Jack,
It appears that amensalism might have its origin in the social sciences.
Odum's Fundamentals of Ecology (1971) refers to "Burkholder's adaptation
(1952) of Haskell's (1949) classification"
Burkholder, PR. 1952. Cooperation and conflict among primitive
organisms. American Scientist 40:601-631.
Haskell, EF. 1949. A clarification of social science. Main Currents in
Modern Thought 7:45-51.
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Ecology (1994) by Michael Allaby gives
this definition of amensalism:
"An interaction of species populations, in which one population is
inhibited while the other (the amensal) is unaffected. It is the
opposite of commensalism."
Commensalism does refer to eating at the same table. Amensalism implies
"not at the table", but it looks like an unhappy combination of a Greek
prefix ("a") with a Latin root ("mensa").
Hope this helps!
Geoff
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Geoffrey M. Henebry, Ph.D., C.S.E.
Coordinator, Geospatial Science & Engineering Ph.D. program
Professor of Biology and Geography &
Senior Research Scientist
Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence (GIScCE)
1021 Medary Ave., Wecota Hall 506B
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-----Original Message-----
From: Ecological Society of America: grants, jobs, news
[mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] On Behalf Of Jack Siegrist
Sent: Wednesday, May 02, 2007 9:03 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject: [ECOLOG-L] origin of word: amensalism
Can anyone attest the origin of the word "amensalism"? I couldn't find
it in
the OED. It seems to be a word invented by ecologists, and I suspect it
was
formed as sort of an opposite of commensalism. I am also wondering about
the
origin of the current usage of commensal. The regular sense of the word
comes directly from its Latin sense, i.e. "sharing the same table", or
messmates. This is also how Clements used the word, his idea being that
commensalism was a prerequisite of competition. It seems to have taken
on a
distinctly different current usage. If anyone has any insight into this
I
would be happy to hear from you.
