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If you would like to have a text translated, you might want to post on this Wiktionary page.

August 9

"correspondance" a valid French word?

Of course in English it's a typo, but googling it seems to get French results. Comments? --mboverload@ 08:04, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, judging from http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Correspondance --Kjoonlee 09:24, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Correspondant(e) is the French word for correspondent, and correspondre is the verb, so I suppose it makes sense that correspondance is the French word for correspondence. Markdarb 21:07, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Translation from Japanese

Hi,

Just trying to work my way through a homework assignment :-)

I've stumbled across the following sentence..

日本人が毎年春する事があります。何だか知っていますか。

I'm stuck on the meaning of 春する and 何だか.. The closest I can get to a translation is "Every year the Japanese experience spring; what do you know about this?" but that doesn't sound right to me. :-(

Thanks in advance for any help.

splintax ^(talk) 09:54, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Directly translated Japanese almost never sounds right. The languagese are too different. ;) Also, I think it's unclear who it is that "知っていますか" refers to, the reader or the Japanese people? Having said that, my Japanese is very limited... 惑乱 分からん 10:30, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I should have clarified.. this is from a series of questions that I'll be asked and have to respond to. The 知っていますか refers to me, the reader - as a Westerner, many of the other questions are asking me what I know about Japanese culture (eg. "日本でたくさん雪がふる所を知っていますか" - "Do you know a place in Japan where lots of snow falls?"). splintax ^(talk) 10:39, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

何だか means 'a little', 'a bit'. Idiomatically, maybe "Do you know anything about spring in Japan", or more literally "Do you know anything about Japanese people's experience of spring?" (The answer's almost certainly sakura.) :) Henry^Flower 10:45, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Jim Breen's dictionary gives:

何だか 【なんだか】 (adv) (a) little; somewhat; somehow; (P); EP

Maybe that would translate as "Do you know anything about it?" 惑乱 分からん 10:50, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

(After edit conflicts:) Japanese-person-TOPIC/SUBJECT every-year spring do-work/thing-TOPIC/SUBJECT-exists. (Of-)Which-know-PRESENT-QUESTION. I don't really know Japanese very well, but my translation (thanks to the similarities between Japanese and Korean) would be: There's something that Japanese people do every year at spring. Do you know what/which it is? --Kjoonlee 10:51, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Nandaka is usually translated to "무엇인지" or "무언가" in Korean. 무엇인지 means "something" or "what it is" or something like that. --Kjoonlee 10:51, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks guys. I remember vaguely the teacher mentioning sakura when going through the sheet yesterday, now. I've translated it as "Every year, the Japanese experience spring. Do you know much about it?". splintax ^(talk) 11:22, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Noooooh.. suru is not an auxiliary verb here.. --Kjoonlee 11:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

And suru-koto is an action, so the answer is probably hanami, if it's related to sakura. --Kjoonlee 11:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

The translation of Kjoon (bold sentence) is perfect -- Are you really ja-1?? I don't know Korean unfortunately, but this fact seems to imply the similarities between Japanese and Korean is significant! The problem was, in fact, that the original Japanse sentence was not that perfect...

• original: 日本人が毎年春する事があります。何だか知っていますか。
• normal: 日本人が毎年春にする事があります。何だか知っていますか。

Usually に ("in", "at" or "on" depending on the context) is needed after 春, since 春 (spring) alone is just a noun. Note, though, some words like 昨日, 今日 or 明日 can be used as adverbs by itself, say: "明日買い物に行く" = "I'm going to go shopping tomorrow" (hmm, in English it's not on tomorrow, either... coincident?)

It is clear (in Japanese) who it is that "知っていますか" refers to: the reader, or the person who is asked. Actually, this sentence is ommiting "あなたはそれが" before "何だか知っていますか". The phrase "(それが)何だか" in this context is equivalent to "(それが)何であるか" = "what it is". Thus, the last half is the short form of "あなたはそれが何であるか知っていますか" which means "Do you know what it is?" (where, it = the thing Japanse people do in every spring... uh, probably ja:花見? ... oh, Kjoon already mentioned it!)

• 蛇足 (dasoku, a side note): "何だか" as an adverb is like thie: "何だか眠いな..." = "Nandaka nemui na..." = "I'm feeling a little sleepy...". "何か" (nanka) can also be used. --marsian 03:34, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

That also brings to light the obvious problem with referring to a dictionary for definitions of anything more complex than a simple noun. The dictionary you (the original poster) read that defined 何だか as "a little" was attempting a convenience for English speakers, when in reality it has no such meaning. Note that in English, "I'm a little sick" and "I'm kind of sick" have almost exactly the same meaning, though the words "a little" (a small amount) and "kind of" (a type of) have very different meanings. It is not realistic to believe such words can translate so easily into every language, and it's a shame that dictionaries try to inform users in such a way. It is much more easy to understand, anyways, when you realize the grammatical parts, e.g. WHAT + copula + QUESTION, which clearly gives it the same meaning as 何か (WHAT + QUESTION), which was so clearly explained at length previously by Marsian.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  20:06, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

A Dutch translation.

Could anyone provide Dutch, Swedish, Finnish or Norwegian translations of the word "plant"?

• Dutch: Planten [This is plural, sing. plant -- David Sneek 11:22, 9 August 2006 (UTC)]
• Swedish: Växter
• Finnish: Kasvi
• Norwegian
  • Nynorsk: Plante
  • Bokmål: Planter

You can use Wikipedia as a simple translator by looking at the InterWiki links at Plant. --Kjoonlee 11:04, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

You can also use Wiktionary, the sister project of Wikipedia. It includes the entry for plant. Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 11:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

You've seriously mixed up singular and plural form for several languages, Swedish: växt / växter (or planta / plantor), Dutch: plant / planten, Bokmål: plante / planter, vekst / vekster, Nynorsk: plante/ planter, vekst / vekster, vokster / vokstrar As far as I know. I don't know Finnish, but considering how the forms are mixed for most other languages, I would be suspicious concerning Finnish, too... 惑乱 分からん 11:57, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

/me smacks forehead. --Kjoonlee 12:10, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Which meaning(s) of plant? --Lambiam^Talk 02:05, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Well? 惑乱 分からん 11:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Any.

Is there still a problem now concerning the Dutch translation? Anyway : the plant (singular,noun, as in your garden) = de plant the plants (plural, noun, as in your garden) = de planten plant (singular, noun, as in power plant) = centrale :) Evilbu 13:37, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Plagerism Plagiarism

I have recently read a book, in which everything including quotes were not cited. I need to know who to report this author and book to.

Report this to the people whose work was copied. Note that a lack of citations is not the same as plagiarism; many popular books do not follow this academic pattern. Plagiarism is outright copying. Notinasnaid 11:23, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

See plagiarism and copyright infringement. Quoting up to 400 words of a work still under copyright is normally considered fair use. More than this and the publisher or author will have to seek permission, but they are not obliged to provide a reference unless they are specifically asked to do so by the copyright holder, though I agree a lack of references can be very annoying.--Shantavira 13:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I imagine there must be exceptions to the 400 word limit. For example, a book which is a review of another book would certainly need to quote far more of the original than that. StuRat 17:14, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, but the publisher would still need permission. There are various exceptions. For example, you shouldn't quote more than 25% of a poem without permission (again, assuming it's still under copyright). This is a real bugger when you only want to quote a haiku.--Shantavira 07:36, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Those seem to be pretty arbitrary limits. I don't think such limits are actually written into law anywhere; they're probably just guidelines. —Bkell (talk) 19:56, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I Ching

How is "I Ching" properly pronounced in English? I've heard it as either "I ching" or "E ching" (I don't know IPA). Dismas|^(talk) 12:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I've heard both too. I doubt there is any one "correct" way. I'm surprised that a lot of people have never even heard of it, so it hardly matters in the end. JackofOz 12:42, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

The modern Chinese pronunciation is, in a rough and ready romanisation, 'Ee Jeeng'; the 'Eye Ching' pronunciation is the result of applying conventions of English spelling-sound correlation to Chinese systems (with unfortunate results). Having said that, one could argue that in English we can call it whatever we like, and that the English name doesn't need to be the same as the Chinese one (and the pronunciation 2000 years ago was ceratinly nothing like either of them). I'd just say use whatever is most likely to be understood- Chinese-style or English-style according to your audience. (As a sidenote, I saw a reporter on the news today talking about a 'priceless Kwing vase'. Oh, how I giggled). Henry^Flower 12:54, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Reminds me of a radio announcer on a classical station in Texas who announced the broadcoast of Gow-nodd's Faust; the scene began with Faust "laminating" his fate... User:Angr 13:02, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Which in turn reminds me of a scene from the wonderful short film "X Marks the Spot" (about automobile safety) as interpreted by MST3K:

(Joe Doaks and his guardian angel arrive in God's "crummy" office.)

CROW (speaking as GOD): I'll be with you in a moment, I'm just sealing some fates. --Tkynerd 13:22, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the info... even the off topic sort.  :-) --Dismas|^(talk) 14:24, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Very...non sequituric. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 15:32, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd like to comment on that, but I can't think of anyth ........ (oops). :--) JackofOz 23:35, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

• I've been told "yee zhing" but China is a huge place so maybe accents differ but I say "eye ching" to some people cos they don't know what I'm talking about otherwise hotclaws**-- now where are my three coins(82.138.214.1 16:06, 14 August 2006 (UTC))

Asian verbosity

I was at a place today where there was a poster on the wall aimed at non-English speakers. It said "Ask for an interpreter here", then translated that sentence into a range of other languages. The Serbian, Czech, Macedonian, Greek, Indonesian and Turkish translations each required 3 words. The Spanish, Arabic, Armenian and Georgian versions used 4 words. The Italian translation needed 5 words, like the English original. But the Thai, Chinese and Vietnamese translations each used no less than 10 words or characters. Why so many words/characters for such a simple concept that other languages can get by with using as few as 3 words? JackofOz 12:51, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

In Chinese and Vietnamese at least, each character corresponds to one syllable, and a word might be more than one syllable. Thai is written in an abugida, so I don't know if you saw that many words or that many individual consonant symbols with their concomitant vowel markings, but if it was the latter, it will also be roughly one syllable per symbol. User:Angr 12:59, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Also, Chinese, Thai and Vietnamese are analytic languages, which use functional words rather than inflection to indicate various factors. The more concise languages may be pro-drop, for example. How is your Thai, by the way- are you sure these were separate words? Henry^Flower 13:01, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

The Thai and Georgian were educated guesses. They may not have been those languages at all. The one that really amazed me was Vietnamese. I even wrote it down (pardon some missed diacritics): "Quŷ vi có thê xin thông ngôn viên ó đây". Supplementary question: Why is Vietnamese so chock-full of diacritics? There's hardly a word that doesn't have one or more. JackofOz 13:09, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Because Vietnamese is tonal. Chinese has lots of diacritics too, when it's written in Latin.

