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{{Wiktionary|Wiktionary:Information desk}} {{Wiktionary|Wiktionary:Information desk}}
{{Wiktionary|Wiktionary:Translation requests}}


= January 8 =
{{Misplaced Pages:Reference_desk/Archives/Language/2012 July 20}}


== Pronunciation of "breen" ==
{{Misplaced Pages:Reference_desk/Archives/Language/2012 July 21}}


How do you pronounce the ''-breen'' that appears at the end of ] glacier names? I went through all the Svalbard -breen glacier articles on Misplaced Pages at Category:Glaciers_of_Spitsbergen, and not a single one provides IPA. ] (]) 02:32, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
{{Misplaced Pages:Reference_desk/Archives/Language/2012 July 22}}


:The ''-en'' ending is the ], and '']'' means "glacier", so, for example, ''Nansenbreen'' means "the Nansen glacier".
===Mongol-era names of provinces of Burma in Chinese characters and in pinyin===
:The pronunciations in ] and ] would be slightly different, with also regional variations. I have no idea which variety of spoken Norwegian is prevalent among the roughly 2,500 Norvegicophone inhabitants of Svalbard.
The Mongols set up two separate provinces in Upper Burma after their invasions in the late 13th century. My sources say the first province with the provincial capital at ] in northern Burma was named "Cheng-Mien" or "Chiang-Mien", supposedly meaning the "Burmese capital". It was set up around 1284/1285. The second province in central Burma was named "Chung-Mien" some time after the invasion of 1287. Would anyone know their Chinese and pinyin spellings? Thanks. ] (]) 16:13, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
:Extrapolating from the pronunciations of other words, I believe the pronunciation of ''-breen'' to be:
:Just two educated guesses: 城緬 Chéng Miǎn / Ch'eng Mien, 中緬 Zhōng Miǎn / Chung Mien. (], they are 城缅 & 中缅) --] (]) 16:40, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
:* Nynorsk: /²brɛːn̩/
::Wow, that's quick. Thanks! I think your guesses are good. Just found this book by Marco Polo which describes the "City of Mien", which must be Chéng Miǎn. Zhōng Miǎn makes sense too since it was in central Burma. Thanks again. ] (]) 17:20, 23 July 2012 (UTC)
:* Bokmål:&nbsp; /bʁe̞ːn̩/
::: Chinese Misplaced Pages's list of provinces of the Yuan empire only has Mianzhong (缅中): ], but notes that it was also known as Zhengmian (征緬). Hybernator, I note that Zhengmian would have been transliterated in W-G as "Cheng-mien", and Mianzhong as "Mien-chung", which seems similar to what your source suggests. Based on some brief searches these names are also reflected in other sources.
:For the meaning of the ] , see on Wiktionary ]. &nbsp;--] 10:23, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::: Is it possible that there was only one province but its name was changed as the political situation changed? Also, is it possible that your original source may have reversed the characters for the second name (i.e. from Mianzhong to Zhongmian)?
:(Simultaneous editing) an example of Norwegian pronounciation, "Jostedaalsbreen" first mentioned around 0:06. Since Norwegian is a language of dialects I cannot rule out that there could be regional differences in pronounciation. -- ] (]) 10:24, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::: For completeness, these two names in traditional, simplified and pinyin are as follows:
::This agrees with my extrapolation of the Nynorsk pronunciation. &nbsp;--] 10:38, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::: T: 緬中行省 S: 缅中行省 P: Miǎnzhōng Xíngshěng
:::However, I believe the two ee in the middle are being distinguished in the pronounciation rather than just pronounced as a long vowel. -- ] (]) 11:40, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::: T: 征緬行省 S: 征缅行省 P: Zhēngmiǎn Xíngshěng
::::The long vowel represents solely the <u>first</u> ⟨e⟩. The definitive suffix ''-en'' is represented by . The vertical understroke diacritic signifies that this is a ]. &nbsp;--] 15:46, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::: If it helps, "行省" is the customary abbreviation of "行中书省", a Yuan dynasty regional administrative function which is the direct ancestor of the Chinese "province" in later dynasties and even today. It is usually translated as "province" but literally meant "the Secretariat-in-action". --] (]) 09:50, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::Ok, that would make sense. Not an IPA expert here. -- ] (]) 16:05, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::::Regarding the dialect, I found this: https://munin.uit.no/handle/10037/14074. Excerpt from Google Translation: ''This is interesting because Svalbard has no local dialect. The language community on the archipelago is instead characterized by dialectal variation. The Norwegian population in Svalbard comes from all over Norway, and the average length of residence is short. ''. On Norwegian Misplaced Pages it stated that Nynorsk spellings have to be used for all town names in Svalbard but this probably has no bearing on the pronounciation practices. -- ] (]) 17:58, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
:Thank you all for your input! So it's a monosyllabic /²brɛːn̩/. ] (]) 21:05, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
::Is it really monosyllabic if a syllabic vowel is followed by a syllabic consonant? By the way, I believe the common Swedish curse word ''fan'' often is pronounced somewhat similarly. ] (]) 21:45, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
:::<u>By definition</u>, a syllabic consonant forms a syllable on its own. So we have two syllables, the first of which ends on a vowel. &nbsp;--] 00:01, 9 January 2025 (UTC)


= January 9 =
::::Thanks very much. But what does (征緬) Zhēngmiǎn mean? The "City of Mien" reference in the Marco Polo book above seems to favor Chéngmiǎn (城緬) but apparently, it may not have been the true administrative/official name.


== Is there a term which categorises these phrases? ==
::::One of my two sources, (Htin Aung "A History of Burma" 1967: 70), says according to Chinese sources, Mongols set up the first province of "Chiang-mien" meaning "Burmese province" around 1284/1285. I think this W-G spelling is incorrect. Another source (Than Tun "History of Burma: A.D. 1300–1400" 1959) gives the spelling of Cheng-mien. Also only Htin Aung, again citing "Chinese sources", says the Mongols declared central Burma to be the second province of "Chung-mien" some time after 1287. (Than Tun 1959) doesn't say anything about Chung-mien. It only states that the Mongols abolished the province of Cheng-mien per the emperor's decree dated 4 April 1303. Nothing about "Chung-mien". But I can see your point about a change in the political situation leading to a name change. Mongols could have renamed the existing province from either Chéngmiǎn or Zhēngmiǎn to Miǎnzhōng after the 1287 invasion. So when they did abolish it, they abolished one province, not two. Anyway, now I know the official name was Miǎnzhōng. Thanks again. ] (]) 01:12, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::::: Zhēngmiǎn (征緬) literally means "subjugating / conquering Mian (Burma)". I did try to search for references to Chéngmiǎn (城緬) as well but could not find any relevant references. Is it possible that "Capital of Mian" was a post facto (mis)interpretation by someone who saw the W-G "Chengmian" derived from Zhēngmiǎn (征緬)?
::::: This may be relevant: in Chinese translations of Marco Polo the phrase you referred to ("city of Mian") tends to be translated as either "緬城" (Miancheng, "Mian city") or "緬州" (Mianzhou, "Mian prefecture"), but I am not sure to what extent the translators just made those names up based on a literal translation of Marco's words.
::::: Another relevant note is that I found discussions in Chinese sources on the administrative divisions of the Yuan dynasty which suggested that the "expeditionary" ''xingsheng''s are different in nature from the other "administrative" ''xingsheng''s - while the latter are properly "provinces" similar to the ''xingsheng''s of the later dynasties, the former were almost purely military functions during invasions. It is suggested that ''Zhengmian'' at least definitely fell within the "expeditionary" category.--] (]) 09:40, 25 July 2012 (UTC)


Is there a lexicographic word or term to describe phrases such as "out and about", "bits and pieces", or "nooks and crannies"? There are many such phrases which conjoin words which are less often used separately. I am not thinking of "conjunction", but something which describes this particular quirk. For example, where I grew up, no-one would say "I was out in town yesterday" but "I was out and about the town". ] (]) 15:29, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
::::::Thanks. Very informative. Could ''Zhēngmiǎn'' be translated as "Subjugated Burma"? If so, it could have been the name of the first "province" (or colony, or whatever). Now, staying with your "subjugating / conquering Mian (Burma)", it's quite probable that ''Zhēngmiǎn'' (a la Operation Subjugate Burma) was the name of the campaign, and ''Mianzhong Xíngshěng'' (Province of Central Burma) the name of the new province. Plausible, though we're still in the realm of speculation. I wonder if the Chinese Misplaced Pages's editors have cited an authoritative source (preferably one that cites the original records.) It'll help me put in the findings from this discussion in the Mongol invasions of Burma article. So far, all I've been able to confirm is that the names reported in my Burmese sources, although the authors say they got the names from Chinese sources, is at best incomplete. Anyway, if you do find anything, please reach out to me at my talk page. Thanks again. ] (]) 00:26, 26 July 2012 (UTC)


:I think a ], also called a set phrase, fixed expression, is the term you're looking for for the phrase. ] (for words not used outside set phrases) and ] (for phrases which have fixed order - you wouldn't say "about and out") may also be of interest. ] (]) 16:23, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
{{Misplaced Pages:Reference_desk/Archives/Language/2012 July 23}}
::All three examples above are irreversible binomials. &nbsp;--] 10:59, 10 January 2025 (UTC)


: If you are thinking of expressions where a single meaning is carried by a conjunction of two near-synonyms, ] may be a fit. There is a narrow definition of that term where it covers only conjunctions of two terms that logically stand in a relation of subordination to each other, but there's also a wider usage where it's used for expressions like these, where the two terms are merely synonyms. ] ] 16:59, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
= July 24 =
::Such as "lively and quick". ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 18:04, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
::And also ]. ]&nbsp;] 18:42, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
: There's a similar concept in ]s. ] (]) 15:00, 12 January 2025 (UTC)


= January 11 =
== Connecting the unconnectable ==


== Evening and night ==
What is it called when 2 facts that have no connection, other than both relating to the same person, are put together in a sentence like this (from ]):
* ''Of Norwegian ancestry, she had one sibling, Karen "Bear" Ride, who is a Presbyterian minister''.


Does English refer a period from 22:00 to midnight as ''late evening''? Does English ever say "late-evening shows"? And is a period around 17:00 known as ''early evening'', and a period around midnight as ''early night''? And do English speskers ever say "late in the morning"? --] (]) 22:36, 11 January 2025 (UTC)
What has her Norwegian ancestry got to do with how many siblings she had? I see this sort of thing all over WP, and I often wonder what causes editors to combine unrelated facts in this way. I could understand it better if it had been:
* ''Of Norwegian ancestry, she had blue eyes and blonde hair''.


:We say "late evening". The exact time is probably after ]. It could be hyphenated if you like, but isn't. We say "early evening" and "late morning". The phrase "late in the morning" is fine, and not at all awkward, but is not engraved into our English-speaking minds as an idiom like "]". Our article on ] defines the evening as 14:00 to 22:00, so later than that may be night, but in common usage the definition is flexible, and "night" and "evening" undoubtedly overlap. Night shift workers live in a state of confusion about whether it is currently night or morning, and which day it is. ]&nbsp;] 00:59, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
Also, what's the introductory phrase/clause ''Of Norwegian ancestry'' an example of? -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 03:30, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
::Style guides recommend hyphenation in attributive use to avoid the interpretation as "evening shows that are late". &nbsp;--] 09:58, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:Here are a few examples of "late-evening show": , , . And here are a few examples of "late in the morning": , , . &nbsp;--] 09:48, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:In American English "late evening" is not a specific period of time but just a way of saying late in the evening. The distinction between evening and night has less to do with the exact time, and more to do with whether one is out with friends or at home preparing for bed. I would never consider 22-24 late evening (that's night) but others might. There are no "late evening shows"; ] air at that time. "Early night" is not a common idiom. ] (]) 21:52, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
::@]: In British English, "early night" is commonly used to signify going to bed earlier than usual, as in "I'm really tired so I'm going to have an early night." Similarly, "I had a late night last night" suggests having not gone to bed early enough. See . ] (]) 22:41, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
::: We can use "early night" in that sense in American English too (though "make it an early night" sounds a bit more idiomatic to me). But that doesn't seem to be the sense the OP was asking about. --] (]) 22:49, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:<small>This reminds me a lot of when ] said he would smoke marijuana. --] (]) 22:55, 12 January 2025 (UTC) </small>


:It's an ], particularly the ]. I would say it's not totally egregious, since comments about her ancestry and her siblingry both deal with her family(ry). ] (]) 03:59, 24 July 2012 (UTC) My home Internet connection has failed. I reported it to my ISP. I had an email from them yesterday (Sunday) at 5.34pm telling me they would be calling me "today" about the problem. It's now past 10.00am Monday. Still waiting. ] (]) 23:13, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:OK, so they didn't do what they said they were going to do. Imagine my shock. What does it have to do with the question? --] (]) 23:17, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Speaking of "today" as a future time at 5.34pm. ] (]) 23:01, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
::Or they'll call at 23:59, "late today". &nbsp;--] 23:52, 12 January 2025 (UTC)


= January 12 =
:: Maybe not a hanging offence here, but I could find some real doozies. One I saw the other day went something like: ''"Born in 1823, his first success as a composer came with his oratorio "Blah-blah" in 1851"''. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 04:13, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


== Latin alphabet ==
:::There is supposed to be some sort of relevance, and it does raise the question whether all Norwegians have one sibling. ] (]) 04:23, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::: Indeed, and thanks for the answer to my other question. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 06:15, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


Why did Khmer and Lao not switch to Latin alphabet during French colonization, unlike Vietnamese?
:This is a fairly common construction in obituaries, presumably because having one short fact per sentence might enter into Hemingway territory. I knew it wouldn't take me long to find one in the wild; this one is from today's AP science wire:
--] (]) 13:43, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
::''Born on May 26, 1951, in Los Angeles' San Fernando Valley, Ride became fascinated with science early on, playing with a chemistry kit and telescope.''
:I assume you forgot a "not", and it might be since ] was a highly complex writing system only mastered by about 5% of the population. A Latin-based writing system would have been a lot more accessible at the time, both to French colonialists and the majority of the Vietnamese, themselves. ] (]) 13:55, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
:<span style="font-variant:small-caps">]</span> (]) 05:07, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:: Yes, that's right. Given that many of our biographical articles are sourced from obits, it's no wonder that obituary style has crept in all over the place. A lot of editors seems to feel that at least one example of this type of construction per article (sometimes even one per section) is essential for good writing. How mistaken they are. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 06:15, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


:40bus -- Khmer and Lao already had alphabets, since they had experienced significant Indic influence. The Vietnamese did not have an alphabet, since they experienced predominant Chinese influence. The ] and ] were used in what is now Vietnam, but Vietnamese-speakers did not adopt them. ] (]) 06:47, 13 January 2025 (UTC)
:I would say it's a ].--]|] 05:39, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


= January 14 =
:: "Born on May 26" is a (past) ], not a genitive absolute. ''Non sequitur'' is usually used of ]s, not parts of a sentence. ] (]) 06:08, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


== Nuevo! ==
From a strict grammatical sense, the sentence mentioned by JackofOz above is wrong.


