If baja is short what does Baja California mean?
It's just a beginner’s question about associations and meanings of words.
6 Answers
Lower California
"Baja" translates to "low" as well as "short" - much the same thing. Hence "low" California doesn't refer to their height or their morals but where they are - low down at that sticking out Southern bit.
In fact, saying that 'baja' or 'bajo' means 'short' or 'low' is an oversimplification, in both ways. Depending on the case, 'Bajo/baja' can be translated, and I'm only talking about its use as an adjective, as short, low, poor, lowered, scarce, etc.. And 'short' can be translated as 'bajo', 'corto', 'breve', 'escaso', 'poco/s', 'a corto plazo' etc..
In other words, it's not good to associate a generic word in one language to yet another generic word in a different language, because you'll get it wrong most of the time.
baja means" lower". I often go to Baja California everyweek to work
Baja means "la de abajo", equivalent to South California.
Also, Alta California (the part in USA) = North California.
Many words in Spanish and English have several meanings. Usually words which agree in one of their meanings, don't agree in others, either within the same language or in another language. The pair baja and short is one example of this.
