So it is true...
Marc Adler
group with no one batting an eyelash?
Do Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians have trouble understanding _anything_
in each other's languages?
Marc
Thomas Koenig
> Do Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians have trouble understanding _anything_
> in each other's languages?
I liked to watch those Scandinavian talk shows, where they chatter
effortlesssly to each other, but the Danish stations subtitle Norwegians
and Swedes, and the Norvegian stations subtitle Danes and Swedes. For
German and Dutch speakers that helps, but my guess is, that that was not
the intention.
I'm glad that the Brits don't subtitle Seinfeld, though.
Mats Bengtsson
newsgroup there's usually no problem.
On Swedish TV, Norwegians and Danes are mostly subtitled, and I suppose
it's the same in Norway and Denmark.
Mats
Des Small
> Am I mistaken, or is this guy posting in Danish to a Swedish-language
> group with no one batting an eyelash?
Um, I don't know, is he?
> Do Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians have trouble understanding _anything_
> in each other's languages?
Numbers, for sure. Danish numbers are so very hilarious that
Norwegishes and Swedishes often prefer to switch to Engleesh to avoid
them.
Other than that, written Danish isn't so bad, but the spoken form is a
whole 'nother game of ball.
Des
reads VG.no, BT.dk and Aftonbladet.se via RSS, hurrah!
Skraedder
"Marc Adler" <marc....@gmail.com> wrote in message
news:1133310569....@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com...
When I spent some time working in Copenhagen I was told by my Danish
colleagues that they could understand spoken Swedish but the Swedes could
not understand spoken Danish. I guess that reading the text wouldn't be too
bad for either of them but to me it seemed that the Danes only pronounced
about half the letters in a word - and those appeared to change ramdomly as
far as I was concerned :-)
Skraedder
Nigel Greenwood
> "Marc Adler" <marc....@gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Am I mistaken, or is this guy posting in Danish to a Swedish-language
> > group with no one batting an eyelash?
>
> Um, I don't know, is he?
Did he forget the url?
> Numbers, for sure. Danish numbers are so very hilarious that
> Norwegishes and Swedishes often prefer to switch to Engleesh to avoid
> them.
No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
soixante-quinze.)
I've noticed on consumer product labels that a Uni-Scand version is
sometimes used, with translations only when the words are very
different. Eg on a "bath & creme" product one of the languages is
"S/DK/N": the product is said to leave "huden din" (your skin, in
Norwegian) "deilig myk/dejlig blød/underbart mjuk" (wonderfully soft,
in N/DK/S -- ie the reverse of the stated order!). There seems to be a
certain redundancy there.
Nigel
--
ScriptMaster language resources (Chinese/Modern & Classical
Greek/IPA/Persian/Russian/Turkish):
http://www.elgin.free-online.co.uk
Ruud Harmsen
<Skra...@skraedder.com>: in sci.lang:
>When I spent some time working in Copenhagen I was told by my Danish
>colleagues that they could understand spoken Swedish but the Swedes could
>not understand spoken Danish. I guess that reading the text wouldn't be too
>bad for either of them but to me it seemed that the Danes only pronounced
>about half the letters in a word - and those appeared to change ramdomly as
>far as I was concerned :-)
Danish is to Swedish what Portuguese is to Spanish?
--
Ruud Harmsen - http://rudhar.com
Des Small
More or less. Except that Portuguese only keeps the consonants, and
Danish only keeps the wovels.
Des
prefers a balanced phonemic diet
Ruud Harmsen
30 Nov 2005 11:34:22 +0000: Des Small <vonb...@yahoo.co.uk>: in
sci.lang:
>More or less. Except that Portuguese only keeps the consonants, and
>Danish only keeps the wovels.
>
>Des
>prefers a balanced phonemic diet
So do I. And European Portuguese, strange though it may seem, does
provide that balance:
http://rudhar.com/foneport/en/not2port.htm#Note16c-VowelStretch
Des Small
You wait all that time for a wovel and then N come along at once?
Des
's idea of balance involves more mixing
Christian Weisgerber
> Do Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians have trouble understanding _anything_
> in each other's languages?
When we were checking out of a hotel in Stockholm, a Dane actually
spoke English to the girl at the reception. When I asked him about
it afterwards, he explained that the Swedes have weird numerals.
--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber na...@mips.inka.de
Nigel Greenwood
> When we were checking out of a hotel in Stockholm, a Dane actually
> spoke English to the girl at the reception. When I asked him about
> it afterwards, he explained that the Swedes have weird numerals.
Well, he had a point, if he was thinking about a number like sjutti sju
(77). Even the usually objective phonetician John Wells was moved to
describe the "sj" sound as "this unusual sound of Swedish". He goes on
to say, on the Swedish SAMPA page:
"some commentators find this symbol (S) phonetically imprecise. Those
who feel this way are free to use more elaborate symbols instead: [s`]
or even [x\] (from X-SAMPA)."
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
I have experienced that as well. One time in Stockholm, I was talking
to a Danish woman over breakfast in a hotel. Later, I saw her again
while we were checking out. She was talking English to the
receptionist. I asked why and the answer was: "It's just easier".
Many Danes seem to be happy listening to Swedish. Swedish TV can be
picked up in Copenhagen (some parts anyway) and many use it to increase
their choice. I get the impression that the reverse is not true and
not so many Swedes understand spoken Danish. I have some sympathy, I
have spent much more time in Denmark than Sweden yet I find Swedish
easier to understand than Danish.
A Danish friend went a pan-Scandinavian conference once. The
politically correct instructions said that delegates should speak in
their own languages. They were struggling even before the Finns
arrived.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
rcaetano
[snip]
> A Danish friend went a pan-Scandinavian conference once. The
> politically correct instructions said that delegates should speak in
> their own languages. They were struggling even before the Finns
> arrived.
But what where Finns doing in a pan-Scandinavian conference?
Rafael Caetano, because the thread is unusually calm
Arndt Jonasson
Des Small <vonb...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
> "Marc Adler" <marc....@gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Am I mistaken, or is this guy posting in Danish to a Swedish-language
> > group with no one batting an eyelash?
>
> Um, I don't know, is he?
>
> > Do Swedes, Danes, and Norwegians have trouble understanding _anything_
> > in each other's languages?
>
> Numbers, for sure. Danish numbers are so very hilarious that
> Norwegishes and Swedishes often prefer to switch to Engleesh to avoid
> them.
It probably happens quite often that a considerate Dane uses the
"simple" number forms when talking to other Scandinavians in Danish.
I think those forms have some standing in the Danish language too.
rcaetano
Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
[snip]
> politically correct instructions said that delegates should speak in
> their own languages. They were struggling even before the Finns
> arrived.
But what where Finns doing in a pan-Scandinavian conference?
Marc Adler
> Did he forget the url?
Oops.
> No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
> who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
> the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
> soixante-quinze.)
Jesus.
Marc
Des Small
> Nigel Greenwood wrote:
>
> > Did he forget the url?
>
> Oops.
>
> http://tinyurl.com/drlny
That's Danish in a Swedish froup, for sure. To be fair, he's asking
specifically for Zwedish technical terms rather than just hanging
around being gratuitously Danish.
> > No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
> > who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
> > the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
> > soixante-quinze.)
>
> Jesus.
Is that an under-punctuated exclamation or a non-sequitur?
Des
doesn't, in any case, sequit
Marc Adler
> That's Danish in a Swedish froup, for sure. To be fair, he's asking
> specifically for Zwedish technical terms rather than just hanging
> around being gratuitously Danish.
So the technical terms are different, then.
> Is that an under-punctuated exclamation or a non-sequitur?
It's a sequitur. (Exclamation points are reserved for "Christ!".)
Marc
Thomas Widmann
> That's Danish in a Swedish froup, for sure. To be fair, he's asking
> specifically for Zwedish technical terms rather than just hanging
> around being gratuitously Danish.
Sure, but in dk.kultur.sprog, we have regular Norwegian participants,
and I and other Danish speakers often post to no.fag.spraak.diverse
without any problems at all. (Although I must admit I sometimes write
Nynorsk there, just for the fun of it.)
/Thomas
--
Thomas Widmann tw...@bibulus.org http://www.twid.bibulus.org
Flat 0/1, 57 Rose Street, Garnethill, Glasgow G3 6SF, Scotland, EU
Thomas Widmann
> Des Small <vonb...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
>> Numbers, for sure. Danish numbers are so very hilarious that
>> Norwegishes and Swedishes often prefer to switch to Engleesh to
>> avoid them.
>
> It probably happens quite often that a considerate Dane uses the
> "simple" number forms when talking to other Scandinavians in Danish.
> I think those forms have some standing in the Danish language too.
Yes, they are used on the notes (e.g., "FEMTI KRONER", not "HALVTREDS
KRONER"), and they were frequently used on cheques when they were
still in common use.
Esben I.
> Nigel Greenwood wrote:
>>No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
>>who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
>>the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
>>soixante-quinze.)
> Jesus.
Indeed, it is tricky..comes from an ancient base-20 system.
I remember once trying to explain it to an asian woman who was learning
Danish. When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems), cut it apart into
4½ x 20 + 7 + 10 , there was a crowd of native Danes behind me, asming
if I were pulling her leg.. none of them was aware of the number system
though they all knew how to use it.
As for scandinavian, written Norwegian and Swedish is easy for me to
understand. Spoken is another matter.
cheers
Esben I. (of .dk)
Esben I.
>>Danish is to Swedish what Portuguese is to Spanish?
> More or less. Except that Portuguese only keeps the consonants, and
> Danish only keeps the wovels.
more or less.. danish has developed more towards the "erosion" of long
words. Take "selvfølgelig" meaning evident/of course, lit. "self-following"
Is pronounced "sfoelie" 4 syllables spoken as 2
cool
Esben I. (of .dk)
Thomas Widmann
> Well, he had a point, if he was thinking about a number like sjutti
> sju (77). Even the usually objective phonetician John Wells was
> moved to describe the "sj" sound as "this unusual sound of Swedish".
> He goes on to say, on the Swedish SAMPA page:
>
> "some commentators find this symbol (S) phonetically
> imprecise. Those who feel this way are free to use more elaborate
> symbols instead: [s`] or even [x\] (from X-SAMPA)."
For some younger speakers, he might also have suggested [w_0]
(voiceless [w]).
Des Small
> I remember once trying to explain it to an asian woman who was
> learning Danish. When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems),
97 has a "ni" in it? Can I get a shrubbery with that?
> cut it apart into 4½ x 20 + 7 + 10 ,
"4½ x 20 + 7 + 10" comes to 107. Either Danish numbers are even more
enigmatic than I had heard or you've been at the gammel dansk, isn't
it?
Des
will have what Esben's having, for sure
Thomas Widmann
> Many Danes seem to be happy listening to Swedish. Swedish TV can be
> picked up in Copenhagen (some parts anyway) and many use it to increase
> their choice. I get the impression that the reverse is not true and
> not so many Swedes understand spoken Danish. I have some sympathy, I
> have spent much more time in Denmark than Sweden yet I find Swedish
> easier to understand than Danish.
Typically, people from Copenhagen understand standard Swedish (but not
the neighbouring Scanian) well, whereas Scanians understand Danish
well. Jutlanders often don't understand spoken Swedish at all, and I
believe it's similar for non-Scanian Swedes.
Wiktor S.
> > >Danish colleagues that they could understand spoken Swedish but the
> > >Swedes could not understand spoken Danish. I guess that reading the
> > >text wouldn't be too bad for either of them but to me it seemed
> > >that the Danes only pronounced about half the letters in a word -
> > >and those appeared to change ramdomly as far as I was concerned :-)
> >
> > Danish is to Swedish what Portuguese is to Spanish?
>
> More or less. Except that Portuguese only keeps the consonants, and
> Danish only keeps the wovels.
yup, [@@@@ @ @@ @@ @@@] :-)
--
Azarien
Thomas Widmann
> No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
> who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
> the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
> soixante-quinze.)
Well, yes, that's the etymology. However, Danish speakers are
typically unaware of this and have simply learnt the words by heart:
50 halvtreds
60 tres
70 halvfjerds
80 firs
90 halvfems
If only speakers of Swedish and Norwegian would do the same instead of
trying to subtract and multiply, they wouldn't have a problem. :-(
> I've noticed on consumer product labels that a Uni-Scand version is
> sometimes used, with translations only when the words are very
> different. Eg on a "bath & creme" product one of the languages is
> "S/DK/N": the product is said to leave "huden din" (your skin, in
> Norwegian) "deilig myk/dejlig blød/underbart mjuk" (wonderfully soft,
> in N/DK/S -- ie the reverse of the stated order!). There seems to be a
> certain redundancy there.
Yes, this is fairly common. I guess it takes up less space than
writing it three (or four) times.