A lot of areas of the Spanish Empire in America had a name in the pattern of "New XXX" where XXX is usually a Spanish province or city. Some examples are: ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ]. I'm not able to recognize any pattern or obvious motivation for them to select precisely these names. Why call some place New Extremadura and not, for example, New Catalonia? Where they chosen randomly? Is there any reason behind them? Thank you? ] (]) 10:10, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
* ''"Born in 1823, his first success as a composer came with his oratorio "Blah-blah" in 1851"''


:I don't know the answer, but ] would probably have been the one who decided, or at least approved, some of ]. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} ] (]) 10:22, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
You need a noun, after "Born in 1823", otherwise it is is considered a ]. The sentence should be re-written; one correct version is as follows:


::It's not just the Spanish. An early name for the British part of Australia, and now one of its states, is ]. Apparently ] thought it looked like South Wales. Then just across the ocean is New Zealand. That one came from the Dutch. ] (]) 10:31, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
* ''"Born in 1823, John first experienced success as a composer with his oratorio "Blah-blah" in 1851"''
:::Not to forget New Amsterdam/New York and New Orleans. However, these things aren't consistent as the Spanish also copied names without the Nuevo/Nueva in front, like ] and ]. Would be interesting to see if this was a time-dependent pattern. As to the choice of names, this could well have to do with the individuals involved. E.g. a lot of the ]es came from Extremadura, including ] and ], and Castilia, Granada etc. aren't far from that area either. -- ] (]) 11:18, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
::::{{small|They decided to follow the rule, "Nuevo say neuvo again." ] (]) 21:04, 15 January 2025 (UTC)}}
:::: The English were in a habit of omitting 'new' too. In the US there's Durham, Manchester, Washington. In Australia there's Newcastle. What's notable is all of these are distinctly English names, very old ones with meanings that make sense only to historians. It's highly unlikely they arose the same way in AUS and the US. ~~----
::::::Indeed. In 1940, the Royal Navy was able to rename ] after British and American towns that share a common name. ] (]) 12:12, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
::: The whole Australian mainland was previously known as New Holland. Anything less like Holland it would be impossible to find, but there you go. But at least this recognises that the Dutch were the first Europeans definitely known to have landed on Australia, in ]. -- ] </sup></span>]] 19:12, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
:They probably weren't chosen randomly. Possible reasons include:
:* Naming after the namer's homeland. ] (Chile) was named by ], who was from Extremadura
:* Naming to honour a patron, e.g. New York was named after the Duke of York
:* Naming after a resemblance (New South Wales, as stated above).
:] (]) 11:15, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
:{{small|Nuevo say nuevo again. ] (]) 21:04, 15 January 2025 (UTC)}}
::A variation - Within the town of ], Australia, is what is effectively now the suburb of ]. It apparently gained that name because when it was established, Moe had just become a ]. ] (]) 22:53, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Also the ], a 1965 merger of ] and ]. It was originally intended to be pronounced "New-ham" but is now universally called "Newum". ] (]) 12:04, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
::::It's not obvious to me how "Newum" would be pronounced. It could be "Nee-wum". ] (]) 23:04, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
:::::/ˈnju(w)əm/ ] (]) 23:25, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
:::::{{small|Ni! Peng! ] (]) 21:39, 18 January 2025 (UTC)}}
::::They could have called it Hams Ambo ('both' in Latin), like some other merged parishes; Hambo for short. ] (]) 07:45, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
:Curious that there was a Nueva Castilla in the New World when there was already one in Old Spain. They could have called it Tercera Castilla. ] (]) 21:42, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::Or Nueva Nueva Castilla. &nbsp;--] 00:24, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Or ''Más Nueva Castilla.'' ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 07:45, 20 January 2025 (UTC)


= January 18 =
The original sentence makes it seem that the success (instead of John) was born in 1823, which is illogical. Modifier phrases can be tricky. <sub>] (]) 08:45, 24 July 2012 (UTC)</sub>


== Conlangs allowed here? ==
: Your point is valid (even though Misplaced Pages seems to provide safe haven for as many dangling modifiers as people can dream up). However, this thread wouldn't really be the best place to make your point, as the point of my example was to show the apparent disconnection between being born in 1823 and having his first success as a composer 28 years later. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 08:59, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


Is discussion about conlangs permitted here or is it solely for natural languages? {{User:TheTechie/pp}} <span style="font-family:monospace; font-weight: bold"> <span style="color:ForestGreen;font-size:1.15em"> ]</span> (<span style="color:#324c80">she/they</span> {{pipe}} ]) </span> 02:14, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::JackofOZ: Oops. Sorry this came out the wrong way. I was actually trying to explain to the OP that although connecting seemingly unrelated ideas is discouraged, the English grammar permits us to do so - through the use of phrase modifiers that modify nouns. For example:
:Presumably you're referring to ]. ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 09:45, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::* ''"Born in 1823, John first experienced success as a composer with his oratorio "Blah-blah" in 1851"''
::I believe they are. ] (]) 12:06, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::This sentence is grammatically correct; however, it is tedious to read since it contains two unrelated facts modifying the same noun (John): Grammatically permissible but discouraged. <sub>] (]) 12:42, 24 July 2012 (UTC)</sub>


:In the past, there's occasionally been a little discussion of Esperanto, and I don't remember anybody complaining (see ] for example). Workshopping or promoting your own personal stuff might be perceived differently (depending on how you approach it). ] (]) 13:27, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::: I'm the OP here. Sure, many sentences are perfectly grammatical in themselves, but fail on other grounds, such as illogicality ("Three plus three equals 97"), inaccuracy ("Henry VIII died in 1947"), impossibility ("My father had 7,328 siblings"), etc. The sentences I'm asking about are generally grammatical in themselves but fail on the ground of connecting things that should not be connected. If, in addition, they happen to be constructed ungrammatically via the use of dangling modifiers or whatever else, that's a further nail in their coffin but that is merely the icing on the cake, to mix my metaphors. As I say, I don't disagree with your point, but it's not central to my question. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 20:54, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


: Let's call it a '''kitchen sink sentence'''. I wouldn't be surprised if Fowler's ''Modern English Usage'' has a clever term for it, but it's impossible to find anything in Fowler <small>because I don't know where my copy is</small>. —] (]) 08:09, 25 July 2012 (UTC) ::Was it here or on Wiktionary someone discussed a fable about a goat written, first in some conlang and second, in some Low German dialect between German and Dutch? ] (]) 19:04, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Are you thinking of ]? I imagine that has been translated into many languages, constructed and otherwise. ] (]) 21:41, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
::::Not exactly. It appeared as if some amateur conlanger had constructed something similar, first written in the conlang, and then, for some reason, in that particular German-Dutch dialect. ] (]) 00:22, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
:Why wouldn't or shouldn't it be? --] (]) 15:27, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
:Since ], ]. As long as this page is allowed to be active, conlangs per se are within its scope, but note any question that has little relevance to improving our articles will be frowned upon by at least some, especially if you post multiple such questions within a short period. ] (]) 16:38, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
:The Reference desk attempts to provide services similar to those of a ]. It should be viewed as a supplement to the encyclopedia. Users who are seeking information on a topic post questions here, and the respondents try to find answers to these questions. If you have a question ''about'' conlangs for which you cannot find the answer in our articles on the topic, you are welcome to post the question here.
:Next to being a service to our users, this can also help to signal lacunae in our coverage of encyclopedic topics. &nbsp;--] 19:04, 18 January 2025 (UTC)


= January 19 =
:: Hey, I like that. You should see the ... ''matter'' that is sometimes discovered in my kitchen sink. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 12:08, 25 July 2012 (UTC)


== Questions ==
: Or, better: '''grab bag sentence'''. —] (]) 07:28, 26 July 2012 (UTC)


# Are there any newspapers in Serbia written in Serbian Latin alphabet?
== Spanish translation ==
# Are there any words in English with onsets /kn/, /ps/, /ks/, /tf/, /tv/, /kv/, /pw/, /fθ/ or /ts/?
# Are there any words in English where letter combinations {{angbr|iw}} and {{angbr|uw}} are pronounced as diphthongs, similarly to {{angbr|aw}} and {{angbr|ow}}?
# Are there any words in Spanish where {{angbr|ll}} and {{angbr|ñ}} occur in consonant clusters, as in made-up words ''socllo'', ''mopña'', ''sollto'' and ''liñteda''?
# Are there any words in Spanish where consonant clusters /tθ/, /kθ/, /pθ/, /tx/, /kx/ and /px/ occur, as in made-up words ''lotza'', ''poczo'', ''sopce'', ''totja'', ''hecge'' and ''mapjota''?
# Are there any words in Korean with three consonants in a row? --] (]) 21:02, 19 January 2025 (UTC)


::1 -- You can look at ]. 2 -- Only in a few obviously incompletely-assimilated loanwords, such as "kvetch" or "tsetse fly". 3 -- "Uw" has never been an established English orthographic digraph, as far as I know (though it occurs in some incompletely-assimilated loanwords from Welsh). "Iw" may have been a marginal alternative to "Iu" centuries ago, but when the sounds written by "Iu" and "Eu" merged, there was no longer a real use for it. ] (]) 21:44, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Can someone help me translate this paragrpah for an article? The google translations are a bit hard to understand.--] (]) 03:31, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


::5. I guess -tz- might be found in loanwords from Basque or Native South American languages, but it's possible it might rather be pronounced as /ts/... ] (]) 22:49, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
El sepulcro que contiene los restos de Inés Rodríguez Girón es más pequeño que el que contiene los restos de su esposo. El estilo demuestras que ambos fueron realizados en la misma época. El sepulcro sólo tiene labor escultórica en los costados, pero no en la cabecera ni en los pies. Sobre la tapa del sepulcro aparece colocada la estatua yacente que representa a la difunta. La cabeza de Inés Rodríguez descansa sobre tres almohadones, al igual que la de su esposo.
:::And historic names originating from other languages like ] or ]. There are also words like ''lección'' but the pronounciation is represented as leɡˈθjon/ leɣ̞ˈθjõn rather than kθ. . Ad 4. I don't think those exist either in regular Spanish words. -- ] (]) 11:14, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
*1: Yes, even some of ]: see the front pages for 20 January of , and (the latter also features a Cyrillic-script ad in-between). Although Serbian clearly favours Cyrillic for anything government-operated or Orthodoxy-related, in all other cases the two scripts are in free variation and it all depends on the author's or the publisher's preference.
*6: Orthographically that's possible when a character has a complex final and the next one has a non-silent initial, as in ] ''ilgda''. But phonologically any such clusters are simplified, so the actual pronunciation in this case is /ikt͈a/. --] (]) 00:38, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
*2: I tend to pronounce ''xi'' and ''psi'' as /ksaɪ/ and /psaɪ/ for disambiguation, though I might simplify them to /saɪ/ if only one of them is being used as a variable. Also I'd say ''kvetch'' with /kv/, ''phthalate'' with /fθ/, and ''tsetse'' with /ts/ (though maybe not everyone would). Further I'd use the German pronunciations for the chess borrowings '']'' and '']'' (so the latter gives even initial /tsv/ for me). See also ]. ] (]) 08:23, 20 January 2025 (UTC)


::Double_sharp -- the standard traditional method for distinguishing the letters Xi and Psi in English, without attempting to produce word-initial consonant clusters, is to pronounce Xi with a consonant, as in "Xylophone"... ] (]) 14:57, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
:It's ''demuestra'' , not ''demuestras''. Following google translate with the corrected verb and a few tweaks: "The tomb containing the remains of Inés Rodríguez Girón is smaller than the one containing the remains of her husband. The style shows that both were done at the same time. The tomb only has sculpture work on the sides, but not at the head or feet. On the lid of the tomb appears a recumbent statue representing the deceased. Ines Rodriguez's head rests on three pillows, like that of her husband." ] (]) 03:44, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::{{ping|AnonMoos}} I'm aware that it's standard (like "xylophone", "xylem", and "xenon"). Unfortunately I've heard xi with /s/ enough times (it's mentioned in ) that I don't trust anything but the clusters to disambiguate them by now. :) ] (]) 14:21, 21 January 2025 (UTC)


:*4: There are some words with prefix + ll- such as ] or ]. --] (]) 16:44, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
== expression about Great Inventions ==


= January 20 =
''"It is solemnly hoped that someday a genius will come along and invent something that will make golf unnecessary."'' It's is just one of the ten expressions I'm studying and I don't understand what it means. Any insight about it is appreciated. ] (]) 07:06, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


