Content deleted Content added

Inline

Revision as of 13:03, 14 September 2023

Welcome to the language section
of the Wikipedia reference desk.

skip to bottom

Select a section:

Shortcut

WP:RD/L

Want a faster answer?

Main page: Help searching Wikipedia

How can I get my question answered?

Select the section of the desk that best fits the general topic of your question (see the navigation column to the right).
Post your question to only one section, providing a short header that gives the topic of your question.
Type '~~~~' (that is, four tilde characters) at the end – this signs and dates your contribution so we know who wrote what and when.
Don't post personal contact information – it will be removed. Any answers will be provided here.
Please be as specific as possible, and include all relevant context – the usefulness of answers may depend on the context.
Note:
- We don't answer (and may remove) questions that require medical diagnosis or legal advice.
- We don't answer requests for opinions, predictions or debate.
- We don't do your homework for you, though we'll help you past the stuck point.
- We don't conduct original research or provide a free source of ideas, but we'll help you find information you need.

Ready? Ask a new question!

How do I answer a question?

Main page: Wikipedia:Reference desk/Guidelines

The best answers address the question directly, and back up facts with wikilinks and links to sources. Do not edit others' comments and do not give any medical or legal advice.

September 8

A few questions

Is there any language with an open front unrounded vowel and none other open vowels?
Are there any dialects of Catalan where soft c / ç is a dental fricative /θ/ like in Spanish?
Can palatalized consonants occur at the end of word in Lithuanian?
Why does English not use article a/an in plural?
Can click consonants be geminated?
Can consonants be geminated after long vowels in Hungarian?
Is there any language with phonemic voiceless vowels?

--40bus (talk) 15:27, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Item 4: Because it doesn't. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:12, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Item 4: because "an" comes from the Old English word "an", literally "one". BbBrock (talk) 16:59, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

And was possibly reinforced by preceding Brythonic, surviving in almost-extinct dialectical counting systems as in "Yan tan tethera". {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 51.194.81.165 (talk) 08:17, 9 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Also, many European languages use similar terms for the indefinite article, and ALSO don't use the indefinite article for plurals; French for example uses "un/une" for the indefinite article (literally the same word that French uses for "one") and uses "les" for plurals always. --Jayron 32 17:52, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, the plural of "un" or "une" in French is "des" in both cases, as in "un homme, des hommes" or "une femme, des femmes". Xuxl (talk) 18:44, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

However Spanish has unos, unas and probably other Iberian Romances do the same. Even Basque has bat and batzuk. I wonder if it is a Sprachbund thing. What does Llanito do? --Error (talk) 18:20, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I was just writing same about unos, unas. And Portuguese has ums, umas. --40bus (talk) 18:52, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

"The ones" would be an English equivalent, although "those" is more commonly used. Xuxl (talk) 13:27, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The Spanish indefinite plural article is usually translated to English as some, certain, a couple of..., etc. The ones certainly is not indefinite. Pallida Mors 22:20, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Um - there is no Portuguese word ums. It declines like algum, alguns, "some". 2A02:C7B:301:3D00:5CEE:C4AA:A518:B49B (talk) 13:54, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

wikt:uns has Catalan, Galician, Old French and Portuguese meanings. --Error (talk) 23:07, 10 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Are there any dialects of Catalan where soft c / ç is a dental fricative /θ/ like in Spanish?

ca:Fricativa dental sorda:

El català estàndard no té aquest fonema, si bé es pot sentir en alguns manlleus del castellà o en una pronúncia a la castellana de la lletra Z. En canvi, és tradicional a part del Baix Aragó i del ribagorçà.[1]

Ribagorçan dialect:

Occasional interdental fricative as reflex of Latin /k/ before front vowels; e.g., cinc [ˈθiŋk] ('five'). This feature gets more general moving westward (cf. Eastern Ribagorçan and Catalan cinc [ˈsiŋk]).

--Error (talk) 17:57, 8 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

September 11

What does chille tid mean?