Thomas Widmann
> When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems),
(syvoghalvfems)
> cut it apart into 4˝ x 20 + 7 + 10
+ 10???
Anyway, shouldn't it have been 7 + (˝ - 5) x 20?
Brian M. Scott
<tw...@bibulus.org> wrote in
<news:m3iru9k...@alcedo.bibulus.org> in sci.lang:
> "Esben I." <raggamuff...@get2net.dk> writes:
>> When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems),
> (syvoghalvfems)
>> cut it apart into 4½ x 20 + 7 + 10
> + 10???
> Anyway, shouldn't it have been 7 + (½ - 5) x 20?
One trusts not, since that's 7 - 4.5*20 = -83.
7 + (5 - 1/2) * 20 seems a better bet.
Brian
Torsten Poulin
> Nigel Greenwood wrote:
>> No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
>> who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
>> the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
>> soixante-quinze.)
> Jesus.
Well, they are already simplified. 75 is "femoghalvfjerds". Four syllables -
just like "seventyfive". The full form "femoghalvfjerdsindstyve" Nigel
alluded to sounds quaint.š Its original meaning is five and half fourth
times twenty, where half fourth means 3˝, but for modern speakers it is
opaque.
Nobody would use "syvtifem" with a straight face, unless of course they
happened to be writing a check (where it would save some ink and time) or
having a conversation with Swedes or Norwegians.
The Danish 50 kroner bills actually have "FEMTI KRONER" printed on them, but
everybody and his dog refer to such a bill as a "halvtredser".
š The corresponding ordinal number "femoghalvfjerdsindstyvende" is another
matter entirely. It is getting some competition from femoghalvfjerdsende",
however.
--
Torsten
Colin Fine
Either I'm being dense, or that's got a 9 at the start, not a 7.
Colin
Brian M. Scott
<ne...@kindness.demon.co.uk> wrote in
<news:dmlegg$lf0$1$8300...@news.demon.co.uk> in sci.lang:
> Brian M. Scott wrote:
>> On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 21:15:28 +0000, Thomas Widmann
>> <tw...@bibulus.org> wrote in
>> <news:m3iru9k...@alcedo.bibulus.org> in sci.lang:
>>>"Esben I." <raggamuff...@get2net.dk> writes:
>>>> When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems),
>>>(syvoghalvfems)
>>>>cut it apart into 4½ x 20 + 7 + 10
>>>+ 10???
>>>Anyway, shouldn't it have been 7 + (½ - 5) x 20?
>> One trusts not, since that's 7 - 4.5*20 = -83.
>> 7 + (5 - 1/2) * 20 seems a better bet.
> Either I'm being dense, or that's got a 9 at the start, not a 7.
Thomas corrected the <ni-> to <syv->, and Des also pointed
out the error.
Brian
Thomas Widmann
> On Wed, 30 Nov 2005 21:15:28 +0000, Thomas Widmann
> <tw...@bibulus.org> wrote in
> <news:m3iru9k...@alcedo.bibulus.org> in sci.lang:
>
>> "Esben I." <raggamuff...@get2net.dk> writes:
>
>>> When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems),
>
>> (syvoghalvfems)
>
>>> cut it apart into 4½ x 20 + 7 + 10
>
>> + 10???
>
>> Anyway, shouldn't it have been 7 + (½ - 5) x 20?
>
> One trusts not, since that's 7 - 4.5*20 = -83.
:-(
> 7 + (5 - 1/2) * 20 seems a better bet.
Yes, but the order is wrong. What I meant was
7 + (-½ + 5) x 20
syv og halv fem s
Please not that the "20" is not explicit in the current form, but it
does show up in the old-fashioned form "syvoghalvfemsindstyve".
Skraedder
"Des Small" <vonb...@yahoo.co.uk> wrote in message
news:yyrjr78x...@pc156.maths.bris.ac.uk...
>
> Either Danish numbers are even more
> enigmatic than I had heard or you've been
> at the gammel dansk, isn't it?
Ah the good old gammel dansk. What a fine way to start an 8 a.m. meeting!
Skraedder
Wiktor S.
>> sometimes used, with translations only when the words are very
>> different. Eg on a "bath & creme" product one of the languages is
>> "S/DK/N": the product is said to leave "huden din" (your skin, in
>> in N/DK/S -- ie the reverse of the stated order!). There seems to
>> be a certain redundancy there.
>
> Yes, this is fairly common. I guess it takes up less space than
> writing it three (or four) times.
Interesting, that this is not the case of Czech and Slovak - my eau de
toilette says:
Toaletní voda: Datum výroby: uvedeno na výrobku. (CZ)
Toaletná voda: Dátum výroby: uvedený na výrobku. (SK)
The differencies always are so huge ;-)
--
Azarien
Nigel Greenwood
Skraedder wrote:
> Ah the good old gammel dansk. What a fine way to start an 8 a.m. meeting!
More sociable than starting it with norsk gammelost.
Nigel Greenwood
> "Nigel Greenwood" <ndsg...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
>
> > No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
> > who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
> > the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
> > soixante-quinze.)
>
> Well, yes, that's the etymology. However, Danish speakers are
> typically unaware of this and have simply learnt the words by heart:
>
> 50 halvtreds
> 60 tres
> 70 halvfjerds
> 80 firs
> 90 halvfems
Actually, now I think about it more carefully, the French system may be
worse. You can't just memorize "soixante-dix" for 70 & add a "cinq" --
you actually have to use the special form "quinze". I learnt French in
Geneva (some other parts of French-speaking Switzerland are different),
so I naturally use septante/quatre-vingts/nonante. 81-89 are simple to
produce (but careful about those spellings!) & understand; but I find I
still have to think a moment or two when people say things like
"soixante-quatorze".
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Why wouldn't they be there? It wasn't a conference on language.
Something to do with government.
A google for Scandinavia gives this as the first result:
http://www.goscandinavia.com/
Finland is a member of the Nordic Union.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Wiktor S. wrote:
> >> I've noticed on consumer product labels that a Uni-Scand version is
> >> sometimes used, with translations only when the words are very
> >> different. Eg on a "bath & creme" product one of the languages is
> >> "S/DK/N": the product is said to leave "huden din" (your skin, in
> >> in N/DK/S -- ie the reverse of the stated order!). There seems to
> >> be a certain redundancy there.
> >
> > Yes, this is fairly common. I guess it takes up less space than
> > writing it three (or four) times.
>
>
> Interesting, that this is not the case of Czech and Slovak - my eau de
> toilette says:
>
> Toaletní voda: Datum výroby: uvedeno na výrobku. (CZ)
> Toaletná voda: Dátum výroby: uvedený na výrobku. (SK)
>
> The differencies always are so huge ;-)
>
>
>
> --
> Azarien
Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more? Or do we have only separate
Serbian and Croatian speakers?
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Wiktor S.
>> de toilette says:
>> Toaletní voda: Datum výroby: uvedeno na výrobku. (CZ)
>> Toaletná voda: Dátum výroby: uvedený na výrobku. (SK)
>> The differencies always are so huge ;-)
> Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
I don't know, I live in Poland, and international product descriptions
weren't very common "before".
> Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more? Or do we have only
> separate Serbian and Croatian speakers?
Once I've seen (on a chocolate or so) some South Slavic text (in latin
alphabet) with only some words /slashed e.g. mleko or mlieko vs mlijeko -
(milk, I don't remember the exact spellings). Any idea what was that?
--
Azarien
Torsten Poulin
> "Nigel Greenwood" <ndsg...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
>> No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there? (For those
>> who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
>> the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
>> soixante-quinze.)
> Well, yes, that's the etymology. However, Danish speakers are
> typically unaware of this and have simply learnt the words by heart:
>
> 50 halvtreds
> 60 tres
> 70 halvfjerds
> 80 firs
> 90 halvfems
Exactly. And if we compare the syllable counts, the traditional cardinal
numbers don't look so bad:
20 | tyve (2) | toti (2)
30 | tred(i)ve (2) | treti (2)
40 | fyrre (2) | firti (2)
50 | halvtreds (2) | femti (2)
60 | tres (1) | seksti (2)
70 | halvfjerds (2) | syvti (2)
80 | firs (1) | otti (2)
90 | halvfems (2) | niti (2)
The catch, of course, is the "og" that combines the ones and the tens:
"syvoghalvtreds" (4 syllables) versus "femtisyv" (3 syllables). Sometimes
the traditional system saves a syllable due to assimilation, thereby
compensating for the "og" (e.g, "otteogfirs" (3) versus "ottiotte" (4),
"fireoghalvfjerds" (4) versus "syvtifire" (4)), but overall the alternative
system wins when counting syllables: the traditional cardinal numbers from
20 to 99 contain a total of 284 syllables and the alternative ones 248,
saving, on average, 0.45 syllables per number ...
--
Torsten, with tongue (firmly) in cheek
Marc Adler
> The biggest problem is understanding the spoken language, so in a
> newsgroup there's usually no problem.
What about written Icelandic? Is it at all comprehensible?
Marc
Thomas Widmann
Jim Heckman
On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
wrote in message <1133429997....@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
Notice that that site is targeted towards North Americans.
> Finland is a member of the Nordic Union.
Exactly. In general, people from that part of the world distinguish
between "Nordic", which includes Finland, and "Scandinavian", which
doesn't.
As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as referring
specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it took me a while to
realize that for the natives the term also includes Denmark.
--
Jim Heckman
Brian M. Scott
<wnzrfe...@lnubb.pbz.invalid> wrote in
<news:11ov04o...@corp.supernews.com> in sci.lang:
[...]
> As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as
> referring specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it
> took me a while to realize that for the natives the term
> also includes Denmark.
Interesting: for me it's always meant the region in which
the Scandinavian languages are natively spoken, the only
hesitation being whether I want it to include Finland. I
don't even even think of that peninsula as 'the Scandinavian
peninsula'.
Brian
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
> wrote in message <1133429997....@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
>
> > rcaetano wrote:
> >
> > > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> > > [snip]
> > > > A Danish friend went a pan-Scandinavian conference once. The
> > > > politically correct instructions said that delegates should speak in
> > > > their own languages. They were struggling even before the Finns
> > > > arrived.
> > >
> > > But what where Finns doing in a pan-Scandinavian conference?
> > >
> > > Rafael Caetano, because the thread is unusually calm
> >
> > Why wouldn't they be there? It wasn't a conference on language.
> > Something to do with government.
> >
> > A google for Scandinavia gives this as the first result:
> > http://www.goscandinavia.com/
>
> Notice that that site is targeted towards North Americans.
So? If it were created by Americans then it may not be so accurate but
it appears to have been created by people from those countries and they
have chosen to come together under the name "Scandinavia". The only
significance of the site is that it was my first hit when I searched
for Scandinavia.
> > Finland is a member of the Nordic Union.
>
> Exactly. In general, people from that part of the world distinguish
> between "Nordic", which includes Finland, and "Scandinavian", which
> doesn't.
Good point, that proves nothing. I have always treated Scandinavia and
Nordic Union as pretty much synonymous so it seemed significant to me.
> As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as referring
> specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it took me a while to
> realize that for the natives the term also includes Denmark.
>
> --
> Jim Heckman
Growing up here in the UK and Ireland, I tended to think of Scandinavia
as being Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland and maybe Iceland. The
defining feature was the common flag design. They all have a similar
cross with the vertical bar offset.
I tried some more research and the more I did, the more answers I
found. Some supported your interpretation and some mine. Wikipedia
sums up the confusion nicely: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavia
By the way, have you been to "that part of the world". I have been to
Denmark and Sweden many times. I have also been to Finland, Iceland
and Estonia. I have not yet been to Norway. I have met many people
from that part of the world and see some of them regularly.
I'll do some different research over the weekend. I will call my
sister who has lived in Denmark for the last 25 years. I already
expect to meet a Finnish friend who lives here in England near me.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Colin Fine
>
>>Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more? Or do we have only
>>separate Serbian and Croatian speakers?
>
anybody refer to it.
>
> Once I've seen (on a chocolate or so) some South Slavic text (in latin
> alphabet) with only some words /slashed e.g. mleko or mlieko vs mlijeko -
> (milk, I don't remember the exact spellings). Any idea what was that?
>
dialect groups (which corresponded to some degree with the Serb/Croat
division) were known as 'reka' and 'rijeka'.
Colin
Torsten Poulin
> Jim Heckman wrote:
>> As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as
>> referring specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it
>> took me a while to realize that for the natives the term
>> also includes Denmark.
> Interesting: for me it's always meant the region in which
> the Scandinavian languages are natively spoken, the only
> hesitation being whether I want it to include Finland. I
> don't even even think of that peninsula as 'the Scandinavian
> peninsula'.