== What's the common phrasing in spoken English? Is it "Not Always do I buy", "Not only does he buy but he also sells", "Not necessarily do we know", and likewise? ==
:* ''""'' -> I/We wish that
:* ''""'' -> at some time in the future
:* ''""'' -> a clever person
:* ''""'' -> will make something new that will
:* ''""'' mean that golf is not needed
:"I wish that at some time in the future a clever person will make something new that will mean that golf is not needed" - that is, the writer does not enjoy the game of ], so he/she is making a joke that they want someone to have an idea that means they don't need to play any more. - ] (]) 07:22, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
::That sounds like something ] would write. Of course, is golf really ''necessary'' to begin with? ] <sup>(]&#124;])</sup> 07:45, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


] (]) 16:05, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
: What is the context in which you're studying these ten expressions? Who chose them, and what are you hoping to achieve? -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 08:09, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


This seems like a caption to a cartoon in ]. A google search gets a bunch of posts in fora around Nov 2011 and nothing else. ] (]) 22:22, 24 July 2012 (UTC) :<small>We don't necessarily know what's the common phrasing. At least I don't always buy into your proposed ordering of the words. scnr -- ] (]) 16:09, 20 January 2025 (UTC)</small>


:The common wording for the first and third is "I don't always buy ..." and "We don't necessarily know ...". For the second, the wording you've suggested is possible, but "He not only buys but also sells" would perhaps be more frequently encountered. ] (]) 16:20, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
== Correct sentence ==


Thx all. ] (]) 18:47, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Check which of the following sentences (bold parts) are correct according to English grammar.<br>
1) I am good at Maths, Physics, Biology, '''History, etc'''.<br>
I am good at Maths, Physics, Biology, '''History etc'''.<br>
2) Mahatma Gandhi said, "Honesty is the best policy'''."'''<br>
Mahatma Gandhi said, "Honesty is the best policy'''".'''<br>--Sunny Singh 14:30, 24 July 2012 (UTC) <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) </span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
:We ''know'' that these are homework questions, because we had to do questions like these ourselves. Have a look at our article ] and also check your textbook or class notes. Note that comma rules vary in English-speaking countries, and punctuation of reported speech can differ between manuscript and printed text. Come back if you still have questions. ] (]) 14:37, 24 July 2012 (UTC)<!--


= January 21 =
I know two sentences are correct of above sentences according to American English. It is not my homework, I asked it myself. Please, tell me correct sentences with respect to American English.Sunny Singh 14:53, 24 July 2012 (UTC) <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) </span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->


== Why can you say that someone is "on meth" but not "on cigarettes"? ==
:It's not actually "grammar" at all, but differing punctuation conventions... ] (]) 15:37, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


]<sub>]<sub>]</sub></sub> (]/]) 00:42, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
The first of each pair is the correct sentence. I have never seen anyone use ''etc.'' without a preceding comma. (It needs a period after it, BTW, since it is an abbreviation.) The placement of a period outside of quotation marks is encouraged at[REDACTED] when the punctuation isn't logically part of the quote itself. This can contradict standard usage which demands we always place the punctuation inside. In this case[REDACTED] would go with convention and the first sentence, since Gandhi made a complete statement ending in a period that we are quoting in full. See ]. But keep in mid those guidelines are not generally accpeted, most people still insist that this example[REDACTED] gives as correct:
:''Arthur said that the situation was "deplorable".''
is improper. I happen to prefer wikipedia's conventions and use it wherever I am not writing according to a teacher's or employer's standard. ] (]) 17:17, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
: When you say "standard usage" and "most people", I think you mean "standard usage in the USA" and "most people in the USA". Elsewhere, there is no rule demanding we always place the punctuation inside. If the punctuation is not inherently part of the quotation but simply part of the sentence in which the quotation appears, it is placed outside the quotation in most parts of the anglo world. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 20:26, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Can you give a reference for an English or Australian manual of style published before 1990 which would mandate in favor of the period outside the quotes format of the "Arthur" example above? I have a Kiwi friend aged 50 who would have a heart attack if he saw that in print. I have never heard that the US has some odd preference in this matter compared to tradition. ] (]) 22:14, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
::Wouldn't wikipedia's conventions downcase "honesty"? See . --] (]) 19:03, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::No, that change to the MOS was ill-considered and not in accord with the usual capitalization of quotations that are complete sentences. I've just reverted it. ] (]) 19:22, 24 July 2012 (UTC)


:In large part because one usually doesn't speak of the effects of cigarette use as if it's socially peculiar or of note. I would say, for example, something like "I'm on nicotine patches" though, since that's a comparatively unusual regimen. <span style="border-radius:2px;padding:3px;background:#1E816F">]<span style="color:#fff">&nbsp;‥&nbsp;</span>]</span> 00:55, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
::::Reference for Medeis's query: Fowler's ''A Dictionary of Modern English Usage (Second Edition)'' (published by the ] copyright 1968, reprinted 1982 (with corrections) says, under its section on 'Stops' sub-heading 'Inverted Commas' starting with the first full paragraph of the second column on page 591:
:You could, but the implication would be decidedly odd. Like you're using cigarettes as part of a medical regime, 'I'm on cigarettes to manage my anger' or similar. ] (]) 04:27, 21 January 2025 (UTC)


:It's kind of a subset of the general expression that someone is "on drugs", which implies "illegal" drugs. If you're on prescription drugs, you would probably say you're "on medication". ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 04:35, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
:::::''Questions of order between inverted commas and stops are much debated and a writer's personal preference often conflicts with the style rules of editors and publishers. There are two schools of thought, which might be called the conventional and the logical. The conventional prefers to put stops within the inverted commas, if it can be done without ambiguity, on the ground that this has a more pleasing appearance. The logical punctuates according to sense, and puts them outside except when they actually form part of the quotation.''
::Probably because cigarettes/tobacco don't have much effect on someone's behaviour. I've seen people described (or describing themselves) as being high "on caffeine", but only if they've drunk enough for it to noticeably affect them. ] (]) 17:22, 22 January 2025 (UTC)


:because "meth" is a substance and "cigarette" is the carrier. ] (]) 06:07, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
::::It is the logical format that I was taught in Canada in the 1950s. Neither Gowers (who did the revisions in the second edition) nor Fowler ranked one above the other.
::but you wouldn't say 'I'm on tobacco' either. ] (]) 07:12, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
:::Maybe it's for the same reason that we don't say "beer users"? Smoking tobacco is seen as a (somewhat less than it was in recent years) socially acceptable activity and not really considered drug use. ] (]) 07:19, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
::::{{small| &nbsp;--]}} &nbsp;--] 09:46, 22 January 2025 (UTC)


:It's worth pointing out that you ''can'' say it, but it might make someone wonder what ''you'' are on. ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 11:44, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
::::I also have a copy of The Macmillan Company's (New York) English Arts and Skills (1961), published for use in grade 10 of the Catholic Education Division which says the following on page 375, all in bold face:
::{{small|On leave (from being on meth)? &nbsp;--] 09:40, 22 January 2025 (UTC)}}
:::::''3. When the end of the quotation is also the end of the sentence, the period falls inside the quotation marks.'' (examples omitted)
:::::''4. If the quoted words are a question or an exclamation, the question mark or the exclamation point falls inside the quotation marks.'' (examples omitted)
:::::''5. If the entire sentence is a question or an exclamation, the exclamation point or question mark falls outside the quotation marks.'' (examples omitted)


= January 22 =
::::Nothing wishy-washy when the representatives of the Pope speak. ] (]) 23:52, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::Thanks, Bielle, that's great. Odd to see the British preferring the logical over the traditional, given their spelling habits. I am surprised I never came across this in school, since we were warned of the royalist's generally bad habits. Perhaps it would have been too tempting. My Enzed friend will have a heart attack. ] (]) 02:54, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:::::: We like to say the NZers are "more English than the English". How refreshing to find a counter-example. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 04:23, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: ''etc.'' without a preceding comma doesn't bother me (unlike Medeis). I'm also anti-]. —] (]) 08:38, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::::::Medeis, if you look again at the quotation from Fowler' text, you will note that no preference is stated. In fact, as I read it, it is a very nice example of NPOV with respect to the two then-prevalent patterns. ] (]) 16:18, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:Only one of those sentences is correct in American English. Math is not maths so both in that set are wrong. ] (]) 19:27, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::Even I knew the OP wasn't asking for the correct way to abbreviate mathematics. You tempt me to . ] (]) 22:23, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

== Italian after French - what to concentrate on ==

I'm learning Italian now after learning French quite deeply (for a foreign language), and am finding it quite easy due to how similar they are. Of course, this comes at a cost: while I can quickly guess the meaning of almost any sentence, perhaps I come to the wrong conclusion. So, are there "false friends" or the like for an English speaker who's learned French and is learning Italian? What are things to focus on (missing from French but in Italian; or quite different in Italian while resembling the French structurally; or simply structural differences I might not notice, producing sentences "a la francaise" without noticing how different Italian is.) Thanks. <span style="font-size: smaller;" class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 15:50, 24 July 2012 (UTC)</span><!-- Template:Unsigned IP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:You could try looking at , or . - ] (]) 16:02, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

:: thank you; I would appreciate even more like this. Neither link has any grammar mentioned at all. As someone who learned French well as an adult, it's tempting to "assume" things behave the same. I guess the French might have less of a problem seeing the differences (just as when learning German it's not really similar to English to me as an English speaker, and I don't use a lot of anglicisms; but Romance language speakers who first learn English then German or vice versa tend to get a lot more jumbled up!!). ] (]) 16:19, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

: You might have to be careful with auxiliary verbs: ''sono stato'' vs ''j'ai été''. —] (]) 08:41, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

== French poem translation ==

Hello, I would like to kindly request a translation of a poem by ] found . I'm interested in understanding what the poem tries to convey, so it would be nice to know what a french-speaker perceives from this poem in its original form. (For some reason the text uses double slashes for line breaks and quotation marks for stanza breaks.) Thanks in advance. --] (]) 15:59, 24 July 2012 (UTC)
: has another variant of that poem (scroll down to Phénixologie). --] (]) 18:29, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

Fine then, here's the text in poem form if it helps anyone translate. I had been warned to not put poems here because of copyright but whatever, I guess.
<blockquote>" phenixologie" à Lucien Clergue photographe ". Poësie autographe, signée. Baux-de-provence, 1959 ; une page 1 / 2 in-4. Au début cette note du poëte. " Ce poëme doit paraître comme préface à l'album des photographies de Lucien Clergue prises autour du travail de mon fil : Le teStament d'orphée.<br>

:Jusqu'où veut aller ce rêve taciturne ?
:le monde en soi-même était mal travesti
:la gloire abusant de son soleil nocturne
:nimbait une Minerve au visage menti.

:On les connaît ces espions romanesques
:en fatal équilibre au bord de l'âge mûr
:De Chef-d'oeuvre en Chef-d'OEuvre elles deviennent fresques
:Douze jeunes soldats les clouant contre un mur.

:Un pied sur le sol ferme un autre dans le sang
:Je boîte vers l'appel du Val d'enfer des Baux
:j'entre par les trous d'une funèbre éponge
:Dans la nuit attentive au choix de nos tombeaux.''</blockquote>

If you're having trouble with the meaning, then the translation alone will do. I really think it's not that long. Again, thanks in advance. --] (]) 01:39, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:The version above hardly seems correct. I have found this :

::“Jusqu’où veut-il aller ce rêve taciturne
::où le monde en soi-même était travesti
::Où la gloire brillait de son soleil nocturne
::Nimbant une Minerve au visage meurtri.

::On les connaît ces espionnes romanesques
::En total équilibre au bord de l`âge mûr
::De chef-d’oeuvre en chef-d'oeuvre elles deviennent fresques
::Douze jeunes soldats les clouant contre un mur

::Un pied sur le sol ferme un autre dans le songe
::Je boite vers lappel du Val d’Enfer des Baux
::Et j’orne par les trous de sa funèbre éponge
::Une nuit attentive au choix de mes tombeaux.”


Here's a ''very'' loose and imperfect translation based on what I suspect is a flawed original lacking proper punctuation at best:

:“Jusqu’où veut-il aller ce rêve taciturne
::How far does this taciturn dream wish to go
:où le monde en soi-même était travesti
::where the world-in-itself was disguised,
:Où la gloire brillait de son soleil nocturne
::where shone the glory of the midnight sun,
:Nimbant une Minerve au visage meurtri.
::haloing a Minerva with a bruised face?

:On les connaît ces espionnes romanesques
::They were known, these novelesque spies
:En total équilibre au bord de l`âge mûr
::all balanced on the edge of middle age
:De chef-d’oeuvre en chef-d'oeuvre elles deviennent fresques
::from masterpiece to masterpiece they become frescoes:
:Douze jeunes soldats les clouant contre un mur
::twelve young soldiers, stuck against a wall

:Un pied sur le sol ferme un autre dans le songe
::one foot on solid earth, the other in a dream
:Je boite vers lappel du Val d’Enfer des Baux
::I limp towards the call from the valley of a leased-out hell
:Et j’orne par les trous de sa funèbre éponge
::and I ornament with the holes of its funereal sponge
:Une nuit attentive au choix de mes tombeaux.”
::for one careful night, the choice of my tomb

] (]) 05:15, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:"''Douze jeunes soldats les clouant contre un mur''" should be "twelve young soldiers <s>stucking</s> sticking them against a wall" — ] (]) 07:30, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:::I interpreted the subject and verb as inverted here, seeing the soldiers (the twelve apostles?) turned to frescoes--a huge problem is the omitted punctuation--and the feminine form espionne makes no sense. Maybe the soldiers are nailing the spies. ] (]) 16:21, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::I limp towards the Hell Valley of ]. ... I decorate through the holes (or, with the holes) of its funereal sponge//a night that is attentive to the choice of my tomb. Near the start, "travestied" is closer than "disguised", with the possibility of the transvestism connotation. ] (]) 07:49, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: I don't think that "''Val d'Enfer des Baux''" should be translated, may be it's worth a note to give an explanation. As mentionned here above is a village located in South of France. Baux, in Occitan language, means "overhang", "cliff", "rocky escarpment" (see French WP ). This meaning is far away from "leased-out"! "''Val d'Enfer''" means "Hell valley". It's a common name for a place in France. I don't know if such a place exists in les Baux-de-Provence. (Aside: bauxite, the mineral from which aluminium is extracted, has its name derived from "Les Baux-de-Provence") — ] (]) 07:53, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::Thank you all for the translations and corrections. I think I can discern the meaning of most of the poem after chewing it over for a while. I don't think I'll ever find out what the heck a ''"funereal sponge"'' is, though... :) ] (]) 15:46, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

In hindsight the fact that Baux is capitalized leaves only the option of a place name. "Disguised" goes well with "the world in itself". A funeral sponge is used to clean the body before burial, which goes along with the twelve spies nailed to the wall--imagine the painting of the last supper.

