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August 5

about wikipedia

can i create a page in wikipedia for me...?? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Naveen nganesan (talk • contribs) 14:29, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You can create a User Page, if that is what you mean (click here to do so). If you mean you want to write about yourself and about some sort of achievements (Are you an author? Are you a sportsman? A politician? etc.) then we prefer that you don't. You can get someone else to write about you, but all articles must have links to reliable sources, otherwise they will likely be deleted. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 14:37, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There are already the pages Naveen, Nganasan. μηδείς (talk) 20:36, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

What do you call phonetic nativization of borrowed words?

The issue came up in this thread on Johnson/Ivanovich as to what to call it when a language nativizes the pronunciation of a foreign word, such as the Russian spelling and pronunciation of Harvard as Гарвард "Garvard". The conversion in orthography is called transliteration. The change in sound can be described as a sort of assimilation, although this term is a technical one with a different meaning in linguistics. See assimilation (linguistics). Conversion specifically into English can be called Englishing or Anglicisation, but this is language specific, and does not only refer to pronunciation. Can anyone offer a relevant article (better than Hobson Jobson!) on this or a scholarly technical term with a source? μηδείς (talk) 19:50, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This article explains the different ways loan-words from one language change when adopted by people who speak another language: spelling, pronunciation, meaning, word order, and new combinations with parts of speech. However, the article addresses just one language pair. http://web.archive.org/web/20150824080748/https://www.csun.edu/~bashforth/301_PDF/301_P_P/EnglishLoanWordsJapanese.pdf And, yes, the word that linguists generally use is "nativization." The phonetic changes are nativization of phonology to conform to the phonetic inventory and co-occurrence constraints of the language doing the borrowing. There is also an element of code-switching that can occur when the native pronunciation and the foreign pronunciation vie for prestige. MichelleInSanMarcos (talk) 03:33, 2 August 2019 (UTC)[reply]

Pronunciation of "New Zealand"

The article on New Zealand includes a pronunciation guide which doesn't look right: a short e in Zealand, and emphasis on New. Before I, an English English speaker, correct it to what I think is right (long e, emphasis on Zea), can anyone confirm that I'd be OK doing so? Bazza (talk) 22:13, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

American pronunciation agrees with your proposal (without the y-glide in "new", of course). I imagine the enZedders will have something to say about this, though. -- Elphion (talk) 22:27, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Not all American pronunciation has yod-dropping. --Trovatore (talk) 20:45, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's definitely wrong as is in the article; I have watched Flight of the Conchords enough to know that. There might be an ɛ hidden in there somewhere, but is certainly not a plain short lax vowel. More likely some odd antipodean diphthong. μηδείς (talk) 22:32, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've corrected the article. Angr (talk) 06:14, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Bazza (talk) 07:42, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Shouldn't the vowel marked as ɛ at least be long? μηδείς (talk) 18:11, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Does New Zealand English distinguish long and short ɛ? I know there are a few accents that do, e.g. shed [ʃɛd] vs. shared [ʃɛːd], but I don't know if NZE is one of those accents. But even if it is, it seems unlikely that "New Zealand" would have the SQUARE vowel. (I've never heard a Kiwi pronounce it with a DRESS vowel either, for that matter, as the article currently claims, but then I don't know that many Kiwis.) Angr (talk) 20:42, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I worked with quite a few kiwis in Japan, and they all pronounced it closer to /nju: zɯlənd/. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 03:40, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

But the question is, what do they mean by that? More precisely, what lexical set are they using for the stressed vowel? Are they pronouncing the first syllable to rhyme with the way they say heel or the way they say hell? Angr (talk) 20:31, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The OED is utterly useless, giving no New Zealand pronunciation, and suggesting that some Americans (Truman Capote?) say /nju ziln/. μηδείς (talk) 22:31, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This video blog of The Hobbit production (at 19:22) makes it quite clear the British pronunciation is the proper one, either [i:] or [ɪə] at the worst. (The first minute of the same video has the name "Wellington" pronounced with a nice lax normal open /ɛ/, while most other expected /ɛ/ sounds are hightened to approach closed /ɪ/, and /eɪ/ sounds to approach closed [i:]. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zfX1PYv1FEY I am going to change the article to [i:] but welcome other interpretations. μηδείς (talk) 05:51, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

ik heb hem geslagen

Of this issue, Edith Bosch writes "IK HEB HEM GESLAGEN". The BBC are translating "geslagen" from Dutch as "beaten" but given the circumstances and her being a judoka, isn't "defeated", "overcome" or "subdued" a better translation? In particular, would a Dutch judoka use "geslagen" when describing a victory in judo, which usually doesn't involve a beating (that is, punching and other blows). Would a Dutch tennis player having beaten another say "geslagen"? -- Finlay McWalterჷTalk 23:47, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"To beat" can mean "to defeat in a competition" in English, so I'm not sure I see the problem. AnonMoos (talk) 03:54, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

