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This is a thread where you can talk about the etymology of certain words as well as what is so great (or horrible) about languages in particular. Nothing is stopping you from conversing about everything from grammar to spelling!

Begin the merriment of posting!

MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#926: Apr 19th 2022 at 8:34:37 PM

Wiktionary claims that both the silent-r and nonsilent-r pronunciations exist in both the UK and the US.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
AoeAbility Akarat bless you. from Personal Evil Tower of Ominousness Since: Mar, 2021 Relationship Status: Longing for my OTP
#927: Apr 29th 2022 at 3:26:12 PM

The Polish phonetic equivalent of "eventually" (ewentualnie) means "optionally". Weird, huh?

Edited by AoeAbility on May 1st 2022 at 1:00:03 AM

You keep using the term "POV". I do not think it means what you think it means.
flyingsnow Obsesses over fictional characters too much from In my own world Since: Jan, 2021 Relationship Status: Shipping fictional characters
Obsesses over fictional characters too much
#928: May 3rd 2022 at 4:09:06 AM

Yeah. If I remember correctly, that sort of thing is called "false friends".

Hello! I'm Emu Otori. Emu is meaning SMILE!
NotSoBadassLongcoat The Showrunner of Dzwiedz 24 from People's Democratic Republic of Badassia (Old as dirt) Relationship Status: Puppy love
The Showrunner of Dzwiedz 24
#929: May 7th 2022 at 5:29:17 PM

[up][up] Not quite. Aside from "possible, but not certain or necessary" meaning, it's often used in either/or context.

"what the complete, unabridged, 4k ultra HD fuck with bonus features" - Mark Von Lewis
Demetrios Lucky Seven from Des Plaines, Illinois (unfortunately) Since: Oct, 2009 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Lucky Seven
#930: May 7th 2022 at 6:07:09 PM

Do you pronounce the “l” in “guillotine” or not?

Come on! Let's bless them all until we get fershnickered!
Cibryll ~Serra~ from Lightning Crest (she/her) Since: Feb, 2022 Relationship Status: Squeeeeeeeeeeeee!
~Serra~
#931: May 8th 2022 at 4:08:19 AM

I've always pronounced it with the "L".

"Can you even read the blackboard written clear as can be?" / "Can you even read his mind? See that kid's lost fantasy?"
AoeAbility Akarat bless you. from Personal Evil Tower of Ominousness Since: Mar, 2021 Relationship Status: Longing for my OTP
#932: May 19th 2022 at 12:30:46 PM

[up][up][up]Still kinda weird when you think about it.

You keep using the term "POV". I do not think it means what you think it means.
MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#933: May 24th 2022 at 7:31:20 AM

When it comes to country names, what's the difference in connotations between "Republic of X" and "X-ian Republic"?

[up][up][up] If you want to be faithful to the French pronunciation (as the word is borrowed into English from French), you pronounce it like "y". And also, the "u" is silent. So "gee-yoh-teen" (or "gee-yoh-tin" to be even more faithful). That said, apparently both that and the more straightforward but inaccurate pronunciations of "gill-oh-teen" and "gill-oh-tin" are standard/acceptable.

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
flyingsnow Obsesses over fictional characters too much from In my own world Since: Jan, 2021 Relationship Status: Shipping fictional characters
Obsesses over fictional characters too much
#934: May 26th 2022 at 4:07:50 AM

There's no difference in connotations, as far as I'm aware.

Hello! I'm Emu Otori. Emu is meaning SMILE!
gc10 Human Bean from Pastastastan Since: Feb, 2019 Relationship Status: A cockroach, nothing can kill it.
Human Bean
#935: May 26th 2022 at 6:12:10 AM

The Italian equivalent of the French "LL" would be "GLI", which is pronounced like an L with the tongue sticking to the palate. Though I never personally heard this sound pronounced by English or French speakers. So I avoid using it when I'm not speaking Italian.

skan123 Since: Aug, 2018
omega2900 Jemerald of Brainrot from The Midwest, where everything is MID! (Ten years in the joint) Relationship Status: In my bunk
Jemerald of Brainrot
#937: Jun 16th 2022 at 6:53:28 PM

I was today years old when I found out that "judgment" isn't spelled with an e after the g in American English. I always thought it was spelled that way.

Get taxed. Idiot.
omega2900 Jemerald of Brainrot from The Midwest, where everything is MID! (Ten years in the joint) Relationship Status: In my bunk
Jemerald of Brainrot
#938: May 12th 2023 at 9:02:47 PM

I watched Defunctland's video about The Wiggles' dark ride and learned that "skivves" apparently means a turtleneck in Australia. I'm wondering if it's countrywide term or exclusive to New South Wales.