The only time I've ever seen this phrase was in the title of a Steven Universe episode. – MrPersonHumanGuy (talk) 10:58, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

From https://steven-universe.fandom.com/wiki/Chille_Tid

"The title "Chille Tid" translates roughly to "Chilling Time" in Danish and in Norwegian Bokmål.

Matt Burnett has stated that the crew got the idea for the title from an overseas commercial for Regular Show.[4]

The title is also a play-on-words of the phrase "Chill a tad".

In Steven's dream, Garnet's first words were "Chille Tid"."

The source referred to is

https://web.archive.org/web/20160412170940/https://twitter.com/mcburnett/status/634424769987743744 2601:195:C300:7C30:81EF:5B0F:DA6A:CF49 (talk) 11:23, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

As a Swede, I wonder if it shouldn't rather be written together as "chilletid", though. But I might not be up-to-date with the latest syntax rules. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 15:42, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I found the original commercial in Norwegian. It's not written together.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58nWxKpnmTg 2601:195:C300:7C30:81EF:5B0F:DA6A:CF49 (talk) 19:55, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, possibly because it's a title of a show, I guess. Then, the logotype might not be evidence in itself, the way it is designed... 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 00:48, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

If you listen to the commercial, it's clearly pronounced as two separate words, with clear primary accent on each. Don't know about Swedish, but in Danish what the actor said would be transcribed as two separate words. A compound word would sound different. And as far as the typeface goes, that unambiguously a capital T in the commercial. 2601:195:C300:7C30:81EF:5B0F:DA6A:CF49 (talk) 01:01, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I listened, I didn't think the pronunciation was consistent. Oh, well... 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 09:21, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

What is the difference between "roast potato" and "roasted potato"?

When I Google "roast potatoes", both "roast" and "roasted" appear in the search results. Why are there two variations? Is it a difference in dialect (ie British vs American)? I tend to refer to them as "roast potatoes" but others seem to be disagree. Panamitsu (talk) ^{Please ping on reply} 12:39, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah, I'd say this is a US/UK thing. I'm fairly certain only "roast potato" is used in UK English, but having scanned a few recipes it seems like both "roast" and "roasted" are used in US English. (You can always tell when recipes are American by the measurements) – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 12:43, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

You may find this enlightening.[1] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:47, 11 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

September 12

Flying Tigers

Hi. Claire Lee Chennault was born in America to American parents; his first language was English. He spent much of his later life in China, and married a Chinese citizen, Anna Chennault, so I am guessing that he had some fluency in one of the Chinese languages later in life.

Chennault would conceive, create, then command the First American Volunteer Group to victory. This unit is much better known as the Flying Tigers in English, and the "Flying Tigers" (飛虎隊) in Chinese.

Question 1: Who, and in what language, first coined the name "the Flying Tigers"? To be specific, in 2023, what is the oldest known piece of reliable historical evidence that contains the phrase "Flying Tigers", in either English or Chinese?

The Special Duties Unit is much better known as the Flying Tigers in English, and the "Flying Tigers" (飛虎隊) in Chinese. This nickname is the exact same nickname given to the First American Volunteer Group, both in English and in Chinese.

Question 2: Who, and in what language, first coined the name "the Flying Tigers" for the Special Duties Unit?

Question 3: Is the Special Duties Unit nickname a reference to the First American Volunteer Group nickname? Satoshit1 (talk) 19:23, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Side note: According to Flying Tigers, "The AVG was created by an executive order of Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek. He did not speak English, however, and Chennault never learned to speak Chinese. As a result, all communications between the two men were routed through Soong Mei-ling". Clarityfiend (talk) 02:58, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

A direct quote from Chennault:

Before I left the United States in the summer of 1941, I asked a few friends in Louisiana to watch the newspapers and send me any clippings about the A.V.G. Now I was being swamped with clippings from stateside newspapers, and my men were astonished to find themselves world famous as the “Flying Tigers”. The insignia we made famous was by no means original with the A.V.G. Our pilots copied the shark-tooth design on their P-40’s noses from a colored illustration in the India Illustrated Weekly depicting an R.A.F. squadron in the Libyan Desert with shark-nose P-40’s. [2]

An added note under that text says;

"The Book Black Sheep One: The Life of Gregory (Pappy) Boyington, by Bruce Gamble, published 2000. Page 181, Time Magazine published an article (last issue of 1941) using the name Flying Tigers. Prior to this the The New York Times did an article with the name. The people of China started calling them “fei hu,” which meant “Flying Tigers.” Most likely the way they attacked the Japanese airplanes. A reporter covering the area must have sent it back to the states".