But this wasn't a competition, this was an Olympian beating down a drunk. 69.62.243.48 (talk) 04:12, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I don't know about Dutch, but in German, "Ich habe ihn geschlagen" could mean "I beat him [in a competition]" but it could also mean simply "I hit him". Maybe Dutch is the same. Angr (talk) 06:12, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I understand her sentence as: "A drunken guest in front of me throws a bottle on the track! I HAVE BEATEN HIM .... Unbelievable! # mad # disrespectful". Perhaps "I hit him" would be better. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 23:06, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The word 'geslagen' is never used to mean 'defeated' in modern Dutch (the word 'verslagen' is used for that purpose). The BBC's translation as 'beaten', in the sense of punching etc. is accurate ('hit' is also an option, like Pp.paul.4 suggested above) . - Lindert (talk) 23:25, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

How Similar is Modern Greek to Ancient Greek?

I've heard that ancient Greek to modern Greek is like Shakespearean English to modern English. Was the info that I heard about this correct? Futurist110 (talk) 23:55, 5 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's a bigger difference than that. The phonology has changed significantly, with many vowel sounds changing to "ee" and b, d, and g changing to v (β), th (ð), and gh (ɣ) as well as u > f in certain circumstances. Much of the grammatical vocabulary has been reanalyzed. Except for some nouns and verbs, I am lost trying to read modern Greek, and entirely lost trying to follow spoken Greek. (I studied enough as an undergrad that my prof wanted me to add Greek as my third major, and worked with and did business with Greeks in NYC for about a decade.) I would say the difference is about the same or slightly more than that between Chaucer and SAE. See the Great Vowel Shift which is a similar radical change in English phonology that accounts for the discrepancy between our spelling and that of Latin and most European tongues. μηδείς (talk) 01:49, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Which SAE? —Tamfang (talk) 04:12, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm sure regulars here know this, but for the record, the "SAE" in question would be Standard American English. -- 04:49, 6 August 2012‎ WilliamThweatt

Oops, didn't occur to me there would be need for disambiguation. Thanks. μηδείς (talk) 18:07, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If you have seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding, at one point the groom is tricked into saying έχω τρία αρχίδια (exo tria arxiðia) "I have three balls". This is almost good Ancient Greek, but αρχίδια would have been ὄρχεις and έχω was more at "carry" or "bear" than just "have". μηδείς (talk) 02:03, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In ancient Greek, it would have an omega (ΕΧΩ); not sure why there wouldn't be an omega in modern Greek also... AnonMoos (talk) 12:35, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It does indeed have omega in both modern and ancient Greek. By the way, in both versions of the language this is the normal word for 'have' - it would not normally mean 'carry' or 'bear', to my knowledge. Maid Marion (talk) 14:19, 8 August 2012 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Maid Marion (talk • contribs) 14:18, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In ancient Greek, it can mean "to hold" or "to keep in a position" almost as often as "to possess"... AnonMoos (talk) 16:00, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Written Katharevousa and New Testament koine Greek are kind of similar (though by no means the same), but as indicated by Medeis, modern spoken Greek would be completely incomprehensible to any ancient Greek speaker, and even in written form, ancient Attic and modern Dhimotiki are quite strongly divergent. AnonMoos (talk) 03:51, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This is a topic I have commented on before, and I repeat my opinion that Modern Greek differs from Classical Greek much, much more than Modern English differs from Chaucer. I have placed classical Greek texts in front of modern Greek native speakers and they are unable to fathom any meaning at all. Chaucer admittedly appears somewhat foreign to modern English speakers, but with a little practice it becomes clear that the structure of the English language is pretty much now what it was then; the main problem is the unfamiliar vocabulary. Whereas the structure of an ancient Greek sentence is drastically different from that of its modern Greek equivalent. In particular, the modern language has lost most of the rich range of the ancient verb structure and expresses every kind of subordination by means of the particles na and tha, neither of which existed in ancient Greek (though I assume that na is a relic of ancient hina - please correct me if I'm wrong). Maid Marion (talk) 09:40, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Here's the previous thread that Maid Marion is (I believe) referring to. The OP may find it of interest. Deor (talk) 14:39, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

