Jack of all trades
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"Jack of all trades, master of none" is a figure of speech used in reference to a Generalist, a person, that is competent with many skills but is not outstanding in any particular one.
Ultimately, a Jack of all trades may be a master of integration, as such an individual knows enough from many learned trades and skills to be able to bring their disciplines together in a practical manner, and is not a specialist. Such a person is known as a polymath or a Renaissance man, and a typical example is someone like Leonardo da Vinci.
In 1612, the phrase appeared in 'Essays and Characters of a Prison' by Geffray Mynshul and the phrase has been in use in the United States since 1721.[1]
The 'jack of all trades' part of the phrase was in common use during the 1600s and was generally used as a term of praise. 'Jack' in those days was a generic term for 'man'. Later the 'master of none' was added and the expression ceased to be very flattering. Today, the phrase used in its entirety generally describes a person whose knowledge, while covering a number of areas, is superficial in all of them, whilst when abbreviated as simply 'jack of all trades' is more ambiguous and the user's intention may vary, dependent on context.[2]
In other languages
- Chinese
- Mandarin (Simplified): 门门懂,样样瘟. ("All trades known, all trades dull")
- Mandarin (Traditional): 門門懂,樣樣瘟. ("All trades known, all trades dull")
- Cantonese: 周身刀,無張利. ("Surrounded by knives, none are sharp")
- Mexico: a todo le tiras, y a nada le pegas (You shoot for everything, but you hit nothing).
- German: Hansdampf in allen Gassen.
- Brazilian Portuguese: pau para toda obra (literally, "wood for every construction") is also commonly used, but with a positive connotation, describing someone who is able and willing to serve many tasks (with enough competence).
- Lithuanian: devyni amatai – dešimtas badas ("when you have nine trades, then your tenth one is famine/starvation"), there is also a term Barbė šimtadarbė (Barbie with hundred professions).
- Estonian: üheksa ametit, kümnes nälg (nine trades, the tenth one - starvation).
- Greek: Πολυτεχνίτης και ερημοσπίτης (he who knows a lot of crafts lives in an empty house"; the empty house – without a spouse and children – implies poverty and lack of prosperity).
- Arabic: صاحب بالين كداب (the one who think of two things is a lair).
- Elizabethan English: the synonymous quasi-New Latin term Johannes factotum ("Johnny do-it-all") was sometimes used, with the same negative connotation[5] that "Jack of all trades" sometimes has today. The term was famously used by Robert Greene in the earliest surviving published reference to William Shakespeare.
- Urdu: ' ("ھر فن مولا").
- Russian: "Мастер на все руки" (the one who is highly skilled (or just talanted) in many areas). It is used only as a term of praise.
References
- ^ "Random House Dictionary of Popular Proverbs and Sayings" by Gregory Y. Titelman (Random House, New York, 1996)
- ^ "Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins" by William and Mary Morris (HarperCollins, New York, 1977, 1988)
- ^ http://www.elearnspanishlanguage.com/vocabulary/expressions/ex-proverbs.html
- ^ http://buscon.rae.es/draeI/SrvltConsulta?TIPO_BUS=3&LEMA=todero
- ^ http://www.sourcetext.com/sourcebook/essays/greene/OED.htm