When I was at university, one of our linguistics lecturers told us a story... that goes something like this.
In the 1920s, insurance agents were called to deal with a number of explosions on an oil platform. When they visited the platform, they noticed an interesting pattern. Rules required barrels on the platform to be painted with labels depending on whether they were 'full' or 'empty'. Workers would then behave differently towards each. They would take great care of barrels that were 'full' - of cold, inert and extremely safe crude oil - not smoking around them, and transporting and stacking them carefully. Those that were 'empty' - empty of oil, but full of highly explosive gasses - they would smoke around and throw around the platform... until they exploded.
By simply changing the labels to 'safe' and 'explosive', the insurance agents eliminated the problem.
A couple of linguists called Sapir and Whorf got wind of this and combined it with other work that they had been doing. The result was a theory of linguistic relativity which states that the structure of language affects the way that those who use that language see the world.
The Sapir-Whorf hypothesis was the spur for much of the 20th century's linguistic research. Even now, although it's largely been discredited at a structural level, the fact that it makes so much sense means that it continues to pop up as something that has to have some truth to it...
Here's an example: Last week I was the U.S. where, in the north at least, they are enjoying the coldest spring anyone can remember. While I was there, I overheard the family I was staying with say "I don't care what they say... that Global Warming thing is a load of rubbish".
Now, I know the Americans are not overly known for their environmental sensitivities... but I can't help but think that whoever coined the phrase Global Warming rather missed a trick. Yeh, OK... so the central feature is that the world is warming up... but in the popular imagination that means that things get warmer... not that things become more unstable.
When I was a child, I was told that Good Friday was so called because it was good that Jesus died... and Easter was called Easter... because it was...
... apparently, Friday is more correctly called Good Friday because 'Good' has the ancient meaning of 'Holy', and it is the Friday of a 'Great and Holy' week of terrible mystery... God become man, dying a mortal death for mankind... it's also called Friday of Lamentation, High Friday, Passion (suffering) Friday and Long Friday (apparently because it's also fasting day)...
The day before was Maundy Thursday... so called because maundy is a derivative of 'mandatum'; Latin for the first word of the new covenant phrase pronounced on that day... "A new commandment I give you, that you love one another like I have loved you". It's also known as Holy Thursday, Covenant Thursday and Thursday of Mysteries.
Today is known as Holy Saturday... or Black Saturday... or Joyous Saturday depending on where you are.
And then Easter day... which is called something to do with 'Pascha' (Passover) else nearly everywhere else, and almost uniquely 'Easter' in English because the feast has been conflated with an Anglo Saxon festival to a fertility goddess named Ēostre.
So, in the UK, our tradition calls the day that Jesus died 'good'... and names the day that he rose again after a pagan goddess.
Whereas, if we lived in Croatia (for example)... we'd call Friday 'Great and Holy'... which is probably more representative of the awesomeness of what it represents. And we'd call Sunday 'Uskrs', which is admittedly more difficult to pronounce... but means 'Resurrection'.
Of course, we can teach people what the words mean... but Sapir and Whorf... and I... reckon that perhaps no great surprise that most people don't really understand what any of it's all about...
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