As Henry hinted at, the number of words isn't the only number worth counting. How many syllables did they have? Inuktitut could probably express "Ask for an interpreter here" in a single word, but it would be a very long word. How many morphemes did they have? The Asian languages might have expressed part of the meaning in a separate word that the other languages put in a suffix on another word, but in terms of communicative efficiency, it amounts to the same thing. Would you say English must be wordier than German because English uses two words ("Main Page") while German uses one ("Hauptseite")? --Ptcamn 13:14, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

It mightn't always be like that of course - I recall the name of an Asian country or something being only two short words - syllables, even - with its English translation being "Land of a Thousand Elephants". It all reeks a bit of the Sapir-Whorf (I think that's what it is) hypothesis, I suppose. It's a bit like the aforementioned Inuktitut example. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 14:34, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

That would be Lan Xang. Actually it seems to me that an explanation in terms of analytic/synthetic languages is the opposite of Sapir-Whorf.And therefore probably right. Henry^Flower 15:12, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

True: the example I gave is probably to do with S-W but in the question it's all analytic vs. synthetic. Whoops. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 15:29, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, can anyone do a back-translation of the Vietnamese version I quoted above, "word" for "word"? JackofOz 14:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm going to guess that among the Asian languages, the Korean and Japanese translations were very polite-- this can really add on alot of syllables. Perhaps this is part of the explanation? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 203.236.49.81 (talk • contribs)

Since (as far as we know) there weren't any Korean or Japanese translations, I'd say probably not. :) Henry^Flower 12:59, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Here's a try for a

back-translation of the Vietnamese version, "word" for "word"

of Quý vị có thể xin thông ngôn viện ở đây. (as I think it should be)

quý

honorable

vị

part of "you", quý vị is a polite way of saying "you all"

có

have

thể

possibility – có thể means "can"

xin

to beg for, to request

thông

understand

ngôn

speak – thông ngôn just means "interpreter". It's a bit silly to split that one up, like "inter pret er".

viện

help – xin viện means "ask for help"

ở

at

đây

here – in fact ở đây means "here" in full

I hope this is somewhat what you were searching for... David 22:23, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks David. That's very enlightening. JackofOz 04:15, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Most nouns in formal writing are created in Chinese with 2 characters, and I can only assume the same for Vietnamese (and it seems to be so from David's great explanation!). Thus "interpreter" and "here" will automatically take 4 "words", although they're more like syllables.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  20:14, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

viện should be viên. Viên is similar to the suffix -er in English. "Thông ngôn viên", literally, is "understand speak person" or "interpreter". It is quite archaic. "Thông dịch viên" is usually used instead. DHN 12:19, 9 September 2006 (UTC)

Translation of the following into as many languages as possible.

I'd like to get a translation of the following into as many languages as possible. My own language skills only allow me to translate it it to poor Esperanto and even worse Malay, and Babelfish is far too... well, horrible. I appreciate any responses. My world is collapsing. People are aware but not that bothered. They casually avoid large parts of the structure as it falls to the earth. Taiq 14:48, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

German - Meine Welt stürzt ein. Die Leute sind gewahr aber haben keine Lust. Sie fechten großen Stücke des Aufbaus beiläufig an, während es zum Grund (or zur Erde if you mean the planet Earth) fällt.I hope that's right.- THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 15:17, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Leute is a plural noun in German. Otherwise, I'd go with Meine Welt bricht zusammen. Die Menschen wissen es aber es stört sie nicht. Sie umgehen unbekümmert die großen Stücke der Struktur, die zur Erde fallen. User:Angr 15:54, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the translations so far. To clarify a little, "the earth" refers to "the ground". Taiq 16:27, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Then, zu Boden may or may not be better, depends. It should be fällt instead of fallen since sie refers to the structure. Greatgavini's version sounds a lot like coming straight from Babelfish.--80.136.159.34 17:45, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

What? What's Babelfish??? And in case you hadn't noticed, "structure" is singular and masculine thus would not use sie. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 17:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Struktur is feminine (der Struktur is genitive singular feminine), but I intentionally used the plural of fallen to indicate that parts of the structure that are falling to the ground and people are walking casually around them, rather than that the entire structure is falling to the ground at once. User:Angr 18:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I meant Aufbau is masculine. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

The original says "it".--80.136.159.34 19:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Aye, that's right. It should be singular like the one in mine. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Dutch - "Mijn wereld stort in. De mensen realiseren zich dit, maar trekken zich er niet veel van aan. Ze ontwijken achteloos grote stukken van de structuur terwijl die ter aarde stort." The first sentence would more literally be "Mijn wereld is in aan het storten". The last bit coud be "... terwijl die op de grond valt", but I made it somewhat more poetic, in keeping with the style. I won't dare other languages with phrases like that. DirkvdM 16:50, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Hey, if he can use stort in for "collapse", then surely stürzt ein sounds alright for the German one, if not sounding a little "western".- THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 18:06, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't know Dutch, and German isn't my native language, but my non-native intuition of German says einstürzen is too literal for "My world is collapsing", though if the second part of the sentence had said the structure was collapsing, einstürzen would have been okay there. User:Angr 18:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Meine Welt bricht zusammen is idiomatic.--80.136.159.34 19:33, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

French - Mon monde s'écroule. Les gens sont bien avisés mais ça leur est bien égal. Ils évitent avec désinvolture de grands fragments de la structure pendant qu'elle tombe par terre. And I did not use Babelfish. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 18:20, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd rather have "Les gens sont au courant mais cela ne les dérange pas|cela leur est bien égal." -- DLL ^{.. T} 18:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

And what about: "... pendant qu'elle ..."? --Lambiam^Talk 02:20, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Is that when you use it? I thought it meant "during that". - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

For "during" followed by noun it's "pendant", but followed by a clause as here it's "pendant que".

I'd prefer to translate "people" as "on". Possibly something like "On est bien au courant, mais on s'en fiche." ("s'en fiche" is slightly idiomatic but not highly so I think.) And then "On évite" etc. --Zeborah 08:51, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Russian. Мой мир рушится. Люди это видят, но им нет до этого дела. Они небрежно уклоняются от падающих на землю больших кусков здания.—Ëzhiki (Igels Hérissonovich Ïzhakoff-Amursky) • (yo?); 19:13, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Spanish - Mi mundo se derrumba. Todos son conscientes pero les da igual. Evitan despreocupadamente los pedazos de la estructura al caer a la tierra. Some variants: se derrumba/se cae a pedazos; todos/la gente; son conscientes/están al corriente/lo saben; les da igual/no les molesta; a la tierra/al suelo.--RiseRover|^talk 19:20, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

In stead of 'son conscientes' I would have used 'se dan cuenta', but then my Spanish isn't that perfect. DirkvdM 09:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Igpay Atinlay: Ymay orldway isway ollapsingcay. Eoplepay areway awareway utbay otnay atthay otheredbay. Eythay asuallycay avoidway argelay artspay ofway ethay ucturestray asway itway allsfay otay ethay earthway.  ;-) hydnjo talk 19:20, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

In Syriac Aramaic it is:

ܥܠܡܝ ܗܘ ܢܦܠ

ܥܡܐ ܗܘ ܚܙܐ

ܐܠܐ ܗܢܘܢ

ܠܐ ܚܫܒܝܢ ܐܢܘܢ

ܡܬܦܪܩܝܢ ܐܢܘܢ

ܡܢ ܡܢܘܬܐ ܕܒܢܝܢܐ

ܐܝܟܢܐ ܗܘ

ܢܦܠ ܠܐܪܥܐ

which transliterates roughly as:

‘olamyu nofel

‘amau hoze

elo henun

lo-hoshbin enun

methparqin enun

men-menawotho d-venyono

aikano hu

nofel lar‘o

I hope that's OK. — Gareth Hughes 20:08, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Czech – Můj svět se hroutí. Lidé jsou si toho vědomi, ale nezajímá je to. Lhostejně se vyhýbají velkým kusům struktury, které padají k zemi. Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 22:55, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

1337 - |\/|y w0|21|) 15 c0ll@p51n6. Ppl @|23 @w@|23 8u7 n07 807h3|23d. 7h3y c@5u@11y @v01d 1@|263 p@|275 0|= 7h3 57|2u(7u|23 @5 17 |=@115 70 7h3 3@|27h. schyler 23:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Turkish – Dünyam çökiyor. İnsanlar duyuyor ama endişesi yokmuş. Yere düşen bünyenin büyük parçaları raslantısal çekiniyorlar. --Lambiam^Talk 02:47, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Scots - Ma warld's comin in. Folk is awaur bot nae gey fasht. Thay owerlie jouk lairge dauds o tha framewark while hit fa's tae tha grun. I'd like to point out that, me being me, it's not worth going by my translations. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 13:12, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Swedish - Min värld rasar ihop. Folk vet om det men det bekommer dem inte så mycket. Obekymrade går de runt stora stycken från strukturen medan det hela faller till marken. Corrections or other help welcome, as Swedish is not my first language. (I'm specifically dissatisfied with my use of strukturen for the structure, but I couldn't think of anything better.) --Tkynerd 18:08, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Possibly Min värld faller samman." Then either folk "är medvetna om det/"vet om det" or "märker det" (notice it), "men bryr sig inte". "De undviker obekymrat stora stycken av massan(?) medan den faller till marken", possibly. I sure would like to know what context this is for...