In my experience, the radical change comes with the Koine: most modern Greeks can (or at least should be able to) read a Koine text with ease (I remember sighs of relief at school when we got to the Hellenistic texts), while Classical Greek, with its more complex grammar and syntax and odd vocabulary, is very difficult to follow and is regarded pretty much as a related, but foreign language. Constantine ✍ 14:40, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I fixed the typos above, I blame interference from Spanish. I had three semesters of Attic Greek with a purist who pronounced the iota subscripts and would sing the tones. After Xenophon, reading New Testament Greek was like being on vacation. The oldest meaning of εχω is "bear, carry, bring" which naturally evolves into "hold", then "have". The word (ϝ)εχω is cognate with weigh, wagon, vehicle; PIE had no verb "to have". μηδείς (talk) 16:35, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

He pronounced the iota subscripts!? He sang the accents!? May I ask the name of this paragon? In many years of mingling with scholars of ancient Greek I have never come across anyone like this. Though it does remind me of an infamously pornographic book that circulated among the boys during my school days 40 years ago (Frank Harris, My Life and Loves). The boys were interested in other stuff, but my attention was caught by a reference to a professor of Greek who was said to be able to converse in ancient Greek. Can this really be true? Maid Marion (talk) 14:29, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

When I studied Ancient Greek at the University of Texas a quarter-century ago, lots of professors and graduate students pronounced their iotas subscript. At least one grad student, in addition to faithfully rendering the pitch accent, meticulously pronounced all the unwritten digammas when reading Homer out loud, too. Angr (talk) 23:31, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

There are two different verbs ἔχω. The one that comes from *wekhō means "bear, carry, bring" and is very rare, but the one that means "have, hold" comes from *sekhō via *hekhō with deaspiration to ekhō via Grassmann's law and is very common. Its aorist is ἔσχον with the zero grade *skh-. Pais (talk) 17:20, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, you are right. Guess that makes them even differenter. μηδείς (talk) 17:39, 8 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I am curious. Are there common cognates for the *segh- root? Do you know what it means originally? μηδείς (talk) 00:08, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The American Heritage Dictionary of Indo-Europen Roots says that the basic meaning of the root is "to hold", and most of its development appears to have occurred in Greek—at least, those developments that have given rise to English words, which is the focus of the dictionary. For instance, an agentive suffixed form *segh-tor lies behind the name Hector, a zero grade form *sgh- lies behind σχῆμα (and thus scheme) and σχολή (and thus scholar, school, etc.), and a reduplicated form *si-sgh- lies behind ἴσχω (and thus ischemia). The only two developments it gives in other languages are a suffixed form *segh-es- as the source of German Sieg and names such as Siegfried and Sigmund and a possible suffixed (abstract) form *segh-wēr as the source of Latin severus and its derivatives. Deor (talk) 00:55, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Most interesting. The word sieg did occur to me, but its underlying sense is unclear. Severus did not occur, but I am familiar with it, and it is quite plausible. Perhaps seize? I'll have to look it up in Mallory (or Pokorny if necessary) to see what the PIE gloss for the root is. 01:07, 9 August 2012 (UTC)

August 6

Half/full-assed question

The term "half-assed" has come up in this forum before, but my question doesn't concern etymology directly. My question is, if "half-assing" something is bad, what would be good? Full-assing or zero-assing? Obviously, I'm asking in connection to home improvement and a marriage may be at stake. Drmies (talk) 04:29, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