To this Dane "Skandinavien" means Denmark (excluding the Faroes Islands and
Greenland), Norway, and Sweden. No more, no less. "De nordiske lande" and
"Norden" adds Finland, Iceland, and the autonomous territories the Faroe
Islands, Greenland, and Åland to the list.
The English word "Scandinavia" is another can of worms ...
--
Torsten
Torsten Poulin
> Jim Heckman wrote:
>> As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as
>> referring specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it
>> took me a while to realize that for the natives the term
>> also includes Denmark.
> Interesting: for me it's always meant the region in which
> the Scandinavian languages are natively spoken, the only
> hesitation being whether I want it to include Finland. I
> don't even even think of that peninsula as 'the Scandinavian
> peninsula'.
To this Dane "Skandinavien" means Denmark (excluding the Faroe Islands and
Javi
> Wiktor S. wrote:
>
>>
>>> Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more? Or do we have only
>>> separate Serbian and Croatian speakers?
>>
>>
> And Bosnian. And I guess Montenegrin as well, though I've never heard
> anybody refer to it.
If Montenegro becomes independent from Serbia, no doubt we will
frequently hear it. That will be good news for professional translators
and bad news for tax-payers. But local pride seems more important than
economy in Europe.
--
Javi
Paul J Kriha
>Wiktor S. wrote:
>> >> I've noticed on consumer product labels that a Uni-Scand version is
>> >> sometimes used, with translations only when the words are very
>> >> different. Eg on a "bath & creme" product one of the languages is
>> >> "S/DK/N": the product is said to leave "huden din" (your skin, in
>> >> Norwegian) "deilig myk/dejlig blřd/underbart mjuk" (wonderfully soft,
>> >> in N/DK/S -- ie the reverse of the stated order!). There seems to
>> >> be a certain redundancy there.
>> >
>> > Yes, this is fairly common. I guess it takes up less space than
>> > writing it three (or four) times.
>>
>>
>> Interesting, that this is not the case of Czech and Slovak - my eau de
>> toilette says:
>>
>> Toaletní voda: Datum výroby: uvedeno na výrobku. (CZ)
>> Toaletná voda: Dátum výroby: uvedený na výrobku. (SK)
>>
>> The differencies always are so huge ;-)
Obviously, judging by the verb, the word "Datum" has different
genders in CZ and SK. To same people the sex of a "date"
might be indeed hugely important. :-)
>> Azarien
>Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
In the times of the old federal republic the languages were
often used interchangeably. For example, half the banknote
denominations were printed in Czech and half in Slovak.
The radio and TV newscasts were usually given in both
languages by two presenters alternating between items.
That resulted in, apart from active knowledge of one language,
people having at least good passive knowledge of the other one.
This is not the case any more. Czech children growing up since
the eighties don't understand Slovak and vice versa.
Re your eau de toilette...
Separate inscriptions in both languages even when the words
happen to be almost identical are probably de norm these days.
If nothing else they are a sign of respect for the other state/nation.
>Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more?
A few university professors of Slavic studies around the world? :-)
pjk
>Or do we have only separate
>Serbian and Croatian speakers?
>
>Seán O'Leathlóbhair
sig...@binet.is
Jim Heckman wrote:
> > Finland is a member of the Nordic Union.
>
> Exactly. In general, people from that part of the world distinguish
> between "Nordic", which includes Finland, and "Scandinavian", which
> doesn't.
>
> As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as referring
> specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it took me a while to
> realize that for the natives the term also includes Denmark.
The former Danish lands of Skane, Halland and Blekinge were the
heartland of Denmark in the middle ages and so the main part of Denmark
was on the Scandinavian peninsula so that Scandinavia and the
Scandinavian peninsula were synonymous at that time.
That is why it seems odd for people from the Nordic countries that
people elsewhere seem to keep mixing these things up.
sig...@binet.is
When Denmark consisted of Scania (+Blekinge and Halland) and the
islands to the south-west (Jutland did not become a part of the realm
until later) it was naturally a part of the Scandinavian peninsula.
That is why Denmark is Scandinavian along with Sweden and Norway.
Des Small
> When Denmark consisted of Scania (+Blekinge and Halland) and the
> islands to the south-west (Jutland did not become a part of the realm
> until later) it was naturally a part of the Scandinavian peninsula.
> That is why Denmark is Scandinavian along with Sweden and Norway.
This looks like an instance of the etymological fallacy to me; or do
Scandiwegians's synchronic intuitions about 'skandinavien' really come
with these such ancient and glorious cultual and histories?
Des
uses the term 'Scandiwegian' advisedly
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Paul J Kriha wrote:
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1133447738....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
<snip>
> >Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
>
> In the times of the old federal republic the languages were
> often used interchangeably. For example, half the banknote
> denominations were printed in Czech and half in Slovak.
> The radio and TV newscasts were usually given in both
> languages by two presenters alternating between items.
Were they regarded as different languages rather than merely dialects
before the split? I know that there is no good linguistic distinction
but nonetheless people usually have opinions on the matter. Are the
differences much greater than UK to US English? How does the level of
difference compare to the Scandinavian languages?
> That resulted in, apart from active knowledge of one language,
> people having at least good passive knowledge of the other one.
> This is not the case any more. Czech children growing up since
> the eighties don't understand Slovak and vice versa.
Are the two languages really that different? I didn't realise. Here
in the UK, a good bookshop will have several books on Czech. I
struggle to recall whether I have seen a book on Slovak.
> Re your eau de toilette...
> Separate inscriptions in both languages even when the words
> happen to be almost identical are probably de norm these days.
> If nothing else they are a sign of respect for the other state/nation.
But, as we have seen, the Scandinavians do not seem so concerned about
this respect.
I deal with IBM a lot and sometimes I am slightly irritated that they
produce numerous translated versions of material, often distinguishing
even European and Brazilian Portuguese, yet they never bother with UK
or any other non-US English. However, if they did then I may be
offended that they considered me unable to understand a different
variety of English. So, to be fair, they can't win.
> >Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more?
>
> A few university professors of Slavic studies around the world? :-)
Within the former Yugoslavia, has pretty much everyone taken a side?
Are there no unionists left?
> pjk
>
>
> >Or do we have only separate
> >Serbian and Croatian speakers?
> >
> >Seán O'Leathlóbhair
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Arndt Jonasson
Des Small <vonb...@yahoo.co.uk> writes:
> "Marc Adler" <marc....@gmail.com> writes:
>
> > Nigel Greenwood wrote:
> >
> > > Did he forget the url?
> >
> > Oops.
> >
> > http://tinyurl.com/drlny
>
> That's Danish in a Swedish froup, for sure. To be fair, he's asking
> specifically for Zwedish technical terms rather than just hanging
> around being gratuitously Danish.
It's quite normal for a magazine to be published in Scandinavia with
articles in Norwegian, Swedish and Danish, depending on the native
language of the contributor. I suppose it's natural when respective
national organizations are not big enough to each publish a magazine
of their own, or have a close enough cooperation that a common magazine
is preferable. I know examples in the fields of amateur astronomy and
board games.
Arndt Jonasson
When writing in English, "Scandinavia" often refers to Sweden, Norway,
Finland, Denmark, the Faroese Islands and Iceland.
When writing in Swedish, Norwegian or Danish, "Skandinavien" refers
to Sweden, Norway and Denmark. The word "Norden" is used for the group
mentioned in the previous paragraph.
When mixing languages and cultures, misunderstandings may arise. (I've
used the word "Scandinavian" in the narrower sense recently here, but
there was no big risk of misunderstanding in that case, I felt.)
This subject has probably been beaten to death here several times.
sig...@binet.is
I don´t know about that, I am not Scandiwegian myself.
Peter T. Daniels
Not really ... "Scandinavian design" is mostly Danish (e.g. Georg
Jensen) and Finnish (e.g. Alvar Aalto); the Finnish flag even conforms
to the regional pattern.
--
Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
Mats Bengtsson
"Scandinavian" as a political term was coined (around 18th century),
there were only two nations, Sweden and Denmark. Norway, Finland,
Iceland and the Faroe islands all belonged to either Denmark or Sweden
(although Norway had a special status as dependent kingdom).
As I've understood it, after the independence of Finland, the
politically correct view in these countries was that it was not part of
Scandinavia. Other countries may have simply ignored the issue, and
kept calling everything Scandinavia for simplicity.
So... How about Taiwan, does is belong to China or not?
Javi
>
> Re your eau de toilette...
> Separate inscriptions in both languages even when the words
> happen to be almost identical are probably de norm these days.
> If nothing else they are a sign of respect for the other state/nation.
Same in Iberia. Many multinationals have just one branch for the Iberian
peninsula, so they label their products in Spanish and Portuguese. They
have learned a trick to not seem ridiculous, since if they used the same
words in their Portuguese and Spanish versions, the resultant text would
look almost identical (with minor and likely differences, like
Portuguese ending "-ao" and Spanish "-on", some final [m] in Portuguese
verbs corresponding to Spanish [n], and so on), so they use different
synonymous words, and the result is that the Spanish and Portuguese
versions look different; anyway, despite the choice of different words,
the resultant texts are easily understandable by both Portugueses and
Spaniards, but the "look" of the texts is different, so the national
pride (mainly the Portuguese pride, methinks) is not hurt.
--
Javi
Paulo da Costa
> Same in Iberia. Many multinationals have just one branch for the Iberian
> peninsula, so they label their products in Spanish and Portuguese. They
> have learned a trick to not seem ridiculous, since if they used the same
> words in their Portuguese and Spanish versions, the resultant text would
> look almost identical (with minor and likely differences, like
> Portuguese ending "-ao" and Spanish "-on", some final [m] in Portuguese
> verbs corresponding to Spanish [n], and so on), so they use different
> synonymous words, and the result is that the Spanish and Portuguese
> versions look different; [...]
I don't think that is the reason. The reason is that the so-called
"synonyms" are words that are unusual or archaic or have shifted meaning
in one of the languages, so a version that used only words common to
both languages would look stilted in one (or possibly both) of them.
When you are writing product instructions, you don't want people to
claim that they burned themselves because they read some unusual word in
the wrong way.
[...] anyway, despite the choice of different words,
> the resultant texts are easily understandable by both Portugueses and
> Spaniards, but the "look" of the texts is different, so the national
> pride (mainly the Portuguese pride, methinks) is not hurt.
I've had the experience of seeing Spanish speakers finding
Portuguese-language magazines impenetrable (I particularly remember the
use of the simple word "orçamento" in a headline throwing them off).
Paulo
Ruud Harmsen
<pmcc411...@yahoo.com>: in sci.lang:
>I've had the experience of seeing Spanish speakers finding
>Portuguese-language magazines impenetrable (I particularly remember the
>use of the simple word "orçamento" in a headline throwing them off).
http://europa.eu.int/ is a nice site to see how different related
languages are, because it has so much multi-lingual content. Just
change es to pt and vice versa in teh URLs, to compare Spanish and
Portuguese.
Example:
http://europa.eu.int/pol/singl/overview_es.htm
http://europa.eu.int/pol/singl/overview_pt.htm
--
Ruud Harmsen - http://rudhar.com
Javi
> Javi wrote:
>
>
>>Same in Iberia. Many multinationals have just one branch for the Iberian
>>peninsula, so they label their products in Spanish and Portuguese. They
>>have learned a trick to not seem ridiculous, since if they used the same
>>words in their Portuguese and Spanish versions, the resultant text would
>>look almost identical (with minor and likely differences, like
>>Portuguese ending "-ao" and Spanish "-on", some final [m] in Portuguese
>>verbs corresponding to Spanish [n], and so on), so they use different
>>synonymous words, and the result is that the Spanish and Portuguese
>>versions look different; [...]
>
>
> I don't think that is the reason. The reason is that the so-called
> "synonyms" are words that are unusual or archaic or have shifted meaning
> in one of the languages, so a version that used only words common to
> both languages would look stilted in one (or possibly both) of them.
I didn't mean that it is always possible a word by word translation; my
point is that the differences, in products labeled in Portuguese and
Spanish, are more than the strictly necessary from a linguistic
viewpoint, so other factors must play a role (namely "nationalism").
Accidentally (a visiting friend left it here), I happen to have at home
a box of Kellogg's Special Classic. It reads as follows:
Spanish Portuguese
En tu línea Mantém a linha con vitalidade
¿Quieres estar en tu talla? Quer estar na sua linha?
La talla es aquella con la É a linha que a faz sentir-se melhor
que te ves mejor.
Está presente en los momentos Está presente nos momentos importantes,
que necesitas verte bien. em que gosta de se ver bem.
Y a media mañana, puedes tomar E a meio da manhâ, pode comer uma barra
una barrita SpecialK ¡Hay tres SpecialK, há três variedades a escolha.
variedades para elegir!
etc.
