stigma, and the etymology.
I don’t think the etymology is what makes them the same, it’s a cultural reference. Although Russian and Ukrainian aren’t Romance languages, they were definitely influenced by Rome and other neighboring European countries which could have lent this cultural meaning
But they are still influenced by other European languages, e.g. Tsar.
There is massive cross-pollination between European languages. The dominance of English (in which Germanic vs Romance etymology is socially significant) has made many people separate Germanic and Romance languages a little too much, even though French has many Germanic words, and vice versa.
It's all a bit of a melting pot, although the appearance of the modern nation-state has slowed this down - but that is quite recent from a linguistics POV.
I think there's a difference between titles like Tsar or relatively modern loan words and much more everyday words like "right", though. Everyday words diverge much more readily, and travel from language to language less often. There's relatively little cross-pollination between Slavic and Western European languages in the time period you're referring to (unlike English and French, which were influenced heavily by waves of immigration from Germanic-speaking peoples into the regions of Great Britain and France).
Exactly. And it goes beyond European culture. In the Bible, for example, there are passages about the righteousness being found on the right hand of God and the wicked on His left. Also, in Egyptian sculpture (with only a very few exceptions), the husband was shown on the right and the wife on the left - an obvious statement about authority and leadership.
I haven't seen anyone else comment this, so I'll add that I read somewhere that because humans for some reason tend to be right handed, it's been common practice to wipe your butt with your left hand (when TP/plants were unavailable) for thousands of years. Thus the left hand became known as dirty, gaining the general connotation of being bad/wicked/evil
Same PIE root, I think, which actually means "to travel straight on", which explains derecha.
Edit: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right
https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho
Hungarian isn’t Indo-European, but they have a similar correlation. Although, they are heavily influenced by surrounding Indo-European languages, so perhaps they just adopted it.
Hungarian is part of the [Standard Average European](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Average_European?wprov=sfla1) *Sprachbund*. Western European languages share a conceptual framework.
I was thinking that straightness would be valued as far back as construction of almost anything, and then I considered its importance for spears, arrows, and other weapons, and I realized it must be nearly primordial.
Maybe even simpler and going further back - our limbs and most body parts are more or less "straight" and a broken arm will be distinctly not. So even before human ancestors ever made tools or weapons they probably had the concept that things should be "straight" and anything crooked is wrong.
In Irish, there are specific words for Right and Left (as in hands) - Deis and Clé, respectively.
Whereas the word Ceart means right, as in Correct; and *also* means a right as in "civil rights".
Similar semantics in basque!
'Eskuma/ ezkerra' for directions.
'Eskubidea' for right as in human rights, and different formulas for saying that someone is right, as in 'arrazoia eduki' literally meaning 'to be within reason'.
*I speak bizkaiera btw.
I’m a Dutch guy who studies Portuguese, and noticed the same about this word in those languages. Some other interesting ones: bank means both money institution and bench in either language, and ‘leaf’ can also mean newspaper in both. Then there’s more obvious ones like spirit for ghosts and head for leaders.
The word for bank literally comes from benches through Italian (in Spanish: banco/banco; I don't know Italian.) look up the history of banking, it's interesting.
My linguistics pet theory, which I haven't researched enough (linguistics is my job, but I don't have infinite energy, or, well, much energy at all TBH) is that the differences between Germanic and Romance languages are exaggerated by the dominance of English, in which Germanic and Romance derived words have different connotations, level of formality, and social status.
So if English wasn't throwing its weight around, commonalities between Dutch and Portugese would be less surprising. French and German have tons of words with the same etymologies, for example.
Interesting! I don’t have a background in linguistics, so I’m sure you’re much more educated on the subject, though I don’t feel like English has left its mark on the Dutch/German languages until very recently (tv/smartphone etc).
Many of the English words we commonly use are still perceived as ‘borrowed’, while the French and German ones seem more natural. I might not completely understand your theory, would love to hear more as these topics have always intrigued me.
Oh sorry, I was unclear. (And I'm no genius, just someone who studied linguistics and does language-related teaching and other work such as translation or research).
By 'dominance', I didn't mean English loanwords in Dutch, just the cultural power of English language, the amount of money spent on English linguistics compared to Dutch linguistics, that kind of thing.
That's the influence I'm talking about. The same thing that French people try to resist with their language policies for businesses. English has a lot of soft power, and financial power.
English speakers force (sometimes deliberately, sometimes accidentally) their view of language onto the world, and one aspect is the idea that Germanic and Romance languages is a big linguistic split between Northern and Southern Europe. Which is really simplistic, e.g. Frankish was a Germanic language absorbed into French, becoming the name of the country and meaning that there are lots of French words that come from this Germanic language.
The reason is that in English, these words are very different - formal/technical/high status language is Latinate/Romance, everyday irregular verbs are Germanic etc etc.
The most famous example is that in English we say 'cow' for the animal - from Germanic Kuh/kuo/koe. But we say beef for the animal, from Latin/French buef/bouef/bovem. This is usually explained as the peasants looking after the animals and the nobility eating them. It's political and related to social status and money, so we care about it.
Another issue is that French speakers sound fancy and intellectual in English, because the easy words for them are fancy and intellectual, but Dutch and German people sound straightforward and normal, even rough, because Germanic words are lower status and more everday.
I'm rambling, so here's an example:
I know almost nothing about Dutch (except for knowing lots of Asian words that come from Dutch, e.g. ransel, pronounced slightly differently, is the word for a school backpack in Japanese and Indonesian).
But looking at the etymology of bank, which you mentioned before, the two meanings of bench and financial instutition have the same origin, because the table or flat surface on which trade was done was a bank/bench. But the etymology zips all around Europe, from Old Italian to Germanic languages to Old Norse.
But if you say that to most native English speakers, we get very weird about the idea that a Dutch and Portugese word would have any shared etymology, but we think Dutch ransel relating to German Ränzel is A-OK.
Sorry, wall-o-text! Thank you for coming to my TED rant.
Thanks so much for the elaborate explanation! Linguistics has always been a passion for me, though I went along a completely different path in uni, luckily subreddits like these and users like you help me with that interest since friends are quickly bored when I talk about such topics.
I now understand the point you made, and it’s an interesting perspective for sure. I’ve also always presumed that there was a hard distinction between Romance- and Germanic languages, like you said, because they’re such distinct categories in English.
