Wow!

Más que una palabra o una onomatopeya, esta expresión de admiración y sorpresa trasciende las fronteras lingüísticas y culturales. Pero ¿de dónde surge?

by GRAZIELLA DEL CIUCO

LANGUAGE The word ‘wow’ is used to express surprise, excitement or admiration. It is a versatile term with a curious history. Even though it sounds like a modern word, its origins date back1 centuries. It was first recorded in writing in a 1513 English-language version of Virgil’s Aeneid translated by a Scottish bishop2. It was originally used as an interjection to express surprise or astonishment3, and may be related to the old exclamation ‘vow’, a shorter form of ‘I vow4!’ (I promise), which was used to add emphasis to a statement5. Over6 the centuries, the meaning of ‘wow’ has evolved, and by the late 1800s7 it was in common use among English speakers. VERSATILE In the early 1920s the word ‘wow’ was used as a noun8, (“The show we saw…

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Speak Up (Digital) - 1 Issue, No 467

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