A few years ago I had this notion that EURO is a word whose connotations in English would be likely to be weak.
What this entailed for what societies, publics and nations would want to do in or with the EURO, I don't know - it is something it would be good to explore.
From time to time the notion crops up and I look in my records and find that I have been going on about this for over a dozen years now. The earliest I found this morning was am email to an academic in Exeter University - in 2002!
I am still waiting to hear from her.
Anyway - here is the suggestion:
The Influence Of A Name: The Euro Case An
Experiment Proposed
by: J.M.Wober
Introduction A
substantial literature indicates that the name of a person or an object
influences how it is thought about, and this in turn can influence behaviour
concerning the person or object. The Euro is a new 'actor' in European society,
and one may hope that it is regarded as being reliable and durable as
well as friendly, attractive and with other positive
attributes. One of the elements of the introduction of the currency is the
evocation of connotations by its very name. In English, two very closely
sounding words are eros and urine; it is at least possible that some evocation
of the connotations of these words may spill over into that of the Euro. It
should be acknowledged that little is known about such matters and it would be
wise, therefore, for some study to be carried out of the overtones of meaning
that will (and already do) surround or suffuse the term, in the UK.
Theory One
relevant observation may be that the names for many existing currencies contain
hard consonants; in many cases these come close to the start and or end of the
word and thus provide what sounds like firm enclosure for it. A contrast would
be with words which lack a hard consonant or which may have one but not at
either beginning or end; such words are 'open-ended' in sound. It may be far
fetched, or not, but it may at least be worth investigation that a new
currency's name might more readily evoke the desired attributes if it sounds,
like the names for so many other currencies, as though it conveys 'hard-ended
closure' (franc, mark, dollar, pound, escudo, peseta, rand, baht, dirham,
shekel, even lirra).
Method A set
of new and meaningless names should be made up. Half of these would contain
hard consonants and afford substantial acoustic 'closure'. Half would have
softer consonants, not placed at either end of the word and would thus sound
less 'closed'. A set of semantic differential scales would be established on
which a sample of observers would be asked to place each term, on the basis of
how it sounds to them, and of which descriptions if evokes. Each new 'word'
would contain two syllables. The rating could be required without context; or a
context could be supplied. The most explicit context would be to say that terms
for a real new currency are being studied, and one wants to explore the ideas
and feelings each term evokes. A less explicit context (which I favour) would
be to propose that a scriptwriter was considering names for a fictional
currency, for a new science fiction tv series. An indirect context would be to
say the same, but for names for fictional characters. Finally, people could be
asked to assess the terms without saying what they applied to. This procedure
could then be repeated for the terms pound, and finally euro. Some personal
details of respondents would be taken, to learn whether stereotyping may occur
in some ways amongst certain parts of the population more than amongst others.
Terms and Scales
Terms might include: delim, kinot, suled, bagup, galed. jubol, kedit
(etc); aryo, uwiah, ehyor, oirue, ilwo,
(etc). Scales might include: worth 10p...£10; respectable/dis-;
fast/slow; changeable/steadfast; reliable/un-; friendly/hostile;
indestructible/in-; desirable/un-; etc
Hypotheses The null hypothesis would be that the terms are all
meaningless (ie, words not in the dictionary, nor are the major syllables such
words), and that a number not significantly different from 100% would choose
the centre point on each scale. A variant of this hypothesis is that replies
would be normally distributed around the centre, with a small distribution. The hypothesis of the introduction, above,
is that some terms would tend to score high or low on various scales, in ways
that imply imputation of character. In
particular, terms with much closure would seem firmer, more reliable, more
friendly and attractive.
