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English
Etymology
From babu + -ism.
Noun
babuism (countable and uncountable, plural babuisms)
- A malapropism or other erroneous form produced by an Indian speaking English.
1924, EM Forster, A Passage to India, Penguin, published 2005, page 60:They altered the idiom, but they could say whatever they wanted to say quickly; there were none of the babuisms ascribed to them up at the Club.
1972, Samuel Ichiyé Hayakawa, Language in thought and action, page 239:Abandoning its original application, then, let us use "babu English," or "babuism," as a general term to mean discourse in which the speaker (or writer) throws around learned words he does not understand in order to create a favorable impression. Babuism probably has existed and will continue to exist in every culture in which there is a learned class of magicians, shamans, priests, teachers, and other professional verbalizers with big vocabularies.
2006, Rimi B. Chatterjee, Empires of the Mind:This book, written 'with love' and based on Goffin's considerable experience as manager of first the Bombay Branch and then the whole India operation, was a spirited defence of Indian English as a legitimate form of the language, which, once it had thrown off its thrall to babuism, would take its place on the international stage.
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