"Hebrew - "עולמי נופל. אנשים יודעים אבל לא אכפת להם כל כך. הם מתרחקים באופן מקרי מהחלקים הגדולים של המבנה כשהוא נופל ארצה" which would be transliterated (with ch representing the voiceless fricative chet or chaf) as " 'Olami nophel. Anashim yod'im aval lo echpat lahem kol kach. Hem mitrachaqim ba'ophen miqri mehachalaqim hag'dolim shel hamivneh k'sh'hu nophel artza." СПУТНИК^{CCC P} 18:02, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Norwegian - Min verden faller samme. Folk vet om det, men bryr seg ikke. De unngår ubekymret store deler av strukturen etterhvert som den faller til bakken -- Tsaetre 20:51, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Arabic..

العالم ينهار من حولي,الناس يعلمون ذلك ولكنهم لا يكترثون,انهم غالبا يحاولون تجنب الحطام المتساقط من الهيكل على الأرض

IPA for "Gisele Bündchen"

Could anyone provide the IPA for Gisele Bündchen's name? Note that:

Gisele's name is actually pronounced Giseli (The e at the end of her name is not silent). She has said it doesn't matter to her now how people pronounce her name. Her last name is pronounced "Bindchen". -- Zanimum 15:48, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Now there's a challenge: how is a German name pronounced by Portuguese speakers. Gisele is [ˈgiːzələ] in German but probably [ʒiˈzɛli] in Brazilian Portuguese. Bündchen is [ˈbʏntçən] in German, but since Portuguese has neither [ʏ] nor [ç] it's anyone's guess how the name is pronounced in Brazil. [ˈbĩtʃẽ], maybe? User:Angr 15:58, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Is there any way to list the Brazillian pronouncation and German prounciation together at the start of an article? Or should it be mentioned in the footnote explaining the IPA? I've added the German pron. for now. -- Zanimum 16:12, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with Angr: this is an interesting one. Does anyone know which is her first language? I've added the IPA for the German and supposed Brazilian Portuguese pronunciations to the ref. — Gareth Hughes 18:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

It seems to me a really bad idea to start guessing how her name is pronounced in order to put it in the article. Since no-one here seems to know whether she uses a German, Brazilian, or other pronunciation, badly-educated guesses are worse than nothing. Henry^Flower 20:49, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

However, there is a good chance that her family is still German-speaking, and uses the German pronunciation. However, Bünchen's statement that it doesn't matter how it's pronounced could be something to do with her being used to hearing a Portuguese pronunciation of her name. It is highly unlikely that she would pronounce her name in any other way than these two. As a Brazilian citizen of German descent, both pronunciations have some merit. — Gareth Hughes 21:01, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Her family is 6th Generation Brazilian, and hardly anybody in the Germanic regions of Brazil even knows German anymore, let alone speaks it as a first language. Gisele's name is pronounced in Brazil according to Portuguese Brazilian pronunciation. The e at the end of her first name is not silent and the "ü" in her last name is pronounced like it is almost not even there. In America they generally pronounce her first name wrong- a decision she decided at the onset of her career to simply live with and not bother correcting. Caroline Trentini suffers a similar problem but solved it by having Americans call her "Carol" rather than listen to them butcher the end. They pronounce Gisele's last name a variety of inconsistent ways in America. Sometimes correct in Portuguese. Sometimes correct in German. Sometimes some weird American English bastardization. But she is so famous now they hardly bother with the last name anymore.Bogan444 (talk) 19:28, 20 July 2010 (UTC)

I strongly doubt her family would apply German pronunciation rules to Gisele. It's not a German name I've ever heard of – I guess it's a version of French Gisèle sans diacritics, or perhaps a Portuguese form. If it's German, it's probably an affective or dialectal form of Gisela, a fairly common name some decades ago. Wikipeditor 00:25, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I looked on Youtube, and it looks like Angr is close. The host shown in this clip pronounces it [ʒiˈzɛli ˈbĩtʃĩ]. Gustavo Kuerten's last name was pronounced [ˈkiɾtẽ]. Also, it's interesting to note that the word ü in über-model was pronounced [ju]. --Chris S. 05:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

August 10

crossword help

can u help me with these clues

severe addict's practice (5-7)(*h*I*SELLING)

Shirt selling ? StuRat 07:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Chain smoking?--Shantavira 07:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Child selling.Thylacoleo 01:34, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

kind of cattle (10)B*G*a*o

Bighorn ? StuRat 07:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Bighorns are sheep. —Bkell (talk) 19:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's right, the cattle are called longhorns. StuRat 19:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Buffalo?--Shantavira 07:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Buggalo? :-D - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

everything possible -british film (**E*U***L*T*)

How many words? Closest I can come up with is Without Limits.--Shantavira 08:56, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Could be The Full Monty, assuming the L is wrong. Thylacoleo 01:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

corporal punishment (*I*O*T*E*E**)

Guillotine?--Shantavira 07:48, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think Madame Guillotine would be appropiate for corporal punishment... - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:53, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, that would be more like decapital punishment. =S 惑乱 分からん 09:53, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

HIT ON THE LEGS . JackofOz 10:49, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Very clever! By way of digression, corporal punishment is punishment to the body. My dictionaries don't suggest that it excludes capital punishment.--Shantavira 14:19, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

irregular (*I*F**)

Fitful?--Shantavira 07:39, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Sinful? JackofOz 10:06, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Misfit? —Bkell (talk) 19:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

thanks in advancMightright 04:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)e

french help

hi im learning french at school but i was wondering if there were any mnemonics or something like that to help me remember irregular french verbs that have to be conjugated with 'etre' in 'passe compose ' and aslo if there were any rules to conjugating the first group ,second group and third group verbsMightright 05:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I was taught DR. & MRS. P. VANDERTRAMP. It stands for the verbs: devenir, revenir, monter, rester, sortir, passer, venir, aller, naître, descendre, entrer, rentrer, tomber, retourner, arriver, mourir, and partir. --Chris S. 05:59, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

For 'etre' my class learnt "Mrs Van Der Tramp". I've found two links about this: [1] and [2].

For verb conjugations, yes and no... that is, there are lots of rules: there are regularities but there are still things that you just need to memorise. Is there a specific tense or person you're having problems with? --Zeborah 06:06, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

There is, but I might not be as convenient for you as for me, a mnemonic for word order : veerfles =voir, envoyer, écouter, regarder, faire, laisser, envoyer, sentir Usually you say : Je veux le battre. Je vais le manger.

But when you use any of these as auxiliary verb: Je le laisse travailler. Evilbu 11:24, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's true. You just need to know the auxiliary verbs in English and their French equivalents. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 13:17, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Oh by the way, it's être, not etre. But maybe not having an AZERTY (like me!) might be the cause of that? Evilbu 14:38, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Ha! We learned MMT DRAPERS VAN. Which is a rubbish mnemonic. As opposed to other splendid mnemonics we learned in other subjects, such as "Many naughty rabbits eat green rhubarb roots" (characteristics of living organisms) and "Smiles of happiness come after having tankards of ale" (usually taught as SOH CAH TOA!) --Dweller 14:55, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, we had that. Someone in the class came up with TRAMP VENDS RAM. I'll chuck it at an anagram generator and see if it can come up with anything better... watch this space. ---- No, nothing much... at least within the output that I can be bothered to sift through. Arbitrary username 17:24, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Why bother learning the mnemonics? I just learnt that they're generally "verbs of motion." I suppose nager etc. could all be motion verbs too but je suis nagé doesn't really look right. I don't know. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:36, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

If you're not into mathematics you might not care, but you can also use French to make mnemonics : Tu aideras à rappeler ta quantité à beaucoup de docteurs amis. 2. 7 1 8 2 8 1 8 2 8 4 which are the first digits of e. Evilbu 20:49, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Under what circumstances would a month or day not be capitalized?

See title. (other than "may") --mboverload@ 07:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

In English, names of months and days are always capitalised. When it refers to the month, "May" is always capitalised; it's only "may" if it's being used as the verb. --Zeborah 08:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I just wanted to brainstorm before I commit it to WP:RETF =D --mboverload@ 09:08, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

There's also the noun and verb march; june isn't necessarily capitalized in june bug; and there's the adjective august. User:Angr 09:20, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

What about April fool? (And is 'April's fool' proper English?) DirkvdM 09:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

April is always capitalised. The day is April Fool's Day, and the victim of such cruel and unusual punishment is called an April Fool. JackofOz 09:57, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Days and months are capitalized because they take their names from various ancient gods. A common error is to capitalize the names of the seasons as well, but these should be lower case.--Shantavira 15:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

What is the difference between 'April fool' and 'june bug', then? DirkvdM 03:50, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"April fool" actually refers to the month of April, whereas (as far as I know) the name "june bug" doesn't derive from the name of the month. -Elmer Clark 09:21, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I suppose if some poet, like ee cummings, refuses to capitalize them, then that case should be preserved in any quotations of that poet, as well. StuRat 16:05, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Apparently Cummings himself did not approve of this rendering. --Lambiam^Talk 03:39, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

All august men may march. --Lambiam^Talk 19:20, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

this is probably what the answerer wanted?--K.C. Tang 09:17, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

One is assuming that Septem, Octo, Novem and Decem were gods. Then why not Unus, Duo, Tres (?) and the others ? I'm not sure that Caesar was divinised either (but he was). -- DLL ^{.. T} 17:40, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

No. As far as I know, the first few were either just names of months, July and August were after the emperors, and September-December were originally the 7-10th months. Look it up (here). —Daniel (‽) 20:52, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Septem, Octo, Novem, Decem are the actual names of the numbers (if I remember my Latin from ten years ago!) Nyttend 18:37, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Possession in Japanese.

I need someone to check my Japanese symbol choices and grammar for me, thanks in advance!

魚 - this is ("Sakana") fish?

雄 - this is the name "Tetsuo"?