"Ass", like other vulgarities, can be used as a general intensifier without having a logical extended meaning. That is, the phrase can be idiomatic and defy further analysis or productivity. Half-assed just means doing half the quality of the work, but that doesn't mean that "ass" means anything in isolation here, beyond acting as an intensifier. Another word that works like this is "shit", where you get words like "batshit" and "chickenshit" and "apeshit". "Batty" means "insane" and "Batshit" just means "really insane"; "chicken" means cowardly, and "chickenshit" means "really cowardly". --Jayron32 04:40, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Hmm, I like that. Hey, since you released this according to the GFDL, I can use "defy further analysis or productivity" as my motto, as long as I credit you. That's great. BTW, a friend of ours is referred to as "batshit crazy"--so that's really crazy. Thanks for the lesson in idiom, Jayron. Drmies (talk) 04:52, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Since I did want to find a reference to back up my statements above on using vulgarities as non-specific intensifiers (which stems from my musty memories of a decade-and-a-half-ago linguistics class), I did find this article by none other than H. L. Mencken from 1944 which discusses the very same issue; he uses the word "hell" as the vulgarity in this case, but it could apply to any of a number of common vulgarities. The one that comes strongest to my memory is of the use of "fuck" as an "infix" intensifier, as in words like "unfuckingbelievable" and "absofuckinglutely". Wikipedia has an article on Expletive infixation, which covers those specific uses, but following the refs may lead to a more general ideas about expletives as intensifiers. --Jayron32 05:10, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Well, since the expression "I can't be arsed [to do something or refrain from doing something]" means to have no interest in doing or refraining from doing something, and and a "half-arsed" attempt is half-hearted, it would appear to me that something done with full commitment and interest must logically be "fully-arsed". Of course I can only speak of my knowledge of degrees of *arsedness where <r> is included in the spelling (ironically, mostly in varieties of English that are non-rhotic). As for degrees of "assedness", I can only speculate.--Shirt58 (talk) 09:59, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I remember seeing, a few years ago, a paragraph in a novel in which something (ideas, I think) were described roughly as "Starting as half-assed, and working down into lower ass-fractions". For myself, I can't readily decide whether the expression derives directly from the idea of the uselessness of having less than a whole arse, or by way of the 'be arsed to' construction mentioned above. It might also be a deliberate variation on the obscene-sounding but actually firearms-related "half-cocked". AlexTiefling (talk) 11:19, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

More likely a variation on "half-baked", don't you think? Deor (talk) 23:14, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Or "half-hearted". Angr (talk) 22:00, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If assed is just an intensifier, then the negative meaning is provided by half, so logically the answer is that full-assed would be the equivalent positive term. Seems like you inadvertently analysed it just fine. Card Zero (talk) 21:12, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Cut in line, as opposed to "But In Line."

For some years, I was like, "Why do they use the term, 'quit buttin' in line?'"

Then I learned that the Bloods street gang use "B" in place of "C" since "C" stands for the Crips. (e.g., they instead say, "He was in the bity of Bompton for a bup of boffee.")

So instead of "butt in line," is it really "but in line" because so many people nationwide (or at least my corner of Kansas) decided to adapt the West Coast street gang parlance and sound like the Bloods by putting "b" in place of "c" where "cut" is supposed to be?

But why only for "cutting into" (interrupting) a conversation? And for getting ahead in line without permission? But not for other contexts? (e.g. "We need to but him free from that seatbelt after we use the Jaws of Life to pry open a hole to pull him out of." Or "Kayden, please don't run with scissors pointing up; you'll but yourself in your neck after you trip and need to go to the emergency room.")

Somehow solve this, please. If it's not because we adopted Blood lingo, where did this idea come from? --70.179.170.114 (talk) 05:38, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I have no source, but I'd be amazed to hear that it had anything to do with gang lingo. I believe butt is short for buttocks in this sense. I've always thought that when you butt in line or butt into a conversation, you're putting yourself where you weren't invited to be. (physically or not)... Even if it was based on some random gang stupidity, there's no reason for every single phrase to have caught on to their way of speaking. --Onorem ♠Dil 05:47, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict)"Butting in" is a phrase that is much older than the Bloods and Crips, it has been used to mean "to insert oneself rudely into a situation" for quite a long time. Etymonline has "To butt in" meaning "to rudely intrude" dating from the early 1900s. See [1]. (post EC-reply to Onorem) I don't think it has anything to do with buttocks, rather it has to do with smashing two things together, as in a "butting heads", i.e. as sheep or elk do. --Jayron32 05:53, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Look at this. The phrase is older than some gang stuff. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 06:02, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Fair enough. That makes sense too. More of a forcing your way. It's not something I'd ever thought too much about...but just really didn't think it could be anything so silly. Thanks for the additional info. --Onorem ♠Dil 06:07, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

