Date:  Thu, 16 Oct 1997 21:22:43 -0400
From:  Fred Shapiro <fred.shapiro[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]YALE.EDU>
Subject: Re: Etymology of _Hoosier_

On Thu, 16 Oct 1997, Dennis R. Preston wrote:

> There is also some caution to be taken in lessons learned from medicine and
> other areas (which we all pray are dominated by hard science) where folk
> facts have tuned out to be right on.

I would be curious to learn of examples of folk-etymologies that have
turned out to be "right on." I have long believed that the more colorful
an etymological story is, the less likely it is to have anything to do
with the truth. If one automatically dismissed all colorful etymological
stories as hogwash, one would rarely be in error.


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 Fred R. Shapiro               Coeditor (with Jane Garry)
 Associate Librarian for Public Services   TRIAL AND ERROR: AN OXFORD
  and Lecturer in Legal Research      ANTHOLOGY OF LEGAL STORIES
 Yale Law School               Oxford University Press, 1997
 e-mail: fred.shapiro[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]yale.edu        ISBN 0-19-509547-2
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