Put like this: 魚雄 would mean "Tetsuo's Fish", right? Or is it done differently? -- 69.138.61.168 07:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

you have to add a "no" between the possessor and the possessed: 雄の魚--K.C. Tang 07:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think 雄 is the name "Tetsuo", actually. There's several dozen ways of writing names, depending on the individual, but I don't think that's one of them. --Ptcamn 19:19, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Here are some common ways of writing the name "Tetsuo": 铁男 (as in the SciFi horror flic) • 鉄雄 (as in Tetsuo Shima) • 哲男 • 哲徃 • 哲応 • 哲暢 • 天津夫. --Lambiam^Talk 20:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

If you're intending "Tetsuo's fish", then "Tetsuoの魚" is it. 雄 alone does not mean any specific thing. The possible kanji options for Tetsuo are: for "Tetsu" = 哲, 徹 or 鉄; for "o" = 雄, 夫, 男, 郎, or 生; choose a kanji from each, then put them together. These are quite common kanjis -- for more, google (and you'll get something like this).

If you would like to know the meaning of 魚雄, I don't know such a word... Google says there's a sushi restaurant of the name. --marsian 03:57, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

雄 is the rarely used kanji for osu, male. Sometimes の can be hidden when part of a name, like as in Yamanote Line, but a combination like this would almost certainly be coupled with furigana to explain how they intend people to interpret/read it.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  17:36, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

cree word for

loaf and relax

meanings

213.165.161.214I came across a word 'imminant' i can't seem to find a meaning for it anywhere in british english .. does it mean exactly the same as imminent? is it american? or does it have a different meaning altogether?

I'd say it's just a typo for imminent. Or maybe eminent. User:Angr 17:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Or a really bad typo for "immigrant". What context is it used in? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 18:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Or "immanent"? · rodii · 19:01, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Was it in a Wikipedia article? Because anyone can edit them, spellings in Wikipedia articles are not reliable. I've just found and corrected three instances of that word.--Shantavira 18:38, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's probably it then. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:46, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't the only one. Googling 'imminant' on English sites gives 18400 hits, 4 of which in Wikipedia. 3 of which were old versions, already corrected, and 1 in a talk page archive. DirkvdM 04:03, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Anglophone countries

what countries speak English as a homelanguage

"Home" language? Take a jouk at Image:Anglospeak.png - it might be what you're looking for. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:44, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

"jouk"? JackofOz 00:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, imminantly. DirkvdM 04:04, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Imminantly and haistily. It is emportant that it you see it! :-D "Jouk"'s a...errrr...Northern Ireland word, sort of, meaning "look". I thought it'd be clear from the context. Does it mean something offensive in Australia? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:20, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's even phonotactically acceptable in Australia. The "ou" diphthong only occurs before coronals. --Ptcamn 09:09, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it just represents the /ʉ/ sound. Badly spelt, I know, but who spells slang words? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:32, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

August 11

Meaning of a mantra

11 August 2006

Sir/Madam:

Somebody sent me a text saying it is a mantra - "Laxmi Devigeni Namo" Do you know what this means?

Thanks. ---- luz dg. galang email: %deleted%

See these answers. --Lambiam^Talk 01:50, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

The whole point of a mantra is that it's not supposed to mean anything at all. Whilever you focus on something that has a meaning to you, you're defeating the purpose of meditation, which is about clearing the conscious mind as far as possible. JackofOz 04:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Despite what you say, om mani padme hum does have lexical meaning(s). If he/she's curious, let him/her be curious. ;) --Kjoonlee 05:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

palatal fricative

Okay, this is kind of a weird question. If you try to make the [ʒ] or [ʃ] sound without actually touching the roof of the mouth, is the resluting sound a palatal fricative? KeeganB

They're certainly similar sounds though. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Nope, that would be a postalveolar approximant. Mo-Al 07:17, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, When I make that sound, it has a fricative quality. Any tips on how to make a genuine palatal fricative? I'm trying to make some adjustments to my Spanish pronounciaton.KeeganB

Many English speakers have a voiceless palatal fricative as the first consonant in words like huge and human. --Ptcamn 09:07, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah. If you make a Y sound(as in yellow) and constrict it more until there's some friction, that's a palatal fricative. But if that's too difficult you could always just pronounce <y> and <ll> as [ʒ], that way you'll be speaking Spanish of Río de la Plata. AEuSoes1 21:58, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

What's the name of this container?

What is the name of the large (approx. 50 cm), round, plastic container used for washing? For example, you can fill it with water and wash your feet in it, or you can dip a towel in and wash your face thoroughly. Here is a photo of it:

http://72.136.70.187/IMG_3963.JPG

--Bowlhover 07:06, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Hoverbowl? --Lambiam^Talk 07:22, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

In Korean, they're colloquially known as 다라 dara, but the "proper" word for it is 대야 daeya. I think "plastic basin" would be the closest term in English. --Kjoonlee 07:29, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

This one looks more like a ranarium.--Shantavira 07:31, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd have just called it a bowl. Isn't a ranarium like an aquarium for frogs? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:34, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

the first question is: do the people in the West use this thing? If they do, there should be a name for it. It is widely used in Asia (I use it everyday), but do the peopel in the West use it?--K.C. Tang 09:29, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I call it a wash tub. I use it for soaking my feet, washing stockings and dishes, and holding wash water when I hand-wash my floor. Anchoress 09:35, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

In Serbia its called "lavor". My dictionary suggests washbowl, laver or basin. --dcabrilo 12:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

We had a plastic basin like that when I was a kid, but we only ever used it when we were sick and had to thrown up (and so we called it a "barf bucket"). I saw it being used for soaking feet once, and I thought that was really weird, haha. Adam Bishop 17:27, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"Barf bucket" it is! ;-) - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:28, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Vomiting is bad enough, but projectile vomiting is "just beyond the pail". StuRat 19:23, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I would say a wash basin in general, but, as shown in the pic, it appears to be used as a bird bath, or perhaps a toad bath. :-) StuRat 19:23, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for the quick responses, everyone! I think I'll call it a "plastic basin" or "water basin". About whether this basin is used in the West: I'd be glad to know. I'm Chinese, and although I don't use the basin very much, I have many at my house. (By the way, the container is called "xi lian pen" in Chinese, literally translated as "face-washing container").

No, it's not common in the West (although it probably was before indoor plumbing). Sinks in the West have stoppers that allow them to retain water long enough to wash one's face, etc. Also, many people don't wash using a bowl of water, but rather take a shower or bath and then wash everything, including their face. StuRat 21:03, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Also, the plastic basin is not very commonly used to keep toads. :) I needed a temproary place to keep the toads I caught, so I used a water basin. --Bowlhover 07:47, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Since there isn't a top on it and toads can jump, I would think it would be an EXTREMELY temporary container for toads, LOL. StuRat 20:59, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

That's interesting, because in Korean, a daeya is called a sesutdaeya when you use it for washing your face. Sesu is literally 洗手, "wash hands," but it actually means "wash face." --Kjoonlee 10:30, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The family Slumgum would call it a washing-up bowl.  Slumgum T. C.   23:45, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

On seeing this my first instinct is to call it a washpan. Basins are deeper. Something that particular size is likely to used in the West on a camping trip if at all.--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 14:40, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

• in Britain,a washing-up bowl,they were all this shape until plastic moulding got better and oblonge bowls to fit the sink began to be produced-hotclaws**==(82.138.214.1 15:17, 15 August 2006 (UTC))

quiz type question

it is an 13 letter word as -h-t---i--me- clues Doctors hate fishermen like children love to eat what it is—Preceding unsigned comment added by 220.227.133.67 (talk • contribs)

The closest single word I can find is "what's-his-name's", which isn't a perfect fit. Are you sure you have the letters right?--Shantavira 15:29, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Children love to eat it, so it's obviously some type of not too exotic food. Fishermen like it, so maybe it's a really big or rare fish...and doctors hate it so it must be unhealthy. I'm not sure. White-something, maybe whitebait-something? Could it be whitebait smelt? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:16, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

White Irishmen? White triremes? —Bkell (talk) 17:32, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Do children eat them? I've never heard of them. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

No, those are just words that fit __i__me_. Fishermen might like triremes, if they are warlike fishermen. Neither of my guesses is likely to be correct. —Bkell (talk) 19:21, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Ach, you never know: you might be right. Maybe it's a metaphor or something. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:53, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

It could be the something. Or what something, as in "what lies beneath". "That policemen" fits, but it's ungrammatical. —Bkell (talk) 19:58, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I've found quite an extensive list of 13-letter words in English. If anyone feels like going through the list, it's available at [3]. Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 20:03, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

What's in it? Amen. —Bkell (talk) 20:04, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I found an answer with my mad Google skills, but it's a pretty strange answer. --LarryMac 20:06, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

As far as I can tell chathuringmes is not an existing word. --Lambiam^Talk 07:13, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

According to Yahoo Answers, the answer is Chaetognathas, i.e. "worms". However, this appears to be a pretty specific type of worm, and I'm not sure about the "children love to eat" part. --LarryMac 14:50, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Could there be a combination of three different words? Like Doctors hate -h-t-, fishermen like --i-, children love -me-? Strange, indeed... 惑乱 分からん 11:31, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

• bet it's the name of a fly-fishing lure,you know those tied from feathers and stuff-hotclaws**==(82.138.214.1 15:20, 15 August 2006 (UTC))

ITS ANSWER IS Chathuringmes ITS A NAME OF GUMMY WORMS ITS A PARASITE SO DOCTORS HATE IT AND FISHERMEN LOVES IT FOR CATCHING FISHES AND KIDS ALWAYS LOVES GUMS ;)

meaning of a word

hi i wonder if you could give me the meaning of the word 'e'rets

thank you greatly

sandy brown

In which language? In Hebrew, it would mean "land" or shorthand for "the land of Israel". --Dweller 14:54, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Though without the second apostrophe... Hebrew-alphabet spelling is ארץ . AnonMoos 00:53, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

IPA for Bomis

Could someone add an IPA to the article Bomis? It rhymes with "Thomas". Add this ref... <ref>[http://www.bomis.com/about/bomis_faq.html Bomis FAQ]</ref>, please. -- Zanimum 17:14, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Think I've got it... - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:25, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

This is the problem with using IPA: it's too specific. Pace the Bomis FAQ, I don't think it rhymes with Thomas in all accents. This transcription is only accurate for those with the weak vowel merger. --Ptcamn 01:35, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't really know what the IPA for Thomas is anyway. Can't we just write "rhymes with Thomas" instead? -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:09, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

"rhymes with promise" would probably be better. --Ptcamn 07:38, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

But the ref says "rhymes with Thomas". Is there any point having the ref in there then? -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 15:34, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, all! -- Zanimum 17:16, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Specific and general

How would you describe the relationship between the concepts of "poem" and "poetry"? They both refer to the same basic concept, but in different scope. (Clearly, a poem is an example of poetry, but not vice versa.)

