Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2021 June 15

Language desk
< June 14	<< May | June | Jul >>	June 16 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

June 15

Is "Hindic" a real word?

I noticed that the English Wikipedia uses it (few dozen times), but I had not seen it before and no reliable sources immediately jumped out in a quick google search; most results are of it being a surname in an unrelated culture. No results in the online Merriam-Webster, Oxford Adv. Learners and Cambridge dictionaries. Some results in google books but not enough to convince me. Most look like they are just searching for the right word. I looked up "Hinduic" and it has even fewer hits. Are "hindic" and "hinduic" mistakes made when people meant "Hindu" or "indic" or "sanskritic"? Are they included in more comprehensive dictionaries, or used frequently in some academic fields? Usedtobecool ☎️ 03:11, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

When enough people use a term, it becomes a "real" word, and lexicographers will add it to their dictionaries. The term Hindic is definitely attestable.^[1][2][3] Authors may prefer Hindic to Indic because the latter is increasingly understood as referring to the current state of India, not to the culture that emerged from the Indus Valley. (The English word Indic comes from the Latin adjective indicus, which is a straight borrowing from Ancient Greek. In Neo-Latin texts one also finds the spelling Hindicus,^[4][5][6] although only rarely.) Wikipedia articles should IMO stick to words that are found in major dictionaries.  --Lambiam 09:43, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

As for "real word" you might be interested in Linguistic prescription vs Linguistic description.--Shantavira|^{feed me} 10:39, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

Also, -ic is a productive morpheme, meaning that new, perfectly acceptable words can be created "on the fly" by using it; such words are acceptable and "real" as any other word, because the grammatical processes used to create them is well established in English. Prior approval is not required. --Jayron32 14:06, 15 June 2021 (UTC)

"Hinduic" is in the OED, "Forms: 1800s Hindooic (now rare), 1800s Hinduic.

Origin: Formed within English, by derivation. Etymons: Hindu n., -ic suffix.

Etymology: < Hindu n. + -ic suffix.

Compare earlier Hinduish adj.

Now rare.

Of, relating to, or characteristic of Hindu peoples or Hinduism.

1834 E. Moor Oriental Fragments 401 The Druids had also Ceridwen, the goddess of Death; who in their metempsychological system, was likewise the goddess of the renovation of life. This is strictly and strangely Hinduic.

1889 R. B. Anderson tr. V. Rydberg Teutonic Mythol. 6 The Hindooic Aryans were possessors only of Kabulistan and Pendschab.

1947 Indian Year Bk. 33 12/2 The iconography of the Hinduic pantheon is developed during this period." DuncanHill (talk) 16:29, 15 June 2021 (UTC)