new column

Funny Canadian Sayings / Canuck Words / Canadian French Words / My Blog

The Wording Room / Buy Books / Contact / Links / Site Map / Biography

Schedule / New Entries / Photos / Letters / Good Reviews

MORE Features & Services >>

Thursday, July 24, 2008

search this site

 

 

Geophagy = the eating of dirt, earth, soil

pronounced:   jee-OFF-uh-jee

 

Geophagy is a modern scientific Greek compound γεωφαγíα (geophagia) = γη ‘earth’ (combining form: geo-) + φαγíα ‘eating’

The clearest reference to geophagy in popular American culture is the title of one of the bestselling American novels of the 20th century, Pearl Buck’s The Good Earth. Set during the reign of the last emperor of China, the story depicts, among other realities of earlier Chinese life, a prolonged drought and period of starvation during which the heroine mother, O-Lan, serves her children something to eat. Her poor neighbours, clutched in famine’s claw, desperate for food, discover that she has fed the kids soil, “the good earth” itself, because, as O-Lan says, it is warm and gives life. Nowadays we know that dirt also contains intestinal worm larvae and a number of bacteria best left out of the human digestive tract. Eating dirt is contraindicated at all times.

Pearl Buck 1892- 1973

In China from childhood, Pearl spoke both English and Chinese.

In 1931 The Good Earth won the Pulitzer Prize and became a major MGM film in 1937. In 1938, less than a decade after her first book had appeared, Pearl Buck won the Nobel Prize in literature, the first American woman to do so.

Pica : A Synonym for Geophagy

Among veterinarians and pediatricians, a common synonym for geophagy is pica. This term arose in late fifteenth century Latin as a word for the craving of pregnant women for odd foods. Pica in classical Latin was a bird name, a magpie. It was suggested to medieval physicians because of the magpie’s habit of dining on a wide assortment of foods. Some modern pediatricians still use the term for a symptom cluster in certain cases of childhood malnourishment.

Geophagy Today in Haiti

Geophagy has reared its dirt-eating head in today’s Haiti, one of the poorest countries on earth.

A woman dries mud cookies in the sun on the the roof of Fort Dimanche, once a prison, in Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Nov. 29, 2007. Rising prices and food shortages are threatening Haiti’s fragile stability, and the mud cookies, made of dirt, salt and vegetable shortening, are one of very few options the poorest people have to stave off hunger. (Ariana Cubillos/ AP Photo)

 

English Words Containing the Gai-, Ge- and Geo- Radicals

The Greek root for earth persists in the general and the scientific vocabularies of most European languages. Here is a list of some English -geo- words:

Gaia

The earth mother in ancient Greek mythology was Gaia. This Urmutter reappeared in the twentieth century as a icon and feminist symbol, and Gaia was then appropriated by earth-loving ecofreaks to remind us of how all creatures on earth are indeed pressed to Gaia’s nurturant breasts, a biological fact we forget at our peril.

“Big Momma” Gaia

By George!

The geo root is also in some surprising words, like our common given name, George. In Greek Georgos meant farmer, that is, earth-worker (ge + orgos ‘worker’). A georgic is a poem dealing with rural life, such as the Roman poet Virgil’s Georgics.

Apogee – (Greek apo ‘away from’ + ge ‘earth’) The apogee is that point in the orbit of the moon at which the moon is farthest away from the earth. The apogee of a space satellite is also spoken of.

Epigeal – (Greek epi ‘on’ + ge ‘earth’) In botany, an epigeal plant sprouts and grows on or above the ground after germination.

Hypogeal – (Greek hypo ‘under’ + ge ‘earth’) In botany, an epigeal plant develops or grows or matures underground. The peanut is epigeal.

Geography – literally: writing about the earth (Greek graphein ‘to write’)

Geology – literally: study of the earth (logia – ‘study’)

 

 

English Words with the Greek -Phag- Root

 

phagos Greek ‘eater, eating’ and phagein ‘to eat’ and phagia ‘eating’

 

Sarcophagus = sarx, sarkos Greek ‘flesh’ + phagos ‘eater’

The first sarcophagus was possibly a limestone coffin said to assist in the disintegration of a human corpse and so employed in making coffins. Later, the word sarcophagus names any ornate coffin built of stone or rare wood and decorated with the usual clichés of funerary mopery.

In days of yore, some British sacrophagi were adorned with weeping angels hiding their heads beneath tear-moistened winglets. Or the carved coffins might depict a chubby flock of volant putti flying over the deceased person and bearing banners emblazoned with messages of spurious hope like “Nigel hath joined the Choir Celestial.” Hardly likely, after Nigel had diligently applied an arsenic salt to Aunt Emily’s kippers.