:(ec) Well, that solves the funeral sponge mystery! Baux is indeed where the poem was signed (and/or written?). The soldiers being the ] is an interesting idea, but as you remarked above, the 12 soldiers seem to be the ones who pin the spies-turned-frescoes onto the wall, and the spies themselves are female to begin with. --] (]) 16:33, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::Don'r rely on the translation being right; neither quoted version of the poem seems entirely correct. The accents and almost the certainly the punctuation is incorrect in both. If ''éponge'' were supposed to be ''épongé'', for example, the meaning would be totally different. If anyone has a better source he should speak up. ] (]) 01:39, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:::The accents seem correct except in the bilingual part: "Je boite vers lappel du Val d’Enfer des Baux" should spell "Je boîte vers l'appel du Val d'Enfer des Baux". If you are particular: "chef-d'œuvre", not "chef d'oeuvre" (ligature). And trust me, it cannot be "épongé" instead of éponge. About the ponctuation: a full stop/period seems to be missing after "mur". Cocteau could have not use commas on purpose. — ] (]) 08:12, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::::But compare lines 3-6 above: ''menti/meurtri'', ''fatal/total'', ''abusant/brillait'', etc. The second version generally seems more likely, but not in all cases, and it is not unflawed. I don't think we can be sure we are translating what was actually written. ] (]) 21:23, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::::: You are absolutly right. But it is possible that there exists at least two variants. I don't think it's matter of accentuation nor punctuation (in all variants commas are not used). Unfortunatly, it is obvious that all Web copies are flawed.
::::: '''catalogue.drouot.com:''' "autour du travail de mon fil : Le teStament d'orphée" → "autour du travail de mon film : Le Testament d'Orphée"; "ces espions romanesques ... elles deviennent fresques" → "ces espionnes romanesques ... elles deviennent fresques" or (I don't think so) "ces espions romanesques ... ils deviennent fresques" ; upper cases missing at the beginning of some verses.
::::: '''passouline.blog.lemonde.fr:''' "où le monde en soi-même était travesti" → "Où le monde en soi-même était travesti"; "De chef-d’oeuvre elles deviennent fresques" → "De chef-d’œuvre en chef-d'œuvre elles deviennent fresques"; "Je boite vers lappel du Val d’Enfer des Baux" → "Je boîte vers l'appel du Val d’Enfer des Baux"
:::::'''oversized.over-blog.com/article-kholle-de-litte-numero-3-48457525.html''': "où le monde en soi-même était travesti" → "Où le monde en soi-même était travesti"; "Je boite vers lappel du Val d’Enfer des Baux" → "Je boîte vers l'appel du Val d’Enfer des Baux"
::::: — ] (]) 08:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== Six questions left in french ==

I'm looking for a clear and concise way of saying "There are six questions left" for a questionnaire in French that will be read by French native speakers. My co-worker and I are French-as-a-second-language, so we can't quite tell what to say, but nothing we can think of feel right.

We have so far (accents not included)
* Il y a six questions a la fin
* Il y a six questions en suspense
* Il y a six question de plus

Any other ideas? ] (]) 22:26, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

*Il y a six questions qui reste
*Il reste seulement six questions
--] ] 22:37, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

''Il reste seulement six questions'' should be ''Ils restent seulement six questions.'' and ''Il y a six questions qui reste'' should be ''Il y a six questions qui restent.''
] (]) 02:26, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: "''Il reste seulement six questions''" is the correct sentence. Because "''Il reste''" is a "''forme impersonnelle''", like "''il pleut''". Hence the singular form. Whereas "''Il y a six questions en suspense''" should be "''Il y a six questions en suspens.''" Aside: "''Il reste six questions.''" seems to be the more concise. — ] (]) 07:18, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: One more: "''Six questions restantes...''" — ] (]) 08:31, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::Il ne reste que six questions. Il ne vous reste que six questions. But I'm only near-native, like fhe ofher responses here. You need a native speaker to adjudicate now, preferably someone who has designed questionnaires. ] (]) 09:42, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Juste encore six petites questions. Et maintenant pour les dernières questions (il n'en vous reste que six).] (]) 09:46, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::::correction: (il ne vous en reste que six) --] (]) 10:27, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::How did I do that! How would you say it XuXl? ] (]) 10:35, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::Aldo's a native speaker, Judith. And Xuxl too? ] (]) 10:59, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::: The best sentence? It depends on the tone of the questionnaire. In most of cases, the simpler, the better! As a French native speaker, I would say : "''Il reste six questions.''"; if the questionnaire is very long: "''Il ne reste que six questions.''" — ] (]) 15:32, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
Then how about ''Il y a six questions qui restent''? Please tell me the subject-verb agreement is correct. ] (]) 16:05, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
: Perfect French! — ] (]) 16:10, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

== Have an Arabic speaker translate this Qadafi capture video ==
{{formerly|Have an ] speaker translate this ] capture video}}

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy1dsO-jKd0&feature=player_embedded&bpctr=1343175474&skipcontrinter=1

See, all I understand from the video is "Moammar!" and "''Allahu Akbar," (God is Great.)

This was an exciting day for Libyans and pro-democracy individuals worldwide. The moment marked the fall of a die-hard dictator after a rule that spanned longer than I've been alive.

This is why that moment is worth translating.

Now, could anyone translate everything else that was said in the video? I know it's quite a lot of shouts, but please translate whatever is intelligible. Thanks. --] (]) 23:50, 24 July 2012 (UTC)

:In harmony with ] (point 13: Section headings), I am changing the heading of this section from <b>Have an ] speaker translate this ] capture video</b> to <b>Have an Arabic speaker translate this Qadafi capture video</b>—in order to enable links to the archived section. In the future, someone may wish to link to this discussion in the archives, and square brackets in headings hinder the functioning of section links. See ] (September 2009).
:—] (]) 15:02, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

= July 25 =

== Dustman's hat ==

What is a dustman's hat? <span style="font-size: smaller;" class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 00:59, 25 July 2012 (UTC)</span><!-- Template:Unsigned IP --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
:Like http://www.rosemerena.org/home/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/goodolddays4.gif. And that's a ''dustman's 'at'', by the way. You must get the accent right. ] (]) 02:34, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:If you're talking about the lyrics of ], then I don't think it means any more than "a hat worn by a ]". Even more mysterious are the "gor blimey trousers". ] (]) 06:13, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::That's because they are ]. But it might have originally been . ] (]) 06:30, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:: Trousers that inspire a ] derived from ''God blind me!''. —] (]) 08:44, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
Real ]s (not ]s) are more likely to say something that sounds closer to "dastman" than "dustman". Then again, I am a real Cockney and I say "dustman". ]. Cockneys in a marketplace selling stuff by the pound (weight) for £1 will shout something that sounds like "a pan a pan". And we come from "Landon". Further to the speculation in that old WP:RD/L link, I'd guess that cor-blimey trousers is a pun on ]. But that's 100% OR. --] (]) 08:52, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: Also as worn by Stanley Holloway as in '']''. I dont know if it has a special name, but it's clearly designed to protect the dustman's head and neck from stuff falling out of bins (in the days when they lifted the bins onto their shoulders to tip them into the dust cart, rather than pulling them along on wheels and letting machinery do the lifting). A drawing of a more extravagant example is shown . ] (]) 08:57, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:::It's called a fan-tail (or fan-tailed) hat. We don't (yet) have an article on it, but it is listed in our ]. The OED has only one citation, but Googling "fan-tailed hat" confirms this usage.--]|] 15:48, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

== tʃ and ʨ ==

What's the difference between the ] and the simple tʃ? The recording on the VAPA article sounds to me just as if the speaker were saying tʃatʃ. ] (]) 02:17, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:Maybe you could ''give a link'' to the article you're talking about? ] (]) 02:43, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::I did. It's the only link in my question, aside from the links to my userspace. ] (]) 02:53, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:::<del>I am sorry, but when I look up the ] article, it has nothing to do with what you are talking about.</del> Oh, never mind. I see what you meant. ] (]) 03:37, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::::I still can't listen to the audio, even after having downloaded the driver from Java. I have my guesses about the difference in pronunciation from the written description, but don't want to give you ''polno hovno''. Maybe someone can suggest why I, who use windows 7 on a gateway nv78, am having such trouble listening to the file? ] (]) 04:55, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:Nyttend: Unless you have an extraordinarily sensitive and well trained ear, it's going to take you a long time to recognize the difference between tʃ and ʨ, especially in recordings. It's just too subtle a difference for the ear of an English speaker. You're just going to have to take it on faith that the difference is enormous and easily recognizable by natives of languages that distinguish the sounds. It took me months of hard practice to learn to distinguish and reproduce these sounds when I was learning Polish, and even after ten years of living in the country, I still have difficulty pronouncing them correctly. For that matter, try convincing a Polish learner of English that the English words "bad", "bat", "bed" and "bet" are all pronounced very differently, and you'll get a blank stare. ] (]) 06:31, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
::Is there any effort to create images of mouths as they produce certain sounds? I might better be able to understand this sound if I could be given a visual depiction of how I could approximate ʨ. ] (]) 12:12, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:::I don't know about pictures, but I can describe how to make the sound. The tʃ sound is made by placing the tip of the tongue on the palatal ridge, and the ʨ is made the exact same way, but with a spot more in the middle of the tongue. Try it and see if you can hear and feel the difference. ] (]) 16:33, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:::@Nyttend: That's not going to help you much, either. The difference is far too subtle for an English speaker to hear. You're going to have to have a real live speaker of Polish (or other language with these sounds) sit in front of you for hours over several days before you can reliably recognize the difference, and for a lot more hours over the space of a month or more before you can reliably reproduce it. At first, you might hear no difference at all. Like I said, even after ten years of speaking Polish living in Poland, I still have some problem with pronouncing it correctly unless I speak slowly and deliberately. ] (]) 17:28, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:::::I just found Bakmoon's suggestion very helpful, and have no problem telling the difference between the two sounds pronounced. ] (]) 22:11, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

::::::As an English speaker who can tell the difference between these sounds, I have found it frustrating to try to get other people to say them when telling them about such-and-such word in whatever language I happen to be studying / discussing with them: "No, you're saying , it's ." "Oh, OK, so it's ." "That's the same sound as the first one you made!" At least to my ear, the way is articulated causes it to sound slightly more "high-pitched" almost. It has that very characteristically Russian palatal noise to it, if you're familiar with that, though I doubt that description is particularly helpful for someone who cannot already differentiate the sounds. Bakmoon's description of the way the sound is created is good, and will likely cause many people to generate the sound correctly. (There is always that small risk when giving people descriptions of how to make a sound that they will exaggerate it and produce some other sound though, which is why it's easiest when you can hear the sound as the person is making it.) &nbsp;] <sup>(])</sup> 08:13, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:I've searched for Serbo-Croatian samples on Forvo. In most Serbian dialects, <ć> /tɕ/ and <č> /tʂ/ are well-distinguished: you will certainly hear the difference in , and possibly hear the difference or /tɕ/ from English /tʃ/. Also check out , featuring /dʑ/. In many Croatian dialects, there is a merger. For example, both speakers pronounce (]) with . However, the female at has pretty clear . Hope this helps. ] (]) 09:47, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

== Help discussing with another user in Turkish ==

If you can help, please visit ]. Understanding of ] is not required! Thanks. --] (]) 09:58, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

== Anabolic effect ==

I often heard that doing squat has the anabolic effect on biceps. Here, what is the meaning of "Anabolic effect" or "Anabolic"? Thanks--] (]) 10:19, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

: What is the meaning you have in mind for "doing squat"? I can think of at least 2 equally likely meanings. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 12:02, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

:''Embiggening''. The word ''anabolic'' originates from the Greek for ''mound'', and ] speaks of "building up". (I have no idea why a leg exercise would build up the arm muscles, but I won't question these things in case I'm made to try them. )]&nbsp;] 15:48, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

*] effects are generally thought of as hormonal changes that promote muscle growth, such as increases in ]. In a strictly technical sense, though, any type of muscle growth is an anabolic process, regardless of what produces it. Any type of weightlifting causes anabolic effects that promote muscle growth throughout the body, but the effects are not likely to be very large on muscles that are not directly exercised. Doing bicep exercises is likely to have a much larger effect. By the way, there are many different kinds of squats, as described in our ] article. ] (]) 15:54, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:However, "doing squat" also has an informal meaning of "doing absolutely nothing". ] (]) 17:32, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:: Hence my question above, seeking to know what the OP meant by that expression. The answers will vary wildly depending on what they're actually asking about. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 22:24, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Precisely, Jack; Looie and Card Zero didn't seem to observe your question. ] (]) 06:05, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
::::I observed it, but I was 99.99% certain which meaning the OP intended. ] (]) 21:46, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
::::: Whence came that certainty? -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 23:44, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

