Not talking about its historical existence, but referring the modern resurgence of the word influenced by the mainstream media. Since some of my coworkers and friends have been using the word recently, I wonder what program or show they must’ve watched before adopting the word in their daily dialogue.
In: Culture
It Is a noun forming suffix which dates back to Proto-Indo-European.
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/-iskos
You can see it in Germanic, Baltic, Slavic and Greek language families.
Have they been watching Blackish or Youngish?
Pretty simple actually. -ish, as a suffix, means “having the qualities of”. For example “apish” is similar to “ape-like”.
Because of that it works to make adjectives based on other nouns and adjectives in the same manner, with adjectives like colors becoming an approximation of the original adjective.
“Yellowish” is “kind of yellow” or “yellow-like”.
It’s only a matter of time before we use it for all sorts of approximations, like “thirty-ish” for “around 30”. Or even as a response, like “Is he friendly?” “…-ish…”
According to [Merriam-Webster](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/-ish) Online:
Middle English, from Old English -isc; akin to Old High German -isc, -ish, Greek -iskos, diminutive suffix
adjectival word-forming element, Old English -isc “of the nativity or country of,” in later use “of the nature or character of,” from Proto-Germanic suffix *-iska- (cognates: Old Saxon -isk, Old Frisian -sk, Old Norse -iskr, Swedish and Danish -sk, Dutch -sch, Old High German -isc, German -isch, Gothic -isks), cognate with Greek diminutive suffix -iskos. In its oldest forms with altered stem vowel (French, Welsh). The Germanic suffix was borrowed into Italian and Spanish (-esco) and French (-esque). Colloquially attached to hours to denote approximation, 1916.
The -ish in verbs (abolish, establish, finish, punish, etc.) is a mere terminal relic from the Old French present participle.
**Long story short, it’s been around for a long time and is proto-Germanic in nature.**
“-isch” is actually the standard ending for adjectives in modern German, too.
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