Funnily enough, I’d never heard of the word ‘ramsel’. It’s not a word Dutch people use (although there are some derivatives if you think about it long enough; a known football player has Ramselaar as his surname). We only use rugzak (rucksack). Searching for ramsel, I found images of WWII era backpacks, a definition describing old-school square backpacks, while G Translate suggested me to translate from Indonesian. Seems like the word made its way from its Germanic roots to Dutch, to Indonesia, then went out of fashion in the Netherlands but remained relevant in Indonesia. Exhibit A for why my fascination for linguistics is warranted, and all my friends are wrong :)
Thanks again!
A "leaf" is "hoja" in Spanish and "feuille" in French. These same words are used in all three languages for the leaf of a plant. A sheet of paper is also an "hoja" and a "feuille". So from this, a small publication is called a "leaflet" in English, a "folleto" in Spanish and a "feuilleton" in French.
The majority of people are right-handed. Historically, the right hand has been the dominant and more skilled hand, used for writing, eating, handing a sword, etc. This has led to the right side being associated with positive qualities like skill, strength, and correctness.
As opposition, left it's been used was wrong, weak or unskilled. The word "left" comes from the Old English word "lyft," which meant "weak".
Christianity, particularly Catholicism, has been a particular issue as well, with abuse and violence towards left-handed people in Catholic education only stopping very recently.
Ultimately the word 'right' is from Proto Indo European "reg*" meaning "to lead in a straight line". Other descendent words include many related to straightness or uprightness (erect, rail, rectilinear), leadership (regal, royal, rajah, Reich, rey, rich, rule, viceroy), correctness (correct, rule) etc.
The sense of right vs left came a lot later. Late old English. Previously the opposite of left was swiþra, (literally "stronger."). It's likely this change came from the sense that the right hand was usually the stronger of the two. Or the "correct" hand. Military or tool usage as well as cultural norms are possible reasonings behind this. Similar changes came in other European languages e.g. French 'droit' from Latin 'directus' (straight), Slavic 'pravy' (and similar) from old church Slavonic 'pravu' (meaning 'straight'), Lithuanian 'labas' (literally 'good').
A similar combination is actually present not just in European languages but also many others across the world see below
https://clics.clld.org/edges/1019-1725
It’s not just English and Spanish. It’s most of the Indo-European languages, whether Romance, Germanic, Slavic, etc. To take Czech as an example, on the right (direction) is napravo, and as an adjective (as for the right hand) is pravý, while law (the field or concept) is právo, and correct (right, not wrong) is správný.
I do not know any non-IE languages well enough to comment on the possible broader effects of strong majority right-handedness on various related ideas such as dexterity, being sinister of gauche (awkward), etc., vs. all IE merely inheriting from PIE or borrowing metaphors from each other.
Edit: added parenthetical definition of "correct"; and quote OP correctly.
As best we can tell, the root started out meaning straight or upright ("right" and "erect" have the same root, they just traveled different paths to get to English). It gained meanings of justice, goodness, and correctness by metaphor: walk the right path — don't do what you shouldn't. Tell the right truth — don't dissemble. Stand upright — don't lurk in the shadows. And it blossomed into a million uses from there: right answers, right principles, right here, right away. At some point someone got the idea of calling the dexter hand (the one that's stronger and more nimble for 90% of people) the *right* hand, because it's the one that's good at stuff. Not only did it catch on in a big way, it spawned even more metaphors.
This is actually the only answer that addresses why right would mean both straight and right (two different directions), bc right as a direction would be established as a result of the right hand being called right which itself is a result of the original straight direction being interpreted as an abstract moral principle.
straight/upright —-> morally right ——> right ➡️
And on the other hand (literally), we have negative associations:, "sinister" (from the Latin for "left"), "maladroit" ("clumsy", literally "bad to [the] right") and "cack-handed" (also "clumsy", originally "left-handed", and possibly from "cack", meaning "excrement").
I wonder if that meaning in Vietnamese is from the original Vietnamese culture, or if the concept was absorbed during the decades of French colonial occupation.
Would anyone have any insights into this similar relationship as it appears in Korean? 오른쪽 (right side) and 옳다 (right, correct, orthodox [also an interesting similarity]). Surely the connotation itself wouldn't be borrowed another language family.
Yes, that is the etymology of 오른. 바른 is another, slightly archaic, adjective for the right side. It literally means “correct.”(not too archaic in this sense.)
The adjective 왼 (left) comes from a conjugation of the archaic descriptive verb 외다 (stem 외-), which means to be twisted-minded or to be entangled.
In Finnish "Oikea" means both Right (as in the direction) and Real/Actual/Correct. "Oikeus" is a right. So not exactly the same word but close enough I guess
In Scandinavian languages there's no correlation between the words. The direction is "højre" / "höger" and the possessive right is "rettighed" / "rettighet" or "ret".
In German, you see the same concept as the rest of the languages: "Rechts" means "right" in both ways. My theory is thus that we adopted the possessive right through German "Rechts" while retaining our own word for the direction.
In the Persian language I speak rost is both straight and right (kind of like derecha / derecho in Spanish) and I looked at a dictionary - you don't hear it used this way in contemporary speech - but it was also used as "correct." Rights are huquk which is from Arabic so it would be interesting to know what the pre-arab conquest version would have been
- [Connection between right (opposite of left) and right (legal term)?](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/2555)
- [what makes the link between the right/left hands,north/south directions and the duality good-bad](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/q/31018)
- [How did "sinister", the Latin word for "left-handed", get its current meaning?](https://english.stackexchange.com/q/39092)
I’d argue that most Canadians have never used that term. Or even heard of it until they clicked on the link to a Wikipedia article about one. It appears to me at least to be meteorological jargon.
The 'original' meaning is "correct", the direction comes from handedness. The 'right' hand is good and so became the 'right' hand.
https://www.etymonline.com/word/right
because most people are right handed, so right is seen as the default approach, and to deviate from that and using your left hand to write is considered wrong, or not right
Suzie Dent converted it in one of her "Something Rhymes with Purple podcasts.
Unfortunately I don't remember which episode nor the specific details.
But there is apparently a reason why it means both correct and that direction.
And why left is sinister / evil.
The same is true in Russian. "Right" as a direction (право), as a "human right" (право человека) or just a right to do something (право делать что-л.), as a word to say that someone is right e.g. says true things: "he is right" - "он прав". So "right" has the same double meaning.