I'm specifically asking, because I'm wondering about the proper way to express this relationship in Esperanto. Is this the same as the "-ado" suffix? --π! 20:43, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

A poem is a specific piece of verse. Poetry is the general group of poems. It is similar to the distinction between a story and literature. I would guess that it is grammatically the difference between a concrete and an abstract noun. —Daniel (‽) 20:46, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Concrete and abstract - that's exactly what I was looking for. Does anyone know if there's a rule for abstracting nouns in Esperanto? --π! 21:17, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Though there may be a rule, I'm not sure if it applies for "poem" and "poetry". Poem is simply "poemo", and poetry is "poezio" (poetic is "poezia"), so the words have different roots!  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  17:22, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

I think you could describe it as th formation of an abstract noun as described above. Most languages have a clear way of doing this (English has a confusing array of different ways to do it). In Syriac, for example, the word malkā means 'king', and malkutā means 'kingdom', and this '-utā' ending is common in the formation of abstract nouns. — Gareth Hughes 17:50, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Small nitpick. A poem is an item of poerty. Neither is neccesarily "verse" (ie prose poem) and there also can be items of verse which are not poems (ie dramatic verse)--Birgitte§β ʈ Talk 15:14, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

August 12

chemistry term

Hi

I'm looking for a word I heard used the other day in a chemistry lab that I've completely forgotten. It meant "work the solvent out of a liquid (physically with a glass rod) to make it a solid" and I'm pretty sure it started with a t and it could have sounded like "titilation" maybe with an extra syllable.

Thanks for your help!

Aaadddaaammm 01:32, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Too slow guys! Someone at the "Science" help desk got it! If you want to know, it was trituration. Thanks anyway! Aaadddaaammm 01:39, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

What on earth would we language-desk folk know about science??? -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:13, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Too... many... question marks...

Well, the question fell both into the category of "science question" and "looking for a word". I suppose we fall into the latter category. --π! 07:27, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Question about transcription (moved from talkpage)

I have been editting the page on Wollongong.

Some nice person has put up the name in phonetics. The only problem is- they have got it wrong.

Even without having a deep knowledge of phonetics it is clear to me that this is the case.

the reason being that the first ong doesn't rhyme with the second ong. Or rather it DOES and it didn't orter, if you take my meaning.

My meaning is that the place is called, most plainly, and impossibly, Woollen-gong.

Not Wal-ong-gong, (that's Wal as in Wally Wombat, OK?)

It should be Woollen as in Onkaparinga. And Gong as in Order of Australia.

See ya!

--Amandajm 13:41, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, I read the article's transcription, which is [wʊlɒŋgɒŋ]. I read up on the phonetics of Australian English to make sure we are on the same page. I'll assume you described it in Australian phonetics.

• The first syllable, [wʊl], has the same vowel as "foot." So I guess this is right.

• You are right about the vowel [ɒ] in the last two syllables (ong and gong), it doesn't even exist in Australian English. It's the "a" in the british prunounciation of "what." Originally, it was the vowel in words like "lot," "cloth," etc. but it changed into [ɔ].

• You said the first vowel is prunounced more like "en." Is it like the vowel in "dress" and "bed"? If it is, then the correct way to write that vowel is simply [en].

• I'm not quite sure what you mean by "Gong as in Order of Australia." Are you referring to the "or" in "order"? If so, then you'd write it as [ɡoŋ]. But if it's closer to the vowel in "goat," you'd write it as [ɡəʉŋ].

So you'd write it as [wʊl.en.ɡoŋ] (unless, of course, the vowels are different from what I described). The full-stops/periods seperate the vowels, you can remove them if you want.

Please tell me if you need any more help. It's a pleasure to work on phonetic transcription. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 14:26, 9 August 2006 (UTC)

Hi there!

Thank you for getting back to me!

This time, I will try to be very serious and not make silly Australian jokes!

Firstly- the "o" sound as in English "hot" and "what" does exist in Australian English. I use it, and I am Australian.

Secondly- My reference to Woollen as in Onkaparinga is because Onkaparinga were (until about 1980) the largest manufacturers of woollen blankets and dressing gowns in Australia.

So it's not Wool-en, it's wool'n, as in reason, bitten, given. The wool part is oo like foot, not ool like school.

Thirdly- "gong". A gong like the big round thing that's used to start a Rank Organisation movie, or summon people to dinner. Like "song" and "wrong"

In Australia, the main award of honour is the Order of Australia which is a very large gold medal which is often called a "Gong". The term is sometimes used for medals in England as well, but as far as I know, it originated with the Order of Australia because it looks exactly like on. Hope this is clear!

--Amandajm 14:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Then based on your description, it's [wʊl.ɪn.ɡɔŋ] if you pronounce "en" like "in". If you pronounce the "en" in those words like "un," then it's [wʊl.ən.ɡɔŋ]. I don't know which way is the standard in Australia, but perhaps you do. By the way, I'm sorry I didn't understand the Australian cultural references....I try to be international in the way I do things, but there is some stuff that just goes over my head. Anyway, cheers, The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 20:59, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't know how that looks on your computer but in what you've written, how it looks to me is as if all three vowels are identical, which is not the way it is.

oo as in foot, the next vowel is barely pronounced at all, like Allen, Colin and Dylan. the third vowel is o as in long, song etc.

the first ng is pronounced as n-g, as is "Go man, go!" the second ng is pronounced as in long, song and gong.

Maybe I need to find an Australian who can fix it! The pronunciation of Australian Aboriginal place names is inconsistent. Canberra is often pronounced Can'bra, Cairn'bra or Cairm'bra. And Canowindra, which one would expect to be Canno-wind-dra is K-noun'dra. !

--Amandajm 12:14, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

OK, I'm taking it to the language reference desk. Perhaps we could get a third opinion, to clarify which part of the transcription needs work. It seems the only part that could be wrong are the second and third vowels. The ikiroid (talk·desk·Advise me) 13:32, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

The abbot-rabbit merger is standard in Australia: "en" and "in" are both [ən].

I hate IPA for pronunciations. British speakers are going to read it and thing we say "gawng". But nevertheless, [ɔ] is accurate for the Australian vowel in "gong" and "what".

I think the first "ng" is actually [ŋ], not [n]. /n/ often assimilates to [ŋ], so it can be difficult to tell them apart.

In my own speech, the l is dark, [ɫ]. This varies from place to place, but I'm going to assume Wollongongian English has it dark too.

So, I would write [ˈwʊɫəŋˌɡɔŋ]. --Ptcamn 19:44, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

"Four-leaf clover" in latin?

Subject says it all, I suppose. I'd like to know how you say "four-leaf clover" in latin... TERdON 17:46, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Seeing as 'clover' is trifolium, or 'three-leafed', a four-leafed clover would be a quadrifolium. — Gareth Hughes 17:56, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Assuming that Pliny the Younger had wanted to write about four-leaf clover (he mentions trefoil in a letter to Domitius Apollinaris), my best guess is he'd have used trifolium quadrifoliatum – "four-leafed trefoil". --Lambiam^Talk 18:59, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

Which translated into Latinate English would be quadrifoliate trefoil. — Jéioosh 23:39, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Pronunciation of Azania

This is my first question on a reference desk, so I offer my apologies if I did something wrong. Anyways, what is the correct pronunciation of the second syllable (the "an") of Azania? (I don't understand the International Phonetic Alphabet, so please don't answer with that alone) My guess is that it is pronounced like 'ain'/'ane', as in rain and insane. But I figure it could also be 'an', like tin can. Then I thought it might even be 'ahn'/awn, as in autobahnand lawn. I've read the article twice over, and find no mention of pronunciation. Thank you in advance for your answers, as I'm going on wikibreak shortly and might not be here for the response, but will be awaiting it. Picaroon9288|ta co 02:40, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

It is not an official name, so your pronunciation is "as good" as mine. In the U.S., you'll most likely hear a sound as in sane. In other countries you may hear other sounds. In any case the stress is on the second syllable, unlike for "Tanzania" where it is on the first. --Lambiam^Talk 03:36, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm sure you mean that the stress in Tanzania is on the third syllable. User:Zoe|(talk) 03:53, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Right, although with a clear secondary stress on the first. --Lambiam^Talk 05:40, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

August 13

Translations of Japanese/Chinese phrases

What does "釘宮理恵" mean? I'm not sure of the original language. Babelfish says if it's traditional Chinese, it's "Nail palace principle □"; whereas if it's Japanese, it's "Rie Kugimiya." Windows Media Player somehow came up with this as a folder name when it was sorting the song Banquet by Bloc Party. On a related note, what does "「りぜるまいん」主題歌～はじめてしましょ！｜ほんきパワーのだっしゅ！" mean? NeonMerlin 05:25, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Update: Some Googling, and following an interlanguage link from the Japanese Wikipedia, have revealed who 釘宮理恵 (Rie Kugimiya) is. However, that still leaves the question of the other phrase. NeonMerlin 05:32, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

The first part 「りぜるまいん」 transliterates to "Rizerumain" ("Rizelmine"), which is the name of an anime [4]. --Lambiam^Talk 06:04, August 13, 2006 (UTC)

りぜるまいん is Rizelmine. 主題歌 is theme song. はじめて♡しましょ is "Let's ♡ for the first time", the title of the opening theme song. ほんきパワーのだっしゅ! is "Real power dash!", the title of the ending theme. --Kjoonlee 06:21, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Well, this is clearly an example of how poorly Windows Media Player's metadata services can work when they don't have the whole album. I'm sure glad I now use iTunes for almost everything. NeonMerlin 15:37, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Use of Nowadays

I'm not sure why, but I have always thought the word nowadays to be very informal and not acceptable for any sort of formal writing. When I see it used in a Wikipedia article, I want to reword things to eliminate it. However, from some quick looking at some online dictionaries, I don't see any indication that it's not just as fine a word as currently. Now I'm curious: am I very peculiar in my attitude towards this word, or do others share my view? –RHolton≡– 11:56, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

"Nowadays" to me doesn't sound very informal; it just sounds like it came out of the mouth of a senior citizen. "Currently" is probably best for a Wikipedia aricle, although it is very formal and sounds weird in vernacular. They're not exactly synonyms, are they? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 12:36, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

We use it a lot in the south-western United States (i.e. Texas). schyler 12:52, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

What does <3 mean

I have seen this on some message boards but don't know what <3 means... it is leet?

