Monday, September 20, 2010

September 20, 2010: Diosito: On the Ontological Implications of Calling God “Little”

Nate teaching computer skills to his youngest student ever, the little girl we used to live with.


She is the cutest bebita ever! 15 months old.


(Among family and friends we have quite a range of Spanish knowledge. From a fluent brother who can trick people into thinking he is Argentinean, to a German-speaking Grandmother with little orientation to Latin languages, to everything in between. So, if you find this explanation ponderous, please bear with us.)

Spanish has a fairly well-know and rather charming ability to take a word, a noun or adjective, and modify it to make it diminutive. Take a noun like casa (house). A little house is a casita. How about a perro (dog): a little dog is a perrito. Just add –ito or –ita to a noun and you have created a whole new word and cut out the need for a separate adjective. This can refer to either the actual physical size of something (a tiny house) or how adorable it is (such a cute little house!) or both. So instead of saying “I live in a little house, and I have a little dog” a Spanish-speaker is able to get away with something akin to “I live in a housey-wousy and I have a doggy-woggy.” And no one laughs.

Costa Ricans have an idiosyncratic version of this usage. Instead of –ito, they use –tico. So a small amount is not just un poco. It’s un poquitico. If you need just a minuto (minute), you can ask for a minutico. Due to their tendency to use this form, Costa Ricans are themselves nicknamed “ticos.”

During my eleven years of speaking Spanish, I have always felt that this was a cute trick, that the creation of a new adorable word from an otherwise boring specimen is a nice creative flourish, nothing too profound, but fun. The linguistic equivalent of floral accents in a room. However recent usages by people in our town have led to doubt. It may be that something more profound is going on. Maybe by using –ito, instead of a free and independent modifier, you actually make the thing itself more itsy-bitsy because it is now inherent in the thing itself to be so darn cute and small. Further, the widespread use of this linguistic tool does what all language does: it helps shape the way we think and illuminates the cultural processes by which we see ourselves and our world. –Ito has changed in my mind from mere décor to vital ontological window.

How?

Let’s take three examples: Feíto, pobrecito and Diosito.

Feíto: The use of –ito acts as an excellent social lubricant and is key for those who need an ambassador’s skill to communicate with people who regard politeness as important and look down on aggressive or overly direct social behavior. Let’s say you need to describe accurately someone who is not handsome and is overweight. You could call him feo (ugly) and gordo (fat), but why, when you can much more politely and endearingly name him as feíto and gordito. What if you need to get a meeting with an otherwise recalcitrant co-worker but can’t risk being seen as pushy? Easy! Ask her ever so politely for just a little of her tiempecito (time). Is someone asking you to do something you’d really rather not do right now? Let them know you’ll get to it ahorita (sometime around now, or a bit later than now), and you have anywhere from 5 minutes to 3 years to get to it! You were still accurate with your words (sort of), and yet everyone is happier with you because otherwise overly harsh, direct or impolite words were softened.

Pobrecito: Pobre means poor, but a pobrecito is quite another matter. This is the term universally accepted to describe someone to whom bad things have happened and over which s/he has little or no control. Catch a cold last week? Pobrecito. Did the river flood your house? Pobrecito. Did you lose your homework? Pobrecito. Not show up to that key meeting because you forgot about it? Pobrecito. Can’t get a job because you never leave the house and why would you anyway, your mother cooks and cleans and keeps a roof over your head so there’s really no need? Pobrecito. The seemingly harmless addition of –ito covers a wide spectrum of culpability and victimization, with the effect of diffusing responsibility from said pobrecito. Whereas a Tica mother might say, “Pobrecito my son, he can’t get his act together,” a traditional mother of American Puritan persuasion might respond, “Pobrecito my hind foot, he needs to take on some responsibility and get a job while he’s at it!” Thus, the whole idea embedded in this word is the metaphor of a tiny, helpless human who cannot fight circumstances in a universe beyond his control. This has traditionally been referred to as Latin American “fatalism.” It’s a complicated phenomenon and far from universal, but suffice it to say that the seemingly innocuous phrase holds telling clues to this idea that we, at least, see manifested quite often in the Costa Rican countryside.

Diosito: Dios means God. We have actually heard the term Diosito used several times, once by a priest and once when someone was petitioning God for something. This has got to be the ultimate and most baffling use of the –ito diminutive. What does Diosito mean? Little God? Cute, adorable God? Tiny, smoothed over, no-more-fire-and-brimstone God? Just-the-baby-Jesus God? Creator God that is now tired out like an old man so He’s shrunk down a little? Can you really add a diminutive onto the Someone or Something that is all-knowing, all-powerful and all-loving? Perhaps Diosito is a divinity you can feel more comfortable with, a more personal God along the lines of born-again Protestantism, a guy that you can really talk to and maybe play soccer with on Saturdays. We don’t know. Perhaps all we can say for certain is that the Spanish language itself offers theological possibilities that are not available in English.

There’s no better opportunity than learning another language to realize how much the words you use shape the way you view the world. One tiny suffix can make anything adorable and absolve you from any personal responsibility, as well as softening the blow of any word’s ultimate meaning. We’re working on adopting -ito into English: we live in an house-ito, do a little bit of work-ito in the Peace Corps-ito, and suffer from the tiniest bit of homesick-ito. Don’t worry, we aren’t poor-itos. We’ll always have the Spanish language-ito to keep us going.

3 comments:

  1. I imagine Godsy-poo would find this quite brilliantico. as did I.

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  2. oh mis angelitos...you are so brilliant and funny. this latest post has both Drew and I in stitches...nicely done. xoxo, re and drewtico

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  3. You know, I always thought it had to do with the ease of rhyming. Think of the endless poetry/lyric possibilities...

    Me vine con mis compas de playa bonita
    Fui a un pasapasa que habia en cieneguita
    Decido irme pa chepe
    recogo a mi bebita
    y la dejo en casa de su abuelita

    ...porque me para ahh!

    Partiendo de risa desde Limóndosmilcito. Gracias por el 'post' excelente. Que sigan escribiendo!

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