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November 3

IPA for Romanian

Hello! I added the IPA for this person, but I can't figure it out on which syllable the stress is on the family name.

Alexandru Cicâldău – Romanian pronunciation: [alekˈsandru tʃikɨlˈdəu]?

Here is a video, where you can hear his name at 0:06, 0:17 and 0:27. Thanks in advance!8Dodo8 (talk · contribs) 11:33, 3 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@8Dodo8: The stress placement is correct. Note also that the final "u" of the surname is non-syllabic, and is transcribed /w/ in Wikipedia: /tʃikɨlˈdəw/. See Romanian phonology#Diphthongs and triphthongs. Sequences such as /əw/ are sometimes considered diphthongs and sometimes vowel–semivowel sequences, while /e̯a/ and /o̯a/ are unambiguously diphthongs. --Theurgist (talk) 09:50, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@Theurgist: Thanks very much for the answer! I'm not really good at IPA, I wrongly assumed that the "u" is transcribed with the same character. So I appreciate pointing that out and giving and explanation.8Dodo8 (talk · contribs) 17:47, 10 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

November 4

what de?

Hi, in my lonely planet phrasebook for mandarin, there is a sentence, "Wo gen ji ge tongshi yi kuai lai de" (我跟几个同事一块来的) (I'm here with some colleagues). What is the meaning of "de" in this sentence? My Chinese students told me it is the same without "de", but they couldn't explain the reason why "de" is there. Can anyone help? IBE (talk) 13:30, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In this case, "的" (de) is an affirmative. ―Abelmoschus Esculentus 13:37, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Can anyone give me more examples of "de" as an affirmative? Do we have similar things in English? Is it a common thing in languages to have some funny little particle act as this? IBE (talk) 18:29, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Similar things in English? See Eh, commonly used in Canadian English and New Zealand English. I'm not sure about Canadian usage, but in New Zealand it has multiple meanings based on context and pronunciation. When appended to a sentence, it can call for an agree/disagree response, but frequently it is simply meaningless and the statement could as easily be understood by leaving it out. Example "I'll try to get to the party by 11 o'clock, eh." It is often seen written as "Ay" in New Zealand. Akld guy (talk) 21:02, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

我不是故意的 - I did not do it in purpose. ―Abelmoschus Esculentus 23:23, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

But surely that is the past tense: the 是..的 construction, which every textbook I've seen describes as a type of past tense. IBE (talk) 14:35, 6 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In English you can use things like the tone and length of words to convey meaning and emphasis. E.g. "Yes" has the normal affirmative meaning when said plainly, but when stretched out can be much more tentative, while when said with a rising tone becomes a question. In particular to affirm or emphasise a statement such as the one immediately above, "I did not do it on purpose", you could emphasise the action: "I did not do it on purpose".

Chinese though is a tonal language. You can’t emphasise words like in English as it would change the meaning. The best example of this is Cantonese which has more tones than Putonghua and vowel length also determines meaning. It uses particles and a lot of them, some of which are heavily used in everyday speech: Written Cantonese#Particles.--JohnBlackburne^words_deeds 16:01, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, but I've never come across "de" before purely as a particle, because there are others to choose from, notably "a" (啊). Is "de" really used as a mere particle? IBE (talk) 14:41, 6 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

See also this comment from a Language desk discussion of February last year:

The spelling may be an indicator of the pronunciation. Here's a passage from Ten Pound Pom by Niall Griffiths (Carmarthen, Wales, 2011, ISBN 978-1-905762-14-9): What's it doing here? I ask a passerby and he says: -Don't know, ey? ... But a word about that 'ey'; Aussies tend to put it at the end of every sentence, whether inquisitive or declamatory. It's just a verbal tic, of course, and means less than when affected Brits do it, because they've consciously adopted it, but it's like the ornithological observation that the beauty of a bird's song in Oz is in direct proportion to the blandness of its plumage; the more lovely the song, the drabber the bird that makes it. Pretty-looking birds just squeal and screech. As if they know, somehow, that humans must be pleased and propitiated in some way, if not through the eye, then through the ear. They must make themselves useful, in some way, to humans. What's this got to do with the Australian 'ey'? F*** it, I don't know. I'm rambling, ey?

Yes. In the sentence "我不是故意的", if you replace "的" with "啊", it is still correct. ―Abelmoschus Esculentus 14:34, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Hair: "zombie" racist?

In the movie Hair, there is a song in which one character lists many racist terms for black people. One of them was "zombie." I've heard one person propose the idea that zombie movies are racist fantasies, metaphors for race wars, but I didn't realize that the connection was made so long ago. Is zombie in fact a racist slur? If so how long has it been such? Temerarius (talk) 15:35, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

The most recent academic overview of the link is Roger Luckhurst's Zombies: A Cultural History (reviewed here). He traces the racism to the plantations of Haiti, and the "othering" of the cultural practices of the slaves, e.g. voodoo. --Carbon Caryatid (talk) 16:01, 4 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Read EO for this word's somewhat ambiguous origins.[1] ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:25, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

November 5

Samoyedic

Any information of the spread of Uralic languages, specifically the Samoyedic branch. déhanchements (talk) 01:17, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Have you read Samoyedic languages? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 01:24, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Barely anything there, I'm looking for an article with buku info in it. déhanchements (talk) 03:29, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

A man from Marseilles

How would you say this re a man, as you would say, 'He's a Parisian'? 'He's a Marseillais'? Sounds odd. Or do you need to rephrase to 'He's from Marseilles'? Ericoides (talk) 14:34, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I found this which says Marseillais Ericoides.MarnetteD|Talk 14:38, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Oops I see you've already written that - facepalm. MarnetteD|Talk 14:44, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