 

Exquisite Roman sacrophagus of Italian marble, 3rd century CE, Getty Museum, California

 

Esophagus = oisophagos an anatomical name coined by the ancient Greeks from oiso- Greek, meaning not known + phagos ‘eater’

The esophagus is the muscular gullet tube, about nine inches long in an adult, that connects the pharynx to the stomach. Peristaltic contractions of encircling muscles pass food through the esophagus.

Phagocyte = phagos Greek ‘eater’ + kytos Greek ‘cell’

A phagocyte is a scavenger cell that ingests foreign cells, debris and disease microorganisms. Some phagocytes are fixed in liver, spleen, and bone marrow. Others, such as leucocytes, circulate in the blood. They play a significant defensive role in immune reactions.

Anthropophagi are cannibals, from anthropos Greek ‘man’ + phagos ‘eating’

Today the word is frequently used humorously to convey a pseudoscientific pomposity to what is more usually called cannibalism.

Anthropophagous shenanigans ensue; decorum evaporates; proceedings get quite out-of-hand at an Episcopalian Church Summer Camp after the cook yells, “Somebody ate all the hotdogs!”

 

Coprophagy is the literal eating of shit.

From kopros Greek ‘dung, shit’ + phagia ‘eating’

Dung-beetles are coprophagous, dining on excrement with far too great an enthusiasm.

 

Hippophagy is eating horse meat.

From hippos Greek ‘horse’ + phagia ‘eating’

 The practice of consuming horseflesh is encountered in North America rarely but does arise at the cheaper hamburger stands. Among ancient wandering peoples of the Asian steppes and invaders of Europe hippophagism served a survival need.

 

Onychophagy is the biting and sometimes eating of one’s fingernails.

From onychos Greek ‘fingernail’ + phagia ‘eating’

The word appears frequently in medical literature describing symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorders and in textbooks of the dietary sciences.

 

Necrophagy is eating corpses.

From nekros Greek ‘dead’ + phagia ‘eating’

Earthly creatures other than ghouls do eat the dead bodies of their fellow critters.

 

Theophagy is eating your god. It is by no means as yucky as one might surmise upon first encountrering the word or the practice.

From theos Greek ‘god’ + phagia ‘eating’

Christians wax theophagous during Holy Communion, as they nibble piously on the dainty bread wafers of the Eucharist miraculously transubstantiated into the very flesh of Christ. That is Roman Catholic dogma. Some of the vegetarian protestant sects found this far too dégoutant. So they came up with consubstantiation, wherein the bread and wine don’t actually undergo a transformative abracadabera and turn into Jesus’ fingers and saviour plasma. Instead, a more seemly metamorphosis follows, in which the molecules of Wonder Bread and Thunderbird wine are said to “coexist” with the Christly bits. So much more tasteful, I always think.

And, yes, brethren and cistern, I wish to blaspheme.

 

copyright © 2008 William Gordon Casselman

 

 

 

Learn the Colorful Origins of Some

Canadian Food Words

 

 

 

 

Order online for 3-Day Delivery in Canada

Order from Chapters/Indigo

 

 

 

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Publishers & Writers!

If you would like your word book reviewed here, send me a two or three-line email note on the book's focus. If I think it might fit, I'll return to you instructions on how to get the book into my hands.

my email: canadiansayings@mountaincable.net

-------------------------------------------------------------------

 

 

 

 

 

   

 

 

 

 

If you enjoyed this column,

please tell your word-loving friends about my site

and ask them to visit it.

 

I invite you to tour my site and select from the hundreds of word stories here.

To begin, click on the Word List banner below.

Then perhaps browse the site map with its links to every page of my

 

 

 

 

 

If you want to share some wonderful Canadian sayings, both in English and in Québec French, you will find more than 3,000 Canadian expressions in my three sayings books. Each of my three volumes of Canadian Sayings contains about 1,200 zesty phrases used by Canadians both today and throughout our history. Remember that profits from the sale of my books keep this website online.

order online from Chapters/Indigo

 

 

 

 

This new book is available from November 2007 and can be ordered at any bookstore in the world. Among the essay contributors in Readings for Technical Communication are George Grant, Marshall McLuhan, C.P. Snow, George Orwell, Stephen Strauss, William Zinsser and, yours ever in abject humility — Bill Casselman.

Order "Readings" at a discount from Chapters/Indigo

 

 

If you can't find my books online or in stores,

order them directly from the author.

Just send me an email

canadiansayings@mountaincable.net

 

 

 

Bill Casselman writes a monthly column for one of the liveliest online journals about language. Sample it at www.vocabula.com

 

 

 

 

Sales of my book support

the continuance of this website.

