Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 December 24

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December 24

Merry Christmas

I wish a Merry Christmas for all my learned friends, known and unknown, on the Reference Desk. --Omidinist (talk) 03:58, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you for your kind wishes Omidinist. A Merry Christmas to you as well, o<|:-)}} from Julia Rossi (talk) 04:05, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Merry Christmas to you too and all Wikipedians. --Mayfare (talk) 21:01, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Euphemisms

Is there a word beside "euphemism" to categorize "Jiminy Cricket", "Cheese & Rice", "Jeezum Crow" and other such ways to avoid saying Jesus Christ?

Is there a list of more of these?151.203.23.82 (talk) 04:40, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Southern American English ?:-)76.97.245.5 (talk) 04:55, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Minced oaths? bibliomaniac15 05:20, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

"Jeepers Creepers, How'd you get those peepers?" - I always wondered whether that line from the song was a question directed at JC personally, or just a gratuitous rhyme. -- JackofOz (talk) 21:12, 30 December 2008 (UTC)

Word meaning

When I was a child, my grandmother used a word which meant "carrying too many items at one time to avoid making two trips." I have spent many years trying to remember that word and have researched it on line. I have had no luck. Does anyone know the single word which has the above meaning?Sandollarz (talk) 07:50, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Shlep or schlep of Yiddish origin76.97.245.5 (talk) 08:33, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Not the ordinary meaning of shlep (if Yiddish), which is basically a transitive verb meaning to convey an object, including oneself, with a sense of some effort involved, and otherwise a noun for the (onerous) trip involved. -- Deborahjay (talk) 17:55, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

In English at least (perhaps not Yiddish), shlep can also be intransitive, as in "I had to shlep across town (to do whatever chore I had to do)." In German, schleppen has pretty much the same meaning as in Yiddish; abschleppen is the ordinary word for "tow away" (e.g. an illegally parked car), which caused me to laugh out loud the first time I saw sign here in Berlin saying "Widerrechtlich geparkte Fahrzeuge werden kostenpflichtig abgeschleppt" and mentally translated it as "Illegally parked vehicles will be shlepped away at owner's expense". —Angr 18:57, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Yep, intransitive is what I was getting at above with "including oneself." That sense = "drag," while I would translate the transitive shlep as "haul," regardless of quantity. (Exception: in late 20th C. SoCalif, one would hear the slang expression haul buns as an exhortation or declaration meaning "to get moving.") The most amusing recent usage I've encountered is shleppost for "snail mail" :-) -- Deborahjay (talk) 08:50, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Sandollarz, what might be the regional, ethnic, or foreign language influences on your grandmother's vocabulary (or idiolect)? -- Deborahjay (talk) 17:55, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

The older black guys I worked with in Philadelphia in the early 1970s called that "a lazy man's load". Hope this helps. --Milkbreath (talk) 16:53, 28 December 2008 (UTC)

French sentence

Help wanted with Speculaas. There's a French sentence: "une espèce de pain d'amandes connu sous le nom de spéculation." My best guess would be: "A kind of almond bread known under the name spéculation." Could "pain" also mean cookie? 76.97.245.5 (talk) 08:29, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Since "biscuit" is French for cookie, maybe not. It's not in Category:Sweet breads, yet. Julia Rossi (talk) 09:19, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

In present-day French at least, I don't think pain can be used to mean "biscuit". But the quote is from the 19th century.

In French, pain can be either countable ("loaf") or uncountable ("bread"). Also, it's used in all sorts of cases where English would use words other than "bread" or "loaf": pain aux raisins means "currant bun," a sort of pastry (European French), petit pain, "bread roll", pain au lait "sweet roll", pain à hot-dog "hot dog bun" (Canadian French) pain pita "a pita." Like the English "loaf", it can be used to refer to things that aren't remotely bread, but are reminiscent of it in their shape: pain d'olives "olive loaf." Joeldl (talk) 09:38, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Interesting, so what should that sentence read as, then? BTW. Merry X-mas from cold but snowless Atlanta. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 09:47, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe "speculaas roll"? (Scratch that; self-referential definitions aren't very useful) I agree with Joel, aand moreover, the sentence you quoted seems to refer to the "Hasseltse speculaas", according to the article at Dutch Wikipedia. The recipe here shows a picture of this particular regional specialty; it doesn't look quite the same ("loafier" and not as "biscuity") as the better-known flat bas-relief variety. Then again, the Dutch article also features a picture of "Speculaasbrokken" ... All sorts of varieties, previously unknown to me, making my mouth water... ---Sluzzelin talk 09:49, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Since they appear to be invariably sweet, perhaps a vague word like confection would be a suitable translation. Joeldl (talk) 10:13, 24 December 2008 (UTC) On second thought, maybe that makes it sound too sweet. I'll have another think. Joeldl (talk) 10:23, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Merry Christmas 76.97 in cold Atlanta. Joedldl's examples seem to be quite close to bread-y things though. Speculaas in my woods don't have the nice defined woodcut look about them, more like the brokken one, but they are crispy. Note to self: complain to manufacturer. In green ink. Julia Rossi (talk) 10:30, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

