To etymologize or not to etymologize

The word deer comes from the Dutch word ‘dier’ and that means animal. I will always remember that and I like that I know this so much that I keep teaching the word deer even when it isn’t relevant and I always add the etymological information. I worry sometimes if this is such a good idea. But that is only because very few students show a slight twinkling of interest in this bit of gratuitous information. (I learned to use ‘gratuitous’ when I looked up ‘gratuit’. In Dutch it has a very special, negative meaning that is different from the standard, original French meaning.) Most students disregard it as being another bit of information that they can do without. It won’t be in a test, no one needs to know the history of a word to be able to use it, why bother the grey cells?

Well, I’ll tell you why, dear language learner, the grey cells will make more connections, languages are connected and the more a word has connections to other words the better you will remember it. It might feel like you are making a detour and it is not efficient but that’s not how my brain feels about it. It doesn’t like drilling exercises. It likes associations.

We sing: “Doe, a deer, a female deer”. Did you know a doe can also be a goat? But the male of a deer, a stag, is only used for deer. That comes from ‘to sting’. In old Norse, however, it was used for more male animals than just deer. When it’s dead it becomes venison, that’s French, much more sophisticated because the rich eat it and they use their own language. In French, or Latin, it becomes any animal that is hunted. In Southern Africa venison means meat of an antelope. That is a nice animal in Dutch. An animal that is anti (against) ‘lopen’, which means to walk. But that’s not etymology, that’s just a silly joke.