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Jenga

2 stages from Swahili to English.

Today it means a game in which players remove and restack wooden blocks from a tower without making it fall; loosely, any precarious stack

Where does the word "jenga" come from? It comes from Swahili kujenga, adopted directly into English (1983).

kujenga→Jenga

Swahili · 1970s

"to build or construct"

the verb inspired the name of a stacking-block game created by Leslie Scott, who grew up speaking Swahili in East Africa

English · 1983

"a game of stacking and removing wooden blocks without toppling the tower"

trademarked as the name of the wooden block-stacking game

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