Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018)

Re:Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018) by crazygringo on Thursday August 15, 2019 @08:59AM (#20704751)

> The Oxford English Dictionary, the most reliable and complete record of the English language, traces “jasm” back to at least 1860: J. G. Holland Miss Gilbert's Career xix. 350 ‘She's just like her mother... Oh! she's just as full of jasm!’.. ‘Now tell me what “jasm” is.’..

And "-asm" is such an unusual word ending in English, it makes me wonder how "jasm" itself came about? (If I didn't know any better, seeing the word for the first time I'd never guess it was supposed to be English.)

Running a regex on the dictionary, there are only a handful of other words ending in it -- mostly "sarcasm", "orgasm", "chasm", "spasm", and various scientific terms ending in "plasm" (e.g. "nucleoplasm").

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Re:Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018) by Sharlin on Thursday August 15, 2019 @09:12AM (#20704834)

Those -asm words all have Greek origins (orgasmos, khasma, phantasma, etc. The words jasm and jism appear to be specific to US English; perhaps originating from a creole language?

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Re:Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018) by id on Thursday August 15, 2019 @09:11AM (#20704824)

"enthusiasm" is another one

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Re:Where Did 'Jazz,' the Word, Come From? (2018) by Sharlin on Thursday August 15, 2019 @09:22AM (#20704923)

Which has an interesting etymology. Also from Greek, but the original root word is theos, "god", from which is derived enthous, "possessed by god", and further enthousiasmos, "being possessed by god", or less literally "being inspired".

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