I can translate the Portuguese version into Spanish in a way that makes
it look almost identical and does not sound stilted at all:
Mantenga la línea con vitalidad.
¿Quiere estar en su línea?
Es la línea la que la hace sentirse mejor.
Está presente en los momentos importantes, en los que le gusta verse bien.
Y a mitad de la mañana, puede comer una barra SpecialK, hay tres
variedades a escoger.
etc.
> When you are writing product instructions, you don't want people to
> claim that they burned themselves because they read some unusual word in
> the wrong way.
That's the reason why in English "inflammable" was changed to
"flammable, but I cannot think of a similar case in Portuguese/Spanish.
> [...] anyway, despite the choice of different words,
>
>>the resultant texts are easily understandable by both Portugueses and
>>Spaniards, but the "look" of the texts is different, so the national
>>pride (mainly the Portuguese pride, methinks) is not hurt.
>
>
> I've had the experience of seeing Spanish speakers finding
> Portuguese-language magazines impenetrable (I particularly remember the
> use of the simple word "orçamento" in a headline throwing them off).
Not all people are equally gifted at languages. Not all people have had
the same exposition to different languages.
Journalese is especial. Sometimes I cannot understand a headline in an
English magazine, but as soon as I began to read the article, the
meaning of the headline becomes clear. As a matter of fact, I do not
know what "orçamento" means, but I am almost sure that if I see it in
context I will understand it.
When I first visited Portugal, many many years ago, I found out that
some Portugueses, who could not speak Spanish, had no problem at all
understanding my Spanish, but other Portugueses refused to make a
minimal effort to understand me.
It is the same with the Spaniards: some will not make the little effort
required to understand a Portuguese text.
Also, consider that there are semi-literate Spaniards (and, by the way,
Portugueses), with a reduced vocabulary in their own language; those
people certainly will have problems understanding, not only written
Portuguese, but even normal Spanish if the words used are not in their
small vocabulary and spoken Spanish regional accents unfamiliar to them.
--
Javi
P.S.: Since tomorrow, I will be out for some days, so, if you reply to
this message, it will several days before I can reply.
Paul J Kriha
>Paul J Kriha wrote:
>> Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>> news:1133447738....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
>
><snip>
>
>> >Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
>>
>> In the times of the old federal republic the languages were
>> often used interchangeably. For example, half the banknote
>> denominations were printed in Czech and half in Slovak.
>> The radio and TV newscasts were usually given in both
>> languages by two presenters alternating between items.
>
>Were they regarded as different languages rather than merely dialects
>before the split?
They were (always) regarded as separate languages.
For about 1000 years until 1918 the Czech and Slovak speaking
nations were living in more-or-less separately administered
territories. At the beginning they were presumably speaking
the same language. The Slovak language based on the central
Slovak dialect was formalized around 1840. So by then it
was definitely regarded as a separate language.
>I know that there is no good linguistic distinction
>but nonetheless people usually have opinions on the matter. Are the
>differences much greater than UK to US English?
Yes, definitely.
> How does the level of
>difference compare to the Scandinavian languages?
Sorry, I don't know Scandinavian languages that well.
The Czechoslovak people since their childhood were every day
passively exposed to each other's language. They don't often
realize the extent of the foreign vocabulary/syntax/morphology
they actually are familiar with.
I can converse in Czech with Slovaks who speak Slovak in a mixed
group without too many problems, occasionally I have to query
a more unusual word. When I read a Slovak book I don't have the
immediate help from somebody in the group and I find it significantly
more difficult and tiring.
To understand the spoken conversation is only possible because
the languages are similar but also because passively I know
Slovak quite well. We are both familiar with each others' common
words, such as "listen" (CZ "poslys" or "poslouchej" SK "poc^u'vaj"),
if we talk about football, we know that CZ "mi'c^" is the same
thing as SK "lopta".
However, unless I parrot exactly what I heard I am unable to
come up with even a simple correct Slovak sentence.
I cannot write Slovak, I've never learned the Slovak orthography
and the morphology is often a double Dutch to me.
On average the Slovaks are more likely to be truly bilingual,
they are quite likely to have read Czech books, while I have
read hardly any. Those of them who studied at Czech
universities are likely to speak Czech like natives.
>> That resulted in, apart from active knowledge of one language,
>> people having at least good passive knowledge of the other one.
>> This is not the case any more. Czech children growing up since
>> the eighties don't understand Slovak and vice versa.
>
>Are the two languages really that different? I didn't realise. Here
>in the UK, a good bookshop will have several books on Czech. I
>struggle to recall whether I have seen a book on Slovak.
>
>> Re your eau de toilette...
>> Separate inscriptions in both languages even when the words
>> happen to be almost identical are probably de norm these days.
>> If nothing else they are a sign of respect for the other state/nation.
>
>But, as we have seen, the Scandinavians do not seem so concerned about
>this respect.
>
>I deal with IBM a lot and sometimes I am slightly irritated that they
>produce numerous translated versions of material, often distinguishing
>even European and Brazilian Portuguese, yet they never bother with UK
>or any other non-US English. However, if they did then I may be
>offended that they considered me unable to understand a different
>variety of English. So, to be fair, they can't win.
Petty politics?
I have seen products with inscriptions in strange collections of
languages, persumably the languages of countries they were
being exported to. At least that was my guess.
Couple months ago I bought some electronic doohdaah
with inscriptions in Hungarian, Arabic, Chinese, and Serbian
(it may have been Bulgarian). Fair enough, I thought,
but it was exported to New Zealand.
And it didn't bother to say where exactly it was made. :-)
>> >Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more?
>>
>> A few university professors of Slavic studies around the world? :-)
>
>Within the former Yugoslavia, has pretty much everyone taken a side?
You cannot deal with THAT problem without taking a side.
>Are there no unionists left?
You mean people who talk about Great Serbia or Great Croatia?
pjk
>> pjk
>> >Or do we have only separate
>> >Serbian and Croatian speakers?
>> >Seán O'Leathlóbhair
>Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Thomas Widmann
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1133517371....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
>>
>> How does the level of difference compare to the Scandinavian
>> languages?
>
> Sorry, I don't know Scandinavian languages that well.
I think it might compare to the difference between Swedish and Danish,
or possibly between Swedish and Norwegian (since Czech and Slovak
pronunciation is quite similar). Danish and Norwegian Bokmaal are
closer.
> The Czechoslovak people since their childhood were every day
> passively exposed to each other's language. They don't often
> realize the extent of the foreign vocabulary/syntax/morphology
> they actually are familiar with.
The same is true for the people of Copenhagen -- until the late 1980s,
there was only one Danish TV channel but two Swedish ones, so most
people there were heavily exposed to Swedish. Since then, the number
of Danish TV channels has exploded, and it is said that young people
of Copenhagen now find Swedish incomprehensible, just as many
Jutlanders have found it all along.
> I can converse in Czech with Slovaks who speak Slovak in a mixed
> group without too many problems, occasionally I have to query a more
> unusual word. When I read a Slovak book I don't have the immediate
> help from somebody in the group and I find it significantly more
> difficult and tiring.
On the other hand, if you're reading a book, you can consult a
dictionary. If you talking, the problem might be decoding the other
party's speech.
> [...]
> I cannot write Slovak, I've never learned the Slovak orthography
> and the morphology is often a double Dutch to me.
The same is very true for most Scandinavians.
Ruud Harmsen
sci.lang:
>Journalese is especial. Sometimes I cannot understand a headline in an
>English magazine, but as soon as I began to read the article, the
>meaning of the headline becomes clear. As a matter of fact, I do not
>know what "orçamento" means, but I am almost sure that if I see it in
>context I will understand it.
Adding a few extra words probably already gives it away: "Orçamento do
estado 2006".
http://www.negocios.pt/default.asp?SqlPage=folder&CpFolderId=62
What's it in Spanish? Presupuesto? That's what my small Dutch-Spanish
dictionary says, without mentioning any context.
>When I first visited Portugal, many many years ago, I found out that
>some Portugueses, who could not speak Spanish, had no problem at all
>understanding my Spanish, but other Portugueses refused to make a
>minimal effort to understand me.
Some people say Brazilians don't understand pt-PT, but that Spanish is
easier for them. Others deny that vehemently. I sometimes hear mixed-
language interviews, Spanish-Portuguese, on Portuguese radio, and both
sides seem to understand each other without any difficulty. There was
one with a flamenco dancer, and I noticed only two problems: torso was
not understood for a few second, then replaced (by the Spaniard) with
a similar but diferent but Spanish word (which I forgot); and pt.
'corre' was heard as es. 'coge' (or maybe a different word pair, but
it was this mistaken phonetic correpondence). Strangely, the wrong
word somehow more or less worked out in the context, and they kept on
talking, both repeatedly using their own non-corresponding word,
seemingly without even noticing there was a problem. The Portuguese
didn't change to the alternative Portuguese pronunciation of rr, which
the Spaniard would have immediately understood.
Ruud Harmsen
<paul.nos...@paradise.net.nz>: in sci.lang:
>To understand the spoken conversation is only possible because
>the languages are similar but also because passively I know
>Slovak quite well. We are both familiar with each others' common
>words, such as "listen" (CZ "poslys" /
Funny you should mention that: completely by accident, the identical
looking word is the Afrikaans word for what in Dutch would be
"postlijst", except that we usually call it "mailing list", in
English.
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
languages of the area considerably. I have been to Prague but I have
not yet been to Slovakia. It is good that I learnt this first.
Paul J Kriha wrote:
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1133517371....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
> >Paul J Kriha wrote:
> >> Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> >> news:1133447738....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
> >
> ><snip>
> >
> >> >Is that only since Czechoslovakia split or was it common before?
> >>
> >> In the times of the old federal republic the languages were
> >> often used interchangeably. For example, half the banknote
> >> denominations were printed in Czech and half in Slovak.
> >> The radio and TV newscasts were usually given in both
> >> languages by two presenters alternating between items.
> >
> >Were they regarded as different languages rather than merely dialects
> >before the split?
>
> They were (always) regarded as separate languages.
I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
I must confess that although I knew the answers for Belgium and
Switzerland, I have been guilty of this mistake in this case.
> For about 1000 years until 1918 the Czech and Slovak speaking
> nations were living in more-or-less separately administered
> territories. At the beginning they were presumably speaking
> the same language. The Slovak language based on the central
> Slovak dialect was formalized around 1840. So by then it
> was definitely regarded as a separate language.
>
> >I know that there is no good linguistic distinction
> >but nonetheless people usually have opinions on the matter. Are the
> >differences much greater than UK to US English?
>
> Yes, definitely.
>
> > How does the level of
> >difference compare to the Scandinavian languages?
>
> Sorry, I don't know Scandinavian languages that well.
The Scandinavian languages are a convenient yardstick. They are
commonly regarded as different languages (because of the one to one
assumption I just mentioned) yet the differences between them are less
than some others which are regarded only as dialects of a single
language.
Possibly. It could also be simple ignorance. Or it may be just
business. How many extra sales would they get in the UK if they
produced British English documentation? Would it cover the cost? My
guess is that it would not. If this is the explanation then it would
suggest that using the wrong Portuguese is more upsetting than the
wrong English.
> I have seen products with inscriptions in strange collections of
> languages, persumably the languages of countries they were
> being exported to. At least that was my guess.
> Couple months ago I bought some electronic doohdaah
> with inscriptions in Hungarian, Arabic, Chinese, and Serbian
> (it may have been Bulgarian). Fair enough, I thought,
> but it was exported to New Zealand.
> And it didn't bother to say where exactly it was made. :-)
I have seen that as well. I have also noticed it with DVD sound
tracks. Sometimes the selection of languages is very strange.
> >> >Does anyone speak Serbo-Croatian any more?
> >>
> >> A few university professors of Slavic studies around the world? :-)
> >
> >Within the former Yugoslavia, has pretty much everyone taken a side?
>
> You cannot deal with THAT problem without taking a side.
>
>
> >Are there no unionists left?
>
> You mean people who talk about Great Serbia or Great Croatia?
I was just wondering if anyone felt that all or most of the former
Yugoslavia should still be one on an equal basis. The names Great
Serbia or Great Croatia would suggest wanting one part to dominate the
other which is not what I had in mind. I should probably cease this
speculation, I guess that it is a potential minefield.
> pjk
>
> >> pjk
> >> >Or do we have only separate
> >> >Serbian and Croatian speakers?
> >> >Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> >Seán O'Leathlóbhair
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Peter T. Daniels
> I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
> since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
> one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
> stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
> Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
> what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
> Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
Belgium and Switzerland (and Iraq) are nations in the American sense,
but not really in the more widespread sense of the word. (We needed a
term for the "United States" in 1787 and took the word that previously
designated both an ethnic and a state unity, to designate a political
unity.)
