Hi, everyone. And welcome back to one of your favorite segments【詞源考古研究所】in English we call it【 It means what? 】

Hi, 安瀾.

Hi, Lulu, hi, everyone.

So in this segment, 安瀾 and I are going to get to the bottom of the origin story of many of the everyday words and phrases and just tell you some of the interesting stories relating to them.

Yes.

So what's the word for today?

The word for today is ostracize.

Ostracize? Does that mean to exclude someone, ostracize o-s-t-r-a-c-i-z-e, it's a pretty advanced word. It means to exclude someone有這種排斥排擠的意思.

Yeah. So you ostracize someone from a group, you ostracize someone from society. It just means that you ignore them. You kind of exclude them.

Yeah, You tell them that you are no longer welcome here. So where does that word come from? I have a suspicion that is from ancient Greeks.

You're right. It comes from the ancient Greek word “ostrakon”

“Ostrakon”. What does that mean?

“ostrakon”means pottery shard or tile.

Shards means broken pieces. So if you break a pottery item, it will be broken into little shards.

Yeah, and also you can use it for glass as well.

Okay, glass shards. Actually in London, the famous landmark is called the shards, right? The shard or the shards?

The shard, and the reason why it's called the shard is that it looks like a shard of glass.

對, 就是倫敦很有名新地標, 碎片大廈. It looks very sharp. Okay, back to ancient Greek time, how is the idea of pottery shards related to excluding someone from the group?

This comes from ancient Athens. So ancient Athens was the world's first democracy. So the citizens would vote, they would vote on the laws, they would vote on who are the officials, who the government are.

And one of the ways they protected their society and the government was that every so often the people would choose someone to banish.

Banish is like putting someone in exile, 就像流放, 驅逐一個人. I've read this in, for example, Shakespeare's plays.

Yeah.

To banish someone.

To banish someone or to exile someone. So the people could choose someone to banish every 10 years.

What? like people who committed crimes or something.

Well. Normally this was because they were getting too powerful or people just didn't like them.

Scary thought. So first democracy basically they can just vote for anyone they didn't like to be banished.

Exactly, think of it like a reality TV show. You can choose...

Vote someone off the island.

Yeah, or vote someone out of the Big Brother House.

I see.

So the Athenians would carve the name of the person they wanted ostracize on the ostrakon. And the people who was named the most would be banished.

How ritualistic to tell you that you're not welcome or liked here. It’s like安瀾 your name is on this piece of pottery shard. Now please leave.

And this actually happened. And when they were doing excavation in Athens, they found these ostraca.

Ostraca, the shards.

The shards, Yeah.

With names written on them.

With names written on them. Now, the thing that people noticed the most was the names were mostly written in the same hands. So probably what happened was this wasn't individuals all writing for the same person. This was someone organizing people to get rid of someone. So they probably had maybe a few people who were working together to ostracize someone.

So for example, if I didn't like you 安瀾, I could get everyone in the team or everyone in the community to say like, let's write his name, let's write 安瀾’s name on the pottery shard.

And you would be the one writing the name and just giving them to other people.

How is that a democracy if I'm the one who's like writing the name again and again.

Well, it could be the fact is organized or it could also be the fact that not many people could write. So maybe these people were going up to someone who could write and say, can you just write the name on the ostraca?

I see. Actually nowadays when we hear the idea of ostracizing, I think modern day people don't think much of it, but it was like a really really really bad punishment.

Oh yeah.

To be banished or to be ostracized. I always remember in Romeo and Juliet, when Romeo killed Juliet’s... or accidentally killed Juliet’s cousin or not so accidentally, but anyhow he was banished and then they both thought banishment was worse than death.

Well exactly. Because think of it back then, that they had no support. But nowadays you get support from the government, you get your identity from your passport. But back then, if you were banished, you were away from your friends, you were away from your family, you had no way of supporting yourself. Mhm. So This was a really really serious punishment.

Yeah, I think it basically means social death.

Well, yeah.

就是社會性死亡了. I mean we say it's not as serious today, but think about it, being ostracized or being excluded, it's seen as a form of bullying本來就是霸凌的一種,

So for example, in a company. If people are intentionally ignoring you, that's actually a form of workplace bullying, You can actually report it. You can report it and you can sue people.

There have been cases in the past where people were being excluded from office parties or kind of even lunches with colleagues. And they were able to successfully sue.

Because it's a form of bullying,

It's a form of bullying.

And also in the school as well, especially among teenagers.Yeah. I think ultimately we're all social creatures really no matter how much you claim to be introverted that you would rather be left alone, but we all crave sort of the companionship from time to time.

Yeah. Even if it's just only from a few people or for many many people to ostracize someone is such a... almost hurtful act.

It is hurtful. It's a cruel act.

It's a very cruel act.

Yeah. 安瀾 what would you do if you find yourself somewhat ostracized by a group?

Hopefully I will never find out.

Are you saying that you are very well-liked?

I won't go as far as that, but what about you?

I was always kind of a lone wolf in that sense. So I was not much of a team player. I was not much a one of those that want to really be part of a group. I needed companionship obviously, from... more from individuals. So I did feel ostracized by groups before and I guess I didn't think much of it as long as I had individual one on one connection that was good enough for me.

So we're gonna wrap up today's episode here. And do you think ostracizing or being ostracized is a really serious thing in your understanding?

Leave us a comment in the comment section or put in request for any other words or expressions that you want us to talk about in this segment.

We'll see you next time.

Bye

Bye.