== Voiceless alveolo-palatal sibilant ==

How do I say /ɕ/? --] (]) 20:01, 25 July 2012 (UTC)
:There is on ]. Are you able to load it? ] <sup>(]&#124;])</sup> 20:05, 25 July 2012 (UTC)

= July 26 =

==Vowels/Consonants at the End of Many Female/Male Names==
How come in a lot of languages female names generally end with a vowel or a vowel-like sound (a, e, i, o, u) while male names generally end with a consonant or a consonant-like sound (ex. "Philippe" in French)? ] (]) 04:01, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:] is male. Be that as it may, the Latin-based languages typically have a trailing "a" to denote feminine gender, so it's reasonable they would do likewise with female names, including those derived from male names. "Paul" and "Paula" come to mind in English. You also have names like "Maria" and "Mario". ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 04:39, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
<small>moved here from the miscellaneous desk ] (]) 05:02, 26 July 2012 (UTC)</small>

::The OP didn't say that people named "Philippe" were female. He was saying that although it ends in a vowel spelling-wise, it has a consonant sound at the end pronunciation-wise. And yes, Mario ends with a vowel sound but that is, IMO, an exception to what the OP has observed. They did say "generally" after all. And in general, they're right. And looking at the US in the article ], the OP is correct... in general. The most popular names in 2011 for the US were Jacob, Mason, William, Jayden, Noah, Michael, Ethan, Alexander, Aiden, and Daniel. And those that don't end in a consonant sound generally end in an 'O' sound such as Mario, Alejandro, Santiago, and Mateo. <span style="font-family:monospace;">]</span>|] 05:08, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

This phenomenon is largely restricted to the ]. See ]. The -ā feminine is found in ], ], and ]. In ] the -ā feminine changed to -ō. In the ] the -ī feminine (Kali, Devi) was generalized. In the Semitic languages one finds an -(a)t feminine. ] (]) 05:12, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:The -o and -a found in ]s, with the -a changed to -e in French, result from the reduced ] and ]s of Latin. The masculine consonat-final declension is common to Greek, Slavic and Latin, if not more widespread. ] (]) 05:18, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
::The ] and the ] except the ] lack gender. The latter probably acquired it as a reanlysis of its ] system in conjunction with ] form the ] which, like the ] and the ] gennerally have a four-part ] system. ] (]) 05:23, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Many female Japanese names end in ''-ko'' ("child") or ''-mi'' ("beauty") , but all Japanese names which do not end in syllabic -n end in a vowel. ] (]) 05:28, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:Medeis -- The -i feminine of Sanskrit seems to have developed partly in compensation for the fact that the "a", "e", and "o" vowels of Indo-European mrged in Sanskrit. ] (]) 06:27, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
::My understanding was this was a common ] feature. ] has parallel feminine nouns in -i. See , scroll to page 76.
:::Merger of "a", "e", and "o" to "a" was also a common proto-Indo-Iranian change, but I only mentioned Sanskrit because you spoke of "Indic languages"... ] (]) 03:18, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

The ] Marius and the ] Maria have separate etymologies, although Maria could potentially be a feminine version of the Latin '']'' Marius. ] (]) 05:37, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

----
The original noun feminine suffix in the Semitic languages was "t", but a disappearance of word-final "t" after an "a" vowel in several languages has resulted in an appearance that "-a" is the Semitic feminine suffix, coincidental with Indo-European (though if you put such a feminine noun in the construct state, or the plural, or add a pronominal suffix, then the "t" will suddenly re-appear). However, the original form of "Maria" is "Miryam" or "Maryam", so it does not have such an "-a(t)" suffix... ] (]) 06:22, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
----
To summarise and expand some of the answers above: in Latin and Greek (and the Slavonic languages), most masculine ''nouns'' end in a consonant, and many or most feminine nouns end in '-a'. Since many of our names come from Latin or Greek, many of them show the same pattern. As a matter of fact, Germanic (including Old English) did not show this pattern strongly, and many of the female names listed in ] do not end in '-a', though some do. --] (]) 19:17, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::Am I wrong in remembering that there were native feminine Germanic words ending in ''-o'' due to the shift from ''a'' to ''o''? ] (]) 21:16, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

: I'm not sure what the backstory is behind the name ]. ]&nbsp;] 19:44, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
::It is common for people in France and Spain (at least) to have two names: one personal, one that of a saint. The first name is the personal name and is gender-specific: the saint's name is not, it could be the favourite saint of the mother (or even a favourite relative). So you could have John-Paul or John-Mary: in both cases, the bearer is male. --] (]) 21:09, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm not sure I accept the OP's original premise. Just looking at names that are common and have a long history in the English-speaking world, for example, I find for example the following men's names that end in vowel sounds: Andrew, Anthony, Matthew, Henry, and the following women's names that end in consonant sounds: Jane, Joan, Catherine, Anne (which probably between them accounted for half the women in England in, say, the 16th C). In Italian (and a lesser extent Spanish), both male and female names frequently end in vowels as vowel-endings are the norm for nouns in Italian and very common in Spanish.

In European names very broadly, you could probably make a good case for a specific vowel sound (or group of similar sounds) - ''a'' (or a reduced version of it) being a strong marker of a female name and being generally avoided as an ending for male names (although the schwa at the end of Peter - and more modern names often borrowed from surnames or occupations like Hunter, Taylor etc. - sounds the same as a reduced ''a'' in non-rhotic dialects of English, though any spelling as -a rather than -er etc. such as Peta would strike me immediately as a female form). This probably comes from the Latin -a ending as ColinFine comments.

Also, just on ColinFine's point about masculine names ending in consonsants in Latin, it's worth keeping in mind that although the nominative of 2nd declension nouns ends in -us, the root is actually -o (the ''s'' is a nominative marker) and it's the -o root form which has survived in some of Latin's daughter languages (Marcus > Marco, Antonius > Antonio and so on). ] (]) 22:48, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

: There's also a well-known Elizabeth often seen loitering about the place. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 23:43, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::"Elizabeth" is a slightly strange case -- it's Elišeβaʕ אלישבע in Hebrew, without special feminine ending (actually ending in a ] consonant), but it was transferred into Greek as Ελεισαβεθ, as if it had a Semitic -t feminine ending (though it didn't)... ] (]) 00:13, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== Suicide Bridge by Ian Sinclair ==

Maybe a long shot but does anyone know if the 1979 story "Suicide Bridge" by Ian Sinclair refers to Hornsey Lane Bridge\Archway in London? ] (]) 11:11, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
:en:WP => ''Writer Iain Sinclair's epic poem Suicide Bridge takes its title from a local nickname for the Archway Bridge.'' Grey Geezer 11:17, 18 July 2012 (UTC) <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) </span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
::If you're going to give us a reference from Misplaced Pages, please link to the article, so we can see whether or not it is reliably sourced. I haven't found that quotation in ], <s>]</s>, ] or ], though ] confirms (with references, unlike ]) that the name is used for that bridge. --] (]) 11:53, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
::I take it back, the quote is in ], but lower down. It is, however, unreferenced, and is therefore of no value in answering the question. --] (]) 11:55, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Several times in blogs (...) Maybe . Otherwise nothing in GoogleBooks. Grey Geezer 13:03, 18 July 2012 (UTC) <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) </span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->

:::: ] (]) 13:13, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::I don't see any mention of Iain Sinclair in the article Bus stop cited. He is mentioned in the source Grey Geezer found, but it does not mention his novel or the idea behind it, and it only mentions the bridge in passing. --] (]) 21:48, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::My mistake. I misunderstood. ] (]) 21:55, 18 July 2012 (UTC)
{{reopen}}
:::::::Thanks anyway. Actually, that article you mentioned will help me write the article. I'm not sure if I will include Ian Sinclair. ] (]) 09:15, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

Wasn't this question already asked recently? ] (]) 16:37, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

: Yes. The OP reopened it in order to thank a respondent. Very courteous behaviour. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 23:40, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

== Street mouth? ==

The place where a river meets a lake or a sea is a river mouth. Is there an analogous name for the place where a street meets a square? Mouth? Exit? — ]<sup>]</sup> 16:15, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:Junction. At the junction of Foo Street and Bar Square. End. At the Bar Square end of Foo Street. --] ] 18:38, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
Thanks a lot, Tagishsimon! — ]<sup>]</sup> 19:20, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

: "The mouth of a river" is on my list of "10 Best (or Worst) Euphemisms". (It's not like the contents of the river are vomited into the ocean.) A more anatomically accurate term would be "the anus of a river". -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 23:37, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::It's pretty much a linguistic universal that body parts are used for geographical and direction descriptions such as ''foot of the mountain''. (In Slavic, the cognate word for foot, ''pid'', in my family's dialect, means beneath) Such terms are common with the indigenous peoples of Siberia. Equations of body parts with concepts of nature such as leaf=ear are also common among languages of certain typologies See . The notion ''mouth of a river'' is probably more common than you would think. I have never heard of the ass of a river, but there is the ].] (]) 01:49, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

:: ]? —] (]) 06:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== ]s (fear of) ==
{{formerly|Magpies (fear of)}}

What is (or if there's no official term, would be) the term for "magpie phobia" / "fear of magpies" ?

] <sub>]</sub><sup>]</sup> 16:17, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:"Ornithophobia" is general fear of birds. Karakaxa is the modern Greek word for a magpie, so you could use that (have no idea what the ancient Greek word was). ] (]) 16:35, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:: apparently attests καρακάξα and a synonym γαγίλα. So using that, you'd get "caracaxaphobia" or "gagilaphobia". And if you extend the definition to crows and jackdaws to which they are very close relations of, you'd get "coracophobia" from ]. The latter is actually Ancient Greek and remarkably similar to καρακάξα, so it might be a cognate. Though all of them are onomatopoeic, so it might not. :P Disclaimer: not real words.--&nbsp;<small>]</small><font size="3" face =times new roman>†</font><small>]</small> 18:16, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:There is not even a formal term for "crow phobia", which must be far more common. It's hard to imagine why anybody would have a fear of magpies, which don't even flock the way crows do. ] (]) 19:03, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Well, someone who was superstitious might develop exaggerated beliefs around the darker aspects of some versions of the traditional rhyme ]. My own mother, being a bit "fluffy bunny" about nature, greatly dislikes magpies because of their predation on the nestlings of other birds;I could see this sort of attitude developing into an obsession. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} ] (]) 21:22, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::There was a flock of maybe two dozen chicken-sized ]s occupying (in the military sense) the courtyard of the university library yesterday. It was the first time I was ever scared by birds, except once when I stumbled upon a blue heron standing silently about 12 feet away from me around dawn on the campus of ]. ] (]) 19:10, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::Looie, if the question was intended to apply not just to corvids but to any bird commonly known as a magpie, the ] has a fearsome and well-deserved reputation:
::* ''Spring in Australia is magpie season, when a small minority of breeding magpies (almost always males) around the country become aggressive and swoop and attack those who approach their nests, especially bike riders.''
::Btw, ] ] have every reason to be afraid of ]. Carn the pies. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 23:23, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::(ec)There are perfectly sound reasons to be wary of the ], a bird unrelated to the northern hemisphere ]s the OP is presumably talking about. ] (]) 23:24, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Although ]phobia as a term would likely be misconstrued. ] (]) 23:30, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
The species name of the common magpie is '']'', so ''picaphobia'' would seem appropriate. ] (]) 19:10, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:In harmony with ] (point 13: Section headings), I am adding an anchor link—"{{formerly|Magpies (fear of)}}"—in order to enable links to the archived section. In the future, someone may wish to link to this discussion in the archives, and square brackets in headings hinder the functioning of section links. See ] (September 2009).
:—] (]) 00:09, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::I get your point now, I was not thinking about archives, this not being an article, the objection didn't seem relevant on merely stylistic grounds. You may have noticed there is at least one other title with a link in it on this thread. ] (]) 01:33, 27 July 2012 (UTC)


:You are all ruddy marvellous, you know that, don't you? Thanks very much for the replies ] <sub>]</sub><sup>]</sup> 06:14, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== Help in writing an article ==

Help me on writing a tremendous article on the topic "Role of youth in nation's development". It's not my homework, I have to give a huge stage performance. ] (]) 18:32, 26 July 2012 (UTC)
:Any particular nation? --] ] 18:36, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

I have to do two things. First, to write article and then to give a speech. I will pay my attention on youth of the world. But, if you want to know a particular nation, then, that's India. ] (]) 18:47, 26 July 2012 (UTC) <small><span class="autosigned">— Preceding ] comment added by ] (] • ]) 18:45, 26 July 2012 (UTC)</span></small><!-- Template:Unsigned --> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
:Be careful, Sunny: a good Misplaced Pages article will not usually make a good speech, and vice versa. They are very different. In particular, an encyclopaedia article should have a level of detail which would be confusing or boring in a speech; and a Misplaced Pages article should not advance an argument. --] (]) 19:22, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::I suppose it depends on what you define as 'youth' (children, teenagers, people in their early twenties, anyone under 35 years of age). The ] is usually seen as the result of the youth in Arab countries being dissatisfied with the situation in their countries. Similarly, the ] were students protesting, as were the demonstrators during the ]. While such demonstrations can have an effect on politics in country, it seems to me that it's rarely the youth who parttook in these demonstrations who end up making the decisions on the way forward. E.g. the youth of Egypt might've toppled Mubarak, but it's the military that ran the show afterwards. ] (]) 19:36, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:::Per Colin's post, above, if we presume you're looking for notes for a speech you have to give, rather than wishing us to write a[REDACTED] article ... you probably want to think about the nature of the argument you'll make. You can be upbeat, along the lines of youth being able to innovate in technology yielding companies like microsoft, yahoo, google, etc. Ditto contributions to music. Or you can be more utilitarian and argue in terms of youth providing low cost entry-level labour necessary for the functioning of an economy. Or you could very legitimately argue that, currently in many western countries, there's a rebalancing of society which lays a historically disproportionate burden on the young - in terms of tuition fees, house prices, etc - which mean that ] loses out to the ], and ] gets pretty well stuffed. In this scenario, the role of the young is to pay for things their parents got for free, and to be paid as little as possible with as shabby as possible pension provisions so as to transfer as much profit as possible to the owners of capital. So; yes. you can put together a very good talk on this subject. But you probably need to guide this conversation if you want to get any more from this forum. --] ] 19:51, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:::: I didn't get that Sunny is writing a ''Misplaced Pages'' article; just an article for some external publication. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 09:23, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

I am not writing a Misplaced Pages article. I am, just, writing article for school students. ] (]) 09:52, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:Since you asked me for help at my talk page — you'll have to specify the way or ways in which you want me to help you. "Help me write an article" isn't specific enough for me to know what to do. ] (]) 11:52, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== Looking for a Word for a Definition ==

I'm looking to describe a certain kind of cultural phenomenon where a fad, event, fictional series, or any other sort mass media event permeates many more layers and levels of society, which would not normally be affected by similar events, are affected. A few recent examples might include: large fictional series such as the Twilight and Harry Potter series or the war on Iraq or 9/11. I'm not really seeing it apply to individual people, though it could potentially apply to situations regarding these people. As well, I'm thinking of it being on a continuum, where a commonly accepted and "objectively significant" case of this is closer to the definition, and a more personalized and perception driven version is less like the definition. So between "A significant or defining mass media delivered event in a person's life" and "a significant or defining mass media delivered event in a culture". Or perhaps there would be two types, one objective and another subjective, and the continuum would rely on importance or size. I suppose a similar idea would be a household name, though I don't quite see it fitting with above definition.

