People often joke about “chai tea” and “naan bread” being tautological but this isn’t actually how borrowing works. Chai doesn’t mean tea and naan doesn’t mean bread in English. We already have words for those so we borrowed chai & naan to refer to specific types of tea and bread

Borrowed words often take on a different meaning in the new language. This can happen in all languages. And while it’s good to understand the history of those words and what they mean in their original language, it’s simply not true that “chai tea” is tautological in English...

because “chai” is not synonymous with “tea”. You can’t refer to a cup of earl grey as “chai”. And it would be confusing to ask for a chai in a cafe because many cafes serve both chai tea (spiced tea leaves in a pot) and chai latte (spices/syrup with milk). The “tea” is necessary!

Of course if you’re a speaker of a language in which chai means tea and naan means bread, the English phrases chai tea and naan bread probably sound amusing. But once a word is borrowed into a new language it becomes a new word with a new meaning. It takes on a life of its own

This happens with words borrowed from English as well. “Viking” (baikingu) means “buffet” in Japanese, “parking” means car park in French, “mobbing” means “bullying” in German, “smoking” is a tuxedo in French, and “evergreen” refers to a classic song in several European languages

Another fun fact is that “chai” and “tea” actually derive from the same word! Chinese 茶 (cha) became “chai” in languages that got their tea via land routes, and “tea/te” in languages that got their tea via sea routes. Some dialects of British English also use “cha” for tea

Tl;dr words that are borrowed into new languages evolve and change from their source language. This can happen in all languages and isn’t specific to English! The etymology of words for tea is a great example of how the pronunciation and meaning of loanwords can evolve over time

Just thought I’d add an addendum that I’m not saying people shouldn’t enjoy making fun of these kind of tautological borrowings, especially if you speak both languages! Mocking the coloniser is valid. I just wanted to share some info about the linguistics of borrowing

I had no idea so many people would read this, I would’ve edited it better otherwise. I’m now going to bow out because the notifications are too much but thanks everyone for this discussion!