No, thanks for that, it was my mistake. I realise I googled for "Il est un Marseillaise" and only got three results, whereas I should have searched for "Il est Marseillaise", which gets many more. If I'd done the latter before asking the question I wouldn't have asked it! Ericoides (talk) 14:58, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

You seem to constantly mix up marseillais (masculine) and marseillaise (feminine). Also note that adjectives are never capitalized in French. — Kpalion^(talk) 15:13, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you're right. I'm not really concentrating, apologies. I searched for Marseillais but am so used to Marseillaise from the song that I automatically typed that by mistake... I don't think Google worries about caps, and this is for an English book: I think "he's a marseillais" would look as odd as "he's a parisian". But thanks for your concern. Ericoides (talk) 17:14, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

If it is English, you could say "He's from Marseilles" or "He's Marseillais", English DOES capitalize those adjectives. I do know that sometimes there is a difference in terms between English and French (c.f. Quebecois vs. Quebecker) but not always. If you were saying it in French, however, you would say "il est marseillais" --Jayron 32 19:11, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

In British English, Quebecois is usual; no idea what they say in Quebec. Alansplodge (talk) 21:13, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

They'd include the 2 acutes when writing: québécois. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:33, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Point taken. Wikipedia has "A resident or native of Quebec is usually referred to in English as a Quebecer or Quebecker" in our Québécois (word) article. Also Québécois people and English-speaking Quebecers - obviously some baggage attached to which term one uses. Alansplodge (talk) 21:59, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

And references for the original question:

"There is no doubt that he was a Marseillais. Wandering through the streets of the old city, now in a café on Rue Cannebiere and now along a quay of the Vieux Port, his ghost has often crossed my path and dogged my footsteps...", from The Saturday Evening Post, Volume 191, Issues 49-52 (1919) p. 30.

"But he is a Marseillais and has a blustering temper and he scolds them for their carelessness. They are all scared of him..." (quoting a diary entry written in 1922), from Tahitian Journal p. 143 by George Biddle.

"She is a Marseillaise, and her maiden name was Jeanne Hadingue. When but a child she became a pupil at the Conservatoire of Marseilles, where she studied for a time as a vocalist", an article about Jane Hading from The Illustrated American, Volume 9 (1892) p. 179

Alansplodge (talk) 21:32, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks, Alan. Ericoides (talk) 07:12, 6 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Turkish pronunciation resources

Is there any online resource that shows which words in Turkish contain long vowels or soft consonants that aren't marked in spelling? (The circumflex, from what I gather, is only used in these words where there would be a homography.) --Lazar Taxon (talk) 18:53, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Wikipedia has an article titled Turkish phonology which may be a good start. The external links section of that article leads to Turkish pronunciation dictionary which may also be useful. --Jayron 32 19:08, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I'm already familiar with Forvo. I'm hoping for something a little more… comprehensive? There seems to be a common impression that Turkish orthography is fully phonemically transparent, leading a lot of resources to neglect to show these distinctions. --Lazar Taxon (talk) 21:47, 5 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

November 8

Terminology

What does varce lectiones mean as to linguistics (or rather study of ancient scriptures; (might be))? ∯WBG^converse 16:10, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

"Varce" is not a word of Latin as far as I can tell (unless it's some kind of place name), but lectio means "reading", and appears in several technical terms, such as matres lectionis and lectio difficilior... AnonMoos (talk) 17:05, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Variae lectiones, however, is pretty common in editions of classical texts. It's the plural of varia lectio. Deor (talk) 17:58, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

Deor, Thanks; I was talking about Variae lectiones, as the corresponding definition fits very aptly to the context. The book had a typo. ∯WBG^converse 19:29, 8 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

I thought this was a church term, but it's clearly just "variant readings". 86.157.229.93 (talk) 17:52, 10 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

November 10

Kool Aid

Our page on "drinking the kool-aid" is just about the term and Jonestown. But surely at least a few people used the phrase earlier, in reference to the Electric Kool-Aid Acid Tests? Temerarius (talk) 15:59, 10 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

[Courtesy links to The Electric Kool-Aid Acid Test and Jonestown]. One would think it plausible, given the ten-year interval between the book's publication (and longer since the antics described therein) and the mass-poisoning event, but the only way to be sure would be to find uses of the term between the 1960s and 1978, which I'm sure others will be much more adept at than myself. Obviously, the intended meanings of any usages prior to 1978 will differ somewhat from most usages afterwards when the darker implication became a trope. {The poster formerly known as 87.81 230.195} 2.218.14.42 (talk) 16:30, 10 November 2018 (UTC)[reply]

@@ Line 96: / Line 96: @@
 ::''Variae lectiones'', however, is pretty common in editions of classical texts. It's the plural of ''[https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/varia_lectio#English varia lectio]''. [[User:Deor|Deor]] ([[User talk:Deor|talk]]) 17:58, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
 :::{{u|Deor}}, Thanks; I was talking about ''Variae lectiones'', as the corresponding definition fits very aptly to the context. The book had a typo. [[User:Winged Blades of Godric|<span style="color: red">&#x222F;</span><span style="font-family:Verdana"><b style="color:#070">WBG</b></span>]][[User talk:Winged Blades of Godric|<sup><span style="color:#00F">converse</span></sup>]] 19:29, 8 November 2018 (UTC)
-::::I thought this was a church term, but it's clearly just "variant reading". [[Special:Contributions/86.157.229.93|86.157.229.93]] ([[User talk:86.157.229.93|talk]]) 17:52, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
+::::I thought this was a church term, but it's clearly just "variant readings". [[Special:Contributions/86.157.229.93|86.157.229.93]] ([[User talk:86.157.229.93|talk]]) 17:52, 10 November 2018 (UTC)
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