Anything like this or along these lines would be appreciated, though the closer the better. I am looking more for a commonly defined term than to coin a new term or phrase. Thanks, ] (]) 19:30, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:Let me clarify this. Something like the death of ], or maybe even ], or the ]? --] (]) 21:04, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

::Harry Potter would be described as a ''phenomenon''. I suggest you look up that word or ''craze'' in an online thesaurus and then click on a word close to your meaning until you arrive at the word you want. ] (]) 21:10, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:You pose is an interesting idea about "an idea" of sorts, but I'm not sure if it has a specific name as such. Running the risk of sounding mundane, I would first call it "a very powerful ]". Thankfully the field of ] is much more mature and expertly developed than the "Internets" would have you believe, so you should check the article for a deep discussion on the subject before dismissing the whole meme concept. There are scientists who have developed an entire lexicon around memes, so you should check out Memetics glossaries such as for more ideas. As for the continuum you speak of, it sounds a lot like ], which usually refers to the sphere of ideas that stand out at a global level. For example, ], which denotes the most searched-for items, was previously called Google Zeitgeist. But it also reminds me of the ], the sphere of human thought, or even the ], through which humanity shares common thoughts and ideas such as the ones you mentioned. So, maybe it could be better to call the phenomenon you talk about a "Zeitgeist event" or a "spark in the collective consciousness" or something like that. There's plenty of "ideas" to go around. :) --] (]) 02:24, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== Uyghur pronunciation ==

How is ] pronounced in Uyghur? The article only gives the English pronunciation. --] (]) 19:52, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:Going by the ] article: /yrymt͡ʃi/, but that assumes it is written with a ]. ] (]) 20:10, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

:: gives the IPA for the Arabic, Cyrillic, and Latin systems of writing the language; that seems to support /yrymt͡ʃi/ as the correct pronunciation. &nbsp;] <sup>(])</sup> 21:12, 26 July 2012 (UTC)

= July 27 =

== French audio translation ==

Hi, could someone please translate a small piece of audio in French ? It's from an interview with ] (about "Phenixologie"). It's just 30 seconds long. Thanks in advance. --] (]) 01:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

{| class="wikitable"
|-
| Jean Cocteau, la scène à laquelle vos amis espagnols viennent d'assister est celle de votre résurrection. || Jean Cocteau, the scene that your Spanish friends just witnessed is that of your resurrection.
|-
| C'est à dire que les poètes meurent et revivent. Dalí a inventé une science très belle: la phénixologie. La phénixologie, cela veut dire que les personnes meurent souvent pour renaître. C'est la renaissance du phénix. Brûle, brûle pour se changer en cendres, et à leur tour les cendres se changent en soi-même. On devient soi-même à travers ce phénomène de la phénixologie. || That is to say that poets die and live again. ] invented a very beautiful science: phoenixology. Phoenixology, that means that people die <s>always</s> often to be reborn. It's the rebirth of the ]. Burn, burn to change into ashes, and in their turn the ashes become oneself. One becomes oneself through this phenomenon of phoenixology.
|}
—] (]) 06:28, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
: Afew small improvements to the translation (IMHO): ...that people die often in order to be reborn... ...to turn into ashes, and in turn the ashes... --] (]) 09:36, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::<small>dunno how I mistook ''souvent'' for ''toujours''! —] (]) 16:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)</small>

::Thank you very much! :) --] (]) 12:24, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

== German infinitive noun declension ==

Hi, I stumbled across an occurence of "das Kitzeln", and it has prompted me to try to figure out how to decline the German infinitive nouns (gerunds?), and I am having trouble finding the rule.

My best guess is that it is as follows with the verb kitzeln (to tickle), and that all gerunds (das Üben, das Fliegen, das Geben, etc) would follow this pattern.

Singular:
*Nominative: das Kitzeln
*Genitive: des Kitzelns
*Dative: dem Kitzeln
*Accusative: das Kitzeln

Plural:
*Nominative: die Kitzeln
*Genitive: der Kitzeln
*Dative: den Kitzeln (or den Kitzelnen?)
*Accusative: die Kitzeln

Is this correct? And does anybody know of a source; I wouldn't mind updating the ] section with this information.

Thanks,

<font color="009900"><b>Falconus</b></font><sup>] ] ]</sup> 03:21, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

::Does the plural of the infinitive exist? ] (]) 04:05, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::The singular is right. I don't think these gerunds are ever used in the plural, but if so, then the dative plural is ''den Kitzeln'' because you don't add ''-en'' to a plural that already ends in ''-n''. ] (]) 05:02, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

::::Our ] article says that "the gerund does not have a plural, and its gender is neuter". I'm by no means fluent in German, but from what I can see, the German Misplaced Pages articles for "gerund", "infinitive", and "German grammar" (of which "verbs" is a subsection) do not even make mention of the fact that such usages exist, their declensions, etc. &nbsp;]&nbsp;<sup>(])</sup> 05:06, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

:::::The plural of the infinitive seems like a contradiction in terms. Spanish does allow one to speak of ''seres humanos'' and ''la separación de poderes'', although these seem like idiomatic expressions, rather than a productive rule allowing pluralization of any infinitive. English may be a bad example, but "are to errs human, while to forgives are divine"? We speak of ''does (do's) and don'ts'', where ''do's'' sounds like a pluralized infinitive. Again, this seems more like an idiom than a generally accepted rule. ] (]) 06:33, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::The German article is ] ("verbal noun"). Both of my grammar books (Eisenberg: "Grundriss der deutschen Grammatik"; Engel: "Deutsche Grammatik") call it ''nominalisierter Infinitiv''. Neither book even has the term "gerund" (''Gerundium'') in the index, that term is not used in German grammar. Verbal nouns only have singular forms, and their declination is correct as stated by Falconus. --] (]) 09:57, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::::Excellent, thanks. Because we could talk about "the ticklings" in English, it hadn't occured to me that you can't do that in German. Thanks for your responses! <font color="009900"><b>Falconus</b></font><sup>] ] ]</sup> 17:34, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::::I suppose if you did want to talk about "the ticklings" in German, it would be ''die Kitzlungen''. ] (]) 17:42, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::::::But "ticklings" are not "to tickles"; gerunds, not infinitives. German has no problem with the pluralization of forms in ''-ung'' such as ''Ermordungen'' or ''Bedeutungen'' (which are feminine, BTW). ] (]) 17:54, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::::::<small>But what about "der Kitzler"? :D ] (]) 18:46, 27 July 2012 (UTC)</small>
:::::::::::<small>Forget Kitzler. How do you like Kipling? ] (]) 18:56, 27 July 2012 (UTC)</small>
:::::::::::: <small> ] only. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 21:33, 27 July 2012 (UTC) </small>

== Have an Arabic speaker translate this Qadafi capture video ==
{{formerly|Have an ] speaker translate this ] capture video}}

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dy1dsO-jKd0&feature=player_embedded&bpctr=1343175474&skipcontrinter=1

See, all I understand from the video is "Moammar!" and "''Allahu Akbar," (God is Great.)

This was an exciting day for Libyans and pro-democracy individuals worldwide. The moment marked the fall of a die-hard dictator after a rule that spanned longer than I've been alive.

This is why that moment is worth translating.

Now, could anyone translate everything else that was said in the video? I know it's quite a lot of shouts, but please translate whatever is intelligible. Thanks. --] (]) 12:46, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

:In harmony with ] (point 13: Section headings), I am changing the heading of this section from <b>Have an ] speaker translate this ] capture video</b> to <b>Have an Arabic speaker translate this Qadafi capture video</b>—in order to enable links to the archived section. In the future, someone may wish to link to this discussion in the archives, and square brackets in headings hinder the functioning of section links. See ] (September 2009).
:—] (]) 15:02, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

== Ireland town ==

]
What is the name of this town in Ireland that I took off the 1860 US Census?--] <sup>]</sup> 15:40, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:Does it have to be a town? It might say ]. ] (]) 16:31, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:: I do believe you got it! Thanks...--] <sup>]</sup> 17:18, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::Funny, I'd've guessed it says ]. ] (]) 22:07, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::::No, County Cavan is in the hills, whereas Barbara Stanwyck is in a big valley. ←] <sup>'']''</sup> ]→ 04:51, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::Ugh. With punchlines like that, I hope they keep you out of the talkies. ;) ] (]) 05:11, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

:::: Barbara, sure, but ''Stanwyck'', Medeis? Where do you see that? Now, ] would have been a much more reasonable stab. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 10:07, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
{{clear}}

== Most useful foreign language ==

Which foreign language is the most useful? --] (]) 19:42, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

: To whom? For what purpose? If you're planning a visit to Iceland, then the best language to study would be Icelandic. You can see how this answer is going to depend on a number of factors none of which you've given us. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 19:56, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

::The user geolocates to ]. Assuming he doesn't wish to leave the US, and does not have specific plans, Spanish would be the best bet since he is statistically much more likely to come across Spanish speakers than others in the US. Learning any foreign language broadens the mind. But if you don't have occasion to use it it is like a blind man studying painting. Spanish is also broadcast widely in the US and it has a long tradition of art and literature to enjoy. Chinese has its obvious and similar advantages as well. Already speaking Spanish, were I able to take up any new language now for free I would add ]. ] (]) 21:35, 27 July 2012 (UTC)

:As has been noted already, your inquiry is a little too open-ended and lacking in context for any significantly practical response specific to your needs, but I'll try to make some general observations about various prominent languages that you might find useful. To begin with, there are the "]", those which are not only spoken by a large number of people globally but which are also spoken in a good number of locations outside their region of origin; other than English, these most notably include the three most broadly spoken ] (], ], and ]) and ]. Like English, these are all languages that gained significant influence through the force of European colonization in the last few centuries and they remain amongst the most dominant languages in general and very widely used in commerce in particular. Then there are a number of prominent languages which have a large number of speakers but do not have quite the global spread that the above languages do (though they may still cover a significant region and/or be found on multiple continents). These include ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], ], and a number of others, depending on your criteria. The degree to which these are spoken predominantly as first or second languages varies considerably from language to language, but they can all be reasonably described as global languages to some degree. Of course, without knowing your particular needs or the reason for your drive to learn a new language (assuming this is why you ask the question) it's hard to refine the answer further. But one thing you might keep in mind when choosing is just how much of a challenge you would like in the process. Presuming you are a native English speaker, you may find Germanic languages the easiest to pick up (Scandinavian tongues in particular tend to be easier for English speakers to assimilate to, relatively speaking) whereas Chinese languages with their tonal phonology or Japanese with it's markedly different syntax would probably be more on the difficult end of the spectrum. If you also don't fancy having to learn an entire new ] you're better off sticking with a language which uses the same alphabet as English; luckily there's no shortage of these. There's also, as has been noted above, the consideration of immersement opportunity; learning a language is considerably easier when you have a context to speak it as frequently as possible, especially with native speakers. Hope that helps some. If you wish to narrow your search a bit more, drop a line with additional details as to your need here (or on my talk page, if you wish). I will say also, all things being equal, you could just go with a language that tends, in your culture, to make the opposite sex melt; for most English speakers the obvious choice here is French. ] (]) 23:28, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:I find English to be a quite useful foreign language. And I quite like its quirkiness. Most ] is a downer, though. --] (]) 23:39, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::Holy crap, that's supposed to be English? I just assumed they were speaking in tongues... ] (]) 23:44, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
:::"Speaking in tongues" is in the ], and thus certainly English! --] (]) 23:53, 27 July 2012 (UTC)
::::I'll generally endorse Jack's comments except to mention that of the European languages he mentioned, Italian, Dutch and the Scandinavian dialects won't get you very far except in their native lands, and many Dutch and Scandinavians speak English. While Japanese has a different word order from English, and its writing systems are relatively complex, its grammar and phonology are quite simple and regular. As for French, maybe it's different in Australia or in cartoons, but nowadays most Americans find it suited as the object of humor, rather than a medium of romance. (But like Latin, it is great for expanding your knowledge of the origins/meanings and even spelling of English expressions and vocabulary.) Hindi/Urdu and Arabic have relatively wide usage. But ], ], ], ], ], and ], while they may have a large number of speakers locally, are otherwise very limited niche languages outside their native areas. ] (]) 00:32, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::: Maybe I'm on your mind, Medeis <small>(which would be understandable enough)</small>. :) The only language I mentioned was Icelandic. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 09:56, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

