For goodness sake, call your grandmother as you like, age of uniformity and dullness should pass! Whatever busha or busia or babusia or babcia or babka - you cannot go wrong if you follow you hearth! So all of you stop being a dick and move on !
But it's certainly an American thing - I still haven't met any Poles who knew what "polack" meant in English.
Use of the word "polack" in English is not merely an American thing. See William Shakespeare's Hamlet: Act 1: Scene 1: Line 63: "He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice."
Let me tell you about my Busha, She was the last of my great-grandparents to be alive when I was born and she was from the Eastern part of Poland. I visited her in the old-folks home and I found her somewhat frightening and foreign but I also knew that she loved me. I gather from this thread that "Busha" is not proper Polish for Great-Granny, but I really believe that my Busha was not only Polish, but her longevity and general tenacity was as Polish as it gets.
My Busha was a large framed woman and her husband, my father's mother's father, was also grand, he was over six feet tall like me and my father and I am greatful to this Eastern-Polish branch of my family for endowing me with height. If any of you has a problem with the word "Busha" when used to describe an elderly Polish lady you should remember that there are large merciless individuals who hold their Bushas dear and hold your tongue.
Use of the word "polack" in English is not merely an American thing.
The 'Pole-axe' was a reference to breaking ice
The lines before are Such was the very armour he had on When he the ambitious Norway combated: So frowned he once, when in an angry parle He smote the sledded Polacks on the ice
I prefer to refer to such places as Senior Retirement Facilities. It sounds more respectful to the elderly.
I enjoy visiting the facility, located next to the Polish church in Los Angeles, CA. It is there, where I have the opportunity and pleasure to chat, with the wonderful people who reside there. They are a precious part of the older Polish generation. Including other people's Babcia or Busha (take your pick of terminology.) I'm intrigued when I hear them speak about Polish culture, along with life in the old country. They are all very special people.
There's no such word as BUSIA in Polish, but there is in Ampolonian. BTW why discrimnate against poor ol' jaja -- that's how some AmPols write dziadzia which is Ampolonian for granddad. In Polish it should be Dziadzio, Dzadziuś, Dzadunio, etc., etc. but Ampolonia is not Poland and is able to coin its own words and phrases. And it has done over the decades, attesting to its vitality.
Busia and dziadzia are widepsread acrossdthe US Polonia from NY to LA, dunno if that's also the case in Canada. PolCanadians, what say ye?
Probably not in the UK. Any Britpols on PF? Subjects of HM of Polish extraction?
The ambitious, angry, armoured Norwegian combatant may have been on a sled, being he was on ice. It is a violent play.There is some value in alliterating Smote and Sled. Pole-axes were usually used on foot with the length giving added momentum to break through armour.
Make of it want you will, if you want to believe that WS was a racist, it's left to the reader for interpretation. WS was a punner (e.g. mistempered swords in R&J), I simply find it hard to believe Shakespeare would stoop to dumb polack jokes. I do find something darkly funny in DEs implication of picking up a Polish person by the ankles and bashing ice with his/her head!
Preempting, Polonius the "tedious old fool" also named as Corambis, Latin for cabbage head, was Danish.
edit: I am not alluding to Polonios3, just noticed his post ahead of mine;)
I do find something darkly funny in DEs implication of picking up a Polish person by the ankles and bashing ice with his/her head!
I thought the line from Hamlet meant that the "Polacks" Hamlets father smote were riding sleds on the ice, but I am now somewhat partial to your interpretation that it is a pole-axe therein refered to rather than Polish warriors, but that being said the Danes, and the Norweigens, of Hamlet's day did fight battles against the Poles. The Norwiegen nobleman Fortinbras, whose character in the play serves to restore order in Castle Elsinore after the bloodbath, was in reality killed by the Poles in battle.
When I visited my Busha in her "Senior Retirement Facility" I was often allowed to go play outside while my parents and her chatted. Her room's window overlooked a swan filled pond and I being just a wee lad, without alot of sympathy for our fine feathered friends, used to throw rocks at the swans, and my father tells me that Busha found this hilarious. One anecdote he tells about her has always interested me. When my father was a boy he, and one of my uncles, would often stay with Busha, and there was at that time a weekly tevelvision program, hosted by a fellow made-up and attired like a vampire, that would feature a different horror movie every week. Busha would unaffectedly watch the horror movies, but when the host's segments came on she would cross herself, and avert her eyes, or even flee the room entirely. Of course this seemed rather funny to me, but when I thought about it I could understand that for a lady from the superstitious depths of Eastern Europe a ghoul on television addressing his viewers directly could indeed be scary.
that it is a pole-axe therein refered to rather than Polish warriors, but that being said the Danes, and the Norweigens, of Hamlet's day did fight battles against the Poles.