As others have mentioned, it's "butt" as in "to push or hit hard or roughly with the head", per http://www.chambersharrap.co.uk/chambers/features/chref/chref.py/main?query=butt&title=21st . I do not believe this "butt" has anything to do with buttocks. 86.129.16.55 (talk) 01:55, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The two terms are not synonymous. You can suggest to a woman with a crying baby that she cut in front of you. You can't suggest she butt in front of you. It wouldn't be butting. μηδείς (talk) 02:04, 14 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It is easy. To 'BUTT' something is to hit it. you BUTT into the queue, i.e. you HIT into it. it makes sense.

whose communication is more crippled?

The Reference desk is not a forum for speculation. Looie496 (talk) 15:28, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

Suppose that there are two gangs, B's and C's. The b's pronounce all words starting with a "c" to start with a "b" instead, to show their spite for the C's. Meanwhile, the c's pronounce all words starting with a 'b' to start with a 'c' instead, to show their spite.

Whose communication is more crippled as a result? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.99.254.208 (talk) 08:25, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'd link to Monty Python's famous Travel Agent sketch but I fear a copyvio, so instead I'll say "look it up yourself, you silly bunt" --TammyMoet (talk) 08:46, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Those changes are really not phonologically plausible (i.e. not observed to occur in real languages according to historical linguistics research). However, looking at it abstractly as a matter of phonemic distinctive contrasts (i.e. numbers of minimal pairs and such), the amount of neutralization is exactly the same in both cases... AnonMoos (talk) 15:23, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

tones in hist.ling.

If you study historical linguistics you see a lot of formulas like

“

k > ts / _iV

”

where the part after the slash is a conditioning environment: the sound change shown (from Vulgar Latin) occurs only before /i/ and another vowel. It occurs to me that I've never seen an example in which tone is part of the condition. Is that because the books I've read are in English, intended for readers unlikely to be acquainted with phonemic tone, or are such conditional changes rare in fact? —Tamfang (talk) 22:16, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The rise of tones themselves usually comes from a loss of prefixed or final consonants. One good place to look for tones conditioning historical changes might be the Oto-Manguean languages. The Mixtec language has a really exotic phonology from an Indo-European standpoint. But I haven't studied it other than buying a grammar to peruse when I met some Mixtecos and heard them use it as a secret tongue. μηδείς (talk) 22:25, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, a google scholar search of ["tone-conditioned" "sound change"] brings up various Oto-Manguean languages and Mixtec in the fourth result. μηδείς (talk) 22:29, 6 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not a historical linguist myself, but I'm pretty sure if you look at Chinese tone sandhi or at the tone systems of various Chinese languages and dialects and how they relate to Middle Chinese or Old Chinese, you will see rewrite rules like this involving tone. I feel like I have seen them, although I can't think of references off the top of my head. rʨanaɢ (talk) 05:51, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, I too have seen them, but didn't mention Sandhi since they don't result in a permanent change of the underlying form. In any case, they are written conditionally based on tone. μηδείς (talk) 05:55, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

August 7

Grammar question about possessive case

I always understood that the possessive case is denoted by either an apostrophe and "s" or by the word "of" (among other ways). So, a phrase such as "John's car" means essentially the same thing as "the car of John". Or "Mike's computer" means "the computer of Mike". I assume that my understanding is correct. If so, that leads me to my question. I ran across a sentence that read something along the lines of this: "He is a friend of Mike's." Is that correct grammar? Or should it be simply "He is a friend of Mike." (without the apostrophe and "s" after Mike)? Is the word "of" (preceding Mike) and the apostrophe and "s" (after Mike) redundant? Or is it perfectly acceptable, in terms of grammar, to use both and to state: "He is a friend of Mike's."? Thanks. Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 03:42, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It means he is one of Mike's friends. Consider the difference between "this is a painting of the King" and "this is a painting of the King's". (The sentence you "ran across" was one of Medeis's, wasn't it?) μηδείς (talk) 03:50, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You can expand this kind of construction to remove the apparent redundancy: He is a friend of [the friends who are] Mike's works, as does He is a friend of Mike's [friends]. Do not confuse "of" to mean that this person is a "friend-of-a-friend"—rather, "of" is used in the sense of "among; selected from a group". The use of "of" in the original is more confusing, as it is easy to mistake for an of-genitive; examples of these were given above (the computer of Mike, etc). dalahäst ^{(let's talk!)} 03:58, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, dalahäst. And note it would be unidiomatic to say "The sentence you 'ran across' was one of Medeis." The of and 's (and double possessive) constructions are not strictly interchangeable. See also Possession (linguistics) μηδείς (talk) 04:07, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The construction expresses a combination of two different senses of the genitive case which in some languages are treated as separate matters. A friend of Mike's = (One of {partitive}{Mike's friends {possessive})). See genitive case and one of its subsections, double possessive. μηδείς (talk) 04:18, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