:::::Well, I'll say this - as someone with a background in comparative linguistics who has studied Japanese (albeit casually) for a good long while, I still find it to be one of the more challenging languages to be a productive and eloquent speaker in, coming from the perspective of a native English speaker. You're quite correct that the learning process is aided somewhat by a shallow phonology and orthography (with regard to the syllabaries, anyway, not kanji of course), but I don't find the syntax to be any more regular than your average language and regardless, both syntax and morphology are just so different from English, especially for someone who has no formal training with language and no experience with speaking a second language. Plus it's absolutely loaded with idioms and other semantic nuances that will take you a lifetime to master if not acquired from early in life -- Japanese grammars are about as thick as a microbiology text, and one-tenth as easily assimilated! Mind you, I'm by no means a ] and mileage will certainly vary, but would I present Japanese as the language likely to be the smoothest for a new learner to transition to from English? Not on your life! On a second note (and not to seem like I'm picking an argument!), I think you're underselling French by a mile if you think it's more a source for comedic than enamouring potential; I can only speak to personal experience from one side of the gender divide, but I assure you it still does ''at least'' as well as any other language in existence for scoring superficial points with women in the States. But again, mileage will vary, I suppose. Of course, the ''language'' itself (any language) pales in comparison to the influence of the ''accent''; in terms of linguistic allure, a Frenchman speaking in English is going to beat you, speaking in (even flawless) French, most any day of the week! ;) ] (]) 04:13, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::::Well, idioms is idioms in any language. I don't imagine anyone not immersed for two decades could speak any language as well as most of us here speak English. But Japanese has no ], it has regular postpositions instead of irregular cases, no irregular verbs to speak of. Its phonology is a tad easier than Spanish. Just no basic IE vocabulary cognates and those damn Chinese squiggles. I have had not a single lesson in Japanese, but was able to help a stranded Japanese businessman at Penn Station in NY get on the right train to NJ by asking him (from just having read Mario Pei and Anthony Burgess), "''Anato wa Purinceton e desu ka?''" (You Princeton to is, eh?) and answering to him when he said "''Hai!''" that, "''Atashi wa Purinceton e desu.''" (I to Princeton am.) He then started a conversation in Japanese--to which I could only answer, "''Aisumasen'' (sorry), no Japanese." I could never have bullshat my way through Russian verbs or Chinese tones like that. Oh, and Spanish and Russian in the right tone have moved me further than French with its silly ]s and ]s ''ever'' could. Merely watching an ] film can give me an orgasm. ] (]) 05:13, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::::::Huh, did you know that we don't have an article (or even a disambig reference) for grammars, in the sense of a reference guide to the grammar of a given language? I'll have to remedy that this weekend. ] (]) 04:31, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

:::: Yes, the Bible tells us all about the adventures of those well-known Englishmen, God and his son Jesus. (Well, ] recorded he was taught that God was not just an Englishman, but a ''Protestant''.) -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 00:30, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::That may have been the case before the Revolution, but nowadays the Father and Son are like the Bushes. God's a New Englander and his son is from Texas. ] (]) 00:36, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::::::<small>And ], to the detriment of their other duties.--&nbsp;<small>]</small><font size="3" face =times new roman>†</font><small>]</small> 03:37, 28 July 2012 (UTC)</small>
::::::All this talk of ] and ] is reminding me of how good ] was. (The first time I heard ], I thought, that's odd, this sounds like Talking Heads. And ''still'' creeps me out.) In my experience, if you're an English speaker abroad, it pays to have a midwestern accent - people find you much easier to understand that way.--] (]) 01:57, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::Above: ''you could just go with a language that tends, in your culture, to make the opposite sex melt; for most English speakers the obvious choice here is French.'' I have often wondered whether this was a key to the amorous successes of multiply-married Newton Leroy Gingrich. As a resident of Brussels and author of , surely he would be a francophone. Although French may not be the first choice; see '']''. -- ] (]) 10:18, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:This might be the perfect topic to establish the fact that learning Latin or Greek is absolutely the most ridiculous way to waste your time. Anyway, I'd think the best "foreign language" is still English, even it's not a foreign language to you. It might help to learn "international English". For me its much easier to understand people who had to learn English themselves. Native speakers are much harder to understand. Being able to speak like someone learning English would make you being understood by many more people than any course in Chinese, Spanish or whatever language could do. ] (]) 01:21, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::Yes, but I don't think that's quite what the OP had in mind. I agree with μηδείς on Spanish. Being in the Americas, you're far more likely to know a few people who are native Spanish speakers. --&nbsp;<small>]</small><font size="3" face =times new roman>†</font><small>]</small> 03:37, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

:: (Ahem!) @ Joepnl: Your so-called "fact" is not even remotely "established". Even as an ironic comment, it deserves instant nuking. -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 10:02, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

:As a citizen of the US who is learning / has learned a number of languages widely considered "useless" here, I can attest to the fact that even the languages which seem useless and do not have huge numbers of speakers like Mandarin can actually be very useful, beyond the mental benefits that learning most any language provide, etc. For example, speaking Norwegian has allowed me to follow ]'s trial and the events surrounding it in far greater detail than most English-language media provides. On a more personal note, I really like the style of ]'s news coverage, so I read most news on their website instead of, say, ]. &nbsp;]&nbsp;<sup>(])</sup> 06:33, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::I agree entirely that no language, even the incredibly elegant Latin and Ancient Greek, is a waste of time to learn. But how horrible to use Norwegian to follow anything to do with Breivik. It's like studying Georgian only to look forward to using it with ].
:::I find it fascinating, in a way—though, fascinating or not, unpleasant events are not undone if we simply pretend they did not happen. Certainly, though, Norwegian and Georgian alike are useful for much more than studying such things. &nbsp;]&nbsp;<sup>(])</sup> 07:53, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

: I'll put in a token plug for Esperanto (which was my second language, at age 5–6) because it's very easy to learn. True you won't get as many opportunities to use it as some of the others mentioned, but every language you have makes the ''next'' language a little bit easier{{cn}}, so it makes sense to start with an easy one. —] (]) 06:35, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::Esperanto is has the plusses of all the pseudo-Romance languages; it is easy to comprehend when it is used in a straightforward way. The weird part is when you get into all the productive little morphological elements and start coining words that have no basis or parallel in the Indo-European languages. At that point a natural-ist wants to retreat into '']'' or go whole hog into ]. And what's the point of LSF when you have Spanish? Or Volapük when there's ], or ], or the ], with its lack of regular verbs? ] (]) 06:46, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:::You want a language with no regular verbs? Try ], a language whose verbal morphology makes even hard-core language nerds tremble. ] (]) 07:57, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

= July 28 =

== Check my grammar? ==
I just edited a paragraph/section at ]. I removed some redundant words/phrases, tried to make it more readable, found the proper medical term (I think), etc, etc. Warning! It is being discussed on the talk page as to wording.--] (]) 06:47, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:Here's the . I oppose the changes as at best unnecessary and at worst supposition and vague euphemism. ] (]) 07:06, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
I just did another edit to fix errors I made in the previous ones.--] (]) 07:20, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:Removing the unsourced medical diagnoses and unnecessary wording was good. However, unless the Romneys have ascended to a more rarefied status than I'm aware of, sticking a capitalized "The" in front was wrong. The last sentence is a bit clunky too ("to the destination"). A bit off the topic, but it's Romney's parents' cottage. ] (]) 08:04, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
::Change from 'destination' to 'cottage' then? And how do you recommend the 'The' thingy?--] (]) 08:14, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

::: Make it lower case. Just like "I am a member of the Smith family". -- ♬ ] ♬ </sup></font>]] 08:32, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
Thank you very much for your help Clarityfiend and Jack. I just dumped a link to a very good online vet manual on the talk page discussion for others to use as RS as well.--] (]) 08:46, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

== Pronunciation in Slavic languages ==

Is there any Slavic language, other than Russian, in which every unstressed (original) /o/ becomes /a/? ] (]) 18:50, 28 July 2012 (UTC)
:Yes, read the stub, it's called ]. ] (]) 19:01, 28 July 2012 (UTC)

== paunch ==

What's perfect meaning? "A fat abdomen" or just "Abdomen" ?

Latest revision as of 17:22, 22 January 2025

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January 8

Pronunciation of "breen"

How do you pronounce the -breen that appears at the end of Svalbard glacier names? I went through all the Svalbard -breen glacier articles on Misplaced Pages at Category:Glaciers_of_Spitsbergen, and not a single one provides IPA. 2601:644:4301:D1B0:B94F:4C6C:A635:20B6 (talk) 02:32, 8 January 2025 (UTC)

The -en ending is the Norwegian definite mascular singular suffix, and bre means "glacier", so, for example, Nansenbreen means "the Nansen glacier".
The pronunciations in Nynorsk and Bokmål would be slightly different, with also regional variations. I have no idea which variety of spoken Norwegian is prevalent among the roughly 2,500 Norvegicophone inhabitants of Svalbard.
Extrapolating from the pronunciations of other words, I believe the pronunciation of -breen to be:
  • Nynorsk: /²brɛːn̩/
  • Bokmål:  /bʁe̞ːn̩/
For the meaning of the toneme , see on Wiktionary Appendix:Norwegian Nynorsk pronunciation § Stress and tonemes.  --Lambiam 10:23, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
(Simultaneous editing) Here an example of Norwegian pronounciation, "Jostedaalsbreen" first mentioned around 0:06. Since Norwegian is a language of dialects I cannot rule out that there could be regional differences in pronounciation. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 10:24, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
This agrees with my extrapolation of the Nynorsk pronunciation.  --Lambiam 10:38, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
However, I believe the two ee in the middle are being distinguished in the pronounciation rather than just pronounced as a long vowel. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 11:40, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
The long vowel represents solely the first ⟨e⟩. The definitive suffix -en is represented by . The vertical understroke diacritic signifies that this is a syllabic consonant.  --Lambiam 15:46, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Ok, that would make sense. Not an IPA expert here. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 16:05, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Regarding the dialect, I found this: https://munin.uit.no/handle/10037/14074. Excerpt from Google Translation: This is interesting because Svalbard has no local dialect. The language community on the archipelago is instead characterized by dialectal variation. The Norwegian population in Svalbard comes from all over Norway, and the average length of residence is short. . On Norwegian Misplaced Pages it stated that Nynorsk spellings have to be used for all town names in Svalbard but this probably has no bearing on the pronounciation practices. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 17:58, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Thank you all for your input! So it's a monosyllabic /²brɛːn̩/. 2601:644:4301:D1B0:B94F:4C6C:A635:20B6 (talk) 21:05, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
Is it really monosyllabic if a syllabic vowel is followed by a syllabic consonant? By the way, I believe the common Swedish curse word fan often is pronounced somewhat similarly. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 21:45, 8 January 2025 (UTC)
By definition, a syllabic consonant forms a syllable on its own. So we have two syllables, the first of which ends on a vowel.  --Lambiam 00:01, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

January 9

Is there a term which categorises these phrases?

Is there a lexicographic word or term to describe phrases such as "out and about", "bits and pieces", or "nooks and crannies"? There are many such phrases which conjoin words which are less often used separately. I am not thinking of "conjunction", but something which describes this particular quirk. For example, where I grew up, no-one would say "I was out in town yesterday" but "I was out and about the town". 51.148.145.228 (talk) 15:29, 9 January 2025 (UTC)

I think a phraseme, also called a set phrase, fixed expression, is the term you're looking for for the phrase. Fossil word (for words not used outside set phrases) and Irreversible binomial (for phrases which have fixed order - you wouldn't say "about and out") may also be of interest. AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 16:23, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
All three examples above are irreversible binomials.  --Lambiam 10:59, 10 January 2025 (UTC)
If you are thinking of expressions where a single meaning is carried by a conjunction of two near-synonyms, Hendiadys may be a fit. There is a narrow definition of that term where it covers only conjunctions of two terms that logically stand in a relation of subordination to each other, but there's also a wider usage where it's used for expressions like these, where the two terms are merely synonyms. Fut.Perf. ☼ 16:59, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
Such as "lively and quick". ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 18:04, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
And also Pleonasm.  Card Zero  (talk) 18:42, 9 January 2025 (UTC)
There's a similar concept in Legal doublets. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 15:00, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

January 11

Evening and night

Does English refer a period from 22:00 to midnight as late evening? Does English ever say "late-evening shows"? And is a period around 17:00 known as early evening, and a period around midnight as early night? And do English speskers ever say "late in the morning"? --40bus (talk) 22:36, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

