Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 December 9

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December 9

What is the name in Arabic?

What is the name of Casablanca-Anfa Airport in Arabic? I need to add the info to this article and the French article, and submit an article request on the Arabic Wikipedia

Also what is the Arabic for Casablanca Tit Mellil Airport?

Thanks, WhisperToMe (talk) 02:15, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Casablanca-Anfa Airport has an article on Arabic Wikipedia: مطار_الدار_البيضاء_أنفا. I found it on ar.wikipedia's list of Airports in Morocco (ar:ملحق:قائمة_مطارات_المغرب). It has "مطار الدار البيضاء تيط مليل" for Casablanca Tit Mellil Airport, but no article yet. ---Sluzzelin talk 04:28, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for finding that! I linked the Arabic of Anfa to the others. For Mellil I will add it to the requests page.

WhisperToMe (talk) 05:13, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Latin problem - presently tense

Hi, I've noticed that the use of the historical present seems to be particularly common in Latin. Am I right, and why would this be? I was wondering if it was because Latin is so much more inflected than English, and because it uses sequence of tenses to convey important connections of meaning that might otherwise be harder to follow, given the free word order. My theory was that using the present as a starting point gives you more places to go - if you start in the past, you can only go to the past perfect, and then you are stuck. If you start with the present, you are kind of in the middle of the tenses, so you have more of a range for jumping backwards and forwards (hope that was clear). It made sense at the time, but I still tend to baulk at what would appear to me to be overuse of a slightly unnatural-sounding form. IBE (talk) 03:28, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

As our article says, it's just a rhetorical device to make the past more vivid. I don't know if it's especially common in Latin, but it is also used rather frequently in French. You may be right, since Latin has more subtle distinctions of past tense than English does (as does French). But English uses it a lot too, especially informally - listen to someone reporting a conversation, they say "I go" or "I'm like" before quoting what was said. Adam Bishop (talk) 08:48, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

It is widely used in English too, just not that often in written English. The uses of tenses in languages generally is far less clear-cut than is implied by the simple past-present-future paradigm of classical Latin (and not many languages have that three-way opposition in their grammar). And Adam, I would dispute that Latin has more subtle distinctions of past tense than English: it's just that all but one of our past tenses are periphrastic. --ColinFine (talk) 08:55, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

True, and Latin has periphrastic past constructions as well, it's just that in English we have to use much longer constructions to represent what Latin can do with one or two words. In any case, Longinus (On The Sublime, c. 25) gives a short explanation, although he was writing about Greek, not Latin: "When past events are introduced as happening in present time the narrative form is changed into a dramatic action." Quintilian (Institutio Oratoria 9.2.40-44 or so) also talks about something similar, although not the historical present tense specifically. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:18, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

The 'historical present' might just be so-called 'relative same time', emphasizing continuity and/or placement within a specified time. Also, don't we have something similar in English (used in informal storytelling)? Take this sentence; while not grammatically correct, it is still linguistically valid; "So this guy walks up to me and says;....." While it is clear that this information is being relayed, and that it happened sometime in the past, the speaker still uses the present tense. Maybe it's to make relayed events seem more current, or to draw attention? Anyway, this gets back to the 'temporal tense v.s. aspect tense'. Van Gulik (talk) 02:33, 14 December 2011 (UTC)

Only too happy

I feel like I've asked this before, but I can't find any actual evidence of having done so.

The expression "only too", usually followed by "happy" or "pleased", is very odd. Analytically, "only" downplays what comes next, and "too" suggests undesirable excess. Put them together and you get what seems like meaningless nonsense. The words sort of cancel each other out, a bit like half a double. Yet it has an accepted meaning, except it's one that can't be derived from examination of the individual words.

Where did this expression come from? There's nothing about it in wiktionary under either "only" or "too". Are there any others like it? I’d be only too happy to hear what my wise colleagues have to say about this. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 05:33, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

From my Google search for only too, the fourth result is http://idioms.yourdictionary.com/only-too, which dates it to 1817.