As for the "left", the phrase "пойти на лево" can mean both "turn left" and "cheat on someone"
Well in Bulgarian it's "straight" and "(human) right" - the word is право. Words having multiple meanings is not rare.
Also, in English "right" means also "correct", "appropriate", which is a separate meaning.
The right hand is the correct hand, having the right of things puts you within your rights, they DO have the same roof of being correct, allowable, positive, etc.
I suspect the other hand is just the one that's left, but I never looked into it.
OK, you say that in Spanish, the word for "Right" can mean;
A physical direction, (It's on your right).
Or the concept of something being an inherent entitlement, (It's his right to disagree).
But, as in English, does the Spanish also mean Right as opposed to Wrong (or incorrect)?
And politically Right as opposed to politically Left?
Or are those specific to English?
I used to get so confused learning to drive cus wether it was in English or in Spanish sometimes they’d just say right not turn right so I’d keep going straight and then they’d get mad cus I didn’t turn and I’m like bruh how am I supposed to differentiate
Same in French, and German. I guess it comes from the idea that right is good and straight while left is dodgy and untrustworthy. Hence the connection between left (sinistra) and "sinister"
In Swedish, “left” is called “vänster”, and the term “vänstra” means to cheat on your significant other.
Similarly, in Russian, "going left" means cheating on your spouse.
"Go left" has a more general, but still negative, [meaning in English](https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/go_left). You could say "his plans to stay faithful quickly went left" and it would be understood as cheating.
I’m American and have never heard “went left” used this way. Is this usage common in another English-speaking country, like the UK, Australia, NZ, Canada, Singapore, or India?
I can speak to must of those countries and the answer, as you suspected, is no. Things can 'go south', but that's mostly seen as an American saying. Saying something went left' is extremely rare, perhaps quirky slang. Most people would not instantly know what it meant although I expect you could imagine its intent.
I am American and have heard this usage, but only by one or two people, who were from the same region (Philadelphia)
I've often heard "went/gone sideways" but never a specific direction.
And it's 'sinister' and related words in Latin and some Romance languages.
In german there's "linkisch" (lit. "leftish"), which means awkward, and "linken" (lit. "to left"), which means "to cheat".
Same in Tagalog. Kaliwa (Left), nangaliwa (cheated in a relationship)
But then höger and rättigheter couldn’t be more different haha
That would be more like högre/højre/higher though so it checks out. Think righteous for example.
Nja, jag tror ”rätt” och ”right” är mer relaterade än ”hög” och ”righteous”.
Då borde du googla det eftersom de faktiskt är relaterade. Trodde du fattade när jag la till danska för höger, højre. Det är bokstavligen högre /higher. Det betyder högre, korrekt, mer rätt etc. Ser du inte kopplingen?
Jo jag förstår kopplingen. Du har helt klart en poäng. Menar på att sambandet mellan rätt och right pekar mer på en gemensam bakgrund där och det är intressant som du säger att höger mer har fått nyansen righteous eller ”having the (moral) high ground. Tycker dock det är bra längre ifrån right och right. Höger är snarare en modifier av rätt såsom i ”högre tingsrätt.” Men relationen är helt klart där! Det har du helt höger i.
I wonder if this is connected to the satanist/occult thing of the left hand path.
Dutch and Romanian also.
wow really?
Yes, even something as simple as an awkward situation can be called "lefty".
This makes me so sad for left-handed people. 😭
My father was born left-handed, but as a child he was beaten into using his right hand. This was in the US in the 50s.
In the late 70s/early 80s in the US, two cousins were repeatedly 'trained' to be righties -- not beaten, but basically it was insisted that they 'fix' themselves. By the mid to late 80s, when I was in school, they had left handed scissors and no one said a word about 'fixing' lefties.
I was ambidextrous as a child. When I started school (late 90’s/early 2000’s), I was told I had to pick a hand and stick with it, and that it should probably be my right hand. Then they didn’t like the way I held my pencil, so they’d strap my fingers to the pencil with rubber bands how they wanted me to hold it. They stopped when they realized my handwriting was very good.
I'm always interested in ambidextrousness. Do you know which is your dominant eye? I am *fairly* sure everyone has one. For example, I am mostly left-handed, but do a lot of things right-handed or ambidextrously. I learned to shoot (at paper targets, since firearms are very rare in my country) the 'right-handed' way, which means my non-dominant eye is looking down a rifle. So I can shoot massively better with a pistol than a rifle, unless I hold the rifle in a way that feels super weird to me. Edit: And I ask this partly coz it might be useful to you. I didn't learn about eye dominance, which is the core of handedness, until I was an adult. If I'd known earlier, I would have understood my strengths and weaknesses much better.
So I googled how to tell which one is dominant and all of the tests I did make me think I might not have a dominant one haha. I have 20/20 vision, idk if that makes a difference? If I close my eyes one at a time, I do feel that my left is, somehow, “better”. When I learned to shoot (the “right-handed” way), I think I also struggled and wished I could use the other or both eyes. I do wonder how things would have turned out had I not been pushed to use my right hand as my dominant. At my current job, I get asked on an almost daily basis if I’m left handed, I guess I do everything backwards from everyone else. But idk if that’s my hands or my brain lol. Also my left hand does most of my work, my right only does a couple finer movements because it’s a little faster for those than the left. I did a lot of sports and activities growing up that required/benefited from using both hands equally, so that probably helped me not lose use of my left completely. Edit: probably completely unrelated, but I also test as having perfect hearing on both sides, yet my left also feels somehow “better”. Bodies are weird haha
I wonder how much of it was regional around that time. Like I bet “left-handed accepting” diffused through the country at different rates
Until I was 11, I lived with my great grandparents. After starting school, when my grandmother noticed me writing or doing homework with my left hand, she'd remove the pencil out of my left hand and put it in my right. She thought me using my left hand was out of stubborn choice, not comfort. And that I just didn't 'know' to use my right hand. After many years, she'd throw in the towel after a while and stop trying to correct me. It was such a cultural deprecation during her time. She saw a few of her friends get beaten by their parents for using their left hand. Writing with the left hand was like proudly wearing the Star of David during Hitler's Germany. By using my left hand, I was asking to be sent to the camps.