Which also explains why Americans don't understand how Saddam could try
to eliminate the Kurds -- they kept calling them "his people," which
they weren't. They were drawn within his (and the others') borders by
Woodrow Wilson.
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Do you mean that Americans today use "nation" differently to other
English speakers? Or, do you mean there is a distinct sense in which
the United States is a nation? That may become an issue for the
European Union one day but probably not in the near future. I expect
the vast majority of EU citizens would name a smaller entity as their
nation. I am happy to say that an I am an EU citizen rather than
British or Irish but I think that I am in a small minority.
The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
etc:
Which is pretty much what I had in mind.
I am aware of other senses e.g. some people talk of the Muslim Nation
or the Nation of Islam which does not fit the above definition. The
second definition is a better but not perfect fit.
2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
area:
the Navajo nation
Here's a link:
http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=52976&dict=CALD
Sadly, despite the possible confusion of the meaning of nation,
Saddam's attempted elimination of the Kurds is not hard to believe.
There have been plenty of others incidents of rulers attempting to
eliminate groups within their same nation / country / state / area
which they control. Also there have been many civil wars.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> >
> > > I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
> > > since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
> > > one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
> > > stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
> > > Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
> > > what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
> > > Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> > > Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
> >
> > Belgium and Switzerland (and Iraq) are nations in the American sense,
> > but not really in the more widespread sense of the word. (We needed a
> > term for the "United States" in 1787 and took the word that previously
> > designated both an ethnic and a state unity, to designate a political
> > unity.)
> >
> > Which also explains why Americans don't understand how Saddam could try
> > to eliminate the Kurds -- they kept calling them "his people," which
> > they weren't. They were drawn within his (and the others') borders by
> > Woodrow Wilson.
> > --
> > Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
>
> Do you mean that Americans today use "nation" differently to other
No, differently from [colloq. than] others
Except we don't realize it. In the US, "nation" and "country" are
synonymous; in Europe, the question didn't arise until fairly recently.
What did Germans or Italians think of themselves as before 1871? Wasn't
there a sense of nationhood long before there was political unity? Was
Yugoslavia a nation?
Are or were England, Scotland, and Wales "nations"?
> English speakers? Or, do you mean there is a distinct sense in which
> the United States is a nation? That may become an issue for the
> European Union one day but probably not in the near future. I expect
> the vast majority of EU citizens would name a smaller entity as their
> nation. I am happy to say that an I am an EU citizen rather than
> British or Irish but I think that I am in a small minority.
Do you pledge allegiance to the flag of the European Union, and to the
Republic for which it stands, one nation, ..., indivisible, with liberty
and justice for all?
(Never mind that allegiance to a flag is a purely American thing, born,
it seems, of the Civil War.)
> The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
>
> 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> etc:
>
> Which is pretty much what I had in mind.
Evidently this dictionary doesn't arrange its definitions in historical
order, like the Oxford and M-W dictionaries.
But even here, note the distictive "language, traditions, etc."
> I am aware of other senses e.g. some people talk of the Muslim Nation
> or the Nation of Islam which does not fit the above definition. The
> second definition is a better but not perfect fit.
I don't know what Muslim Nation is, but Nation of Islam is the name of
the denomination headed by Elijah Muhammad and then by Lewis Farrakhan,
which is not the same as Islam (as Malcolm X discovered during his
Hajj).
> 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> area: the Navajo nation
What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
(And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
> Here's a link:
>
> http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=52976&dict=CALD
>
> Sadly, despite the possible confusion of the meaning of nation,
> Saddam's attempted elimination of the Kurds is not hard to believe.
> There have been plenty of others incidents of rulers attempting to
> eliminate groups within their same nation / country / state / area
> which they control. Also there have been many civil wars.
But probably not people of their own "nationality," i.e. "ethnicity."
("Ethnicity" could be seen as a recent invention -- M-W makes it 1950 --
that turned "nationality" into a retronym.)
I met a recent Polish immigrant in Chicago (I think it was before 1989)
and happened to mention the Jews of Poland. And he said, They're not
Poles! they're Jews!
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Sorry.
> Except we don't realize it. In the US, "nation" and "country" are
> synonymous; in Europe, the question didn't arise until fairly recently.
> What did Germans or Italians think of themselves as before 1871? Wasn't
> there a sense of nationhood long before there was political unity? Was
> Yugoslavia a nation?
>
> Are or were England, Scotland, and Wales "nations"?
A tricky question. Some would say yes and some would say no, a single
person may give different answers according to the context. It is
fairly common to hear the phrase: "The Home Nations", particularly in
the context of sporting events. Usually these "nations" are England,
Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. In some sports they compete
separately e.g. football (soccer) and in others they compete as one
e.g. Olympics.
There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
government at this level in England. The next level above county is
the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
claim to nationhood than the others.
> > English speakers? Or, do you mean there is a distinct sense in which
> > the United States is a nation? That may become an issue for the
> > European Union one day but probably not in the near future. I expect
> > the vast majority of EU citizens would name a smaller entity as their
> > nation. I am happy to say that an I am an EU citizen rather than
> > British or Irish but I think that I am in a small minority.
>
> Do you pledge allegiance to the flag of the European Union, and to the
> Republic for which it stands, one nation, ..., indivisible, with liberty
> and justice for all?
I have never been asked to pledge allegiance to any flag nor have I
been required to sing any national anthem, we don't do that sort of
stuff here. I don't recall even seeing flags in British schools except
in unusual circumstances. If I had to sing a national anthem, I would
prefer the EU one but that choice is encouraged by the music.
If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
oath of allegiance but if you are born a citizen then this is not
required. Rather oddly, when my brother was offered Australian
citizenship, he was required to swear an oath of allegiance to the
Queen of England even though he was already British.
> (Never mind that allegiance to a flag is a purely American thing, born,
> it seems, of the Civil War.)
Yes, it seems an odd concept to me.
> > The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> > is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
> >
> > 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> > living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> > etc:
> >
> > Which is pretty much what I had in mind.
>
> Evidently this dictionary doesn't arrange its definitions in historical
> order, like the Oxford and M-W dictionaries.
I don't know its rationale but another sensible order would be the
frequency of use today. Interesting though a historical order may, it
is not necessarily the most useful one. If you follow the link you
will see the subtitle: Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary. I am
not familiar with the hardcopy version of this dictionary but I do have
the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. This omits etymology and
gives only one definition for nation:
"large community of people, usu sharing a common history, language,
etc, and living in in a particular territory under one government"
which sounds more like 1 from the Cambridge dictionary. I expect that
both dictionaries consider that a learner is better served by
emphasising the most common contemporary uses. The reason for my
choice of dictionary in my previous post is that it is the best UK
English dictionary I know that is freely available online.
> But even here, note the distictive "language, traditions, etc."
Did you mean distinctive?
Yes. If you were too strict about that requirement then most nations
would be very small. Belgium and Switzerland would fragment but what
about the United States? Do you all share common traditions?
> > I am aware of other senses e.g. some people talk of the Muslim Nation
> > or the Nation of Islam which does not fit the above definition. The
> > second definition is a better but not perfect fit.
>
> I don't know what Muslim Nation is, but Nation of Islam is the name of
> the denomination headed by Elijah Muhammad and then by Lewis Farrakhan,
> which is not the same as Islam (as Malcolm X discovered during his
> Hajj).
I was not thinking of that organisation but a proposal that Muslims
across the world should unite. Maybe I have the wrong name for this
idea or maybe the name has been used more than once. The organisation
that you refer to is not well known here.
> > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > area: the Navajo nation
>
> What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
>
> (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
could have a look yourself.
> > Here's a link:
> >
> > http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=52976&dict=CALD
> >
> > Sadly, despite the possible confusion of the meaning of nation,
> > Saddam's attempted elimination of the Kurds is not hard to believe.
> > There have been plenty of others incidents of rulers attempting to
> > eliminate groups within their same nation / country / state / area
> > which they control. Also there have been many civil wars.
>
> But probably not people of their own "nationality," i.e. "ethnicity."
> ("Ethnicity" could be seen as a recent invention -- M-W makes it 1950 --
> that turned "nationality" into a retronym.)
>
> I met a recent Polish immigrant in Chicago (I think it was before 1989)
> and happened to mention the Jews of Poland. And he said, They're not
> Poles! they're Jews!
> --
> Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
How about Pol Pot in Cambodia? What were the criteria for his
killings?
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
HASM
> I didn't mean that it is always possible a word by word translation; my
> point is that the differences, in products labeled in Portuguese and
> Spanish, are more than the strictly necessary from a linguistic viewpoint,
> so other factors must play a role (namely "nationalism").
Could the explanation be that they were independently translated from a
third language, e.g. from English in your Kellogg example, without ever
trying to make them similar?
-- HASM
Paul J Kriha
Thomas Widmann <tw...@bibulus.org> wrote in message news:m33bla4...@alcedo.bibulus.org...
> "Paul J Kriha" <paul.nos...@paradise.net.nz> writes:
>
> > Seán O'Leathlóbhair <jwla...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> > news:1133517371....@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups.com...
> >>
> >> How does the level of difference compare to the Scandinavian
> >> languages?
> >
> > Sorry, I don't know Scandinavian languages that well.
>
> I think it might compare to the difference between Swedish and Danish,
> or possibly between Swedish and Norwegian (since Czech and Slovak
> pronunciation is quite similar). Danish and Norwegian Bokmaal are
> closer.
>
> > The Czechoslovak people since their childhood were every day
> > passively exposed to each other's language. They don't often
> > realize the extent of the foreign vocabulary/syntax/morphology
> > they actually are familiar with.
>
> The same is true for the people of Copenhagen -- until the late 1980s,
> there was only one Danish TV channel but two Swedish ones, so most
> people there were heavily exposed to Swedish.
In the old Czechoslovakia it was even more difficult to avoid
learning the other language. As soon as you listened to radio
news or watched TV you were getting half the newscasts
and half the plays in the other language.
> Since then, the number
> of Danish TV channels has exploded, and it is said that young people
> of Copenhagen now find Swedish incomprehensible, just as many
> Jutlanders have found it all along.
>
> > I can converse in Czech with Slovaks who speak Slovak in a mixed
> > group without too many problems, occasionally I have to query a more
> > unusual word. When I read a Slovak book I don't have the immediate
> > help from somebody in the group and I find it significantly more
> > difficult and tiring.
>
> On the other hand, if you're reading a book, you can consult a
> dictionary.
I have never seen a SK-CZ dictionary in my life. No doubt they
do exist and are used by serious professionals/translators.
Having to use a dictionary while reading a novel would
seriously hamper my enjoyment of it. I am willing to use
one only when I read books written in the language I know
well or am in a process of learning.
> If you talking, the problem might be decoding the other
> party's speech.
I encounter that problem when listening to an unusual
dialect of English or listening to a conversation in very
noisy environment. I don't have that problem listening to
any dialects of Slovak. I may not know what a particular
word or a phrase meant but I know precisely what the
person said and when I ask about it I can repeat it while
it still rings in my ears.
pjk
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > Do you mean that Americans today use "nation" differently to other
> >
> > No, differently from [colloq. than] others
>
> Sorry.
We don't apologize for dialect differences here ...
> > Except we don't realize it. In the US, "nation" and "country" are
> > synonymous; in Europe, the question didn't arise until fairly recently.
> > What did Germans or Italians think of themselves as before 1871? Wasn't
> > there a sense of nationhood long before there was political unity? Was
> > Yugoslavia a nation?
> >
> > Are or were England, Scotland, and Wales "nations"?
>
> A tricky question. Some would say yes and some would say no, a single
> person may give different answers according to the context. It is
> fairly common to hear the phrase: "The Home Nations", particularly in
> the context of sporting events. Usually these "nations" are England,
> Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. In some sports they compete
> separately e.g. football (soccer) and in others they compete as one
> e.g. Olympics.
NI is a whole other can of worms, which is why I didn't mention any form
of Ireland.
> There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
> a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
> Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
> Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
> government at this level in England. The next level above county is
> the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
> claim to nationhood than the others.
So you're adopting the American usage!
> > > English speakers? Or, do you mean there is a distinct sense in which
> > > the United States is a nation? That may become an issue for the
> > > European Union one day but probably not in the near future. I expect
> > > the vast majority of EU citizens would name a smaller entity as their
> > > nation. I am happy to say that an I am an EU citizen rather than
> > > British or Irish but I think that I am in a small minority.
> >
> > Do you pledge allegiance to the flag of the European Union, and to the
> > Republic for which it stands, one nation, ..., indivisible, with liberty
> > and justice for all?
>
> I have never been asked to pledge allegiance to any flag nor have I
> been required to sing any national anthem, we don't do that sort of
> stuff here. I don't recall even seeing flags in British schools except
> in unusual circumstances. If I had to sing a national anthem, I would
> prefer the EU one but that choice is encouraged by the music.
