Tuesday, May 14, 2019

etymology - Where does the word キレる come from?


I'm unsure of how to use this word 「キレる」. When I looked up the definition, it says something along the lines of "to get angry" or "to lose one's temper".


Where does this word come from? I'm somewhat confused at the combination of katakana 「キレ」 + hiragana 「る」. Does the origin of the word explain this?



Answer



The word is kire-ru. Like most 下一段, it naturally derives from the 下二段 verb kir-u. It is properly written 切れる. Consider the word 途切れる. You may think of it as "堪えていた気持ちが途切れて, and now I'm pissed".


As for why it may be written as キレる: it is slang, and the katakana emphasizes this. The final -ru conjugates, so leaving it in hiragana is most natural.


Also note that there is 半切れ (or 半ギレ, if you prefer) in which one may suddenly raise their voice at someone as if they were mad in response to a comment.



No comments:

Post a Comment

digital communications - Understanding the Matched Filter

I have a question about matched filtering. Does the matched filter maximise the SNR at the moment of decision only? As far as I understand, ...