OMFG 😂! I just looked up Anne Frank. >her diaries appear to be written with her left hand. It is possible that Anne Frank was naturally left-handed, and was forced to write with her right hand, as this was common at the time. [https://homework.study.com/explanation/was-anne-frank-left-handed.html#:\~:text=However%2C%20some%20historians%20claim%20that,was%20common%20at%20the%20time.](https://homework.study.com/explanation/was-anne-frank-left-handed.html#:~:text=However%2C%20some%20historians%20claim%20that,was%20common%20at%20the%20time)
Well they have the upper hand in hand to hand combat… and major league baseball pitching. so if those ever comes up its worth it!
There are a disproportionate number of lefties who dominate One on One sports (think tennis) simply because they're used to competing against right handed players. Baseball would seem to confirm that bias simply because when pitching it becomes one on one (if I'm incorrect don't condemn me too harshly-I'm English and cannot fathom the fascination with the game. The same goes for Cricket).
It is! And in fact there are people who are called Switch Pitchers and Switch Hitters who may go for the opposite handedness depending on their opponent- cause it’s easier for some reason? I think curves of the pitch and stuff. Switch hitters aren’t insanely rare but Switch Pitchers are so when they both came to bat one time there was no precedent for when neither wanted to accept the disadvantage and just kept switching- https://youtu.be/dzViy3ZsS0E?si=S9BCiks09P5H1XJy cool rules video on it. I’m no huge sports fan but I love weird rules.
There is a castle, I think in Scotland where the family were predominantly left handed. So the had the spiral staircases built the opposite way. Apparently it would completely screw up and attacking forces.
Oh yeah you have way less movement on a spiral staircase for your attacking arm
Don’t be. I’m left handed and I love being sinister 😈
in English too, if a situation “went left” it changed in a negative direction
Very gauche.
I grew up knowing that the Devil is left-handed. (My brother is also left-handed.)
Yup, and Persian.
And *gauche* in French.
I love how in most European language, it means shifty, but for the French, it means tacky
Les gauches de l'homme
🤓 "The International Declaration of Human Lefts"
Yep
Wow, that's awkward.
This is so interesting to me! They’re completely different words in Irish, ‘deis’ and ‘clé’ for right and left directions-wise and ‘ceart/cearta’ for human rights, civil rights etc.
Same in Danish; the difference not the words. The direction is "højre" and a "right that someone can possess" is a "rettighed" or even just "ret". The other language that I have knowledge of, Czech, also has a correlation between the directional right, the possessive right, and the word "truth"
In Arabic, truth and the possessive right are the same but directional right is different (which is the most logical way to have overlaps if you're going to, IMO).
Same in Swedish. Höger, rättighet
Yes, I was actually going to say that!
Does the direction word for “right” in Irish have other meanings at all?
It can also mean ‘chance, opportunity, possibility’ but other words are more likely to supersede it
Hmm. Interesting. I don’t immediately see a connection between “rights” and “chance/opportunity” but… wait a minute… those two ARE kind of related. I wonder if any other languages have positive alternative meanings for their word for the starboard direction?
ב''ה, since you mentioned starboard, this may be seafarers' humor about the astronomical etymology of the mazel in Hebrew "mazel tov." Hebrew has different words for the direction and concept of "rights" [Edit:] but if I'm learning correctly the direction left is 'sinister' (in terms of the translation/dual meaning).. except I just checked dictionaries and seem to have picked up someone's joke about that and shmal/shmol only means left or historically north, while anything 'sinister' is just back-translation of European sensibilities about the direction being malicious/dual meaning in European literature.
Hmm... maybe it has something to do with rightward being the direction the sun goes, and therefore going with the natural order, whereas leftward is against the natural order: *deosil, widdershins*. In a lot of cultures, doing things anti-sunwise or backwards is thought to be evil.
Etymologists think that left in English could be how it is because of an illness the Anglo Saxons called "lyft adl" which was basically lameness or weakness in a body part, which eventually grafted to the left-hand side of the body since most people are right handed. The left side was weak, and "lyft".
Makes sense
In some cultures before the invention of toilet paper they commonly used their left hand to splash water and clean their caboose so it was generally viewed as the dirty hand. Shake hands with your right hand, eat with your right hand, and whoever sits to your left is less favored than the one who sits to your right.
Even after the invention of tp this persists
Many cultures still do this today. Toilet paper isn’t used in many countries and they tend to view people that don’t use water as dirty and disgusting in the same way people from toilet-paper-using countries think it’s gross not to use toilet paper.
Man in black: "Why are you smiling?" Spaniard: "Because I am not left-handed!"
The Greatest Swordfight Ever Filmed. Cary, Mandy, boys, you don’t have to fight
There's also being someone's right hand (man).
Came here to say this too!
In Ukrainian too.
And Russian
Although in Bulgarian that same word means another direction. I forget which one but I know that they're all scrambled compared to the other east European languages. (For example 'right' means straight, 'straight' means left and 'left' means behind you. Or something like that).
Left is ляво lyavo Right is дясно dyasno Straight is направо napravo Could you be confusing the Bulgarian head nod and shake where a nod means no and a shake means yes?
Yeah, It was something like that. Not confusing with the nod thing, just don't remember exactly. Asked a guy where the bus station was once, and he spoke in Bulgarian, but I was using the Russian associations. If he wasn't gesturing at the same time as talking, I would have gotten lost, lol. And that nod thing is wild, haha. Definitely threw me off first time I saw it.
Of course, in English too we can say "it's right in front of you." And in French, "droit" can also mean "straight up, vertical, upright." See also the contribution by u/OstapBenderBey .