>
> If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
> oath of allegiance
to the Monarch, right? not to the State?
> but if you are born a citizen then this is not
> required. Rather oddly, when my brother was offered Australian
> citizenship, he was required to swear an oath of allegiance to the
> Queen of England even though he was already British.
>
> > (Never mind that allegiance to a flag is a purely American thing, born,
> > it seems, of the Civil War.)
>
> Yes, it seems an odd concept to me.
Americans are verily disgusted when we see you folk make, say,
underpants out of the Union Jack and sit on it.
> > > The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> > > is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
> > >
> > > 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> > > living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> > > etc:
> > >
> > > Which is pretty much what I had in mind.
> >
> > Evidently this dictionary doesn't arrange its definitions in historical
> > order, like the Oxford and M-W dictionaries.
>
> I don't know its rationale but another sensible order would be the
> frequency of use today. Interesting though a historical order may, it
> is not necessarily the most useful one. If you follow the link you
> will see the subtitle: Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary. I am
> not familiar with the hardcopy version of this dictionary but I do have
> the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary. This omits etymology and
> gives only one definition for nation:
>
> "large community of people, usu sharing a common history, language,
> etc, and living in in a particular territory under one government"
>
> which sounds more like 1 from the Cambridge dictionary. I expect that
> both dictionaries consider that a learner is better served by
> emphasising the most common contemporary uses. The reason for my
> choice of dictionary in my previous post is that it is the best UK
> English dictionary I know that is freely available online.
The fact that these are Learner's Dictionaries is very significant; they
won't be useful for this sort of subtlety.
> > But even here, note the distictive "language, traditions, etc."
>
> Did you mean distinctive?
Indeed.
> Yes. If you were too strict about that requirement then most nations
> would be very small. Belgium and Switzerland would fragment but what
> about the United States? Do you all share common traditions?
No. First there were around a couple hundred Native American tribes, no
matter how many or few linguistic groupings they belonged to; then there
was immigration from all over Europe, West Africa, and East Asia. (And,
in smaller numbers, from everywhere else, too.) Any "common traditions"
have emerged over only the last two centuries -- Thanksgiving and Santa
Claus date only to the 1860s and 1880s respectively.
> > > I am aware of other senses e.g. some people talk of the Muslim Nation
> > > or the Nation of Islam which does not fit the above definition. The
> > > second definition is a better but not perfect fit.
> >
> > I don't know what Muslim Nation is, but Nation of Islam is the name of
> > the denomination headed by Elijah Muhammad and then by Lewis Farrakhan,
> > which is not the same as Islam (as Malcolm X discovered during his
> > Hajj).
>
> I was not thinking of that organisation but a proposal that Muslims
> across the world should unite. Maybe I have the wrong name for this
> idea or maybe the name has been used more than once. The organisation
> that you refer to is not well known here.
Islam already exists. Just as in Christianity, there's no central
authority acknowledged by all sects, but you're as likely to unite all
Muslims as you are all Christians!
> > > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > > area: the Navajo nation
> >
> > What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
> >
> > (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
>
> I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
> could have a look yourself.
As you should know by now, I don't click links, because when I do,
either it takes a very long time for the website to resolve itself and
then it doesn't have anything useful anyway, or else it all goes blooey
right away. (Publishers' websites tend to be particularly picky.)
> > > Here's a link:
> > >
> > > http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=52976&dict=CALD
> > >
> > > Sadly, despite the possible confusion of the meaning of nation,
> > > Saddam's attempted elimination of the Kurds is not hard to believe.
> > > There have been plenty of others incidents of rulers attempting to
> > > eliminate groups within their same nation / country / state / area
> > > which they control. Also there have been many civil wars.
> >
> > But probably not people of their own "nationality," i.e. "ethnicity."
> > ("Ethnicity" could be seen as a recent invention -- M-W makes it 1950 --
> > that turned "nationality" into a retronym.)
> >
> > I met a recent Polish immigrant in Chicago (I think it was before 1989)
> > and happened to mention the Jews of Poland. And he said, They're not
> > Poles! they're Jews!
> How about Pol Pot in Cambodia? What were the criteria for his
> killings?
IIRC, a sort of Maoist anti-intellectualism, no?
Ruud Harmsen
sci.lang:
That could certainly be the explanation. If you have two translators
translate an English text to, say, Dutch, you'd get differences
between the translations of similar magnitude. Especially in
commercial texts, where "making it sound right" is important, even
more important than factual accuracy, that can be expected.
Christian Weisgerber
> The former Danish lands of Skane, Halland and Blekinge were the
> heartland of Denmark in the middle ages and so the main part of Denmark
> was on the Scandinavian peninsula so that Scandinavia and the
> Scandinavian peninsula were synonymous at that time.
When I naively look at a map, even the term "Scandinavian peninsula"
isn't self-explanatory. The land protrusion that juts out from
Europe includes Finland-Karelia.
--
Christian "naddy" Weisgerber na...@mips.inka.de
Christian Weisgerber
> Once I've seen (on a chocolate or so) some South Slavic text (in latin
> alphabet) with only some words /slashed e.g. mleko or mlieko vs mlijeko -
> (milk, I don't remember the exact spellings). Any idea what was that?
That looks like the Ekavian/Ijekavian split in Serbo-Croat.
Recently in Italy, I ran across Laško (s with caron) beer[1]. The
cans were mostly labeled in two rather similar looking Slavic
languages--conveniently enough they gave different contact addresses,
allowing to deduce that one variant was Slovenian, the other Croatian.
Christian Weisgerber
[Czech/Slovak]
> I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
> since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
> one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
> stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
> Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
> what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
> Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
There is also considerable confusion of Slovakia and Slovenia.
Paul J Kriha
<<<<<
Don't you ever get Czechoslovakian? :-)
>>>>>
But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
<<<<<
If you want to play a prescriptivist pedant you may find it
useful to know that in English the language is called "Slovak".
The word "Slovakian" is reserved just for geographical features. :-)
>>>>>
I must confess that although I knew the answers for Belgium and
Switzerland, I have been guilty of this mistake in this case.
<<<<<
You may ask even trickier questions like:
What language do they speak in Bohemia?
And Moravia? (not Monrovia or Moldavia!)
pjk
Brian M. Scott
<gram...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in
<news:4391DD...@worldnet.att.net> in sci.lang:
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
>> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
[...]
>>> (Never mind that allegiance to a flag is a purely American thing, born,
>>> it seems, of the Civil War.)
>> Yes, it seems an odd concept to me.
> Americans are verily disgusted when we see you folk make, say,
> underpants out of the Union Jack and sit on it.
I suppose that some probably are, though it seems very silly
of them. But then it wouldn't bother me in the slightest to
find the same use being made of the Stars and Stripes.
[...]
Brian
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> >
> > Peter T. Daniels wrote:
>
> > > > Do you mean that Americans today use "nation" differently to other
> > >
> > > No, differently from [colloq. than] others
> >
> > Sorry.
>
> We don't apologize for dialect differences here ...
Thanks, I didn't know that convention.
> > > Except we don't realize it. In the US, "nation" and "country" are
> > > synonymous; in Europe, the question didn't arise until fairly recently.
> > > What did Germans or Italians think of themselves as before 1871? Wasn't
> > > there a sense of nationhood long before there was political unity? Was
> > > Yugoslavia a nation?
> > >
> > > Are or were England, Scotland, and Wales "nations"?
> >
> > A tricky question. Some would say yes and some would say no, a single
> > person may give different answers according to the context. It is
> > fairly common to hear the phrase: "The Home Nations", particularly in
> > the context of sporting events. Usually these "nations" are England,
> > Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland. In some sports they compete
> > separately e.g. football (soccer) and in others they compete as one
> > e.g. Olympics.
>
> NI is a whole other can of worms, which is why I didn't mention any form
> of Ireland.
This use of nation is primarily for sports and it is comparatively safe
to discuss the various Irelands in this context. It is very complex
though. I have already mentioned that for some sports there are
multiple national teams e.g. England, Wales yet for others there is a
single one for the UK or GB. There is more complexity, for some sports
the Republic of Ireland and the North have separate teams and for
others they have a common team. Fortunately, most people do a fairly
good job of keeping politics out of sport and manage to enjoy a game
even if the constitution of the team offends their politics.
> > There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
> > a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
> > Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
> > Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
> > government at this level in England. The next level above county is
> > the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
> > claim to nationhood than the others.
>
> So you're adopting the American usage!
Not really since, as I mentioned above, the word nation is mostly used
in a sporting context. I think that the official term for these
governments is: regional assemblies. This is probably to dodge the
difficult question of whether they are nations.
> > > > English speakers? Or, do you mean there is a distinct sense in which
> > > > the United States is a nation? That may become an issue for the
> > > > European Union one day but probably not in the near future. I expect
> > > > the vast majority of EU citizens would name a smaller entity as their
> > > > nation. I am happy to say that an I am an EU citizen rather than
> > > > British or Irish but I think that I am in a small minority.
> > >
> > > Do you pledge allegiance to the flag of the European Union, and to the
> > > Republic for which it stands, one nation, ..., indivisible, with liberty
> > > and justice for all?
> >
> > I have never been asked to pledge allegiance to any flag nor have I
> > been required to sing any national anthem, we don't do that sort of
> > stuff here. I don't recall even seeing flags in British schools except
> > in unusual circumstances. If I had to sing a national anthem, I would
> > prefer the EU one but that choice is encouraged by the music.
> >
> > If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
> > oath of allegiance
>
> to the Monarch, right? not to the State?
Why the capital S?
Yes but the monarch represents the state so it is not a significant
distinction. There are often debates on how rich the queen is. A
significant issue is what she owns personally and what belongs to the
job. Does she own Buckingham Palace? Could she sell it? Similarly,
the difference, if any, between an oath to the queen and the state is
debatable. Of course some see a difference, most notably NI
politicians who object to British rule.
> > but if you are born a citizen then this is not
> > required. Rather oddly, when my brother was offered Australian
> > citizenship, he was required to swear an oath of allegiance to the
> > Queen of England even though he was already British.
> >
> > > (Never mind that allegiance to a flag is a purely American thing, born,
> > > it seems, of the Civil War.)
> >
> > Yes, it seems an odd concept to me.
>
> Americans are verily disgusted when we see you folk make, say,
> underpants out of the Union Jack and sit on it.
Some Brits are also disgusted and many think such things are in poor
taste. But, I think that the majority opinion is that they are
harmless jokes. It is common here to think that Americans are too
reverential. We are surprised how upset you get if someone burns the
Stars and Stripes. I am not saying that burning the Union Jack would
not upset many Brits but I am saying that I would expect a much lower
level of upset.
I did not say that I thought uniting all Muslims was likely, possible,
or desirable. Only, that I have heard some call for it.
> > > > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > > > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > > > area: the Navajo nation
> > >
> > > What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
> > >
> > > (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
> >
> > I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
> > could have a look yourself.
>
> As you should know by now, I don't click links, because when I do,
> either it takes a very long time for the website to resolve itself and
> then it doesn't have anything useful anyway, or else it all goes blooey
> right away. (Publishers' websites tend to be particularly picky.)
Well, I don't do research for others if it is very easy for them to do
it themselves. I could copy and paste the dictionary's definition for
race but since it would be so easy for you to follow the link and see
it for yourself, I won't. If you don't like following links, try a
good bookshop or library, you should be able to find the real thing.
> > > > Here's a link:
> > > >
> > > > http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=52976&dict=CALD
> > > >
> > > > Sadly, despite the possible confusion of the meaning of nation,
> > > > Saddam's attempted elimination of the Kurds is not hard to believe.
> > > > There have been plenty of others incidents of rulers attempting to
> > > > eliminate groups within their same nation / country / state / area
> > > > which they control. Also there have been many civil wars.
> > >
> > > But probably not people of their own "nationality," i.e. "ethnicity."
> > > ("Ethnicity" could be seen as a recent invention -- M-W makes it 1950 --
> > > that turned "nationality" into a retronym.)
> > >
> > > I met a recent Polish immigrant in Chicago (I think it was before 1989)
> > > and happened to mention the Jews of Poland. And he said, They're not
> > > Poles! they're Jews!
>
> > How about Pol Pot in Cambodia? What were the criteria for his
> > killings?
>
> IIRC, a sort of Maoist anti-intellectualism, no?
I think so. My point was the victims were probably not a different
nationality in any sense of the word.
> --
> Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Certainly there is confusion in the UK. Is such confusion also common
in Germany? If you step out into the street and ask my questions
above, what answers would you expect? I would expect much better
answers to the Belgium and Switzerland questions. I would not know
what to expect for the Czechoslovakia and Slovakia questions.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Probably. I am not sure if it would come ahead of or behind "dunno".
