Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 October 27

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October 27

Itinerant job?

"After growing up in Liverpool, the brothers, following their father's itinerant job,......"

This is from Red Flag (band).

A person moving often to find work is "itinerant". Is it a) reasonable or b) over-reaching to talk of an itinerant job? —Preceding unsigned comment added by CBHA (talk • contribs) 02:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Itinerant...

• ...as a noun - One who travels from place to place
• ...as an adjective - Habitually travelling from place to place

From this I wouldn't think that you can say itinerant job, but I may be wrong. W.i.k.i.p.e.d.i.a - Reference desk guy (talk) 03:12, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Jobs don't travel from place to place; people do. I would rephrase it as "...the brothers, because of the itinerant nature of their father's job,..." (However, if an eccentric billionaire paid you to to move around a lot, I'd call that an itinerant job.) Clarityfiend (talk) 06:10, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

In the globalized era, jobs do indeed travel from place to place. If people in one place aren't sufficiently experienced, educated or expert; happen to be too expensive; or have the bad luck to live in an unstable or high tax jurisdiction, that job is going to hit the road if it possibly can. Pay attention to your productivity and those jobs will stick around. DOR (HK) (talk) 08:59, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

From my Google search for "itinerant job" I found some web pages that use the expression, including

Wind Technician III Itinerant Job in House, New Mexico with FPL Group | JobCentral.

-- Wavelength (talk) 16:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

"itinerant" seems fine, and Google shows several uses from job ads; "peripatetic" is the nearest synonym but today applies particularly to people doing a circuit e.g. a peripatetic teacher doing different days at different schools (check recruitment ads). If you're really concerned, then you could leave out the word "itinerant" ("the brothers, following their father's itinerant job, moved to locations such as Montreal and Seattle") since it's implied that the job is itinerant if they're moving around.--Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 18:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

On the other hand, I don't really think it's fine. Adjectivally, itinerant means "travelling from place to place". As Clarityfiend pointed out, people travel, jobs don't. Travelling implies the use of some form of locomotion, such as a car, bus, train, aircraft, or even walking. Jobs do none of these things. A job may move, but it doesn't travel. To use the word in reference to a job itself is a neologism not supported by anything much. It may get a few google hits but that doesn't mean much when we can find google-support for virtually anything these days. The Methodist Church uses the term itinerancy, meaning the system of rotation governing the ministry of the church, and preachers who preach from place to place are said to itinerate. But their "job" is not an itinerant one. -- JackofOz (talk) 20:44, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Jack, we were just talking about hypallage a week or so ago (a "slow tin of honey" or similar, wasn't it?). This seems a perfectly acceptable instance of that to me. Deor (talk) 00:14, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Hypallage shmypallage. The word has always been used with exceeding imprecision, like most rhetorical terms. I would speak here of metonymy, just to be on safe ground. OED has this for hypallage (with my underlining for emphasis):

A figure of speech in which there is an interchange of two elements of a proposition, the natural relations of these being reversed.

Servius, in commenting on Virg. Æn. iii. 61, explains dare classibus austros as a hypallage for dare classes austris. In Quintilian (viii. vi. 23) the word (written as Greek) has the sense of metonymy, and English authors have sometimes applied it loosely or incorrectly to other variations from natural forms of expression, esp. to the transference of attributes from their proper subjects to others (cf. quot. 1586).

1586 A. Day Eng. Secretary ii. (1625) 83 Hypallage, when by change of property in application a thing is delivered, as to say+the wicked wound thus given, for, having thus wickedly wounded him. 1589 Puttenham Eng. Poesie iii. xv. (Arb.) 183 The Greekes call this figure (Hipallage)+we in our vulgar may call him the (vnderchange) but I had rather haue him called the (Changeling). 1654 Vilvain Theorem. Theol. vi. 153 Names of Men may import Men of name, sith such Hypallages are usual in Scripture. 1789 Madan Persius (1795) 66 note, Casaubon+says that this is an Hypallage. 1844 T. Mitchell Sophocles I. 25 note, Hypallages of this kind abound in Sophocles. 1874 T. N. Harper Peace through Truth Ser. ii. 1. 44 note, The phrase, ‘you also are become dead to the law’,+is a hypallage for ‘the law has become dead to you’.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 00:31, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Swimming halls and pools