I was taken aback when I first heard that because it means underwear here in the States.

Get taxed. Idiot.
punkcrow The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him) from Northwest Indiana Since: Dec, 2020 Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him)
#939: May 12th 2023 at 10:19:10 PM

I occasionally forget that Spanish is also quite prone to Separated by a Common Language. Given that it's spoken in over 20 countries, though, it makes sense.

In my Spanish class, we're reading a book that has the word "coger" in it quite often. Well, "coger" literally just means "to take", "to catch", or "to pick up"... but in some countries, "coger" also means "to fuck".

The Spanish teacher had to explain this to us.

Cold turkey's getting stale. Tonight I'm eating crow.
MikeK Since: Jan, 2001
#940: May 12th 2023 at 11:29:59 PM

I was recently amused by an American author who wrote a tweet commenting on how Separated by a Common Language and the Scunthorpe Problem collided in the UK edition of her novel: since "pants" means "trousers" in the US but "underwear" in the UK, the editors replaced every instance of "pants" with "trousers"... But they did so with the "find and replace" tool, which meant the book also referred to the "occutrousers" of a building (occupants, get it?)

Edited by MikeK on May 12th 2023 at 11:32:18 AM

Troper1138 Since: Dec, 2010
#941: May 12th 2023 at 11:46:04 PM

When it comes to country names, what's the difference in connotations between "Republic of X" and "X-ian Republic"?
I think there's some difference in connotations, although it's certainly subtle. From Wikipedia, there is the notion of popular monarchy (that is, instead of the king having a title like "King of Ruritania" he has a title in the form of "King of the Ruritanians"); or as that article puts it, "referring to a people rather than a territory". So, I would say a formal state name like "the Ruritanian Republic" puts a bit more emphasis on the country as an ethno-nationalist state—a state of a "people", likely defined in terms of language and some sense of shared history and culture—whereas "the Republic of Ruritania" puts more of an emphasis on the state in question as the government of a particular geographic territory.

MarqFJA The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer from Deserts of the Middle East (Before Recorded History) Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
The Cosmopolitan Fictioneer
#942: May 13th 2023 at 12:06:49 PM

Wow, less than two weeks shy of a whole year since I asked that question. Thanks for the answer; it makes a lot of sense now that I think about it, even though I find the distinction silly since you can simply define "Ruritania" as "the political entity representing the will of the Ruritanian people as a singular whole and the territory that they inhabit".

Fiat iustitia, et pereat mundus.
Troper1138 Since: Dec, 2010
#943: May 13th 2023 at 1:22:09 PM

I admit I hadn't even noticed the dates!

Some countries are named after the people who live there, while in other cases, the people who live there are named after the country. Jordanians are people from Jordan, the country of the Jordan River. But Turkey is the Land of the Turks, named after the Central Asian people who migrated to Asia Minor (or Anatolia) and "converted" the people who live there from speaking whatever languages they spoke to speaking Turkish. Americans are named after America, which in turn is named after some Italian guy who had relatively little to do with North and South America (and "Americans"—in English—is usually used to mean only people from one particular part of North and South America).

It gets complicated. "England" is "the land of the English"—that is, originally, the Angles (as in the Anglo-Saxons, the Angles and the Saxons). But, the Angles may have gotten their name from the "angle" of land where Denmark connects with the mainland of Europe. (There are several competing theories.) So, conceivably, you could have a country named after the people who live there, who in turn are named after a geographic feature in some different country where their ancestors used to live centuries ago. (But "Saxons" probably means "the people who use this one particular kind of knife". Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt and Lower Saxony, in Germany, and Essex and Wessex and Sussex and Middlesex, in England, are all named after the People of [that particular kind of] Knife.)

punkcrow The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him) from Northwest Indiana Since: Dec, 2020 Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him)
#944: May 15th 2023 at 5:29:05 PM

I feel like every now and then someone will say something like "(Foreign language) is weird, because if you don't pronounce their word for (ordinary term) correctly, you're going to end up saying (something obscene, profane, or just a Non Sequitur)", but really, English is also like that.

If you don't pronounce the English word for "ship" correctly, you're going to end up saying "shit".

Cold turkey's getting stale. Tonight I'm eating crow.
Veanne Since: Jul, 2012
#945: May 15th 2023 at 10:05:24 PM

Now, that's an odd sentiment. There are only so many sounds a human vocal apparatus can make, and so many things to name... Incidentally, what I find odd/interesting about English is that you guys (we guys? I'm sort of bilingual, huge amount of typos notwithstanding) feel the need to name absolutely freaking everything. Everything. How is everyday discourse improved by having a name for "aglet"? In my native language, most people would just describe it. And nowadays, there's a rush of terms, most of them calques from English, which made little sense in English but absolutely none ooutside of it. That's a bit confusing.