The existence of a language named Czech is reasonably well known so I
hope a fair number would manage that.
> But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
>
> <<<<<
> If you want to play a prescriptivist pedant you may find it
> useful to know that in English the language is called "Slovak".
> The word "Slovakian" is reserved just for geographical features. :-)
> >>>>>
Thanks.
> I must confess that although I knew the answers for Belgium and
> Switzerland, I have been guilty of this mistake in this case.
>
> <<<<<
> You may ask even trickier questions like:
> What language do they speak in Bohemia?
> And Moravia? (not Monrovia or Moldavia!)
The next time I need to devise a pub quiz, I will consider those
questions.
> pjk
<snip>
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Poul Erik Jørgensen
news:1133348077.6...@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com
> No sign of the Danes wanting to simplify them, is there?
No. Only when writing an amount on a check in letters, we write "like the
English", e. g.:
366,00 DKR = tre hundrede og seksti seks 00/100 DKR
> For those
> who don't know, Danish says something along the lines of "5 & half of
> the fourth score" for 75 -- ie even worse than the French
> soixante-quinze.)
I would rather say: "five and 3½ times 20", in old Danish
femoghalvfjerdssindstyve, nowadays shorter: femoghalvfjerds (litterally 5
and 70).
French is much, much easier ;-)
Poul Erik Jørgensen
DK
--
Remove NNN from my e-mail address when replying.
Enlevez NNN de mon adresse électronique pour me répondre.
Poul Erik Jørgensen
news:joojf.103$Xy3...@news.get2net.dk
> When I got to 97 (nioghalvfems), cut it apart into 4½ x 20 + 7 + 10 ,
97 = syvoghalvfems
99 = nioghalvfems
4½ x 20 +7 - and nothing more = 97.
You should get your school money back ;-)
PEJ
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
> > > a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
> > > Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
> > > Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
> > > government at this level in England. The next level above county is
> > > the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
> > > claim to nationhood than the others.
> >
> > So you're adopting the American usage!
>
> Not really since, as I mentioned above, the word nation is mostly used
> in a sporting context. I think that the official term for these
> governments is: regional assemblies. This is probably to dodge the
> difficult question of whether they are nations.
In Britain, perhaps the word "nation" is mostly used in a "sporting"
context, but perhaps not elsewhere.
> > > If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
> > > oath of allegiance
> >
> > to the Monarch, right? not to the State?
>
> Why the capital S?
Parallelism with Monarch.
> Yes but the monarch represents the state so it is not a significant
> distinction. There are often debates on how rich the queen is. A
> significant issue is what she owns personally and what belongs to the
> job. Does she own Buckingham Palace? Could she sell it? Similarly,
> the difference, if any, between an oath to the queen and the state is
> debatable. Of course some see a difference, most notably NI
> politicians who object to British rule.
AIUI, the Queen has subjects while the rest of the world has citizens.
> > > > > The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> > > > > is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
> > > > >
> > > > > 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> > > > > living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> > > > > etc:
> > > > > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > > > > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > > > > area: the Navajo nation
> > > >
> > > > What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
> > > >
> > > > (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
> > >
> > > I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
> > > could have a look yourself.
> >
> > As you should know by now, I don't click links, because when I do,
> > either it takes a very long time for the website to resolve itself and
> > then it doesn't have anything useful anyway, or else it all goes blooey
> > right away. (Publishers' websites tend to be particularly picky.)
>
> Well, I don't do research for others if it is very easy for them to do
> it themselves. I could copy and paste the dictionary's definition for
> race but since it would be so easy for you to follow the link and see
I just explained that it isn't easy.
Why won't you tell me what [C] and [S] mean?
> it for yourself, I won't. If you don't like following links, try a
> good bookshop or library, you should be able to find the real thing.
Erm, no, it's not likely that any British dictionary, let alone
"Learners'" ones, would be available in an American bookstore _or_
library; who would buy or consult them?
Jim Heckman
On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
wrote in message <1133480399.7...@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
> Jim Heckman wrote:
>
> > On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
> > wrote in message <1133429997....@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
> >
> > > rcaetano wrote:
[...]
> > > > But what where Finns doing in a pan-Scandinavian conference?
> > > >
> > > > Rafael Caetano, because the thread is unusually calm
> > >
> > > Why wouldn't they be there? It wasn't a conference on language.
> > > Something to do with government.
> > >
> > > A google for Scandinavia gives this as the first result:
> > > http://www.goscandinavia.com/
> >
> > Notice that that site is targeted towards North Americans.
>
> So? If it were created by Americans then it may not be so accurate but
> it appears to have been created by people from those countries and they
> have chosen to come together under the name "Scandinavia".
In English for general consumption, yes, apparently. I'm sure you
and they are right that most English speakers almost certainly
don't make the fine distinctions that they do in their own
languages. I'd guess though that they do make those distinctions in
English among themselves, and I generally try to adapt my own usage
along those kinds of lines when I'm aware of them. This is perhaps
somewhat elitist of me, but I like think of it as being polite and
showing some interest in, and respect for, other cultures.
> The only
> significance of the site is that it was my first hit when I searched
> for Scandinavia.
>
> > > Finland is a member of the Nordic Union.
> >
> > Exactly. In general, people from that part of the world distinguish
> > between "Nordic", which includes Finland, and "Scandinavian", which
> > doesn't.
>
> Good point, that proves nothing. I have always treated Scandinavia and
> Nordic Union as pretty much synonymous so it seemed significant to me.
>
> > As a USAmerican who grew up thinking of "Scandinavia" as referring
> > specifically to the Scandinavian peninsula, it took me a while to
> > realize that for the natives the term also includes Denmark.
>
> Growing up here in the UK and Ireland, I tended to think of Scandinavia
> as being Denmark, Sweden, Norway, Finland and maybe Iceland. The
> defining feature was the common flag design. They all have a similar
> cross with the vertical bar offset.
>
> I tried some more research and the more I did, the more answers I
> found. Some supported your interpretation and some mine. Wikipedia
> sums up the confusion nicely: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavia
>
> By the way, have you been to "that part of the world". I have been to
> Denmark and Sweden many times. I have also been to Finland, Iceland
> and Estonia. I have not yet been to Norway. I have met many people
> from that part of the world and see some of them regularly.
Cool. No, I haven't been there yet. But I've given serious
consideration to retiring there someday, if it remains the most
civilized part of the world and if the US continues on its path of
imperialist self-destruction.
> I'll do some different research over the weekend. I will call my
> sister who has lived in Denmark for the last 25 years. I already
> expect to meet a Finnish friend who lives here in England near me.
Let us know what they say. We've already had one Dane weigh in on
the question in this thread, and I know I've heard (well, read)
Finns who say that they too make the Nordic/Scandinavian
distinction.
--
Jim Heckman
Jim Heckman
On 1-Dec-2005, "Nigel Greenwood" <ndsg...@yahoo.co.uk>
wrote in message <1133430301.8...@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
[...]
> Actually, now I think about it more carefully, the French system may be
> worse. You can't just memorize "soixante-dix" for 70 & add a "cinq" --
> you actually have to use the special form "quinze". I learnt French in
> Geneva (some other parts of French-speaking Switzerland are different),
> so I naturally use septante/quatre-vingts/nonante.
Did you ever encounter "octante" and/or "huitante" in Geneva or
elsewhere in Switzerland? I understand that the former is common in
Belgium, and I've read differing reports on Swiss usage.
> 81-89 are simple to
> produce (but careful about those spellings!) & understand; but I find I
> still have to think a moment or two when people say things like
> "soixante-quatorze".
--
Jim Heckman
Joachim Pense
>> Danish is to Swedish what Portuguese is to Spanish?
>
> More or less. Except that Portuguese only keeps the consonants, and
> Danish only keeps the wovels.
>
I don't know Portugese, but I zap throgh a Portugese and a Brazilian TV
channel every now and then. To me it looks like Brazilian is more like
Danish in that respect.
Joachim
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
> wrote in message <1133480399.7...@g44g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
>
> > Jim Heckman wrote:
> >
> > > On 1-Dec-2005, "Seán O'Leathlóbhair" <jwla...@yahoo.com>
> > > wrote in message <1133429997....@g47g2000cwa.googlegroups.com>:
> > >
> > > > rcaetano wrote:
>
> [...]
>
> > > > > But what where Finns doing in a pan-Scandinavian conference?
> > > > >
> > > > > Rafael Caetano, because the thread is unusually calm
> > > >
> > > > Why wouldn't they be there? It wasn't a conference on language.
> > > > Something to do with government.
In hindsight, it may have been a Nordic Union level conference. I
could have misremembered or my friend may have "translated" Nordic
Union to Scandinavia.
> > > > A google for Scandinavia gives this as the first result:
> > > > http://www.goscandinavia.com/
> > >
> > > Notice that that site is targeted towards North Americans.
> >
> > So? If it were created by Americans then it may not be so accurate but
> > it appears to have been created by people from those countries and they
> > have chosen to come together under the name "Scandinavia".
>
> In English for general consumption, yes, apparently. I'm sure you
> and they are right that most English speakers almost certainly
> don't make the fine distinctions that they do in their own
> languages. I'd guess though that they do make those distinctions in
> English among themselves, and I generally try to adapt my own usage
> along those kinds of lines when I'm aware of them. This is perhaps
> somewhat elitist of me, but I like think of it as being polite and
> showing some interest in, and respect for, other cultures.
I also like to take an interest in other cultures and try to respect
them. It is just in the case of Scandinavia, I had seen so many things
such as the tourist web site that I did not suspect that their own use
of the term may differ. For example, I usually say "The Netherlands"
rather than "Holland" when appropriate.
It is an attractive part of the world. My sister loves it there and
has no desire to return to England or Ireland for more than a holiday
(vacation). I like to visit the region and would be happy if I was
offered a job there but would not consider it for retirement. My own
retirement plans are in the Philippines. If funds permit, 6 months in
Europe (the warm ones) and 6 months there. If not, then mostly there
with the occasional trip back here.
> > I'll do some different research over the weekend. I will call my
> > sister who has lived in Denmark for the last 25 years. I already
> > expect to meet a Finnish friend who lives here in England near me.
>
> Let us know what they say. We've already had one Dane weigh in on
> the question in this thread, and I know I've heard (well, read)
> Finns who say that they too make the Nordic/Scandinavian
> distinction.
>
> --
> Jim Heckman
Considering the responses from some Danes, the call to my sister seems
not so important. I had expected to meet the Finnish guy today but it
seems that, even at 1pm, he has not got out of bed. I will call him
later if I do not see him. We have not had a Finnish viewpoint on the
question yet.
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> >
> > Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
>
> > > > There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
> > > > a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
> > > > Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
> > > > Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
> > > > government at this level in England. The next level above county is
> > > > the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
> > > > claim to nationhood than the others.
> > >
> > > So you're adopting the American usage!
> >
> > Not really since, as I mentioned above, the word nation is mostly used
> > in a sporting context. I think that the official term for these
> > governments is: regional assemblies. This is probably to dodge the
> > difficult question of whether they are nations.
>
> In Britain, perhaps the word "nation" is mostly used in a "sporting"
> context, but perhaps not elsewhere.
To make things a bit more precise, I only meant that referring to
England, Wales, etc as nations is primarily limited to sports. It is
used for further away places. At a guess, the usage here is similar to
that in the US.
> > > > If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
> > > > oath of allegiance
> > >
> > > to the Monarch, right? not to the State?
> >
> > Why the capital S?
>
> Parallelism with Monarch.
So why the capital M? I would not use that either. I would regard the
word "monarch" as the name of a job or role and no more deserving of a
capital than doctor, teacher, garbage man etc. Despite being a
"subject of Her Majesty", I don't support the monarchy and don't
dignify it any more than I have to.
> > Yes but the monarch represents the state so it is not a significant
> > distinction. There are often debates on how rich the queen is. A
> > significant issue is what she owns personally and what belongs to the
> > job. Does she own Buckingham Palace? Could she sell it? Similarly,
> > the difference, if any, between an oath to the queen and the state is
> > debatable. Of course some see a difference, most notably NI
> > politicians who object to British rule.
>
> AIUI, the Queen has subjects while the rest of the world has citizens.
Yet my British passport refers to me as a citizen.
> > > > > > The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> > > > > > is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
> > > > > >
> > > > > > 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> > > > > > living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> > > > > > etc:
>
> > > > > > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > > > > > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > > > > > area: the Navajo nation
> > > > >
> > > > > What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
> > > > >
> > > > > (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
> > > >
> > > > I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
> > > > could have a look yourself.
> > >
> > > As you should know by now, I don't click links, because when I do,
> > > either it takes a very long time for the website to resolve itself and
> > > then it doesn't have anything useful anyway, or else it all goes blooey
> > > right away. (Publishers' websites tend to be particularly picky.)