What is a building containing indoor swimming pools called in English? Is it just a swimming pool? In Finnish, it is called "fi:Uimahalli", literally meaning "swimming hall", and it's the same in Swedish: "sv:Simhall". JIP | Talk 06:39, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

"Aquatics Centre" is a common fancy name, as in Beijing National Aquatics Center, but I can't think of a common name that people would actually say. A "swimming pool" is either in someone's backyard, or it is a single outdoor public pool, or a single pool in one of these buildings. Maybe "swimming centre"? I've never heard anyone say "swimming hall". Adam Bishop (talk) 07:57, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

• I'd agree with that answer. Indoor swimming pools don't really have a special name (in Dutch or English) Aquatics centre is the word people use for such a building, but it in day to day life, it still tends to be called simply a pool. -- Mgm|^(talk) 08:30, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

For me, the answer would probably depend on what the place called itself. If I was going to the YMCA to swim, I'd probably say "I'm going to the Y". If, when I was an undergrad at the University of Texas, I had ever gone to the Lee and Joe Jamail Texas Swimming Center, I probably would have said "I'm going to the swimming center". And so forth. I don't think I'd have a single generic name for a building containing an indoor swimming pool. In German, though, I'd use "Schwimhalle" (like Finnish and Swedish above). —Angr 08:48, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

For indoor swimming pools specifically, we, in the North West of England, use 'swimming baths' or just 'baths', while for an outdoor pool, if there was one, we'd say 'the swimming pool'.--ChokinBako (talk) 09:43, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

For others of us, saying "I'm going to the baths" means something quite different, which probably doesn't involve swimming at all. Then there's the option of going to The Baths, which probably involves swimming outdoors in the ocean for most people. —Angr 09:48, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

In eastern Oz we tend to say we're going to the pool (which includes any number of pools available), or more specifically, use the name of the leisure or swim centre (eg, I'm going to "Bubbles" or whatever). We use baths in the term "ocean baths" rather than "ocean pool", though they may be a built up swimming area around the beach and ocean, or a cemented tidal pool. Julia Rossi (talk) 10:12, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

If you want to be Latinate, you can call it a natatorium. That's what the building containing the swimming pool at my high school was named. Deor (talk) 10:39, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

My English-English (i.e. of a kind) would certainly not recognise "swimming baths" as being outside. (An exception to this might be made for "thermal baths".) In my childhood town the local swimming facilities were called the "Walsall baths". These indoor facilities offered, from memory, a 25m pool, a small 'paddling' pool and a 'brine bath' which was salted and warm. (And lovely.) Now living in the Home Counties, I would still tend to say "swimming baths" or simply refer to the "swimming pool" even though our local facilities offer more than one pool. The number of pools is not often important when the idea of going for a swim first comes up. For a centre with lots of slides and flumes etc., I'd say "water park" or something like that. I have never seen "aquatics centre" used in the UK, except to refer to shops selling tropical and other fish.86.139.236.224 (talk) 13:54, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Your 2012 swimming venue is called the London Aquatics Centre. Adam Bishop (talk) 14:40, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Being a keen supporter of the 2012 Games, I'm pleased to be corrected! There's a first time for everything (I don't mean being corrected - there are plenty of opportunities to put me straight! - but the use of the word aquatics in that context). There's also a London Aquatic Centre (admittedly no 's', but a Google search for the Olympic facility throws up some s-less references) that falls into the pet products category.86.139.236.224 (talk) 14:57, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I would just call it a pool or swimming pool, but I've heard Lido for an outdoor pool. As said above, it could also be called an Aquatics Centre, although I haven't heard it called that. W.i.k.i.p.e.d.i.a - Reference desk guy (talk) 15:42, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

In Dublin, the (defunct) Blackrock Baths and Dún Laoghaire Baths were outdoors. [1] jnestorius^(talk) 20:57, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

What would you propose to rename the article Tapiola swimming hall to then? Tapiola swimming pool? Tapiola baths? Tapiola aquatics centre? Tapiola natatorium? JIP | Talk 21:10, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

How about Tapiola swim centre? Tapiola baths isn't so bad. Aquatics may take in all the other sports like water polo, training for synchronised swimming, swim gym for seniors and babies etc, including a cafe and goggle shop, but swim might cover it.