Below that:

"Spenser Moosa an American journalist was in Kunming when the first P-40’s arrived to a cheering crowd. Someone in the Chinese crowd yelled “Fei Hu” and Spenser knew a god tag line when he heard one, This was verified to me by Yu Wei a Chinese cadet in that crowd when I interviewed him in Taipei. If you are interested in the real story of the American Volunteer Group check out our documentary Fei Hu, The Story of the Flying Tigers, the only documentary sanctioned by the AVG, Flying Tigers. It aired on US and Chinese Public Television. Frank Boring co-producer."

Alansplodge (talk) 08:45, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

The documentary referenced above is viewable on YouTube. Not sure if this qualifies as RS, but you can use Template:Cite AV media if it does. Alansplodge (talk) 17:16, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, all! The WWII half is completely answered.

The Hong Kong connection, I fear, is much harder. Since they're less famous. Satoshit1 (talk) 17:36, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

A thorough bash through Google failed to find anything about how the Hong Kong nickname came about. Alansplodge (talk) 20:27, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It just occurred to me that there may be some connection with the Flying Squad, the Royal Hong Kong Police being a British organisation. But I'm guessing now. Alansplodge (talk) 22:26, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

New questions

Does Finnish have modal auxiliaries?
Is there any Romance language where ⟨ge⟩ and ⟨gi⟩ are pronounced /ge/ and /gi/?
Are there any languages in Europe which have many words with two Q's in a row?
Does German have aspect?
Is Icelandic a pro-drop language?
Is English verb want an auxiliary verb?
Why English want is not a modal verb?
Is there any language with open front unrounded vowel and none other open vowels?
Can palatalized consonants occur at the end of word in Lithuanian?
Are there any lexical words in French where plural suffix -s becomes pronounced in liaison?

--40bus (talk) 20:26, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I already answered the Icelandic pro-drop question previously. Based on the material in the "Teach Yourself Icelandic" book, the short answer is No. English modal verbs don't have 3rd-person singular "-s" inflection in what looks like the present, so "want" is not a modal. "Want" is an auxiliary in some exceptional or dialectal cases ("The laundry wants washing"), but not ordinarily. Liaison is frequent with plural endings: Beaux Arts, etc. AnonMoos (talk) 23:43, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

P.S. See Bal des Quat'z'Arts for a liaison plural "z" sound emerging in spelling. (The word "quatre" is often followed by a liaison [z] sound in spoken French, by analogy with "trois", though this might be considered substandard in some circles...) AnonMoos (talk) 23:52, 12 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

4: See Grammatical aspect § German vernacular and colloquial. --Lambiam 09:25, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I digress, but as Swedish works similar to Dutch, I guess it also has aspect... (Ligga, sitta, stå) 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 10:52, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Is there any Romance language where ⟨ge⟩ and ⟨gi⟩ are pronounced /ge/ and /gi/?

Hard and soft G

All modern Romance languages make the hard/soft distinction with ⟨g⟩,[1] except a few that have undergone spelling reforms such as Ladino (Judaeo-Spanish) or Haitian Creole and archaic variants like Sardinian.

One of orthographies for Ladino language is based on Turkish alphabet and the one used by Aki Yerushalayim has G g as [g~ɣ]. After reading the articles, I am not sure about Haitian Creole and Sardinian language. Campidanese Sardinian

Campidanese also uses the digraphs ⟨gh⟩, representing /g/

There are alternative orthographies for Spanish that may have what your are looking for. Bello orthography:

Remove the silent ⟨u⟩ in ⟨gu⟩- (gerra, ginda).

es:Gonzalo Correas's wikisource:es:Ortografia kastellana, nueva i perfeta/Ortografia kastellana, nueva i perfeta:

Lɑ G ɑdmitimos pɑrɑ gɑ kon el primer sonido kon todɑs lɑs vokɑles, i se lɑ prohibe sonɑr xe, kon e, i.