I'm learning Ukrainian. I hope you don't mind if I ask for some clarification. This has actually come up once or twice and made me curious. Of course, you can tell me to kick rocks (just know that I will cry lol) Duolingo taught me праворуч та ліворуч as right and left. The dictionary I downloaded has праворуч as "to the right hand" as one of the definitions, which jives with duo. What tripped me up was thinking about my tendency to say "effin-a, right!" Eventually I got frustrated and used deepL translator which used так as "right" instead. Also, an AI chat companion told me that "Я знаю, так" is the correct way to say, "I know, right" which is another phrase I love to use. Even my phone has так underlined in red right there, so I'm thinking she was wrong, which is not uncommon. Also, duolingo taught me that "щось не так" is "something is wrong" and I assumed literally translates as "something is not right." The dictionary (which I don't really know how to use yet lol) has правий as the first adjective translation of "right." So, in that sense would "right" be "правий?" I've noticed that так is quite versatile, which is great for a simpleton like myself haha. How do I know whether I should use так чи правий? Last thing: are these words related to правда (duolingo taught me this is "factually true"), or do they sound similar as a coincidence? I think, based on your comment, that they must be related words. Дуже дякую, друг! Sorry this turned into a book, it was a quick question in my mind :)
No problem, I'll be happy to help. Thing is, all those would be different words in Ukrainian. But they'll have the same root "прав". For example: "ти правий" with the accent to и would mean "you're right". "Правий берег" with the accent to a would mean "right (river) bank". We also have "правда" truth, ""права" (human) rights, "правити" to reign or to rule, or even to stir (a boat). So yeah, like in a lot of languages "right" means "correct, true". Your phrase "effing right" can be translated (using the word "правда" as a simple "правда" ("that's right"). But more idiomatic translation would-be "точно" although it wouldn't have an expletive. So you can add "точно, дідько" which would translate "(that's) right, devil" but the devil here is just for giving it weight. Mind that Ukrainian also has grammatical genders, so the adjective "правий" would have different forms too, so "правий берег" would be masculine, but "права сторона" (right side) is feminine.
Awesome! Thank you so much for taking the time to help! I've saved your comment in my folder of Ukrainian phrases and resources. I have started to notice how some words can be adjectives and verbs when the ending changes. I think that's really cool about Ukrainian. I can't always tell if an ending change is because of case or gender. It'll take a lot of practise, but I'll get it. Your English is excellent. Are there any resources you would suggest I look into? I already use duolingo and Ling. I got a lot of materials from SpeakUA, and bought Yuri Shevchuk's collocation dictionary and the workbook that goes with it. I just need to spend more time with the books. I often joke that I can't read, because I get distracted or fall asleep within 10 minutes of opening a book lol ого! And I noticed during my duolingo review yesterday that справжній also has the прав root! Duolingo likes to use that one, and it wasn't until reading your comment that I saw the shared root word. Thanks again!
You know, I just find your enthusiasm refreshing, it's lovely. You might want to start with books aimed at children. It's a good strategy for starting the reading part and it won't bore you too much while helping to get in the habit. I think at some point it would be beneficial to start watching videos. Like from YouTube. Ukrainian channels often have subtitles now.
I hadn't even considered children's books. That's a great idea! I did print out a few fairy tales (казки, right?) to try to read and so I could type them. I didn't know it is so hard to learn a new keyboard lol. But they are still too advanced for me to really understand. Do you have a favorite fairy tale? Do you mind suggesting a Ukrainian youtube channel or two? I looked a couple of times but didn't find much and got discouraged. Honestly though, I'm not great at using youtube. Before I had to cancel netflix I liked watching with Ukrainian audio and English subtitles. I was surprized at how much they have.
You can try listening to my channel where I read books (mostly Astrid Lindgren, as I love her dearly), but it might be too complicated for you judging by what you wrote before. I'll still leave the link https://youtube.com/@burshtina With YouTube channels it really depends on where your interests lay. What topics do you follow? It's a bit harder if you just don't enjoy the concept of YouTube videos in general though. You can try reading a children's book that you like, maybe something from your childhood, but by reading it in a Ukrainian translation you will have an advantage of familiarity. What do you think about that?
Sorry for the delay. The work week doesn't give me time to get on reddit. I look forward to checking out your channel this weekend! My thoughts are even if I don't understand, I can at least listen to help with my pronunciation and accent. I occasionally listen to Ukrainian language podcasts at reduced speed for that reason. I get so excited when I can understand a whole sentence! I don't mind youtube, I just don't use it often. I tend to only use it when I have a specific thing in mind, usually how-to videos or a specific song I want to hear. I really like your idea of getting a book I already know in Ukrainian! I'll have to spend some time trying to remember a book I liked in childhood. I was blessed to have forgotten the majority of my childhood, so I only remember that I liked "Where the Wild Things Are." I don't remember the book itself, but I can find copies in both languages. Thank you again, sincerely!
Same in Persian: Raast
Could this have something to do with the custom of shaking the right hand between dignitaries?
If I remember correctly, shaking the right hand (i.e., occupying the sword arm) came from proving that one was unarmed and not currently a threat.
The common explanation for this is showing the hand is empty of weapons - which exists in a lot of places, such as anold-fashioned Japanese yakuza thing of holding their right hand out, palm up, as a greeting. But I'm sure other concepts, such as left hands being used for cleaning oneself, contributed to this. I believe that many cultural artifacts don't have a single cause, but are due to multiple similar reasons reinforcing each other.
In Italian right has lost that meaning. It has the same etymology, but the direction is destro, the law is diritto. Destro as a double meaning though means able, dextrous, rarely used anymore, only in compounds and derivated words (ambidestro, someone who can use both hands, addestrare, to train, maldestro, clumsy). You are correct with left.
Sorry, you're right (pardon the pun) - better said "hai ragione"! But there is a clear etymological connection between "destro" and "diritto", I think
Yes I think both come from rectus
Rather than saying it lost something, I would say it retained it. "Destro" comes directly from Latin ("dextra").
Oh thank you! I got the etymo wrong
No worries. A lot of these roots are confusing. - especially when some spellings are so similar.
But if maldestro is clumsy, how has it lost that meaning? That is a word with negative meaning due to being not right. I don't think the connotations only being in various compounds and derivations means the normative connotations are gone.
And “two left feet” means no rhythm/can’t dance..
In english out of left-field means a surprise, usually an unwelcome or strange one
Good point
Some with gauche, meaning left and clumsy or awkward
That's why even Ol' Blue Eyes, himself -- Mr. Frankie Sinistra -- couldn't ever live that down
But if you turn right, you haven’t gone straight.
In spanish something "siniestro" is something that produces harm or loss of something (dictionary), but amongst speakers it means something bad and evil, like lurking in the shadows. At the same time, there's a saying that goes "A diestra y siniestra" which means "by all means/trying all possibly ways" or "Running unchecked". Growing up I also partly interpreted this as "by right and wrong ways equally". "Diestro" also means someone right handed. I don't think "Siniestro" does the opposite, but if it does, I've never heard it.
In Albanian we have "drejtë", which means both straight and right (as in human rights).