The picture Sluzzelin linked looks like the German "Printen" Gingerbread. Unfortunately there is no page and no English translation, so it doesn't help any. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 10:37, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

All right, maybe we're thinking too hard about this. It says bread, so why not just translate it faithfully as "bread." If it seems strange, so what? It already seems strange in French. An alternative might be "cake." Joeldl (talk) 10:50, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

o.k. I put the translation in as I had it. Thks. everyone for your help.76.97.245.5 (talk) 10:57, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I recently consumed a cake that was flavored with speculaas-spices. It looked, more or less, like the one in the picture. Cakes may be appear in all kinds of varieties, be it different sizes, shapes, decorations (or lack thereof). --VanBurenen (talk) 11:18, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

That's true, but normally, the French word for "cake" is gâteau, not pain.

According to le Trésor de la langue française informatisé one meaning od pain is: food made of flour with other ingredients (aliment à base de farine dans lequel interviennent d'autres ingrédients). A receipe of pain d'amandes translated as "Belgium Almond Spice Bread" here. AldoSyrt (talk) 15:59, 25 December 2008 (UTC)

Type of idiom

What's the name of the construct that hyphenates and repeats a phrase to indicate its genuineness?

Such as "I suppose Dust is your pen name?" "No, it's my name-name."

99.245.92.47 (talk) 09:41, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, we do have an article on word word. I don't know whether there is another, more linguistic sounding term. ---Sluzzelin talk 09:58, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Darn... I asked this question because I was hoping it would lead me to a page I found a while ago with examples of these, many from the series Buffy the Vampire Slayer. I think I found it on StumbleUpon a year and a half ago, but now it seems to be lost in the ether... 99.245.92.47 (talk) 10:18, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Reduplication. I'll just repeat that.... BrainyBabe (talk) 14:29, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't think that's what I'm looking for either. 99.245.92.47 (talk) 11:00, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

This thread's original post mentions the phenomenon; the OP suggests calling it "genuine reduplication". Unfortunately for this question, the rest of the discussion (including linked sources) focuses more on reduplication in general and in other languages. There must be somone who has written about this from a scholarly point of view, but googling reduplications such as "name name" is tricky. ---Sluzzelin talk 11:55, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

hi.

contrastive focus reduplication. The 2004 paper on it is: Contrastive focus reduplication in English (the salad-salad paper). I googled and their corpus is here: http://umanitoba.ca/faculties/arts/linguistics/russell/redup-corpus.html. I also found a Lang Log blog about it: http://itre.cis.upenn.edu/~myl/languagelog/archives/004591.html. enjoy! – ishwar  (speak) 13:14, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

by the way, this paper and the construction are mentioned at Reduplication. so, it was what you were looking for. – ishwar  (speak) 13:22, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks so much! I'll admit, I did only skim that article. 99.245.92.47 (talk) 19:43, 26 December 2008 (UTC)

American english vowels

Hi, I'm a british amateur linguist, and recently I was talking to a friend across the pond. I did a quick survey of a few features I was expecting and a few I wasn't, and I found:

* <pin> and <pen> have merged (expected)
* about as rhotic as it's possible to get (expected)
* /æ/-raising before nasals is also in full effect (expected)
* <cot>, <caught> and <cloth> all share the same vowel (expected)

The surprise was that <father> and <bother> don't share the first vowel, nor do <bomb> and <palm> rhyme. I'd been led to believe this was all but universal in north america (outside the northeast). Her parents are from the south (Arkansas), but she has grown up in the northwest (Oregon). Is this feature more common than I thought it was? And what's the mechanism for this? 79.72.162.202 (talk) 13:35, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Failing to rhyme father and bother is quite rare in North American English (outside the Northeast, as you say), as is failing to rhyme bomb and palm unless palm is pronounced with an /l/ due to spelling pronunciation (which isn't uncommon). Did you actually hear her say "father" and "bother" yourself or are you relying on self-reporting? If the latter, it may be that she actually does rhyme them, but thinks she doesn't. —Angr 13:47, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm an American and I do not rhyme "pin" and "pen", nor do I use the same vowel for "cot", "caught" and "cloth". (/OR). --LarryMac | Talk 13:55, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

No, but it's unsurprising to find those mergers in an American English speaker. It is surprising to find father and bother distinct. Does cloth have the vowel of cot or caught for you, LarryMac? —Angr 14:11, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

As I sit in my work cubicle mumbling to myself ('s OK, the people nearby are used to that) I'd say it's closest to "caught", but not quite the same. And for the record, I do rhyme "father" and "bother". But not "brother", of course. My point though was that there's no single set of "American vowels" any more than there's a single "English accent" (RP notwithstanding). --LarryMac | Talk 14:24, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

