Clothing Q

[Darkmoon]

Khaki pants. Is Khaki only a colour or is the term also used tor a style of pants or suit? And where does the pronunciation, 'Car-key' for this colour come from??

[mikewith]

Khaki is a Dari/ Urdu/ Hindi word, depending on who you believe. It meant 'colour of dust' and was adopted by the British military to describe the colour of their camouflage clothing...and came to mean the type of clothing as well. In modern terms, it does refer to the green-to-brown-to-tan trousers you can buy at The Gap etc.

As for pronunciation, the British KAR-kee is closest to the original, while the American KACK-ee is unbearably amusing to us Brits! There's more and an interesting sidenote on Canadian pronunciation here: http://post.queensu.ca/~strathy/RESEARCH.html