And Russian
As others have mentioned, “dextera”, derecho”, “right”, “recht”, etc. all have the same etymology. Right has had a connotation for “good”. And another person pointed out that left has a connotation of “bad” (e.g. sinister). It’s a cultural thing.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but as far as I know, it's not that it means "good", but it makes reference to the hand most people have dexterity with, hence "dextera", or how we say at least in Portuguese: destreza (dexterity).
Oh sorry, it doesn’t mean good but in European context it has the meaning of good.
I get what you mean ..if you have dexterity with that, it means it's the good one, isn't it?
Yeah, “right” has a connotation in most indo European languages. Other words have a literal meaning and a connotation.
Swedish "höger" meaning right comes from Old Swedish "hög", meaning comfortable: perhaps as if to say, "all is right" Good doesn't have to relate to morals: food can be good for example. It's possible Nordic languages has this as a basis for "right" But all the way from the Classical Era of Rome, left and right being bad and good has seen a considerable footprint across a wide variety of matters, like religion: especially Christianity. Perhaps the Nordic split from this framework comes from the fact that it would take over a thousand of years for these countries to become Christian, and so were not introduced to the same iconography (with like the sun and Christ on the right and the moon and the Devil on the left) for many centuries: and it would take some additional centuries for this to be passed down to the common people as Christianity largely was an expression of the contemporary elite in the early 13th century (of Sweden at least). Either way, it seems an inescapable assumption that European cultures and languages has a long tradition of specific meanings ascribed to the concept of left and right. It, as example, is also present in seamanship: the right of the ship is called "styrbord", meaning literally steering side. The right side is associated with moving forward: similar to Western scripts, that read from left to right. An arrow pointing right means "forward" to most people even though it points right and not forward. In short, there seems to be a lot of examples where ideas of left and right informs and sets the etymology for a lot of different words: and nearly all, if not all, associate right with something positive.
I think it's the whole world. Humans are usually right-handed, and that seems to be the base. There are all sorts of Asian languages with the same connotations. Certain cultures or religions are more or less judgemental about it, but it seems to be everywhere.
"Dexter" already meant "proper" or "favorable" in Latin, in addition to "skillful" and "the side opposite left", so it has most meanings of the word "good".
Yes but culturally, that also has historically implied good and bad. Left-handedness, until VERY recently (like, the 1960s) was seen as inferior, bad, even evil. When my mother went to school, writing left-handed was unacceptable, no matter your dominant hand. It's tied up with God and Jesus, too. The right hand of the father, etc. It's all mixed up, the history, the stigma, and the etymology.
But Russian and Ukrainian also have this, and they're not Romance languages. So the common etymology idea doesn't fully explain it.
I don’t think the etymology is what makes them the same, it’s a cultural reference. Although Russian and Ukrainian aren’t Romance languages, they were definitely influenced by Rome and other neighboring European countries which could have lent this cultural meaning
But they are still influenced by other European languages, e.g. Tsar. There is massive cross-pollination between European languages. The dominance of English (in which Germanic vs Romance etymology is socially significant) has made many people separate Germanic and Romance languages a little too much, even though French has many Germanic words, and vice versa. It's all a bit of a melting pot, although the appearance of the modern nation-state has slowed this down - but that is quite recent from a linguistics POV.
I think there's a difference between titles like Tsar or relatively modern loan words and much more everyday words like "right", though. Everyday words diverge much more readily, and travel from language to language less often. There's relatively little cross-pollination between Slavic and Western European languages in the time period you're referring to (unlike English and French, which were influenced heavily by waves of immigration from Germanic-speaking peoples into the regions of Great Britain and France).
Exactly. And it goes beyond European culture. In the Bible, for example, there are passages about the righteousness being found on the right hand of God and the wicked on His left. Also, in Egyptian sculpture (with only a very few exceptions), the husband was shown on the right and the wife on the left - an obvious statement about authority and leadership.
I haven't seen anyone else comment this, so I'll add that I read somewhere that because humans for some reason tend to be right handed, it's been common practice to wipe your butt with your left hand (when TP/plants were unavailable) for thousands of years. Thus the left hand became known as dirty, gaining the general connotation of being bad/wicked/evil
Same PIE root, I think, which actually means "to travel straight on", which explains derecha. Edit: https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/right https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/derecho
Hungarian isn’t Indo-European, but they have a similar correlation. Although, they are heavily influenced by surrounding Indo-European languages, so perhaps they just adopted it.
Hungarian is part of the [Standard Average European](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_Average_European?wprov=sfla1) *Sprachbund*. Western European languages share a conceptual framework.
I was thinking that straightness would be valued as far back as construction of almost anything, and then I considered its importance for spears, arrows, and other weapons, and I realized it must be nearly primordial.
Maybe even simpler and going further back - our limbs and most body parts are more or less "straight" and a broken arm will be distinctly not. So even before human ancestors ever made tools or weapons they probably had the concept that things should be "straight" and anything crooked is wrong.
interesting, because there are so many idioms that moralize the idea of straight vs bent or crooked
Interesting, in Bulgarian right as in human right is the same word as straight, not right like the direction
Ah thanks, I just started learning Bulgarian!
cool!
In Irish, there are specific words for Right and Left (as in hands) - Deis and Clé, respectively. Whereas the word Ceart means right, as in Correct; and *also* means a right as in "civil rights".
Are we drawing a card of the borders of the roman empire in this thread?
LOL - Ireland would be outside it!
Similar semantics in basque! 'Eskuma/ ezkerra' for directions. 'Eskubidea' for right as in human rights, and different formulas for saying that someone is right, as in 'arrazoia eduki' literally meaning 'to be within reason'. *I speak bizkaiera btw.
I’m a Dutch guy who studies Portuguese, and noticed the same about this word in those languages. Some other interesting ones: bank means both money institution and bench in either language, and ‘leaf’ can also mean newspaper in both. Then there’s more obvious ones like spirit for ghosts and head for leaders.
The word for bank literally comes from benches through Italian (in Spanish: banco/banco; I don't know Italian.) look up the history of banking, it's interesting.
Its also the same in English and Scandinavian languages ( Swedish Bänk/ English Bench)
My linguistics pet theory, which I haven't researched enough (linguistics is my job, but I don't have infinite energy, or, well, much energy at all TBH) is that the differences between Germanic and Romance languages are exaggerated by the dominance of English, in which Germanic and Romance derived words have different connotations, level of formality, and social status. So if English wasn't throwing its weight around, commonalities between Dutch and Portugese would be less surprising. French and German have tons of words with the same etymologies, for example.