Ah yes, natatorium. I too fondly remember one ("the Nat"); in my case it was in Madison, Wisconsin, although I vaguely remember playing squash there too. :) The OED, by the way, says of "natatorium": "orig. and chiefly N. Amer." and all five or six examples cited there are from Canadian or US sources. Fowler&fowler«Talk» 22:14, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I'd actually change it to Tapiola Swimming Hall, if that's the formal title of the establishment. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:30, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I agree with Jack. If the obvious translation of uimahalli is "swimming hall", go with that (capitalized as part of a proper name) in the article's title. You might, however, change the first sentence to something like "Tapiola Swimming Hall (Finnish: Tapiolan uimahalli) is an aquatics centre …", since "swimming hall" isn't really used as the common designation of such a building in English. Deor (talk) 23:20, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

The city of Espoo officially calls it the Tapiola swimming pool, so I have moved the article to use that name. JIP | Talk 17:07, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Mandarin Chinese: “Wŏ bú shì hěn qióng。“ vs. “Wŏ bú shì qióng。”

I saw on livemocha.com in the course Mandarin Chinese 101, Unit 1, Lesson 2, Listening Section, Slide 16/40 (link) that they say that the way to say "I am not poor." in Mandarin is “Wŏ bú shì qióng。”, or “我不是穷。”. This does not go with common sense, as I would think that it would be “Wŏ bú shì hěn qióng。” or “我不是很穷。” as all you are changing is that you are adding the negative “bú/bù” or “不” to “Wŏ shì hěn qióng。” or “我是很穷。”. This site does often have minor errors (such as forgetting some miscellaneous pinyin markings) and I am therefore not sure if this translation is right or not. Online translators are not reliable enough for me to check how valid this is as they could just as easily be wrong. Do any of you know which one is right? Thanks! Yakeyglee (talk) 21:02, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Hěn ("very") is often used as a semantically gratuitous intensifier, or even just a space filler, that is called for more in some grammatical contexts than in others. So for example Chinese–English Frequency Dictionary (Yong Ho, 2002, p. 50; Chinese characters omitted):

Hěn is usually obligatory when an adjective is used without qualification: jīntiān hěn lěng (it is cold today). In this case, hěn serves a grammatical function and may or may not carry the meaning of very.

There is a certain logic to leaving out the hěn in negation. For one thing, negation is a kind of radical qualification, is it not? Also, if we were to say jīntiān bù hěn lěng for the standard negation of jīntiān hěn lěng, we would be missing the mark: it is not very cold today leaves open the possibility that it is still somewhat cold.

Mandarin (or let's call it Putonghua), I am told, tends often to add extra elements for clarity and a kind of a buffer against curt incivility. Perhaps this use of hěn works like that. Compare English Why yes! or Yes, certainly! as against the gruff monosyllable Yes! Compare French Mais oui!, which the grammars advise us to use instead of an unadorned Oui!

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 22:27, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Neither is correct. '是' is not used with simple adjectives like '穷'. The sentence should be '我不穷。' and the opposite would be '我很穷。'.--ChokinBako (talk) 23:37, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Of course you are right, Givnan-ChokinBako! I kick myself for not noticing. Shì is normally not used with an adjective, like qióng in the example. (A point rarely made: it can be used, for special emphasis. So wŏ shì qióng would mean I AM indeed poor! ) But the rest of the analysis stands, does it not? Just remove all instances of shì. How did they get there in the first place, we wonder? How about Wŏ [bú] shì [hěn] qióngde, though, in which qióngde functions as a noun? I am [not] a poor person.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 00:02, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Of course, it is OK for emphasis, and with the nominalisation of the adjective by the addition of '的', but neither of these factors were was mentioned in the OP's original question.--ChokinBako (talk) 00:18, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Quite right, G-C. Neither was mentioned. :)