No. "One of Mike's friends" is indeed a partitive construction, but "A friend of Mike's" means exactly the same as "A friend of Mike". ----Ehrenkater (talk) 17:59, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I dispute this. They have the same denotation, but differ in several ways, most notably because "A friend of Mike" is unusual in ordinary identifying contexts. --ColinFine (talk) 21:02, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Ah, partitive. I have become more familiar with it than most people would care to from studying Finnish. dalahäst ^{(let's talk!)} 04:29, 7 August 2012 (UTC) [reply]

Tolkien was one of Finnish's biggest fans, and he one of my biggest influences.μηδείς (talk) 04:33, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, didn't he base Quenya on Finnish? dalahäst ^{(let's talk!)} 08:20, 7 August 2012 (UTC) [reply]

The phonology of Quenya was partly based on the phonology of Finnish (without umlaut vowels), just as the phonology of Sindarin was partly based on the phonology of Welsh, but without too many meaningful grammatical/morphological/lexical resemblances or borrowings... AnonMoos (talk) 17:37, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The ablaut plurals of Sindarin and the cases of Quenya seem to be strong resmeblances if not concrete borrowings. Sindarin even has (initial) consonant mutation, which is quite rare (The Celtic languages and The Nivkh language have it.) μηδείς (talk) 22:28, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Chicago Style

Translating John Grisham's Calico Joe, I found the sentence as follows:

They(Cubs) were sinking, Chicago style, while the Mets were winning.

Cubs had led by 10 games, but the difference reduced to one after a star player was removed. What does 'Chicago style' mean? Please help. --Analphil (talk) 07:51, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The Cubs have a reputation around Chicago for doing well in the beginning of the season and then falling behind at the end of the season. There's a saying that says that "Cubs" stands for Completely Useless By September. That's what I would take from it. Dismas|^(talk) 08:04, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

For the benefit of those who may not be aware, the Cubs have not won a World Series since 1908, and haven't even played in one since 1945. Their name is synonymous with futility on the field. --Xuxl (talk) 09:56, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe like Chicago-style pizza, into a "deep dish"? Nah, probably not. --Trovatore (talk) 08:07, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

When I saw the title of this section in my watchlist, I assumed it was a question about the Chicago Manual of Style, or a convention advocated by it. Funny, heh. dalahäst ^{(let's talk!)} 08:18, 7 August 2012 (UTC) [reply]

The easy answer is that it means that the Chicago Cubs were doing what the Chicago Cubs always do: even if they do good, they blow it by the end of the year. Ask Leon Durham, Steve Bartman, Billy Sianis, etc. --Jayron32 19:32, 7 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

August 9

Noun cases

I seem to read from time to time of various languages (don't ask me for examples now!) that have lost all or most of their noun cases, or are in the process of gradually losing them. Are there any languages where the differentiation of noun cases is actually getting stronger, or where new cases have been developed in historically recent times or are developing now? 86.129.16.55 (talk) 02:22, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's called grammaticalization. The PIE dative plural (in certain dialects) in -bh- is an example, believed to have arisen from postposition of "by". μηδείς (talk) 03:07, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If it's part of PIE, how can it have happened in "historically recent times"? (Unless we have wildly differing interpretations of "historically recent"...) 86.146.109.55 (talk) 13:40, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Sri Lankan Malay language, a creole of Malay with influences from Sri Lankan languages, reportedly developed a case system which Malay doesn't have[2][3]. --Colapeninsula (talk) 14:28, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

That's not the development of new cases though, because the cases do exist in Sinhala and Tamil, which Sri Lankan Creole Malay is partly based on. This seems to be a case of languages with and without cases mixing while preserving the already existant case system. - Lindert (talk) 14:51, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