> >
> > Well, I don't do research for others if it is very easy for them to do
> > it themselves. I could copy and paste the dictionary's definition for
> > race but since it would be so easy for you to follow the link and see
>
> I just explained that it isn't easy.
You are an enthusiastic user of some internet functions so your
reluctance to use the web is surprising. Young children find it easy.
Many older people don't but you are the first I have encountered that
is happy to use some internet functions but not the web. The converse,
happy to use the web only, is common.
> Why won't you tell me what [C] and [S] mean?
In my first reply after that question, I just missed it. Later, when I
noticed it, I did not answer since I did not know the answer and did
not have the time to check. I have now tried and unfortunately I could
not, in a reasonable time, find the answer. Maybe they are hoping that
we will go and buy the hard copy. Nouns are usually followed by [C] or
[U] or both. It seems likely that they indicate countable and
uncountable. [S] seems rarer and I cannot guess its possible meaning.
Here for example, is one of the entries for race.
race (PEOPLE) Show phonetics
noun [C or U]
a group, especially of people, with particular similar physical
characteristics, who are considered as belonging to the same type, or
the fact of belonging to such a group:
People of many different races were living side by side.
Discrimination on grounds of race will not be tolerated.
An increasing number of people in the country are of mixed race (= with
parents of different races).
> > it for yourself, I won't. If you don't like following links, try a
> > good bookshop or library, you should be able to find the real thing.
>
> Erm, no, it's not likely that any British dictionary, let alone
> "Learners'" ones, would be available in an American bookstore _or_
> library; who would buy or consult them?
Fair point on the bookshops. I have been in a few American bookshops
and I was disappointed by them. Once, with some time to kill in a
small city, I decided to buy an American dictionary. I could find only
one bookshop in the downtown area and it only had pocket dictionaries.
I wanted something of at least the size and seriousness of the Concise
Oxford. Back here in the UK, a city of that size would probably have
multiple bookshops and plenty of choice of dictionaries. I thought
that you lived in, or at least often visited, New York, I would have
guessed that it would have some good bookshops and that some of them
would stock a few British dictionaries. My copy of the Oxford
Learner's dictionary was bought in Bangkok while I lived there.
I have never been in a US public library, would not even the better
ones have any British dictionaries? A decent sized library here would
probably have some American dictionaries. Also, I had expected that
you would have access to some university libraries and that they may
have a good selection.
> --
> Peter T. Daniels gram...@att.net
--
Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Paul J Kriha
Peter T. Daniels <gram...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
news:4391A5...@worldnet.att.net...
> Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
>
> > I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
> > since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
> > one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
> > stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
> > Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
> > what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
> > Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> > Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
>
> Belgium and Switzerland (and Iraq) are nations in the American sense,
> but not really in the more widespread sense of the word. (We needed a
> term for the "United States" in 1787 and took the word that previously
> designated both an ethnic and a state unity, to designate a political
> unity.)
In (probably) majority of European countries the concept of nationality
is different from the American one. The Eu concepts of citizenship
and nationality (and corresponding concepts of state and nation)
are distinct and mutually independent.
pjk
Paul J Kriha
[...]
>If you are offered British citizenship then you will need to swear an
>oath of allegiance but if you are born a citizen then this is not
>required. Rather oddly, when my brother was offered Australian
>citizenship, he was required to swear an oath of allegiance to the
>Queen of England even though he was already British.
I don't think this is correct, Seán.
I swore a similar oath of allegiance some 33 years ago in NZ.
It was to the Queen Elizabeth the Second and her heirs
(well I said hairs, but nevermind).
The QE2 I was swearing my allegiance to was our queen
the Queen of New Zealand. I bet your brother was swearing
his allegiance to the Queen of Australia. At the moment
it happens to be the same person, but that may or may not
be the case in the future.
I believe your brother couldn't have been swearing allegiance
to a Queen of England, i.e. legally a foreign person.
BTW, when QE2 was being crowned she was asked,
and I quote:
"Do you solemly promise and swear to govern people
of United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland,
Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Pakistan and Ceylon
according to their respective law and custom?"
She replied: "I solemly promise so to do."
She did not become an empress.
She was crowned as head of the Commonwealth of Nations.
pjk
[...]
>Seán O'Leathlóbhair
Paul J Kriha
Christian Weisgerber <na...@mips.inka.de> wrote in message news:dmsia8$3fv$3...@kemoauc.mips.inka.de...
Not to mention Slavonia. :-)
(i.e. eastern part(s) of today's Croatia.)
Or Slivovice, also known as Sliwovitz. :-)
BTW, did you know that the Slovak word for "Slovenia"
is exactly the same as Slovenian word for "Slovakia".
Their words for their respective countries are different.
pjk
P.S.
The reason why I don't say what the actual Slovak word
for Slovenia (and vice versa) is is that I forgot how it's
exactly spelled. I have no idea how and where to look it up.
Any Slovaks or Slovenes listening? :-)
> Christian "naddy" Weisgerber
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> > >
> > > Peter T. Daniels wrote:
> > > > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> >
> > > > > There is now a Scottish Parliament with a moderate amount of power and
> > > > > a Welsh Assembly with rather less. I would guess that even the
> > > > > Scottish Parliament has rather less power than one of your States. The
> > > > > Northern Ireland Assembly is currently suspended. Oddly, there is no
> > > > > government at this level in England. The next level above county is
> > > > > the United Kingdom. So, today at least, England probably has a weaker
> > > > > claim to nationhood than the others.
> > > >
> > > > So you're adopting the American usage!
> > >
> > > Not really since, as I mentioned above, the word nation is mostly used
> > > in a sporting context. I think that the official term for these
> > > governments is: regional assemblies. This is probably to dodge the
> > > difficult question of whether they are nations.
> >
> > In Britain, perhaps the word "nation" is mostly used in a "sporting"
> > context, but perhaps not elsewhere.
>
> used for further away places. At a guess, the usage here is similar to
> that in the US.
>
> > > > > oath of allegiance
> > > >
> > > > to the Monarch, right? not to the State?
> > >
> > > Why the capital S?
> >
> > Parallelism with Monarch.
>
> word "monarch" as the name of a job or role and no more deserving of a
> capital than doctor, teacher, garbage man etc. Despite being a
> more than I have to.
The Chicago Manual of Style and the New York Times style guide prescribe
the capital letter when the referent is a single individual.
Dumbya is the 43rd president. The President is dumb.
> > > Yes but the monarch represents the state so it is not a significant
> > > distinction. There are often debates on how rich the queen is. A
> > > significant issue is what she owns personally and what belongs to the
> > > job. Does she own Buckingham Palace? Could she sell it? Similarly,
> > > the difference, if any, between an oath to the queen and the state is
> > > debatable. Of course some see a difference, most notably NI
> > > politicians who object to British rule.
> >
> > AIUI, the Queen has subjects while the rest of the world has citizens.
>
> Yet my British passport refers to me as a citizen.
When did the usage change? Perhaps it has to do with the demise of the
Empire.
> > > > > > > The sense that I meant was an area under a particular government. Here
> > > > > > > is the first definition from the Cambridge Online Dictionary.
> > > > > > >
> > > > > > > 1 [C] a country, especially when thought of as a large group of people
> > > > > > > living in one area with their own government, language, traditions,
> > > > > > > etc:
> >
> > > > > > > 2 [S] a large group of people of the same race who share the same
> > > > > > > language, traditions and history, but who might not all live in one
> > > > > > > area: the Navajo nation
> > > > > >
> > > > > > What are [C] and [S] introducing these definitions?
> > > > > >
> > > > > > (And what does Cambridge think "race" means?)
> > > > >
> > > > > I cannot speak for Cambridge but it is an online dictionary so you
> > > > > could have a look yourself.
> > > >
> > > > As you should know by now, I don't click links, because when I do,
> > > > either it takes a very long time for the website to resolve itself and
> > > > then it doesn't have anything useful anyway, or else it all goes blooey
> > > > right away. (Publishers' websites tend to be particularly picky.)
> > >
> > > Well, I don't do research for others if it is very easy for them to do
> > > it themselves. I could copy and paste the dictionary's definition for
> > > race but since it would be so easy for you to follow the link and see
> >
> > I just explained that it isn't easy.
>
> You are an enthusiastic user of some internet functions so your
> reluctance to use the web is surprising. Young children find it easy.
> Many older people don't but you are the first I have encountered that
> is happy to use some internet functions but not the web. The converse,
> happy to use the web only, is common.
I go to websites when needed. What I don't do is click links provided in
newsgroups. (Especially if their nature is concealed by "tinyurl" or
some such.)
> > Why won't you tell me what [C] and [S] mean?
>
> In my first reply after that question, I just missed it. Later, when I
> noticed it, I did not answer since I did not know the answer and did
> not have the time to check. I have now tried and unfortunately I could
> not, in a reasonable time, find the answer. Maybe they are hoping that
> we will go and buy the hard copy. Nouns are usually followed by [C] or
> [U] or both. It seems likely that they indicate countable and
> uncountable. [S] seems rarer and I cannot guess its possible meaning.
> Here for example, is one of the entries for race.
So you discovered I'm right about the inutility of clicking links.
> race (PEOPLE) Show phonetics
> noun [C or U]
> a group, especially of people, with particular similar physical
> characteristics, who are considered as belonging to the same type, or
> the fact of belonging to such a group:
> People of many different races were living side by side.
> Discrimination on grounds of race will not be tolerated.
> An increasing number of people in the country are of mixed race (= with
> parents of different races).
Does it go on to explain it's a "loaded" (cf. Dwight Bolinger) word and
ought to be used with great care?
> > > it for yourself, I won't. If you don't like following links, try a
> > > good bookshop or library, you should be able to find the real thing.
> >
> > Erm, no, it's not likely that any British dictionary, let alone
> > "Learners'" ones, would be available in an American bookstore _or_
> > library; who would buy or consult them?
>
> Fair point on the bookshops. I have been in a few American bookshops
We don't have bookshops, we have bookstores, as I tacitly indicated in
my reply.
> and I was disappointed by them. Once, with some time to kill in a
> small city, I decided to buy an American dictionary. I could find only
> one bookshop in the downtown area and it only had pocket dictionaries.
Would you care to identify the city and the store and the year?
Over the past two decades or so, the national chains (Borders and Barnes
& Noble, and formerly Crown Books, which started it all with an
aggressive TV ad campaign but never figured out that breadth of coverage
is important to a bookstore) have invaded the malls and shopping strips
of America, very often driving the small independents out of business.
The biggest cities have them in commercial spaces in downtown buildings,
but without parking. They need a huge amount of space, and the costs
must be huge. They depend on volume.
> I wanted something of at least the size and seriousness of the Concise
> Oxford. Back here in the UK, a city of that size would probably have
> multiple bookshops and plenty of choice of dictionaries. I thought
> that you lived in, or at least often visited, New York, I would have
> guessed that it would have some good bookshops and that some of them
> would stock a few British dictionaries. My copy of the Oxford
> Learner's dictionary was bought in Bangkok while I lived there.
How many of the Merriam-Webster line, the American Heritage, and the
Random House can you find in a bookshop? Who would buy them?
> I have never been in a US public library, would not even the better
> ones have any British dictionaries? A decent sized library here would
> probably have some American dictionaries. Also, I had expected that
> you would have access to some university libraries and that they may
> have a good selection.
The point is not whether large libraries have British dictionaries. The
point is that the Cambridge and Oxford Learners' Dictionaries would not
have an audience in the US.
Peter T. Daniels
>
> Peter T. Daniels <gram...@worldnet.att.net> wrote in message
> news:4391A5...@worldnet.att.net...
> > Seán O'Leathlóbhair wrote:
> >
> > > I think that few here in the UK are aware of that but that may improve
> > > since the countries have split. There is a very common naive view of a
> > > one to one relationship between country and language. You can even
> > > stump many people with questions such as: what language is spoken in
> > > Belgium or Switzerland? I would bet a fair amount that if you asked
> > > what was spoken in Czechoslovakia, you would get the single answer
> > > Czech. But I would also think it likely that if you asked about
> > > Slovakia, you may now get the answer Slovakian.
> >
> > Belgium and Switzerland (and Iraq) are nations in the American sense,
> > but not really in the more widespread sense of the word. (We needed a
> > term for the "United States" in 1787 and took the word that previously
> > designated both an ethnic and a state unity, to designate a political
> > unity.)
>
> In (probably) majority of European countries the concept of nationality
> is different from the American one. The Eu concepts of citizenship
> and nationality (and corresponding concepts of state and nation)
> are distinct and mutually independent.
NPR this morning had a story on the Algerians in France -- who after
three generations (since the Revolution) of living in France are still
not considered French. They couldn't even apply for citizenship if they
remained Muslim.