Question: I read that "chic" originally meant something different in French than it means now and that the current French meaning was first used in English and then adopted as the French meaning, too. How and why did this happen? What was the original French meaning?Answer: The word "chic" has been used in French with a wide range of meanings since the late 18th century. As a noun referring to a painter's technique, it often had a pejorative nuance and meant "facility bordering on the shallow."
As an adjective, it meant "stylish," and this is the sense that was borrowed into English in the middle of the 19th century. It is conceivable that the English use may have helped to reinforce the meaning "stylish" for the word as used in French and to hasten the demise of the old painter's sense. But we did not invent the meaning "stylish," and the French did not have to borrow it from us.
Question: In the final credits of many movies I've seen, there's usually a credit for a "Foley Editor," "Foley Artists," "Foley Mixer," etc. What does the term "Foley" mean? Where does it come from?
Answer: The word "foley" (written with either a capital or lowercase "f") refers to incidental sound effects that are added to the sound track of a movie or television program to make the audio livelier or more realistic. Foley effects are distinguished from ordinary sound effects in that they are usually not pre-recorded stock or "library" sounds but rather sounds that are custom-made, as it were, to fit the needs of a particular scene.
Many of the sounds we hear in any given scene on film are not picked up by the microphones on the set but are instead created afterward by "foley artists" working in a separate studio known as a "foley stage." Foley artists experiment with different materials and props to come up with the right sounds for a scene that's already been filmed, creating, for example, the sound of footsteps on a whole variety of surfaces, from sand and mud through shag carpets and linoleum to pavement and snow.
If an actor pats someone on the back in a scene, the foley artist has to create the right sound effect to mimic all the sound the actor's sleeve makes as his or her arm is lifted, as well as the sound produced by the impact of the actor's patting hand.
Another challenge foley artists ordinarily face is timing the sounds so that they gibe perfectly with what the viewer is watching onscreen. Foley editors have to make adjustments to the recordings, often rerecording them altogether, so that the sounds are in perfect sync with the movement of the actors and the props -- otherwise the illusion of reality is destroyed, and the attention of the viewer is misdirected.
Once foley effects are created, recorded, mixed and edited into the film's sound track, they usually blend in so perfectly and seem so natural that the viewer has no reason to suspect that the sounds being heard did not originate in the scene being watched.
The word "foley" derives from the name of the man credited with perfecting the art, Jack Foley (1891-1967). (Legend has it that Foley devised the famous trick of mimicking the sound of galloping horses using the shells of a halved coconut.) Foley learned to improvise incidental sound effects while working in radio and then continued to perfect the technique as an assistant director for Universal Studios in the 1940s.
This column was prepared by the editors of Merriam-Webster's "Collegiate Dictionary," Tenth Edition. Send questions to: Merriam-Webster's Wordwatch, P.O. Box 281, 47 Federal St., Springfield, MA 01102. Merriam-Webster Inc., Dist. by Knight Ridder/Tribune News Service.