One Step Now Education
November 29, 2024
searced
The Thanksgiving holiday is closely associated with food as many families and groups of friends gather to celebrate around a large dinner. As many of you know, I’m always interested in cooking and food. However, I watch far more videos about cooking than I actually cook. While watching one of these videos, I heard a new term, searced. I knew then and there I would have to investigate.
Meaning
What is this word’s meaning and how does the word function?
I first had to figure how to spell this word. From the context of use, I assumed the word would end in a suffix <-ed>. This suffix is often found on verbs to indicate past tense. However, I thought of the rhyming word pierced, and so I looked up * sierced.
After finding nothing, I thought it might be seirced.
No dice.
Last try. Searced.
Bingo.
(notice how I didn’t sound it out? Hmmm…)
The entry from the Collins dictionary said that this is a term that is obsolete. It means “to sift.”
Structure
What are the elements that make up this word’s structure?
With that said, my hypothesis is
searce/ + ed
The slash mark after the <e> is my way of indicating an <e> that will be replaced when a vocalic suffix follows.
What is the history of this word? Let’s look at the entry in Etymonline.
No dice. Obsolete, remember?
I could turn to Oxford or Wiktionary.
The entry in Wiktionary says that this term may have derived from Old French saas, perhaps meaning “cloth with bristles.” In Middle English, an alternative form is sarse.
Relatives
What are the word’s relatives and history?
Since the word is obsolete, there aren’t going to be many relatives. Other inflected forms such as searcing or searces would be related.
Graphemes
What can the pronunciation of the word teach us about the relationship of its graphemes and its phonology?
Sometimes, I’m asked about “r-controlled” vowels. I don’t use that term, but I don’t quibble about it either. Would <ear> be considered a trigraph in this word?
First, not all dialects are rhotic. In American English, the dictionary gave /sərs/, but in British English, the dictionary gave /sɜːs/ for searce. In a non-rhotic dialect, like British Received Pronunciation, the [r] isn’t pronounced following a vowel unless another vowel follows.
For me, the decision of whether this is an <ear> or an <ea> and an <r> has little consequence when working with students. I’m tempted to say that it is not a trigraph here, but it will all depend on whether you parse it as spelling one phoneme or two. Regardless of whether this is s.ear.c.e. or s.ea.r.c.e, the spelling is the same. My focus will be spelling out, not whether or not <ear> is a trigraph in this word.
Next Steps
What can we learn next about the English orthographic system?
What other culinary terms might be interesting to study?
The suffix <-ed> is used to indicate past tense. What else are words suffixed with <-ed> used for?
What are “strong verbs“ and what does that have to do with the suffix <-ed>?
Stay curious,
Brad
One Step Now Education
113 Cherry St #92768, Seattle, WA 98104-2205
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