You are right. A double meaning is there which I didn't want to leave unnoticed. Just you picked a bad quote. Polack is used to refer to Poles later on, as you say. I just got a very slightly irked that WS use was being taken in the same venomous spirit that it is used in the US. 'Pole-axe' would be more obvious when hearing the word in the play, more so than when read.
I know Babcia is the traditional name for grandma but are there any other affectionate names for grandma? We called my great-grandmother Busha (american spelling) but have heard some also call grandma that. Is that correct and, if so, What is the spelling for that?
Are you still harping on this? Busia/busha is a bona fide word in colloquial Polish-American speech. There are even 'I love my Busia' T-shirts and suchlike gadgets.
The masculine equivalent is dziadzia. Not dziadek, dziadziuś or dzadunio, but dziaidzia. If you don't like it you can lump it. I say: Long live BUSIA & DZIADZIA!
Polonius. Perhaps it's difficult for you to understand, but in Poland, we have the Narodowy Korpus Języka Polskiego. They don't recognise "Busha" or variants as a Polish word - therefore, it's wrong.
Incidentally, I checked my Polish dictionary and it doesn't contain "Busia" or any such nonsense, either.
If you want to use Polish words, use them properly!
From a cooking blog here is a little more about the origin of Busia or Busha:
"Also, I wanted to explain why it's called "Busia's" Sauerkraut. Modern day Poles call their Grandmothers "Babcia", however, as my husband's family is Polish by a couple of generations, prior to The Great War, in the Ukraine, Grandmothers were called "Babusia", shortened to "Busia", and sometimes twisted by accent and time to "Buzia" (which actually means "mouth" but I am just glad that they try and are close)..."
The first one is Polish - the second bastardized Russian/Ukrainian
For God's sake people - at least read what others wrote before you (see the post by "porzeczka") and do not come here with your weirdo theories about a Ukrainian/Russian origin of the word, etc.
The word "Busia" is perfectly acceptable - as a shortening of a commonly used, diminutive old Polish form "Babusia" (56,000 uses on Google - not that many but still a significant count.) It is as good as another tender form - "Babunia" (522,000 uses), although less popular. But there is no need to invent strange theories about a Ukrainian origin of that form.
"Babusia" is as correct as "Mamusia". Any problem with "Polishness" of the latter form?
But "Busha" is atrocious - but only spelling wise. I do not care that generations of Pennsylvanians wrote it this way. It is just a barbarous spelling, that's it. You can use it at home as much as you want but do not come here pushing such form on native Poles. Just learn to spell it correctly and we will all be fine. At the same token most Poles would never accept "Jaja" for Grandfather. The correct spelling is "dziadzio" or "dziadek", not "jaja" or "dziadzia" - which actually shows its Russian root "diadia" (but meaning an "uncle").
And yes, not until seeing it first time on this forum, the only "Busia" I have ever heard and used was a diminutive form from Bogusia, Bogumiła or Bogusława. But this is just a matter of different family traditions.
(boletus):But "Busha" is atrocious - but only spelling wise. I
You're right, I got too lazy and didn't feel like reading the entire thread. I don't care about the spelling although I agree with you that Busha looks atrocious. To me, it's the strong "sh" sound pronunciation that makes it so appalling. A grandmother is something I cherish, it's a sweet, good feeling to say babcia, babusia, babunia, even busia (although I've never heard it prior to PF). To hear busha sounds very harsh to me, sounds foreign and not "homey-like" at all. That's me though, YMMV.
PS: I re-typed your name to remember who I was quoting further down the road. I hate the new "anonymous quote" feature. :-((
Grandmothers were called "Babusia", shortened to "Busia"
They are still called that sometimes. My two-year-old niece calls grandma mostly Babcia but I've heard Babusia, Babunia. Children play with language. Professional class in Warsaw.