Kristang language has an orthography based on Malay. Maybe other pidgin and creoles based on Romance languages do as you ask. --Error (talk) 09:23, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

So Campidanese uses ⟨gh⟩ consistently for /g/ in all case? Otherwise, using ⟨gh⟩ before ⟨i⟩ and ⟨e⟩ - to avoid palatalization - is the common orthography of Italian. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 10:45, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Is "want" an auxiliary verb?

In my methodology, an "auxiliary verb" is a verb which can come before infinitive, so "want" would be an auxiliary verb because it can come before to-infinitive , like I want to eat. --40bus (talk) 11:57, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

So "stoop" is also an auxiliary verb in your methodology? --Wrongfilter (talk) 12:03, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

40bus -- Counting all verbs X which can occur in a "X to Y" construction (where Y is also a verb) as "auxiliaries" is clearly much too broad. Traditionally, verbs are considered auxiliaries if their use in certain constructions serves to specify a "grammatical" meaning (i.e. tense, aspect, progressive etc) rather than an ordinary "content" meaning. In English, auxiliaries often have special types of contraction and/or combining two words into one, which do not occur with ordinary "content" verbs (taking an "n't" suffix, an initial vowel or "h" + initial vowel disappearing when the previous word is a pronoun, etc). The verb "to want" has the special merged form "wanna" (comparable to future tense "gonna" or habitual "useta"), but in other respects it's not an auxiliary, except in special cases such as "The laundry wants washing", which aren't common in standard English. AnonMoos (talk) 12:27, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

But the same-meaning verbs in other Germanic languages (German wollen, Swedish vilja, Icelandic vilja) are full modals and auxiliaries. Why isn't English want too? --40bus (talk) 16:20, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

German wollen (and presumably its cognates in other Germanic languages, including English will) is special only on a formal morphological level – together with a few other anomalous verbs it belongs to the historic class of preterite-presents, which means it has some special inflection patterns, including the lack of an overt 3rd person singular ending in the present tense. This small group of verbs is partly coextensive with those verbs that in English became the "modal verbs" (will, can, shall, must). That doesn't mean that wollen itself is also an auxiliary in any functional, semantic or syntactic sense – in German, wissen ('know') is of the same class, and is also clearly not an auxiliary. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:50, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

If you invent your own terminology, you can do whatever you want. If you use the terminology linguists actually use, an auxiliary verb has a different meaning than you gave it. In linguistics, an auxiliary verb has a purely grammatical function, rather than having a meaning indicating an action; it doesn't have anything to do with the infinitive. Take the verb "will", which has two senses. There's the (somewhat archaic sense) meaning "To make happen", such as in the phrase "God wills it", and there's the use of the word as an indicator of future tense, as in "I will run home later today". Some auxiliary verbs take infinitive forms, as in the use of "am going" as a future marker (I'm going to run home later today), while others don't (see will above). --Jayron 32 13:00, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Are there any lexical words in French where plural suffix -s becomes pronounced in liaison?

Not sure what you mean exactly, but it's quite common for a plural "s" to become pronounced in liaison. For example: les hommes, pronounced lé-z-omm, or les grands hommes, pronounced lé grand-z-omm. Xuxl (talk) 15:11, 13 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Or petits enfants /pətiz^⌢ɑ̃fɑ̃/. --Lambiam 08:08, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Are there any instances where the -s suffix becomes pronounced in liaison after another consonant? --40bus (talk) 11:13, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

September 14

"Do not feed the birds" sign at Languages of the United Kingdom

Hi all,

It would appear to me possibly useful to a reader of that article if the languages on the sign were identified.

