General Language Thread

On non-US keyboards, right Alt (labeled Alt Gr) is often a modifier key (like Shift) instead of being identical to left Alt.

On a standard Irish keyboard layout, AltGr+<vowel> puts a gives the vowel with a fada. So, for example, AltGr+a gives á.

On my keyboard, AltGr+<consonant> puts a dot on top of it, if that's possible. So, for example, AltGr+b gives ḃ. AltGr does a whole lot of other things, but I think some of those might be Linux-only, or at least require a keyboard layout that comes with Linux by default but is not bundled with Windows.

But if you really want to get crazy, you should enable the Compose key. A fair number of keyboards in the 1980s had a dedicated Compose key, but for some reason it disappeared in the 1990s. Still, it's easy enough to assign Compose functionality to another key; in Xfce on Linux, click Menu→Settings Manager→Keyboard→Layout, and there is a dropdown menu that lets you assign one of the lesser-used keys. Scroll Lock and Pause/Break are good choices, because they are actually useless on modern keyboards; Caps Lock and one of the Ctrl keys are also popular.

When the Compose key is pressed, it activates a mode on the computer whereby the couple of keys types will generate a particular character according to a code. For example, those arrows in the above paragraph are types by pressing Control,-,> (Control, hyphen, greater than sign). Here are some other fun ones (all are case sensitive):

• ‽ Control ! ?
• ⸘ Control ? !
• ♩ Control # q
• ⅞ Control 7 8
• ☺ Control : )
• ☹ Control : (
• ㊲ Control ( 3 7 )
• ☭ Control C C C P

Yeah I found þat out when trying to look up keybinds.

You need to use an international keyboard layout for it þough, but þat seems easy to set up.

I'd wonder why þe compose key was phased out. But TBH I can see the reasons (it def seems niche and the 90s were the time where þe intenret was becoming mainstream).

Speaking of which. Is it true þat þe reason why Þ was phased out is because of German typewriters omitting it?

Edited by MorningStar1337 on Jan 8th 2024 at 5:11:05 AM

Surely computers and the Internet becoming more widespread would have made the Compose key more useful and less niche.

It wasn't typewriters, but movable type for printing presses. This is also why Iceland Specifically and Only Them kept it long-term, because they didn't get printing presses for a long time, and by the time they did, it was much easier to custom order some thorn pieces rather than saying "well, in the old font it looked kind of like a capital 'y' in the press's font, so we're going to use y instead."

Ah.

Btw I decided to stop using the symbol in my posts here. It appears that it has became too... disruptive, here.

I apologize to all affected by this.

Language development is a mostly organic process. People aren't going to start doing something just because one person does. It needs to either happen on its own (like French gradually removing letters from the spoken language) or be tied to something big (like how Clueless had a seismic impact on 90s slang).

It also needs to be seen as useful, necessary or attractive. Readding the thorn symbol doesn't really fit any of those categories.

Yeah in hindsight trying to force it in the way I did prolly didn't help.

The slang angle might be a better attempt, though not here.

Edited by MorningStar1337 on Jan 9th 2024 at 1:28:28 AM

Realistically, English spelling isn't reformable at this point so long as it remains English. By the early second millennium A.D., vernacular Romance had strayed so far from even the most vulgar Latin that there was no more point in writing hominem—not when the locals were pronouncing that word, respectively, as hombre, homme, uomo, and so on! Similarly, any spelling reform will probably have to wait until current English has successor languages that it will make sense to spell as such.

Changing the spelling of a living language has been done multiple times in the past, so it is far from impossible, though it's not easy, either. For English, note that US spelling is already noticeably different from British spelling.

Case in point the printing press thing. It shows how hardware can affect languages (in fact I'm starting to wonder if keyboards with the þ might be a good avenue in popularizing it.)

Also the very existence of slang, memes and trickle up language proves that the language isn't as set in stone as it might appear. (Compare suck to succ fir instance)

Australia also adopted American spelling for a while, but reverted to standard spelling due to so many people complaining about it. The Labor Party was founded before the reversion, which is why it's spelled that way.

All of those changes were organic, however, not planned. In some ways it's easier to promote an entirely new language than reform an old one.

You know, I’m very confused at the fact Quebec has its own separate French dubs for movies and series… but dubs them in European French anyway. Sure, they have different actors and make different adaptation choices, with more accurate English pronunciation also (a Québécois visiting France must be confused as to who the hell "Speederman" is ), but it’s still basically Parisian French.

There are a few exceptions like the Simpsons, which are dubbed in actual Quebec French, slang and all, but they seem surprisingly rare. I’d have more incentive to check out Quebec dubs if they all went all out like that, honestly.

Edited by Lyendith on Jan 12th 2024 at 11:12:42 AM

CBC has a funny news report on proposed new language laws in Quebec that concerns signage. The Office québécois de la langue française doesn't wanna talk about it.

This is not just exclusive from France. Until the MCU, Spiderman's name was also pronounced the same way in Spain, something parodied like hell and back there, compared with Latin America, when the same character's name is pronounced with the correct English pronunciation or as "El hombre araña".

I unironically prefer the Spanish (Castellano) dub of anime and movies, thanks to -among other things- Spider-Man: The Animated Series.

Edited by jawal on Jan 26th 2024 at 2:47:13 PM

Hi, so a while back, I had a quiz on Spanish, and I got screwed over because I used La for Clima, instead of El because I mistook it as feminine.

I thought it was a golden rule that if a verb/noun ends with A you should use La.

How many verbs are like Clima in Spanish?

Edited by RedHunter543 on Mar 4th 2024 at 5:57:10 PM

Is clima really a verb? Seems like it's a noun.

Yeah but I was asking for verbs just in case something like this happens to me again.

Like aroma uses El apparently. Not La.

EDIT: Ah, okay forgot to put in the noun lemme fix that.

Edited by RedHunter543 on Mar 4th 2024 at 5:57:28 PM

So reading this lead me to learn that El Nino and La Nina (the pacific weather systems that mean either years of drought or years of flood for Australia) mean little boy and little girl respectively?

Apparently El Nino was named by South American fisherman for its appearance during Christmas and La Nina was the obvious counter part for its opposite?

I don't speak Spanish, but I found this article. Apparently nouns ending in -a are often feminine, except for many nouns ending in -ma, -pa or -ta.

Many Greek borrowings that end in A—stigma, plasma, sigma, drama, etc.—are neuter nouns in Greek (all the examples above, for example, have roots ending in "mat-"). So it might make sense if a Spanish loanword of this type is masculine: that's how most of the Romance languages treat neuter word borrowings from another language.

(Don't know how consistently Spanish applies this, but it would at least be the likely reason where you find it.)

Edited by Jhimmibhob on Mar 4th 2024 at 2:55:38 PM

I’ve noticed a recent new term in French in the past few years − the word "matrixer" or "être matrixé"… Meaning "being duped into adopting a certain frame of thought"… I don’t think there’s really an equivalent in English?

I mean there’s "brainwashing" but it’s a little subtle and more insidious than that…

There's that talk about people being "trapped in the Matrix", or "breaking out of the Matrix" that I've heard, usually associated with right-wing groups or conspiracy theorists. Maybe it's derived from that sort of talk? Or maybe it's a separate branch of terminology starting from the same sort of allusions to The Matrix?