You're sitting in your work cubicle on Christmas Eve? :-( Go home, Bob Cratchit, Tiny Tim is waiting for you! —Angr 14:36, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, it's Christmas Eve day still (10:41AM as I type). Although I'm supposed to be here until 5PM, but that may be a soft deadline. (soft's vowel sound rhyming somewhat with cloth's) God bless us, every one. --LarryMac | Talk 15:44, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

See [1] for maps of the pin-pen and cot-caught mergers. Joeldl (talk) 14:21, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Note that the South has peculiar accents, just like the North East. Most of the rest of the nation is closer together in accents, however. As an American from Michigan, I always rhyme "bother" and "father" and also sometimes "bomb" and "palm" (as if they were "bom" and "pom"). At other times I pronounce "palm" more clearly, with the "L". I always rhyme "caught" and "cloth" (as if they were "cawt" and "clawth"), but never rhyme "cot" with either. I never rhyme "pin" and "pen". StuRat (talk) 15:31, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't know that putting the "l" in "palm" is pronouncing it "more clearly". Doing so is a spelling pronunciation as the "l" in such words (others being "balm", "calm", "alms", and "almond") disappeared centuries ago along with the "l"s in "folk" and "talk" (which I trust you always pronounce with no [l]). —Angr 16:32, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

No L in those words, no. I say "folk" like "foke" and "talk" like "tawk". StuRat (talk) 16:41, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Some of this is regional. I'm in the US Midwest and pin and pen do not rhyme, nor do cot and caught use the same vowel sound. However, caught and do cloth do use the same vowel. 216.239.234.196 (talk) 15:54, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

This is self-reported, yes. But she says father and bother are very distinct, not even a near merger. Testing with other words is difficult because of spelling pronunciation and rhoticity (honestly, how many words -are- there in the <father> class?) unfortunately. I'll see if I can get a good enough audio sample to hear for myself, with my completely unmerged ears. 79.72.162.202 (talk) 16:17, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Well, there's calm. Maintaining the father/bother distinction sounds typical of New England to me. Joeldl (talk) 16:25, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

True, there aren't many. You could see if her "Bach" and "dock" rhyme; in theory, you could see whether baht rhymes with "pot", but of course "baht" isn't a word of most Americans' active vocabulary. When I tested this merger on a linguistics class once, I had them compare the phrases "sonata form" and "it's not a form". —Angr 16:32, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Also palm, tomato.

I'm looking at the dictionary, and it says the distinction exists in non-rhotic areas. It says it's pronounced further forward than the vowel in bother in eastern New England, as in southern England. It may have much the same quality, but longer duration, in New York City and the southeastern U.S. Joeldl (talk) 16:36, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Rhotic and non-rhotic accents has a map that excludes Arkansas from the nonrhotic area in the speech of whites. Needless to say, Oregon is rhotic. Joeldl (talk) 16:41, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

"Tomato" has the "father"/"palm" vowel for very few Americans; the great majority of us say it with the "face" vowel. —Angr 16:51, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Maybe this person misread or otherwise misunderstood bother as brother? Otherwise, it's a little hard to explain. It might be that she grew up in a speech enclave in Oregon influenced by New England. Are/Were her parents academics? Incidentally, I don't think that the vowel distinction between father and bother is limited to non-rhotic accents in New England. I am a New Englander with a rhotic accent for whom there is such a vowel distinction, and I think that rhotic accents are common in Connecticut, western Massachusetts, and in more educated social milieus in eastern New England. Marco polo (talk) 16:58, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Angr, I'm Canadian and I pronounce tomato with the vowel of face too. I know most Americans don't pronounce it. I don't think the ah vowel is rare in New England, though, and that's why I mentioned it, since they're the very people we're talking about.

Marco Polo, perhaps this occurs where there were originally nonrhotic accents. Am I incorrect, or are father and farther merged in Boston? That could conceivably go some distance towards explaining the maintenance of the distinction, since there's a large category of ar words - it's just a matter of merging a few ah words into that category.

This makes me wonder what the overlap of rhotic accents and bath/trap-distinguishing accents is in England.

There's a map of the father/bother distinction in "Atlas of North Amercian English" (p. 171, available for partial preview at Google Books). It shows only the Boston area (reaching into New Hampshire), Maine, and New York City. That matches the nonrhotic area pretty closely. Joeldl (talk) 17:37, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

Joeldl, your theory might be right. I would say that father and farther are merged for most non-rhotic speakers in Boston. Marco polo (talk) 20:32, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

As to rhyming, I've always wondered why cringe doesn't rhyme with orange. It does for lots of people. 76.97.245.5 (talk) 23:10, 24 December 2008 (UTC)

You're a genius. They do make an imperfect rhyme. --Milkbreath (talk) 00:58, 25 December 2008 (UTC)