Here's what I can see:

line 1: Some horrible mongrel mix of a West Germanic language with Norman French spellings interspersed with pseudo-Latin and -Greek etymologies resulting in an utterly ridiculous orthography
line 2: Devanagari script - which language?
line 3: Obviously Hindi
line 4: Arabic script - maybe Urdu?
line 5: Devanagari script - which language?
Line 6: Obviously Tamil
line 7: Arabic script - maybe Urdu, maybe some other language of the subcontinent that uses Arabic script?

Your thoughts (hopefully sourced from reliable references) about this?

11:41, 14 September 2023 (UTC) Shirt58 (talk) 🦘 11:41, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Line 4 is indeed Urdu, the 1st word being wikt:پرندہ; and line 7 is Farsi, the 2nd word being wikt:پرنده Crash48 (talk) 11:57, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Line 2 is in Gujarati script, differing from Devanagari by the loss of the characteristic horizontal line running above the letters; and line 5 is in Gurmukhi, most commonly used for Punjabi language. Crash48 (talk) 12:03, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I'm quite surprised about the Farsi but otherwise that selection of languages makes perfect sense for London. Line 5 does seem to be Punjabi, the first word is ਪੰਛੀਆਂ = bird-PL-OBL. – filelakeshoe (t / c) 🐱 12:17, 14 September 2023 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 151: / Line 151: @@
 ::But the same-meaning verbs in other Germanic languages (German ''wollen'', Swedish ''vilja'', Icelandic ''vilja'') are full modals and auxiliaries. Why isn't English ''want'' too? --[[User:40bus|40bus]] ([[User talk:40bus|talk]]) 16:20, 13 September 2023 (UTC)
 ::: German ''wollen'' (and presumably its cognates in other Germanic languages, including English ''will'') is special only on a formal morphological level – together with a few other anomalous verbs it belongs to the historic class of [[preterite-present]]s, which means it has some special inflection patterns, including the lack of an overt 3rd person singular ending in the present tense. This small group of verbs is partly coextensive with those verbs that in English became the "modal verbs" (''will'', ''can'', ''shall'', ''must''). That doesn't mean that ''wollen'' itself is also an auxiliary in any functional, semantic or syntactic sense – in German, ''wissen'' ('know') is of the same class, and is also clearly not an auxiliary. [[User:Future Perfect at Sunrise|Fut.Perf.]] [[User talk:Future Perfect at Sunrise|☼]] 16:50, 13 September 2023 (UTC)
-*If you invent your own terminology, you can do whatever you want.  If you use the terminology ''linguists'' actually use, an [[auxiliary verb]] has a different meaning than you gave it.  In linguistics, an auxiliary verb has a purely grammatical function, rather than having a meaning indicating an action; it doesn't have anything to do with the infinitive.  Take the verb "will", which has two senses.  There's the (somewhat archaic sense) meaning "To make happen", such as in the phrase "[[Deus vult|God wills it]]", and there's the use of the word as an indicator of future tense, as in "I will run home later today".  Some auxiliary verbs take infinitive forms, as in the use of "go" as a future marker (I'm going to run home later today), while others don't (see will above).  --[[User:Jayron32|<span style="color:#009">Jayron</span>]][[User talk:Jayron32|<b style="color:#090">''32''</b>]] 13:00, 14 September 2023 (UTC)
+*If you invent your own terminology, you can do whatever you want.  If you use the terminology ''linguists'' actually use, an [[auxiliary verb]] has a different meaning than you gave it.  In linguistics, an auxiliary verb has a purely grammatical function, rather than having a meaning indicating an action; it doesn't have anything to do with the infinitive.  Take the verb "will", which has two senses.  There's the (somewhat archaic sense) meaning "To make happen", such as in the phrase "[[Deus vult|God wills it]]", and there's the use of the word as an indicator of future tense, as in "I will run home later today".  Some auxiliary verbs take infinitive forms, as in the use of "am going" as a future marker (I'm going to run home later today), while others don't (see will above).  --[[User:Jayron32|<span style="color:#009">Jayron</span>]][[User talk:Jayron32|<b style="color:#090">''32''</b>]] 13:00, 14 September 2023 (UTC)
 === Are there any lexical words in French where plural suffix -s becomes pronounced in liaison? ===