(moved here from further up) doktorb _words^deeds 13:33, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a heart. Isopropyl 13:34, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

It is also used in some circles as a dismembered rear end.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  20:11, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Which makes more sense if you look at it from the emoticon-perspective. The heart is upside down. (or is that left side right?) DirkvdM 07:01, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a heart or balls and a pecker. --mboverload@ 09:47, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I think the pecker is written as o==8 ... 惑乱 分からん 10:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

<3 is a very short penis. --mboverload@ 10:04, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Still quite thick girth, though. What about -8 ? (Wonder if this discussion will be removed, soon...) 惑乱 分からん 10:08, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Vulgarity is a form of language.

Wikipedia is not censored. --Nelson Ricardo 15:54, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Not as scary as +---8 or ^---8 or even :---8 Lemon martini 19:33, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

• haha piercings! hotclaws**==(82.138.214.1 00:19, 16 August 2006 (UTC))

Seperate Login Name for each language of Wikipedia?

Hello, I had registered my login name in the german part of Wikipedia a while ago, and when I wanted to go to an english page and log in that username was unknown.

Is it necessary to create a new account for each language in which one wants to edit/discuss?

Or is there a way to have only ONE account, but still be able to edit/discuss in more than one language?

Each language's Wikipedia currently have separate accounts, as do other Wikimedia sites. For now, you'll have to make a new account. -Goldom ‽‽‽ ⁂ 15:12, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

"Single log-in" has been something desired for quite some time, and it will soon be implemented. See this article from Wikipedia Signpost from a few weeks ago. -- Arwel (talk) 12:10, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Biathlon World Championship 2005

There's a few things in Biathlon World Championship 2005 that I can't translate from Germany, esp. the "sch." thing on the table. Anyone now enough about biathlon to make this mean something? Thanks in advance. --Brandnewuser 15:11, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• I'd imagine that's the shooting (de:Schießen) score. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 16:10, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

The Sch. column shows the number of shots missed on each lap. In biathlon, when one misses a shot one has to ski an extra distance round a penalty loop, and that column shows how many times each competitor had to do so. (Slightly different in the individual event, where there are no penalty loops and instead there is a time penalty for missed shots - but the meaning of the column is the same.)

As for the event titles, I'm sure you are onto these, but "Verfolgung" is best translated as "pursuit", "Massenstart" is "mass start" and "Einzel" is "individual".

A pedantic point - since your copy from the German Wikipedia is for the English Wikipedia, I feel we should follow English language usage and have (eg) 7.5 km rather than 7,5 km.AndyofKent 17:36, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks a lot. Implemented those changes. Any idea what they write instead of sch. in English? Missed shots? Penalty loops? --Brandnewuser 19:53, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

• "Shooting" would be correct. --jpgordon^∇∆∇∆ 05:24, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Vytauto street in Lithuanian?

When I was in Lithuania recently, it seemed that many main streets were called "Vytauto Gatve" or something like this. Why is this? Does "Vytauto" translate as something like "High" or "Main" street, or does it refer to something else? --Robert Merkel 19:04, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

I think it refers to Vytautas the Great. --Lambiam^Talk 20:19, 13 August 2006 (UTC) Postscriptum: For example in the article Vytautas Magnus University you can see that the Lithuanian name is Vytauto Didžiojo Universitetas. --L. 20:24, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

Sentence structure

In the sentence, "Max pounded David to death." what is the correct classification of "to death?" We are considering death to be a noun, but that to death as a prepositionary phrase modifying the verb pounded may be an adverb. --71.98.25.194 23:30, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

It's an adverbial, specifically an adjunct. Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 23:42, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

While the prepositional phrase is adverbial, what would the classification of "death" be? Thanks for the answer, by the way. --71.98.25.194 01:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"Death" alone is still a noun. However, in connetion with the preposition, it funtions in the sentence as an adverbial (different from adverb). Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 01:08, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks for all of your responses. --71.98.25.194 02:34, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Could it be a suppository impaction?Edison 19:14, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Depends whereabouts he was pounded.Sounds mighty painful... Lemon martini 19:35, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

August 14

All-Woman or all-women?

Quick question: Should it be "The film had an all-women crew" or "The film had an all-woman crew" ? TIA. -- thunderboltz^{a.k.a.Deepu Joseph |TALK}03:56, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I would say "all-woman". The Jade Knight 04:56, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

All-female? ;-) --Chris S. 05:50, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I'd say "all-woman" too, but from Google it looks like "all-women" is actually more common. --Ptcamn 06:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree with "all-woman". We say " a six-man crew", not "a six-men crew", and we say "a nine-month gestation period", not "a nine-months gestation period". I don't know what the technical rule for that is called, but there seems to be a pattern. JackofOz 07:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

...a "twenty-year-old", maybe a "seven-foot-long alligator" too. -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:26, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

IIRC, according to my professor who taught me the history of the English language, it's a relic from Old English. I can't remember the details, but its related to two cases having an identical form. --Kjoonlee 10:31, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Old English would use the genitive plural in such situations, and the genitive plural never had an "s" ending in Old English, and frequently had a short unstressed vowel ending (which would be deleted at later stages of the lnaguage)... AnonMoos 14:35, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Google might be turning out more results for "all-women" because it is commonly said like that in a sentence, "Better rights for all women." nadonado.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  12:16, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

But "all-women" is hyphenated: the example you gave is not. -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 15:23, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Google ignores punctuation by default (even if the search string is enclosed in quotes). Is there a way to make it attend to it? It's something I've always wanted for looking up math things, but I don't think you can do that... so yes, a search for "all-women" would return results containing "all women". digfarenough (talk) 15:51, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Not that I know of. Google, by default, seems to ignore all punctuation.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  19:05, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I searched for "an all-women" to make sure it was part of a noun phrase. I also compared this with "an all-women's", which was included in the search for "an all-women". --Ptcamn 20:33, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Okay, thanks guys! So all-woman it is. :) -- thunderboltz^{a.k.a.Deepu Joseph |TALK}08:32, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

case-endings in Indo-European languages

It is easily conceivable that the ablative or dative case-endings originated from postpositions, but how about the nominative and the accusative? Is there evidence that there were particles that indicated the subject and the object of a sentence in Proto-Indo-European, just like those in Japanese? Curious to know...--K.C. Tang 06:46, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Case endings regularly derive from serial verbs and postpositions. Evidently dative case markings regularly derive from a word for "give". I do not, however, know the specific case of IE case origins. You can see if the Proto-Indo-European articles are of any help. The Jade Knight 07:01, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Ah, so the dative was derived from the verb "to give", I always fancy the dative ending was derived from a postposition meaning "to", could you give me an example (in any language)? want to know more.--K.C. Tang 07:21, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I can't, unfortunately—this is simply what Historical Linguistics (by Lyle Campbell) tells me. It recommends checking out World Lexicon of Grammaticalization (Heine & Kuteva), Historical Syntax in Cross-linguistic Perspective (Harris & Campbell), and Grammaticalization (Hopper & Traugott) for more information and specific examples. The Jade Knight 04:55, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

To start, Template:Lan is a hypothetical language. As reconstructed, it is a synthetic language. It may be easy to imagine that the case endings of PIE originated from <insert your favourite theory>, but the fact of the matter is that there is no evidence for any hypothetical origin of the case endings of this hypothetical reconstruction of this hypothetical language. --Lambiam^Talk 07:08, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

How dare you suggest that this hypothetical language is hypothetical! The Jade Knight 04:55, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Which English errors drive you the most crazy?

It's me again! I'm back to ask for your input. Right now I'm fixing all occurrences of "an unique" and I got to thinking, "what other English errors could I fix?"
So, what drives you crazy? I'll include them in User:Mboverload/RegExTypoFix, which is built-in to AutoWikiBrowser. --mboverload@ 09:46, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"I/we/you/they of to" instead of "have to" annoys me. As an ESL speaker, I don't get the error, "he has to"/"I have to", simple as that. Don't know if it's an attempt at phonetic spelling or something... 惑乱 分からん 10:05, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

You will be familiar with Wikipedia:Lists of common misspellings. One I recently worked on is "lead" instead of "led", but there are plenty still. (Pick up context by Googling for e.g. "were lead").--Shantavira 11:07, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

One of my pet peeves is when people put pronouns in the nominative case after a preposition. "There's a special bond between he and I", etc. JackofOz 11:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Wonder/wander/wunder annoy me, but apart from correcting wunder to wonder, I don't think you can program something to catch the confusion. Unless you have some sophisticated AI... Skittle 11:54, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Mistaken usage of the word "what" in place of "which" when setting questions on Wikipedia reference desks. <grins> --Dweller 11:55, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

=( --mboverload@ 12:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"Would/should of" instead of "would/should have." That could be fixed automatically, couldn't it? Mattley ^(Chattley) 12:09, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

My peeve is a little weird. You may know that due to the way the Japanese alphabet is set up, Japanese people have trouble pronouncing consonants at the end of words without affixing a vowel (usually a "u", sometimes an "o") at the end. A number of them do manage to remove those extra vowels but start assuming that every foreign word that is written/pronounced in Japanese with a final "u" or "o" (e.g. Toronto, potato) isn't pronounced with it in real English, so I recieve questions like, "Would you like a potat? Are you from Tront?"