You can loose case quickly, but they take time to develop. A bit like watching species going extinct vs. watching new ones evolve. — kwami (talk) 15:57, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Tocharian developed cases it didn't inherit from Indo-European, but I don't know how quickly it happened, and I wouldn't call it "historically recent". Pais (talk) 16:34, 9 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

I've seen a proposed analysis of the many Finnish noun cases according to which there were once only a few cases to which different particles got fused, analogous to the PIE bh mentioned above. Don't know whether this is controversial. —Tamfang (talk) 00:31, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

If I remember properly, the inessive case ending -ban/ben, meaning "in": a házban "the house-in" könyvben "(a) book-in" in Hungarian developed in the middle ages from a root originally meaning belly. And yes, that is historically recent. μηδείς (talk) 02:20, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It is always a puzzle to me why, when almost all modern trends seem to be to reduce grammatical complexity in languages, such complexity ever originally developed, especially in "primitive" times. I asked a question about this here once before but unfortunately I cannot now locate it. 86.179.3.32 (talk) 11:12, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

This is the main topic of 'The Unfolding of Language' by Guy Deutscher (linguist). AndrewWTaylor (talk) 12:16, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

For people who haven't read the book, could you summarize what his explanation is for this (apparent) simplification of languages? - Lindert (talk) 12:52, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

It's a while since I read the book, and I am by no means an expert, but I think the basic process is as Tamfan and Medeis have described above, where grammatical indicators start out as separate elements but gradually become joined to the roots that they modify. For verbs rather than nouns, see this article, which describes how the future tense in French derives from the addition of parts of the word avoir (to have) to the infinitive. By coincidence I've just seen this article on Language Log, describing an aspect of "grammaticization of going to in (African American) English" AndrewWTaylor (talk) 14:58, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Does the alteration of "I'm going to" to "I'm on" constitute an increase in grammatical complexity? 86.179.3.32 (talk) 17:50, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Russian lost its vocative case centuries ago (except in certain fixed expressions), but recently a new vocative case, formed differently, has emerged in colloquial speech. Lesgles (talk) 22:03, 10 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Makes me wonder whether there are any Russian names with –ья. —Tamfang (talk) 00:17, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

The English progressive and emphatic do constructions ("am speaking" and "do speak') are recent. Sam might say something like "I'm a-coming, Frodo" once or twice in the Lord of the Rings, but otherwise you don't hear the progressive in the entire work, which lends it some of its character. The progressive evolved from "am on coming" to "am a-coming" to "am coming" and was considered uncouth and not found in formal writing until recently. Now the only place you hear older constructions like "I's a-comin" is in period pieces or when Hillary Clinton speaks before a church group. μηδείς (talk) 01:44, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

August 10

Chinese help - Is this how you write this?

How would one write “Ape Immortal of the Peach Grove” in Chinese? Is correct? Or would some kind of modifier be needed? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 00:23, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

Or would 桃花林猿仙 be correct since the location would define the name? --Ghostexorcist (talk) 00:48, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

hairy yellow sparrow wasp

The Japanese hornet was mentioned on the Misc desk. The article shows a Japanese name for it, キイロスズメバチ kiiro-suzume-pachi, which appears to mean 'yellow sparrow wasp'. But why is it in katakana when all three words are Japanese and have kanji spellings? The parallel Japanese article's title is ケブカスズメバチ kebuka-suzume-pachi, 'hairy sparrow wasp', same question. —Tamfang (talk) 00:38, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

See Katakana#Usage: "Technical and scientific terms, such as the names of animal and plant species and minerals, are also commonly written in katakana." Angr (talk) 01:18, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

(ec) I am not an expert in Japanese, but having studied it for 2 years in high school (a long, long time ago), I seem to remember that katakana is not only used for foreign words but can be used for emphasis and for writing scientific names such as genus, species, etc.--William Thweatt ^Talk^Contribs 01:21, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]

August 11

Jamaican lingo

Does anyone know what Warren Weir is saying in this interview?:

1:14 "The love in London is very, very good ... ??? ... one love Jamaica."

3:14 "Shout up/out [?] Birmingham, London, and whole of [?] Trelawny ... ??? ..."

86.179.3.32 (talk) 02:07, 11 August 2012 (UTC)[reply]