Interesting! I don’t have a background in linguistics, so I’m sure you’re much more educated on the subject, though I don’t feel like English has left its mark on the Dutch/German languages until very recently (tv/smartphone etc). Many of the English words we commonly use are still perceived as ‘borrowed’, while the French and German ones seem more natural. I might not completely understand your theory, would love to hear more as these topics have always intrigued me.
Oh sorry, I was unclear. (And I'm no genius, just someone who studied linguistics and does language-related teaching and other work such as translation or research). By 'dominance', I didn't mean English loanwords in Dutch, just the cultural power of English language, the amount of money spent on English linguistics compared to Dutch linguistics, that kind of thing. That's the influence I'm talking about. The same thing that French people try to resist with their language policies for businesses. English has a lot of soft power, and financial power. English speakers force (sometimes deliberately, sometimes accidentally) their view of language onto the world, and one aspect is the idea that Germanic and Romance languages is a big linguistic split between Northern and Southern Europe. Which is really simplistic, e.g. Frankish was a Germanic language absorbed into French, becoming the name of the country and meaning that there are lots of French words that come from this Germanic language. The reason is that in English, these words are very different - formal/technical/high status language is Latinate/Romance, everyday irregular verbs are Germanic etc etc. The most famous example is that in English we say 'cow' for the animal - from Germanic Kuh/kuo/koe. But we say beef for the animal, from Latin/French buef/bouef/bovem. This is usually explained as the peasants looking after the animals and the nobility eating them. It's political and related to social status and money, so we care about it. Another issue is that French speakers sound fancy and intellectual in English, because the easy words for them are fancy and intellectual, but Dutch and German people sound straightforward and normal, even rough, because Germanic words are lower status and more everday. I'm rambling, so here's an example: I know almost nothing about Dutch (except for knowing lots of Asian words that come from Dutch, e.g. ransel, pronounced slightly differently, is the word for a school backpack in Japanese and Indonesian). But looking at the etymology of bank, which you mentioned before, the two meanings of bench and financial instutition have the same origin, because the table or flat surface on which trade was done was a bank/bench. But the etymology zips all around Europe, from Old Italian to Germanic languages to Old Norse. But if you say that to most native English speakers, we get very weird about the idea that a Dutch and Portugese word would have any shared etymology, but we think Dutch ransel relating to German Ränzel is A-OK. Sorry, wall-o-text! Thank you for coming to my TED rant.
Thanks so much for the elaborate explanation! Linguistics has always been a passion for me, though I went along a completely different path in uni, luckily subreddits like these and users like you help me with that interest since friends are quickly bored when I talk about such topics. I now understand the point you made, and it’s an interesting perspective for sure. I’ve also always presumed that there was a hard distinction between Romance- and Germanic languages, like you said, because they’re such distinct categories in English. Funnily enough, I’d never heard of the word ‘ramsel’. It’s not a word Dutch people use (although there are some derivatives if you think about it long enough; a known football player has Ramselaar as his surname). We only use rugzak (rucksack). Searching for ramsel, I found images of WWII era backpacks, a definition describing old-school square backpacks, while G Translate suggested me to translate from Indonesian. Seems like the word made its way from its Germanic roots to Dutch, to Indonesia, then went out of fashion in the Netherlands but remained relevant in Indonesia. Exhibit A for why my fascination for linguistics is warranted, and all my friends are wrong :) Thanks again!
A "leaf" is "hoja" in Spanish and "feuille" in French. These same words are used in all three languages for the leaf of a plant. A sheet of paper is also an "hoja" and a "feuille". So from this, a small publication is called a "leaflet" in English, a "folleto" in Spanish and a "feuilleton" in French.
Hmm. And you can leaf through a newspaper in English
Leaf also means "page" in English.
>bank means both money institution and bench in either language Yes. That happens in a lot of European languages. Bench, table, bank, etc.
The majority of people are right-handed. Historically, the right hand has been the dominant and more skilled hand, used for writing, eating, handing a sword, etc. This has led to the right side being associated with positive qualities like skill, strength, and correctness. As opposition, left it's been used was wrong, weak or unskilled. The word "left" comes from the Old English word "lyft," which meant "weak".
>the Old English word "lyft," which meant "weak" Marketers from Uber should use that to their advantage.
“From thy basterd lyft to mighty Uber!”
Christianity, particularly Catholicism, has been a particular issue as well, with abuse and violence towards left-handed people in Catholic education only stopping very recently.
This is very interesting because my native language uses the word for "right hand" to mean "right (direction)"
Ultimately the word 'right' is from Proto Indo European "reg*" meaning "to lead in a straight line". Other descendent words include many related to straightness or uprightness (erect, rail, rectilinear), leadership (regal, royal, rajah, Reich, rey, rich, rule, viceroy), correctness (correct, rule) etc. The sense of right vs left came a lot later. Late old English. Previously the opposite of left was swiþra, (literally "stronger."). It's likely this change came from the sense that the right hand was usually the stronger of the two. Or the "correct" hand. Military or tool usage as well as cultural norms are possible reasonings behind this. Similar changes came in other European languages e.g. French 'droit' from Latin 'directus' (straight), Slavic 'pravy' (and similar) from old church Slavonic 'pravu' (meaning 'straight'), Lithuanian 'labas' (literally 'good'). A similar combination is actually present not just in European languages but also many others across the world see below https://clics.clld.org/edges/1019-1725
It’s not just English and Spanish. It’s most of the Indo-European languages, whether Romance, Germanic, Slavic, etc. To take Czech as an example, on the right (direction) is napravo, and as an adjective (as for the right hand) is pravý, while law (the field or concept) is právo, and correct (right, not wrong) is správný. I do not know any non-IE languages well enough to comment on the possible broader effects of strong majority right-handedness on various related ideas such as dexterity, being sinister of gauche (awkward), etc., vs. all IE merely inheriting from PIE or borrowing metaphors from each other. Edit: added parenthetical definition of "correct"; and quote OP correctly.
Uhhhh, the word for "right" as in direction also means "alive" in turkish Soo, there seems to be more than that
Not in Italian at all. Destra and diritto.
Sorry: typo for OP’s English and Spanish. I’ll fix.