After that I guess people who use "could" as the past tense for "can", and then of course, "Your stupid!"  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  12:14, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I guess Japanese contributors to the English Wikipedia still is a minority, though... 惑乱 分からん 14:40, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

What's wrong with "could" as the past tense of "can"? "When I was shorter, I could fit under here without stooping." Seems fine to me. --Ptcamn 15:43, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a misunderstanding that "could" is past tense in that sentence. Consider the example "If I were shorter, I could fit under here without stooping." in which it's a little more difficult to point out what tense is being used. I'm not well versed in English linguistics, but I believe "could" should be considered the conditional form of "can"? Anyways, the types of sentences that twist my jimmies are things like "Yesterday, I could make a new world record!"  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  19:01, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

There/their/they're, your/you're. Jesus Christ, it's not that hard. I agree that should of and ... for you and I are bad. And by "bad", I mean coma-inducingly horrible. Rueckk 13:05, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

On the subject of "bad", is the expression "My bad" an example of good American English, because it makes my (British) flesh crawl. --Dweller 13:31, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It was coined by a foreign-born athlete. —Tamfang 04:19, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

It makes my (American) flesh crawl, too. I much prefer mae culpa. The Jade Knight 04:39, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually it's mea culpa. 惑乱 分からん 11:54, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Misuse of apostrophes; the most abused punctuation symbol in the English language. For a start, things like 100's... TomPhil 13:45, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I find the hatred of "would/should/etc. of" frustrating, since I and pretty much everyone else here actually says "of" — and it's pronounced distinctly, it isn't just a reduced form of "have". I'm not expected to write "faucet" and pronounce it "tap", or write "sod" and say "bugger", so why I am considered an idiot if I write it the way I say it rather than the way you say it? --Ptcamn 15:43, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, they're only homophonous in their unstressed and "reduced" forms. "Have" has a pronunciation in other contexts as [hæv] of course, while until somewhat recently "of" also had a stressed citation pronunciation with a real "short o" vowel (as in "hot" etc.). This unreduced "of" pronunciation is rare in the U.S. these days, but is listed in Daniel Jones' pronounciation dictionary, and similar works. AnonMoos 16:06, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I live in Australia, where "of" still has a "real short o" (phonetically [ɔv]). --Ptcamn 16:23, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Then you're demanding that English spelling should value identical spelling of homophones above preserving the visual identity of words between stressed and reduced occurrences of each word. This has little to do with other principles of English-language orthography... AnonMoos 17:45, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

No I'm not. I'm saying that "would of", even when stressed, is [ɔv], the same as "of". --Ptcamn 18:28, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's an interesting argument, but it's about what is or is not correct. Using your own analogy, Faucet and tap are both correct. "Would of" is not... and it doesn't really matter if that's how you (or everyone you know) speak. People frequently call the board game "Trivial Pursuits", so does that mean that particular error also shouldn't be corrected? Some people pronounce the word "ask" as "aks". Does that mean that shouldn't be corrected? In any event, no-one worth bothering about would consider you (or anyone else for that matter) an "idiot" for using "should of". --Dweller 16:10, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

What makes it wrong? I'd like proof, not just people saying so. --Ptcamn 16:23, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's based on a misconception that would've = would of rather than would have. It makes little sense grammatically because of is a preposition in a position where you need a verb. Can't find any detailed explanations, but here are some mentions from usage guides.[5] [6] Mattley ^(Chattley) 16:39, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Usages guides are just people saying so. Unlike scientific fields, where when making a claim you have to back yourself up with evidence, when it comes to the English language people seem willing to accept whatever's pontificated at them.

Who says "of" is only a preposition? Maybe it's both a preposition and a verbal particle, like "to". Where's the evidence?

The second one is factually inaccurate. Passing silently (and paraliptically) over the fact that all native speakers are more familiar with the spoken language than the written... It claims that people can't tell "have" and "of" apart in speech, and that's why it's misspelt. But I pronounce them distinctly, as I said, and I certainly say "of", not "have". --Ptcamn 16:48, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

The second source doesn't make that claim. It claims that the similarity of 've to of is the original source of the "would of" usage. Many people do articulate the of clearly - on the basis that they have taken it to be "would of". But that doesn't have anything to do with whether the usage is "correct" or not.

Usage guides are just people saying so. Yes. But for one thing, you won't find any that endorse "could of" and, for another, that's true of all prescriptive language rules. There is a rationale behind it, which is explained in a little more detail here [7]. But if you don't agree that it's appropriate to take a prescriptivist approach at all then there is not much point pursuing this. Mattley ^(Chattley) 17:38, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I commonly write "would've", showing both etymology and pronunciation. Really, it's the best of both worlds. The Jade Knight 04:42, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I dislike errors like "wierd", "recieve". I hate it when people confuse "it's" and "its", and quite often "they're", "their" and "there" are mixed up as well. I don't get it, these are spelling errors made by people who are most likely anglophonic. They were born speaking the international language, how come they can be corrected by non-anglophonics? Evilbu 16:00, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Because just as you said, they were born speaking the language, not writing it. Those errors are all due to the written language not matching up well with the spoken. --Ptcamn 16:03, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Moreover, "it's" was once an acceptable way to spell "its". The Jade Knight 04:49, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

The one minor error that I'm almost 100% certain to correct if I see it in a Wikipedia article is the comma-splice... AnonMoos 17:12, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Here's an error that I find both in spoken and written form. Using X and I instead of X and me. Such as "this is Matt and I in Paris." It should be "this is Matt and me in Paris." I think it comes from the habit of parents to repeatedly correct children who say things like "Me and Matt went to the store" by growling "Matt and I" so they don't get the whole subject object pronoun distinction. AEuSoes1 18:50, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

No, that's correct, if a bit archaic/overformal, because "is" is not a transitive verb and takes (or rather took) nominative compliments. Would you argue that "It is I!" was ungrammatical? --Ptcamn 18:53, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps I didn't use a good example.

• "She came back to see Julie and I" is incorrect
• "Julie and I came back to see her" is correct
• "She came back to see Julie and me" is correct
• "Julie and me came back to see her" is incorrect.

Children tend to make the fourth sentence's mistake and are corrected with a simple "Julie and I" so they grow up thinking that any "X and self" referent should always be "X and I." AEuSoes1 19:02, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Children? No, people of all ages, walks of life and levels of education make this "mistake". The usual order is "Me and Julie" though. --Ptcamn 19:08, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

True. But as far as the subject/object distinction it's the same. I said children because it's my guess that the first sentence's error is due to improper correction. But the whole point is that it bugs me. AEuSoes1 20:41, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm very fond of "grammer", especially when it shows up in edit summaries :) dab (ᛏ) 21:33, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

My number one error of choice would have to be the misuse and abuse of homonyms, such as those mentioned above (their/there/they're, to/too/two/2, your/you're, where/wear(/were - even though it's technically not homophonic), etc.) Seconding that, I guess tense shifts bother me, although that's not as common here and is much more difficult to detect automatically. I edit papers for school a lot and I have yet to find a student who doesn't shift tenses at least once; even I myself am guilty of it although I usually catch it before I submit my final draft. Don't know what else, although I'm sure I could find a whole list if I took long enough. Most of my pet peeves are prevalent in fiction, though, so they're not useful for Wikipedia. —Keakealani •Poke Me•contribs• 23:01, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

ALOT ALOT ALOT ALOT ALOT!!! Aaadddaaammm 03:23, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Another one of mine is the incorrect use of the subjunctive, such as "If I would have been here, maybe she wouldn't have died". JackofOz 03:32, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

A related phenomenon, perhaps, is "I would have liked to have done that," which literally I take to mean that the subjunctive pleasure follows the conclusion of the subjunctive action but concludes sometime before the utterance. —Tamfang 04:19, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

How would you rephrase that? The Jade Knight 04:49, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

"I would like to have done that"? DirkvdM 06:52, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

I've seen hoard for horde, and vice versa, so many times that whenever I see either word used correctly I have an itch of doubt. My favorite misspelling of all time: "Arafat's ability to reign in terror" — alas I've forgotten where I saw it. —Tamfang 04:19, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

What on earth is wrong with 'an unique'? I HATE 'a unique'. It's like fingernails across a chalkboard. But what I hate? You probably won't find it too much on Wikipedia, but it's when people can't decide whether to say 'leery' or 'wary' and end up saying 'weary', as in, "I was weary of letting my boss drive me home after he felt my backside." Anchoress 04:25, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

For me, "unique" starts with a "y" sound, and "an unique" sounds very wrong. The Jade Knight 04:49, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Keep listening to that voice, because you're 100% correct. The choice of indefinite article in English is determined by the initial sound, not by the initial written letter of the alphabet. --Tkynerd 14:11, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Of course, if Anchoress pronounces unique as /iwnik/ rather than /junik/ that might explain it. You don't see /iw/ listed in most phonologies of English, but it's definitely in my dialect (although I don't use it in the initial position except for the word "ewe," so "an unique" still sounds wierd to me, but "an ewe" is fine). Linguofreak 17:35, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Evilbu mentioned "recieve" and "wierd". My health ed teacher in high school actually used the spelling "protien" and wrote it on the board. When I dared to correct him, half the class corrected me on the basis that "I always comes before E...". Here are my personal pet peeves, and there are many:

• An apostrophe in plural's and third-person singular verb form's get's on my nerve's.
• Sentence fragments. Are annoying. For example, when I'm reading a somewhat long introductory clause expecting a comma followed by an independent clause, and I just get a period.
• Don't fix run-on sentences with a comma, that just turns them into a comma splice. When I tutored writing at community college, people would bring me their papers saying "I fixed all the run-ons". They'd just inserted commas instead. Adding to the confusion, many English/writing teachers used the term "run-on" to mean both comma splices and the classical "fused sentence" type.

szyslak (t, c, e) 05:03, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

The word "loose" meant as "lose", but that won't help your browser, I'm afraid. Misspelling "grammer" when used to attack people. ColourBurst 05:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

"A women" as well. Though I'm not sure if that should be corrected to "A woman" (usually) or just women (very rarely). ColourBurst 05:29, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