MacronNotes (she/her) (Captain) Relationship Status: Less than three
(she/her)
#946: May 16th 2023 at 10:55:27 AM

Nitpick but aglet is not a word that comes up in conversation. I am pretty sure it blew up in public conscience because of a Phineas and Ferb song. It only really matters when you are talking about shoemaking and other jargon.

English having so many words for things isn't something I thought about.

Edited by MacronNotes on May 16th 2023 at 1:56:29 PM

Macron's notes
punkcrow The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him) from Northwest Indiana Since: Dec, 2020 Relationship Status: I made a point to burn all of the photographs
The horrors persist, but so do I (He/Him)
#947: May 16th 2023 at 5:11:27 PM

English really does have a lot of words for things. Some people say that German has a lot of unique words, and really, it does, but English for some reason has a word for tricking someone into watching the music video for "Never Gonna Give You Up" by Rick Astley.

Speaking of German, some literal translations of German words can be pretty interesting given that a lot of them are compounds of existing words. Also helps that some German words are cognates; two of them I know of are "Grillparty" (barbecue) and "Antibabypillen" (birth control pills). And yes, those are both real German words.

Non-cognate, but still interesting literal German translations I know of include Faultier (sloth / lazy animal) and Flugzeug (airplane / flying thing).

Cold turkey's getting stale. Tonight I'm eating crow.
Veanne Since: Jul, 2012
#948: May 16th 2023 at 10:35:34 PM

Hah, "aglet" was the first example that came into my head :) German, as far as I know, is much more agglutinative than English, so new words can be made by gluing together existing words (which is what agglutinative means), and you sometimes do that in English, but mostly, there's a dizzifying variety of old, new, borrowed and blue words. Don't get me wrong, the more the merrier, but remembering all these is a headache. Example: you have a "swan" and "cygnet", a baby swan. Now, if you don't know a thing about etymology and Latin (where "cygnus" means "swan"), you're left needing to remember that two completely different words refer to related things. In my native language, Polish, you create such words systemically (systematically? I'm not sure of the English word): swan is "łabędź", and baby swan is "łabędziątko" (or "łabądek"), so we have less roots and more flexibility.

And no, I'm not complaining. Both ways have their merits. The thing is, (watch out, pet peeve), languages are as different as people. We can't all be the same person, and we can't all speak the same language. English has a tendency to borrow and hoard - have a look at this article: https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/surprising-uncommon-words

Out of 13 words, how many have Polish equivalent?

1. biblioklept - obviously borrowed from Greek. We'd just describe the concept.

2. acnestis - also sounds Greek, also no Polish equivalent that I know of.

3. meldrop - you would probably say "gil" or "kapka", but these are not so grand-sounding and they also have other meanings.

4. octothorpe - "krzyżyk", "kratka" or "płotek". None of these words refers specifically to the sign, you need to read it in context.

5. nauseant - systemically created "mdlący" (note - this is an adjective, not a noun, like in English, but you can say "coś mdlącego" to turn it into a noun phrase).

6. augend/addend - I think there are terms for that, but they're technical and not used everyday.

7. obelus - no real name, it's sometimes called "sztylet" (dagger) or "krzyż filologów".

8. wrest pin - "kołek (do strojenia)". "Kołek" means any wooden pin.

9. agelast - Greek borrowing we'd just descibe.

10. amatorculist - (according to the article, uncommon even in English, but) we'd describe this.

11. pot-valor - this is, technically, a description already.

12. peristeronic - systematically derived "gołębi".

13. hirquiticke - no direct equivalent.

In general, as far as I can tell, Polish words have more homonimy (more referents to the same-shaped word), and of course, there's inflexion to bend them into the shapes we need. In a way, Polish is more frugal, having less tools but more ways to use them. English gets a huge box full of highly specialised tools, and when it lacks the perfect tool for the job, it makes or borrows a new one. Lately, though, more borrowings find their way into Polish - I don't think anything's changed in the English attitude.

Edited by Veanne on May 16th 2023 at 7:35:54 PM

TheLibrarian1701 Since: Dec, 2022
#949: May 16th 2023 at 11:24:00 PM

Is there a word in any language for believing that you understood a concept, then, as you grow older and wiser realize that your initial understanding was rudimentary and simplistic and now you truly understand, only later, when you're older and wiser still, that you realize that your earliest understanding was the correct one after all?

Veanne Since: Jul, 2012
#950: May 17th 2023 at 10:21:41 PM

Not that I know of, but the concept sounds pretty zen. Maybe some sino-tibetan language would have the word?


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