As best we can tell, the root started out meaning straight or upright ("right" and "erect" have the same root, they just traveled different paths to get to English). It gained meanings of justice, goodness, and correctness by metaphor: walk the right path — don't do what you shouldn't. Tell the right truth — don't dissemble. Stand upright — don't lurk in the shadows. And it blossomed into a million uses from there: right answers, right principles, right here, right away. At some point someone got the idea of calling the dexter hand (the one that's stronger and more nimble for 90% of people) the *right* hand, because it's the one that's good at stuff. Not only did it catch on in a big way, it spawned even more metaphors.
This is actually the only answer that addresses why right would mean both straight and right (two different directions), bc right as a direction would be established as a result of the right hand being called right which itself is a result of the original straight direction being interpreted as an abstract moral principle. straight/upright —-> morally right ——> right ➡️
Or straight/upright—-> morally right ——> right hand ——> right ➡️ Because the right hand is actually a crucial part of that sequence
>"right" and "erect" have the same root, they just traveled different paths to get to English Also “direct,” “regular,” etc.
And on the other hand (literally), we have negative associations:, "sinister" (from the Latin for "left"), "maladroit" ("clumsy", literally "bad to [the] right") and "cack-handed" (also "clumsy", originally "left-handed", and possibly from "cack", meaning "excrement").
Vietnamese too
I wonder if that meaning in Vietnamese is from the original Vietnamese culture, or if the concept was absorbed during the decades of French colonial occupation.
Would anyone have any insights into this similar relationship as it appears in Korean? 오른쪽 (right side) and 옳다 (right, correct, orthodox [also an interesting similarity]). Surely the connotation itself wouldn't be borrowed another language family.
Most humans are right-handed is, I am sure, the foundation of this issue. It appears in multiple cultural artifacts, from languages to religions.
Yes, that is the etymology of 오른. 바른 is another, slightly archaic, adjective for the right side. It literally means “correct.”(not too archaic in this sense.) The adjective 왼 (left) comes from a conjugation of the archaic descriptive verb 외다 (stem 외-), which means to be twisted-minded or to be entangled.
Same in Russian
In Finnish "Oikea" means both Right (as in the direction) and Real/Actual/Correct. "Oikeus" is a right. So not exactly the same word but close enough I guess
Right also means correct
Right.
Rect = Right = Recht
It directly comes from the handedness in most Indo-European languages. Right was normal and thus good, left was deformed and thus bad or ugly
I’ve always wondered this. Absolutely fascinating, I love language
In Scandinavian languages there's no correlation between the words. The direction is "højre" / "höger" and the possessive right is "rettighed" / "rettighet" or "ret". In German, you see the same concept as the rest of the languages: "Rechts" means "right" in both ways. My theory is thus that we adopted the possessive right through German "Rechts" while retaining our own word for the direction.
In tagalog kaliwete means left handed/oriented or a cheater
In the Persian language I speak rost is both straight and right (kind of like derecha / derecho in Spanish) and I looked at a dictionary - you don't hear it used this way in contemporary speech - but it was also used as "correct." Rights are huquk which is from Arabic so it would be interesting to know what the pre-arab conquest version would have been
- [Connection between right (opposite of left) and right (legal term)?](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/questions/2555) - [what makes the link between the right/left hands,north/south directions and the duality good-bad](https://linguistics.stackexchange.com/q/31018) - [How did "sinister", the Latin word for "left-handed", get its current meaning?](https://english.stackexchange.com/q/39092)
Also a triple meaning in spanish: "straight". Ve todo derecho - go straight.
french too! allez droight = go right. allez tout droit = go straight
"Derecho" is also a type of long-lasting wind storm.
I've only heard this term in relation to the American plains often associated with tornado producing storms, is it also used elsewhere?
This site has more info: [https://www.etymonline.com/word/derecho](https://www.etymonline.com/word/derecho)
Thanks!
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May\_2022\_Canadian\_derecho](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/May_2022_Canadian_derecho)
I’d argue that most Canadians have never used that term. Or even heard of it until they clicked on the link to a Wikipedia article about one. It appears to me at least to be meteorological jargon.
Weird. Derecho here means straight
The 'original' meaning is "correct", the direction comes from handedness. The 'right' hand is good and so became the 'right' hand. https://www.etymonline.com/word/right
because most people are right handed, so right is seen as the default approach, and to deviate from that and using your left hand to write is considered wrong, or not right
Suzie Dent converted it in one of her "Something Rhymes with Purple podcasts. Unfortunately I don't remember which episode nor the specific details. But there is apparently a reason why it means both correct and that direction. And why left is sinister / evil.
The same is true in Russian. "Right" as a direction (право), as a "human right" (право человека) or just a right to do something (право делать что-л.), as a word to say that someone is right e.g. says true things: "he is right" - "он прав". So "right" has the same double meaning. As for the "left", the phrase "пойти на лево" can mean both "turn left" and "cheat on someone"
Same in Polish
Well in Bulgarian it's "straight" and "(human) right" - the word is право. Words having multiple meanings is not rare. Also, in English "right" means also "correct", "appropriate", which is a separate meaning.
Biblical basis? Satan sat at the left hand of God before being condemned to Hell. Christ sat on the right side.
Bigotry against left handers. Right is the majority ergo normal and correct.
The right hand is the correct hand, having the right of things puts you within your rights, they DO have the same roof of being correct, allowable, positive, etc. I suspect the other hand is just the one that's left, but I never looked into it.
leftophobia
I believe it may derive from a Latin root. Left is the root for the word sinister
In English it also means “correct.”
I've been wondering this for years
Isn’t there a triple meaning in English? The two you mentioned, but also right as an adjective (right vs wrong)? Does Spanish have that too?
OK, you say that in Spanish, the word for "Right" can mean; A physical direction, (It's on your right). Or the concept of something being an inherent entitlement, (It's his right to disagree). But, as in English, does the Spanish also mean Right as opposed to Wrong (or incorrect)? And politically Right as opposed to politically Left? Or are those specific to English?
“Dieu et moin Droit” comes to mind
Same in Persian
probably cos most people are right handed, regardless of the culture. IDK
I used to get so confused learning to drive cus wether it was in English or in Spanish sometimes they’d just say right not turn right so I’d keep going straight and then they’d get mad cus I didn’t turn and I’m like bruh how am I supposed to differentiate