{"id":44140,"date":"2019-03-03T20:44:29","date_gmt":"2019-03-03T19:44:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/?p=44140"},"modified":"2019-03-08T15:57:28","modified_gmt":"2019-03-08T14:57:28","slug":"jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-pinkie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2019\/03\/03\/jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-pinkie\/","title":{"rendered":"Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . Naming the digits\u2014the pinkie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2014\/12\/jeffrey_aronson.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft wp-image-32935\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2014\/12\/jeffrey_aronson-223x300.jpg\" alt=\"jeffrey_aronson\" width=\"122\" height=\"146\" \/><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">After <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2018\/12\/14\/jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-thumb\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">the thumb<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2019\/01\/11\/jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-index-finger\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">index finger<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2019\/01\/25\/jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-middle-finger\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">middle finger<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, and the <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2019\/02\/08\/jeffrey-aronson-naming-the-digits-the-ring-finger\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">ring finger<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, we come to the fifth digit, the little finger. It was known in Latin as digitus minimus, but in Scotland the little finger is often called the pinkie.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">The <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Oxford English Dictionary<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> lists 14 separate meanings for the word \u201cpink\u201d, nine nouns, four verbs, and an adjective; one of the nouns also includes adjectival uses. The <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Chambers Dictionary<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> has eight entries, including seven nouns, four verbs, and three adjectives. The numerous meanings are listed in Table 1.<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_44141\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-44141\" style=\"width: 607px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-44141 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_full.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"607\" height=\"1749\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_full.png 607w, https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_full-104x300.png 104w, https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_full-355x1024.png 355w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 607px) 100vw, 607px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-44141\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Abbreviations: n = noun; adj = adjective; vt = verb transitive; vi = verb intransitive<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">A major problem that arises when you try to sort out so many meanings is that their origins are not well understood. In two cases, \u201cpink\u201d is imitative of the sounds it names. In one case it is the shortened form of \u201cPinkerton\u201d. And in one case it comes from a Middle Dutch word, pincke, a small sea-going ship or fishing-boat. The blinking, winking, peeping, peering meaning may come from an early modern Dutch word pincken, although that is by no means certain. In all the other cases the best the <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">OED<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> can do is to say that the origin is unknown or uncertain.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Add a -y or an -ie to pink and you get pinky or pinkie, meaning the little finger or the little toe. Pinkie could have come from any of the versions of pink that have something to do with smallness: the small sailing vessel, or to become small and narrow (of the eyes), or a very small thing, person, or creature, a fragment. The <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">OED<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> prefers the last of these.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Both of these suffixes, -y and -ie, are diminutives, commonly attached to people\u2019s names, as in Annie, Billy, and Charlie, Richy, Sandy, and Tommy, and Franny and Zooey. Cricketers are particularly fond of nicknames formed in this way: Graham Gooch becomes \u201cGoochy\u201d, Shane Warne becomes \u201cWarney\u201d, and Alastair Cook becomes \u201cCooky\u201d. Ordinary words can also be treated in this way: a bookie is a bookmaker and a nightie is a nightgown. So a pinkie is not just a tiny finger, it\u2019s a teeny tiny one.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201cPinkie\u201d entered English at the start of the 18<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">th<\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> century, when it was used to mean (a) small or tiny and (b) narrow, winking, or half-shut, referring to the eyes. A century later it came to mean something very small or insignificant or a tiny thing, and at the same time <\/span><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">the little finger and occasionally the little toe. In all of these meanings its use was predominantly Scottish. Indeed, its earliest recorded appearance is in John Jamieson\u2019s <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Etymological Dictionary of the Scottish Language<\/span><\/i><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> (1898). In contrast, \u201clittle finger\u201d appears much earlier, in Old English texts.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Don&#8217;t underestimate the usefulness of the pinkie. A \u201c<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/24754727\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">pinkie technique<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201d has been recommended when closing the abdominal wall after surgery. It involves the pinkie of the non-dominant hand, which holds the loop of a stitch and lifts it up to apply tension. What has been called \u201c<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/18226711\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">the pinkie maneuver<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201d in colonoscopy involves hooking the left pinkie around the colonoscope to stabilize it. Alternatively, the \u201c<\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/25434673\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">right pinkie maneuver<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">\u201d involves holding the shaft of the instrument with the right pinkie or the right ring finger and pinkie, freeing the right index finger and thumb for other tasks. On the other hand, one author has <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/19111711\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">reported<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\"> experiencing tenosynovitis through using the pinkie for colonoscopy in this way.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright wp-image-44144\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"106\" height=\"136\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Of course, the pinkie is susceptible to other problems, such as <a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/14734062\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Dupuytren&#8217;s contracture<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/24156589\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">tendon rupture<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, and <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov\/pubmed\/30675262\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">tumours<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">. Even minor things can be problematic, as a poem by <\/span><a href=\"https:\/\/www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk\/poet\/walter-wingate\/\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400\">Walter Wingate<\/span><\/a>\u00a0(1865\u20131918)<span style=\"font-weight: 400\">, \u201cThe Sair Finger\u201d, illustrates:<\/span><\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_44146\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-44146\" style=\"width: 579px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-44146 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_poem2.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"579\" height=\"145\" srcset=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_poem2.jpg 579w, https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/files\/2019\/03\/aronson_pinkie_poem2-300x75.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 579px) 100vw, 579px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-44146\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">A skelf by the way, is a splinter<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p><em><strong>Jeffrey Aronson<\/strong>\u00a0is a clinical pharmacologist, working in the Centre for Evidence Based Medicine in Oxford&#8217;s Nuffield Department of Primary Care Health Sciences. He is also president emeritus of the British Pharmacological Society.<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Competing interests:<\/strong>\u00a0None declared.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>After the thumb, the index finger, the middle finger, and the ring finger, we come to the fifth digit, the little finger. It was known in Latin as digitus minimus, [&#8230;]<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"btn btn-secondary understrap-read-more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/blogs.bmj.com\/bmj\/2019\/03\/03\/jeffrey-aronson-when-i-use-a-word-naming-the-digits-the-pinkie\/\">More&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":38359,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5762],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-44140","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-jeff-aronsons-words"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.3 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Jeffrey Aronson: When I use a word . . . 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