We say "late evening". The exact time is probably after dinner time. It could be hyphenated if you like, but isn't. We say "early evening" and "late morning". The phrase "late in the morning" is fine, and not at all awkward, but is not engraved into our English-speaking minds as an idiom like "early in the morning". Our article on Shift work defines the evening as 14:00 to 22:00, so later than that may be night, but in common usage the definition is flexible, and "night" and "evening" undoubtedly overlap. Night shift workers live in a state of confusion about whether it is currently night or morning, and which day it is.  Card Zero  (talk) 00:59, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
Style guides recommend hyphenation in attributive use to avoid the interpretation as "evening shows that are late".  --Lambiam 09:58, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
Here are a few examples of "late-evening show": , , . And here are a few examples of "late in the morning": , , .  --Lambiam 09:48, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
In American English "late evening" is not a specific period of time but just a way of saying late in the evening. The distinction between evening and night has less to do with the exact time, and more to do with whether one is out with friends or at home preparing for bed. I would never consider 22-24 late evening (that's night) but others might. There are no "late evening shows"; late-night shows air at that time. "Early night" is not a common idiom. Eluchil404 (talk) 21:52, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
@Eluchil404: In British English, "early night" is commonly used to signify going to bed earlier than usual, as in "I'm really tired so I'm going to have an early night." Similarly, "I had a late night last night" suggests having not gone to bed early enough. See . Bazza 7 (talk) 22:41, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
We can use "early night" in that sense in American English too (though "make it an early night" sounds a bit more idiomatic to me). But that doesn't seem to be the sense the OP was asking about. --Trovatore (talk) 22:49, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
This reminds me a lot of when Steve Martin said he would smoke marijuana. --Trovatore (talk) 22:55, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

My home Internet connection has failed. I reported it to my ISP. I had an email from them yesterday (Sunday) at 5.34pm telling me they would be calling me "today" about the problem. It's now past 10.00am Monday. Still waiting. HiLo48 (talk) 23:13, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

OK, so they didn't do what they said they were going to do. Imagine my shock. What does it have to do with the question? --Trovatore (talk) 23:17, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
Speaking of "today" as a future time at 5.34pm. HiLo48 (talk) 23:01, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
Or they'll call at 23:59, "late today".  --Lambiam 23:52, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

January 12

Latin alphabet

Why did Khmer and Lao not switch to Latin alphabet during French colonization, unlike Vietnamese? --40bus (talk) 13:43, 12 January 2025 (UTC)

I assume you forgot a "not", and it might be since Chữ Nôm was a highly complex writing system only mastered by about 5% of the population. A Latin-based writing system would have been a lot more accessible at the time, both to French colonialists and the majority of the Vietnamese, themselves. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 13:55, 12 January 2025 (UTC)
40bus -- Khmer and Lao already had alphabets, since they had experienced significant Indic influence. The Vietnamese did not have an alphabet, since they experienced predominant Chinese influence. The Cham alphabet and Tai Viet alphabet were used in what is now Vietnam, but Vietnamese-speakers did not adopt them. AnonMoos (talk) 06:47, 13 January 2025 (UTC)

January 14

Nuevo!

A lot of areas of the Spanish Empire in America had a name in the pattern of "New XXX" where XXX is usually a Spanish province or city. Some examples are: Nueva Andalucía, Nueva Castilla, Nueva España, Nueva Extremadura, Nuevas Filipinas, Nueva Granada, Nueva León, Nueva Navarra, Nuevo Santander, Nueva Toledo, Nueva Vizcaya. I'm not able to recognize any pattern or obvious motivation for them to select precisely these names. Why call some place New Extremadura and not, for example, New Catalonia? Where they chosen randomly? Is there any reason behind them? Thank you? 195.62.160.60 (talk) 10:10, 14 January 2025 (UTC)

I don't know the answer, but Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor would probably have been the one who decided, or at least approved, some of these names. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.8.29.20 (talk) 10:22, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
It's not just the Spanish. An early name for the British part of Australia, and now one of its states, is New South Wales. Apparently Captain Cook thought it looked like South Wales. Then just across the ocean is New Zealand. That one came from the Dutch. HiLo48 (talk) 10:31, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
Not to forget New Amsterdam/New York and New Orleans. However, these things aren't consistent as the Spanish also copied names without the Nuevo/Nueva in front, like Córdoba and Valencia. Would be interesting to see if this was a time-dependent pattern. As to the choice of names, this could well have to do with the individuals involved. E.g. a lot of the Conquistadores came from Extremadura, including Hernán Cortés and Francisco Pizarro, and Castilia, Granada etc. aren't far from that area either. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 11:18, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
They decided to follow the rule, "Nuevo say neuvo again." Clarityfiend (talk) 21:04, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
The English were in a habit of omitting 'new' too. In the US there's Durham, Manchester, Washington. In Australia there's Newcastle. What's notable is all of these are distinctly English names, very old ones with meanings that make sense only to historians. It's highly unlikely they arose the same way in AUS and the US. ~~----
Indeed. In 1940, the Royal Navy was able to rename fifty old US destroyers after British and American towns that share a common name. Alansplodge (talk) 12:12, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
The whole Australian mainland was previously known as New Holland. Anything less like Holland it would be impossible to find, but there you go. But at least this recognises that the Dutch were the first Europeans definitely known to have landed on Australia, in 1606. -- Jack of Oz 19:12, 14 January 2025 (UTC)
They probably weren't chosen randomly. Possible reasons include:
  • Naming after the namer's homeland. Nueva Extremadura (Chile) was named by Pedro de Valdivia, who was from Extremadura
  • Naming to honour a patron, e.g. New York was named after the Duke of York
  • Naming after a resemblance (New South Wales, as stated above).
AlmostReadytoFly (talk) 11:15, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
Nuevo say nuevo again. Clarityfiend (talk) 21:04, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
A variation - Within the town of Moe, Victoria, Australia, is what is effectively now the suburb of Newborough. It apparently gained that name because when it was established, Moe had just become a borough. HiLo48 (talk) 22:53, 15 January 2025 (UTC)
Also the London Borough of Newham, a 1965 merger of East Ham and West Ham. It was originally intended to be pronounced "New-ham" but is now universally called "Newum". Alansplodge (talk) 12:04, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
It's not obvious to me how "Newum" would be pronounced. It could be "Nee-wum". HiLo48 (talk) 23:04, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
/ˈnju(w)əm/ ColinFine (talk) 23:25, 16 January 2025 (UTC)
Ni! Peng! —Tamfang (talk) 21:39, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
They could have called it Hams Ambo ('both' in Latin), like some other merged parishes; Hambo for short. —Tamfang (talk) 07:45, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Curious that there was a Nueva Castilla in the New World when there was already one in Old Spain. They could have called it Tercera Castilla. —Tamfang (talk) 21:42, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Or Nueva Nueva Castilla.  --Lambiam 00:24, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Or Más Nueva Castilla. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 07:45, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

January 18

Conlangs allowed here?

Is discussion about conlangs permitted here or is it solely for natural languages? If you reply here, please ping me. Thanks, TheTechie@enwiki (she/they | talk) 02:14, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

Presumably you're referring to Constructed language. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 09:45, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
I believe they are. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 12:06, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
In the past, there's occasionally been a little discussion of Esperanto, and I don't remember anybody complaining (see here for example). Workshopping or promoting your own personal stuff might be perceived differently (depending on how you approach it). AnonMoos (talk) 13:27, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Was it here or on Wiktionary someone discussed a fable about a goat written, first in some conlang and second, in some Low German dialect between German and Dutch? 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 19:04, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Are you thinking of Schleicher's fable? I imagine that has been translated into many languages, constructed and otherwise. —Tamfang (talk) 21:41, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Not exactly. It appeared as if some amateur conlanger had constructed something similar, first written in the conlang, and then, for some reason, in that particular German-Dutch dialect. 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 00:22, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
Why wouldn't or shouldn't it be? --Theurgist (talk) 15:27, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
Since Misplaced Pages is not a general discussion forum, the reference desks themselves are controversial. As long as this page is allowed to be active, conlangs per se are within its scope, but note any question that has little relevance to improving our articles will be frowned upon by at least some, especially if you post multiple such questions within a short period. Nardog (talk) 16:38, 18 January 2025 (UTC)
The Reference desk attempts to provide services similar to those of a library reference desk. It should be viewed as a supplement to the encyclopedia. Users who are seeking information on a topic post questions here, and the respondents try to find answers to these questions. If you have a question about conlangs for which you cannot find the answer in our articles on the topic, you are welcome to post the question here.
Next to being a service to our users, this can also help to signal lacunae in our coverage of encyclopedic topics.  --Lambiam 19:04, 18 January 2025 (UTC)

January 19

Questions

  1. Are there any newspapers in Serbia written in Serbian Latin alphabet?
  2. Are there any words in English with onsets /kn/, /ps/, /ks/, /tf/, /tv/, /kv/, /pw/, /fθ/ or /ts/?
  3. Are there any words in English where letter combinations ⟨iw⟩ and ⟨uw⟩ are pronounced as diphthongs, similarly to ⟨aw⟩ and ⟨ow⟩?
  4. Are there any words in Spanish where ⟨ll⟩ and ⟨ñ⟩ occur in consonant clusters, as in made-up words socllo, mopña, sollto and liñteda?
  5. Are there any words in Spanish where consonant clusters /tθ/, /kθ/, /pθ/, /tx/, /kx/ and /px/ occur, as in made-up words lotza, poczo, sopce, totja, hecge and mapjota?
  6. Are there any words in Korean with three consonants in a row? --40bus (talk) 21:02, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
1 -- You can look at Romanization of Serbian. 2 -- Only in a few obviously incompletely-assimilated loanwords, such as "kvetch" or "tsetse fly". 3 -- "Uw" has never been an established English orthographic digraph, as far as I know (though it occurs in some incompletely-assimilated loanwords from Welsh). "Iw" may have been a marginal alternative to "Iu" centuries ago, but when the sounds written by "Iu" and "Eu" merged, there was no longer a real use for it. AnonMoos (talk) 21:44, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
5. I guess -tz- might be found in loanwords from Basque or Native South American languages, but it's possible it might rather be pronounced as /ts/... 惑乱 Wakuran (talk) 22:49, 19 January 2025 (UTC)
And historic names originating from other languages like Quetzalcoatl or Quetzaltenango. There are also words like lección but the pronounciation is represented as leɡˈθjon/ leɣ̞ˈθjõn rather than kθ. . Ad 4. I don't think those exist either in regular Spanish words. -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 11:14, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
  • 1: Yes, even some of the highest-circulating ones: see the front pages for 20 January of Blic, Informer and Kurir (the latter also features a Cyrillic-script ad in-between). Although Serbian clearly favours Cyrillic for anything government-operated or Orthodoxy-related, in all other cases the two scripts are in free variation and it all depends on the author's or the publisher's preference.
  • 6: Orthographically that's possible when a character has a complex final and the next one has a non-silent initial, as in 읽다 ilgda. But phonologically any such clusters are simplified, so the actual pronunciation in this case is /ikt͈a/. --Theurgist (talk) 00:38, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
  • 2: I tend to pronounce xi and psi as /ksaɪ/ and /psaɪ/ for disambiguation, though I might simplify them to /saɪ/ if only one of them is being used as a variable. Also I'd say kvetch with /kv/, phthalate with /fθ/, and tsetse with /ts/ (though maybe not everyone would). Further I'd use the German pronunciations for the chess borrowings zugzwang and zwischenzug (so the latter gives even initial /tsv/ for me). See also en:wikt:Category:English terms with initial /t͡s/. Double sharp (talk) 08:23, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
Double_sharp -- the standard traditional method for distinguishing the letters Xi and Psi in English, without attempting to produce word-initial consonant clusters, is to pronounce Xi with a consonant, as in "Xylophone"... AnonMoos (talk) 14:57, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
@AnonMoos: I'm aware that it's standard (like "xylophone", "xylem", and "xenon"). Unfortunately I've heard xi with /s/ enough times (it's mentioned in Collins) that I don't trust anything but the clusters to disambiguate them by now. :) Double sharp (talk) 14:21, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

January 20

What's the common phrasing in spoken English? Is it "Not Always do I buy", "Not only does he buy but he also sells", "Not necessarily do we know", and likewise?

147.235.223.10 (talk) 16:05, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

We don't necessarily know what's the common phrasing. At least I don't always buy into your proposed ordering of the words. scnr -- 79.91.113.116 (talk) 16:09, 20 January 2025 (UTC)
The common wording for the first and third is "I don't always buy ..." and "We don't necessarily know ...". For the second, the wording you've suggested is possible, but "He not only buys but also sells" would perhaps be more frequently encountered. Deor (talk) 16:20, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

Thx all. 147.235.223.10 (talk) 18:47, 20 January 2025 (UTC)

January 21

Why can you say that someone is "on meth" but not "on cigarettes"?

JJPMaster (she/they) 00:42, 21 January 2025 (UTC)

In large part because one usually doesn't speak of the effects of cigarette use as if it's socially peculiar or of note. I would say, for example, something like "I'm on nicotine patches" though, since that's a comparatively unusual regimen. Remsense ‥ 论 00:55, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
You could, but the implication would be decidedly odd. Like you're using cigarettes as part of a medical regime, 'I'm on cigarettes to manage my anger' or similar. — kwami (talk) 04:27, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
It's kind of a subset of the general expression that someone is "on drugs", which implies "illegal" drugs. If you're on prescription drugs, you would probably say you're "on medication". ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 04:35, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
Probably because cigarettes/tobacco don't have much effect on someone's behaviour. I've seen people described (or describing themselves) as being high "on caffeine", but only if they've drunk enough for it to noticeably affect them. Iapetus (talk) 17:22, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
because "meth" is a substance and "cigarette" is the carrier. Maungapohatu (talk) 06:07, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
but you wouldn't say 'I'm on tobacco' either. — kwami (talk) 07:12, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
Maybe it's for the same reason that we don't say "beer users"? Smoking tobacco is seen as a (somewhat less than it was in recent years) socially acceptable activity and not really considered drug use. Iloveparrots (talk) 07:19, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
Doesn't say who?  --Lambiam  --Lambiam 09:46, 22 January 2025 (UTC)
It's worth pointing out that you can say it, but it might make someone wonder what you are on. ←Baseball Bugs carrots→ 11:44, 21 January 2025 (UTC)
On leave (from being on meth)?  --Lambiam 09:40, 22 January 2025 (UTC)

January 22

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