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 00:37, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

HaHa! My English gets corrected!--ChokinBako (talk) 00:46, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Or to put it another way, somebody has done the equivalent of going up to you and tucking your shirt into your trousers, because that person's opinions about clothing don't permit wearing it the way you were. --ColinFine (talk) 21:00, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Read that tucking in its context, CF, including the tucker's earlier self-deprecation: "Of course you are right, Givnan-ChokinBako! I kick myself for not noticing." Incidentally, shouldn't that be "wearing it the way you did?" :)

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 22:40, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Nope, because Colin's statement was an ellipsis, for 'wearing it the way you were [wearing it]'. Progressive tense, mate, needs various forms of the verb 'to be'. Anyway, leave him alone. He is the only person in Bradford that speaks Albanian. He's probably the only person in Bradford that speaks English, too!.--ChokinBako (talk) 23:10, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Perhaps, but I still hold him liable. Consider your expansion:

wearing it the way you were [wearing it]

For full propriety this assumes a participial context, like this:

he was wearing it the way you were [wearing it]

But in fact the context made wearing gerundial (as we might put it):

that person's opinions about clothing don't permit wearing it the way you were [wearing it]

The second wearing here is participial, while the first is gerundial. (A zeugma or a syllepsis? You decide!) On the other hand, consider:

that person's opinions about clothing don't permit wearing it the way you did

Here there is no pretence that did can be grafted onto the same stock; did wear it is assumed, but nothing about the presumed syntax is imported through a mere surface similarity of forms.

Anyway, Albanian? Hats off to the man! And thank you for writing that and not who, in He is the only person in Bradford that speaks Albanian.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 00:20, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Whoops! I meant to write it without the 是. I'm just very new at learning the language...but thanks everyone for your responses, and it makes much more sense now! Yakeyglee (talk) 21:03, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Apologies, in certain parts of my work, it is required that I use American English. I got stood up the other day for saying 'eraser' instead of 'rubber'. I will be more careful in future.--ChokinBako (talk) 08:31, 29 October 2008 (UTC)

Adding extra letters to words

It's very common for people to shorten words and expressions; reasons include convenience, laziness, a perception that life is too short, human nature, etc. That's why we have all manner of acceptable abbreviations and acronyms. And it explains why the possessive apostrophe is often dropped ("I am not my mother's husband's son" becomes "I am not my mothers husbands son").

However, there's also the reverse phenomenon, whereby people go against this trend by actually increasing the size of words. Typically, they do this by adding an
-s, but there are other ways that don't spring to mind right now. Examples include:

• daylight saving time becomes daylight savings time
• surnames such as Gibb, Stephen, Andrew, John and Jeffery are rendered as Gibbs, Stephens, Andrews, Johns, and Jefferys (or Jeffries)
• its (the possessive pronoun, requiring only 3 characters) is spelled as it's (4 characters). This is a curious one because the people who tend to drop the possessive apostrophe where it's actually required (don't, can't, I'm > dont, cant, Im or im) are often the same people who needlessly expand its to it's.

What is this action called? I'm not referring to inaccuracy or error, but to the linguistic counterpart of abbreviation. -- JackofOz (talk) 21:23, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

I have no idea what this is called, I don't think it has a name but I'm probably wrong. I have always called Daylight Saving Time, "Daylight Savings Time" because that is what I have heard it called, and I haven't bothered to further educate myself on the subject (although from now I will use the correct term).

I have never heard or known of anyone referring to people by their name plus "s", e.g. referring to Mr Andrew as Mr Andrews. Maybe this is done because they perceive it as easier to say? (Sorry about the appalling wording’’)

I believe the misuse of apostrophes though, is simply due to the lack of understanding of how to use them. W.i.k.i.p.e.d.i.a - Reference desk guy (talk) 21:53, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

How about misuse of a comma? —Tamfang (talk) 01:03, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