        $10.95 in all Canadian bookstores

order online from Chapters/Indigo

Says one reader on the Chapters website: “If you're Canadian you gotta read this book. This book made me laugh till I cried. Things I thought only I heard during my youth were there in print before my eyes! I love this book. Everyone I show it to has the same reaction. Different sayings tickled my funny bone on different days - so they never get boring. Keep up this wonderful treasure-trove of Canadiana, Bill.”     — Angie Plamondon

published by McArthur & Company, Toronto, Canada

 

ORDER MY BOOKS

ANYWHERE IN THE WORLD

ONLINE AT

INDIGO.CA

 

 

Visit this roundup of CanNews at www.bourque.org

 

 

Advertisers! Click here to

check this site's web stats

 

 

 

 

 

 

Google
 

 

 

Other Canadian Word Stories

 

Description of Site Contents

Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™ features hundreds of entries about Canadian phrases, words, expressions, and folk sayings. My newest, latest, unpublished word stories and studies appear here on this website. Canadian English is the focus but English spoken and written all over the world and throughout the history of the language interests me as well.

 

 

 

Other Places to Visit on My Website

Casselman's Canadian Words / Casselmania

Canadian Garden Words /Canadian Food Words

What's In a Canadian Name? / Canadian Sayings

Canadian Sayings 2 / Canadian Sayings 3

A Dictionary of Medical Derivations

Bill Casselman's Other Writings

As The Canoe Tips: Comic Scenes from Canadian Life

Canadian Words & Sayings 2006 edition

 

 

 

 

 

 

expressions in Canadian English

etymology of Canadian words and phrases

phrases of Canada

word history of Canada

Canadian talk

Canadian way of speaking

Canadian speech

where Canadian words come from

funny Canadian sayings

humorous Canadian expressions

Canadian catchwords

Canadian epigrams

Canadian mottoes

Canadian stock sayings

learning Canadian English

learning Canadian French expressions

learning Quebec folk sayings

introduction to etymology

Canadian English as ESL

slang and Canadian English slang      

learn Canadian English

Canadian English word power      

learn Canadian words

Canadian English word lists  

 

words used by Canadians

Canadian lingo

Kalan Porter pictures photographs photos

Kalan Porter word lore

Canadian sayings for ESL

 William Gordon Casselman, Canadian author

Bill Casselman's books

Canadian words

folk sayings of Canada

Canadian expressions

Canadian phrases

words used by Canadians

Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day archives

etymology of Canadian words

etymology examples of

Canadian word origins

Canadian English

place names of Canada

word stories

funny Canadian sayings

Canadian books

books about Canadian words

word roots

Canadian vocabulary

Canadian language

Canadian lingo

Canadian turn of phrase

Canadian way of speaking

French-Canadian words

French-Canadian words in English

Quebec words

Quebec French

Canadian surnames

Canadian last names

funny expressions of Canada

Canadian word derivations

Casselman's Canadian Words

Casselmania

Canadian Food Words

Canadian Garden Words

What's in a Canadian Name?

Canadian Sayings

Canadian Sayings one

Canadian Sayings two

Canadian Sayings 1

Canadian Sayings 2

Canadian Sayings 3

Canadian Sayings three

dictionary of medical derivations

etymology of medical terms

what medical words mean

origin of medical vocabulary

medical word stories

Canadian food words

culinary terms of Canada

where food names come from

Canadian English

words about Canada

bill casselman

bill casselman books

etymology

Canadian origins of words

Acadian words

Acadian food terms

Acadian vocabulary

Canadian Word of the Day™

word power

word lore

fun with words

where words come from

Canadian Word of the Day™

Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™

Canadian Word of the Day

Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day

Canadian French as a second language

Bill Casselman's Canadian Word of the Day™

Canadian Word of the Day

Canadian words

words from Canada

Canadian English

Learn Canadian sayings

Learn Canadian English

Canadian English as a second language

Canadian English study

Canadian English as ESL

ESL tips with Canadian English expressions

Learning English ESL from Canadian English

speaking Canadian English

learning about Canada through Canadian English

 Canadian unique words

unique Canadian terms

words used in Canada

Words that are Canadian

phrases terms sayings words original Canadian

original Canadian words terms phrases

Canadian idioms

ESL tips for learning Canadian English

Canadian ESL phrase books 

funny folk sayings in English

Canadian slang

Canadian patois

patois Canadien

ESL sayings

ESL funny sayings

ESL teaching tips

Canadian funny expressions

Canadian English words 

special phrases in Canadian English

words unique to Canada

English in Canada

Old Canadian Expressions

Historical sayings of Canada

old sayings in Canada

Canadian historical sayings

expressions and proverbs of Canada

origin of Avril Lavigne's surname

words of Canada

 

 

Canadian terms

Canadian language

French Canadian sayings

books on Canadian English

books teaching Canadian English

English in Canada ways of speech

Canadian talk in English

 

unique words of Canada

unique Canadian phrases

unique sayings of Canada

 

word origins Canada unique expressions of Canada

 

funny sayings

Canadian expressions