This doesn't really drive me crazy, I just can't understand why I say it...I sometimes attempt to create another level of aspect to conditional phrases by adding another auxiliary, so I end up with "If I had have (verb)". "If I had have eaten...", etc (but it's always pronounced "I'd've"). I'm not sure what I'm trying to do here, because it doesn't make any sense. I must mean "if I would have", but whenever I try to parse it I always think I mean "had have". Adam Bishop 06:21, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Going back to the issue of "me and X:"

In my dialect the objective case is used not only with actual direct and indirect objects, but also with conjunctions (regardless of whether a compound subject formed by a conjunction (ie. him and me) would be in that case), as the second argument of "be," in lists (eg "who all's going?" "Them, us, and the dog, oh, and him too.") even when the list consists of one item ("who wants ice cream?" "Me!"), and probably a few other roles. Linguofreak 06:29, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

'American' for US citizens. And 'Holland' for the Netherlands and such. DirkvdM 06:52, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

The first is correct (there's no other word for us in English). The second is wrong, or at best sloppy. --Tkynerd 14:11, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Hasn't anyone expressed his disdain for "I don't no that man!" yet? Well, I also dislike it when they mix up and write stuff like "I wan't" and "I dont". What I said about anglophonics, I learnt Dutch by hearing it, but apart from the many hours of English, French, Latin etc... somehow there was still plenty of hours left to be force-fed all the (constantly changing!) oddities in Dutch spelling. So my question, do US-ers get any English at all at school, how else would they fill up all those hours?Evilbu 17:53, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Getting around with my languages in Lebanon

Hello,

when watching the news from Lebanon during this war (which I hope has finally been brought an end too for both sides) I found it odd how many Lebanese spoke English or French. The French seems to explicable because of the country being controlled by the French in the 1920's. But the English? Is it because kids are taught English in schools( compulsory?). Of course many people were interviewed (and subtitled) in Arabic but in my opinion to a lesser extent than in Iraq for instance. I've seen a wounded girl in the hospital (16 or something) who spoke to a journalist in English.

I speak English and French (and Dutch...), if I would go to Lebanon, how would I get by? I mean : in hotels, restaurants, shops (I mean little shops where one buys newspapers or water). Meeting a random Lebanese family, is there a chance of at least one member I could talk too? Is there a huge difference between "normal Lebanon" and Beirut?

Well, lots of questions, I'm interested in all opinions. Unfortunately I must admit I don't plan on going to Lebanon right now. Thanks!

Evilbu 16:14, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I've never been to Lebanon, so I can't tell you about my own experience. However, as for French, it is one of the official languages of Lebanon (see also the Lebanon article). Therefore, I suppose it wouldn't be difficult to get by with it in most places. Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 16:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

When you google "most Lebanese speak", you get many hits stating something like "most Lebanese speak three languages at least: their native Arabic, French and English". --Lambiam^Talk 17:44, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

The English prevalence may be because so many Lebanese live in the US, or some day hope to. Danny Thomas and Jamie Farr are two notable Lebanese-Americans. StuRat 20:19, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

and of course Kahlil Gibran--K.C. Tang 01:02, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Arabic and French are well spoken in Lebanon, esp in Beitut, but Im not sure about Englis.

No subject, no sentence

Has this type of "sentence" become accepted English usage? "Just because you believe it doesn't mean it's true." Notice that those words were not a sentence, because there was no subject. A sentence could be: "That you believe it doesn't mean it's true."

"Notice that those words were not a sentence, because there was no subject." Notice that those words were not a sentence, because there was no subject. --Ptcamn 19:10, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Subjects are implicit in the use of the grammatical mood#imperative mood. Sam Korn ^(smoddy) 19:29, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

"Drop the gun!" is a sentence. The subject "you" is implied. Please respond to the initial inquiry. Can a clause (maybe as a concept) be the subject of a sentence?

Noun clauses can. Quoting from the clause article: "That the kid was making so much money bothered me." "That the kid was making so much money" is the subject. -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:41, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I wouldnt personally have a problem with the clause "just-because-you-believe-it" being the subject of the sentence. Jameswilson 02:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Sometimes wish could drop them altogether. At least the first person ones. Sort of thing is easier in Chinese. Am jealous. -LambaJan 02:32, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Could you move the clause to the end to make "It" the noun? "Just because you believe it doesn't mean it's true." --> "It doesn't mean it's true just because you believe it." (I guess it kinda sounds awkward though) Alex Ng 06:52, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

You managed to smuggle in an extra "it" there. A sentence with essentially the same structure as the original: "Because the doorbell rang meant someone was at the door." That sounds terribly wrong, no? So what makes the other sentence almost acceptable? Just because you hear it all the time doesn't mean it's correct. --Lambiam^Talk 08:43, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Just because you can't come up with a rule you can understand doesn't mean it's incorrect. --Kjoonlee 12:03, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

most spoken languages

What are the top 5 or top 10 most spoken languages in the world, in terms of SECOND-language speakers only, i.e. peolpe who learn it as a second or foreign language and not counting native speakers?--Sonjaaa 20:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's extremely difficult to estimate foreign language usage for a variety of reasons, including the variation of fluency involved. 惑乱 分からん 22:24, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't actually have any proof of this, but I'd guess English is probably in the top ten since it's fairly lucrative at the moment - but Wakuran is right that it would be quite hard to measure. —Keakealani •Poke Me•contribs• 23:07, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Hard to say, because of the definition of "second language"? What is "second language"? If a person immigrates to a country, still speaks their primary language at home but is fluent in the new country's language, is it still a "second language"? What about people who speak multiple languages at an early age? Can somebody have multiple second languages? How much fluency do you need for it to be a "second" language? The question is easy to pose but hard to define. ColourBurst 23:25, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Then what about languages one did not grow up with nor needs for everyday life? Ie it is not the major language spoken in the country/countries one grew up in or lives in. That still leaves countries with more than one language like Belgium and Congo, but there aren't too many exceptions (right?). Fluency is always a problem with determining whether one speaks a language, but the question is about a list, not so much quantification. The most important reason to speak such a language is that it is a lingua franca. Of course English is a big one with 150 million - 1 billion second language speakers. Russian has 110 million, Swahili 30-50 million.

Chinese is a bit too complicated for me because there are differnt varieties. And what about French in West Africa. That is the official language in most countries there, I believe, but are the local languages (which must still survive) then second languages?

And what about artificial languages. Hardly anyone grows up with those, so they're always second languages. Esperanto has at most 1 million speakers. But what about mathematics and programming languages? No stats on how many people 'speak' these (hold on - 'speak'?). So I don't have a list either, just some pointers. DirkvdM 06:36, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

India and China are (as always with questions on language statistics) the big stumbling blocks: one could reasonably claim that pupils who learn putonghua or Hindustani in schools are, in most cases, learning a second language; similarly for English and French in much of Africa. But for the classical idea of learning 'a foreign country's language', I'm fairly sure that English is way out in front, followed by the other big European languages - Spanish, French, German. (An incidental puzzler- why do so many people learn Spanish rather than Italian, even in places like Europe where Latin America has little influence?). Henry^Flower 09:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

That people choose to learn Spanish rather than Italian is most likely, primarily due to the widespread usage in North and South America. The difference in influence and importance between Spanish and Italian in Europe is rather minor. In Europe, Spanish has a number of native speakers probably somewhere between 40 and 50 million, Italy might have a number between 60 and 70 million worldwide, primarily in Europe. I guess the importance of Italian has been declining since the last century. 惑乱 分からん 11:09, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Rybka

In what language does Rybka mean little fish, and what is the IPA pronunciation for it?--Sonjaaa 21:44, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

It's a Czech diminutive. The standard form is ryba (fish). Daniel Šebesta (talk • contribs) 22:04, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't know how to do it in IPA, but it's pronounced "RIB-kah," with a rolled "r," as in Spanish. -- Mwalcoff 00:26, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

[rɪpkä] I believe. First syllable stressed. AEuSoes1 03:52, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

/'rɪpkä/ with stress. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:14, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Is that supposed to be ae-ligature?--Sonjaaa 15:37, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

The "Czech language" article seems to say it's a low central unrounded vowel. There's no sign for that in the IPA, and <a> is normally used instead. I guess <ä> is non-standard. --Kjoonlee 16:44, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Oops, sorry. It describes centralization (phonetics), so it's valid IPA. --Kjoonlee 16:46, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

So no. :) --Kjoonlee 16:47, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

August 15

what is litrary meaning of "Gilead"?

what is litrary meaning of hebrew name "Gilead"

Literary, as in the Book, or literal, Gilead or Gil'ad means hill of witness. СПУТНИК^{CCC P} 12:18, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

elegant variation

I want to know this for long: is elegant variation mandatory in journalistic writings? that is, would an editor actually correct a journalist's writing if he or she doesn't varies his terms "elegantly"? and how about the practice in other other languages? Thanks--K.C. Tang 13:22, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Variation is good, even mandatory, or, more specifically, an editor will often remove repetition. It is elegant (or inelegant) variation that Fowler is objecting to.--Shantavira 13:42, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

In articles about film, the Dutch news agency ANP often uses the old-fashioned synonym rolprent. Editors at the newspapers I've worked for will immediately replace this with film; repetition is not considered as bad as "elegance". David Sneek 16:44, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

after death

is there any thing after death is anybody in the world knows anyting after death````````

Why do you pose that question here? Look at death and afterlife. 惑乱 分からん 13:55, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

.....and decomposition.--Shantavira 17:25, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

Depends on your religion or philosophy. It's not something science is particularly good at predicting. -- THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 18:05, 15 August 2006 (UTC)

'Spelling' a pack of cards

If we take a deck of 52 playing cards, then by spelling out the value of each of the thirteen ranks in one suit, (A-C-E, T-W-O, T-H-R-E-E, ..., K-I-N-G) you can go through exactly 52 cards dealing one card for each letter. It can also be done with the same deck in French (A-S, D-E-U-X, T-R-O-I-S, ... , R-O-I).

Are there any other languages in which you can do this? Even allowing for decks of cards with fewer / more cards per suit?

Thanks in advance.