In the case of the surnames, it's no coincidence that all your examples are also used as forenames - the -s is a patronymic. FiggyBee (talk) 22:04, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Really? I don't quite see it that way. I once worked with a guy named Jim Gibb. He had lots of friends, many of whom always pronounced his surname "Gibbs" as if that were how he spelt it. They knew he didn't spell it "Gibbs", and never referred to himself as "Gibbs", but they said "Gibbs" anyway. We had governors-general named Ninian Stephen and Michael Jeffery, but it was very common to hear them referred to as Stephens and Jefferys, even by media commentators who did know (or at least should have known) better. Now, there really are other surnames such as Andrews, Stephens, Johns, etc., and those are where the patronymic comes in. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:24, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Oh. Well in the case of people mistakenly adding the -s, I guess it's because the -s form is more common, and people's minds just tend to go down the more familiar track if they're not concentrating. My own surname has an "a" where an "i" is more common, and it's frequently misspelt, including by friends, by government departments, and in cases where the writer was reading it (correctly spelt) off one document and writing it on another. FiggyBee (talk) 23:53, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

This reminds me of the following.

-eroo: meaning and definitions — Infoplease.com

Signature#Function and types of signatures (mentioning "flourish" and "paraph")

-- Wavelength (talk) 22:09, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

(econ) @ Refdeslguy, agree. Then there's the habit of sms shortcuts (leaving out the apostrophe for speed) resulting in unfamiliarity, a build-up of ignorance and therefore compensating elsewhere. Just wondering, while it's Daylight Saving, is there a missing poss in there when you talk about Daylight Saving's Time? ;)) Julia Rossi (talk) 22:24, 27 October 2008 (UTC)

Shall we coin elongation (or rather add a new linguistic meaning to the existing word)? The new linguistic concept defined by Jack and coined by the language reference desk! Maybe we will get eternal recognition by the future community of linguists. BTW, Jack, have you read "The Unfolding of Language" by Guy Deutscher. It is really an amazing read, and really did explain to me why language goes towards the shortening direction exactly at the same speed as it goes towards the lengthening direction. --Lgriot (talk) 00:19, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

I think you're conflating several unrelated phenomena, Jack.

• Phonology: processes involving adding sounds include epenthesis, paragoge, etc.
• Lexicon: "daylight savings time" IMO sui generis error/change by false analogy with "savings bank" etc. The stress in "daylight saving time" should really be on "daylight", not "saving". Spelling it "daylight-saving time" would help.
• Spelling: "it's": failure to learn an arbitrary one-time rule
• Morphology: -s onto surnames is a diminutive or hypocoristic suffix.

jnestorius^(talk) 00:21, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Just a point; it isn't an arbitrary one-time rule. No english pronoun has an apostrophe in the genitive; his, hers, its, ours, yours, theirs, whose. FiggyBee (talk) 01:07, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Since we're striving for accuracy, Figgybee, let's get this right too. Most English pronouns have an apostrophe in the genitive: one's, nobody's, someone's, everyone else's, whoever's, another's, neither's, and so on. It's just that several of the most common genitive forms (and the correlated possessive adjectives) do not have an apostrophe. And they include his, hers, its, ours, yours, theirs, whose.

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 01:29, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

Well... okay then! Personal pronouns, perhaps? FiggyBee (talk) 01:39, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

OED, for "Personal": "Used as the distinctive appellation of those pronouns which denote the first, second, and third persons respectively, viz. (in English) I, you, he, in their various genders, numbers, and cases."

But in the relevant entry for "One" OED says this: "One is often used as an indefinite personal pronoun (one 20); and the words self and own, used to strengthen the personal and possessive pronouns, are sometimes classed with them."

So what exactly is a "personal pronoun"? Is who? If it is, what about whoever? And if one is, what about someone, anyone, somebody, anybody, and the rest? Why should it be a "personal pronoun"? If it is included, why not something?

Don't believe the slogans!

–_⊥^{¡ɐɔıʇǝo}Noetica!^T– 23:56, 28 October 2008 (UTC)

"... conflating several unrelated phenomena", jnestorius? I prefer to see it in terms of patterns some people notice and others don't. Language analysts can and do create ever finer distinctions between different aspects of the same phenomenon, but that doesn't necessarily make them different phenomena. I guess it depends on one's viewpoint. -- JackofOz (talk) 04:32, 28 October 2008 (UTC)