—Wavelength (talk) 06:07, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that the two senses listed in Wavelength's link are different, with different origins. The "As a matter of fact" is a kind of litotes, as Jack suggests; but the second meaning "extremely", is mainly used of oneself (though not exclusively), and I think the "only" expresses a kind of polite self-deprecation. --ColinFine (talk) 08:59, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

The "only" in "only too happy" doesn't downplay what comes next, it indicates that's the lone outcome of the request. You could be very unhappy, you could be unhappy, you could be indifferent, you could be happy, or you could be very ("too") happy. "Only too happy" ensures that you are totally very willing and eager to do what was asked. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:56, 9 December 2011 (UTC

I don't buy that explanation, Bugs, because the stress pattern does not match it. When "only" means "sole", the word that it qualified is usually stressed, but in "only too happy" the stress is on "happy", and if there is a secondary stress it's on "only". --ColinFine (talk) 16:58, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

I was mainly interested in the 2nd usage (1899) in Wavelength's link. The meaning is very clear, from repeated exposure to such phrases in real life. But surely, the first time anyone hears this expression they would need to have explained to them what the heck the speaker's talkimg about, because it doesn't seem to be a comprehensible juxtaposition of words. So I'm curious as to why the 1899 person came up with it, and why it achieved a permanent place in the language. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 19:44, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

"Only too" is not as confusing as "if not" (which has two contradictory meanings) or "not unoften"... AnonMoos (talk) 10:39, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

An expression such as "not unoften" or "not infrequently" or whatever, suggest some middle ground between "often"/"frequently" and "not often"/"not frequently". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 12:53, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

However, "unoften" is only used in the phrase "not unoften", and so can be hard to parse if you haven't come across it before... AnonMoos (talk) 12:55, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

I've not infrequently come across "not infrequently", but I have never in my life heard "not unoften". -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 19:44, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

In fact, I have my doubts about the legitimacy of "unoften". -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 04:59, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

(1741) The Man of Gallantry not unoften has been found to think after the same manner.

(1835) Nor was it unoften that the mere presence of a noble sufficed to scatter whole crowds.

(1864) You get more patient, ... and not unoften you come to a stand-still.

(OED) — kwami (talk) 05:19, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

The OED? What would they know!  :) -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 08:17, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm in agreement with Jack in regarding "not unoften" as a rare usage in modern Western English (including Oz, of course), but it seems to be common in Indian English, and has been used in Transactions of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers: Volume 72, Part 2; Volume 72, Part 2. Dbfirs 08:46, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Are there any examples of unoften where it isn't negated? The OED examples above are of not unoften twice and nor... unoften once. Is it a negative polarity item, or can one say I go unoften to the movies? Angr (talk) 09:56, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Wiktionary says it almost always follows not. If one were to use it in your sentence, Angr, it would feel slightly less unnatural to say "I unoften go to the movies" (cf. "I often go to the movies"), than "I go unoften to the movies". But either way, it's at the very Nadir of Naturalness for my money. As I say, I'd never come across it before now, and I hope I never do again. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 10:10, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

On the original question, there is also "just too" as in "it was just too wonderful". This should mean it only just got over the line; any less and it would have been merely "quite" wonderful. I think "just too" and "only too" are purely idiomatic, as they immediately prompt a relatively small number of words that could follow them. You couldn't have "only too wonderful", although you might (unnot unoften) hear "just too happy". And I hope Jack's still reading. IBE (talk) 05:35, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Oh, yes. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 05:49, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

---

Then there's also "not unseldom", which means the same thing as "not unoften", though it would be expected to mean the opposite! AnonMoos (talk) 10:27, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

To my amazement, that misuse of litotes is surprisingly common and occurs in no less writers than Jane Austen and Mary Shelley. I wonder how the mis-use began. I suppose the "not un...." construction became an idiom and accidentally transferred itself to an inappropriate adverb. Dbfirs 13:31, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

If an idiom is pretty much only used in one particular way, then it's hard to call it a "misuse"... It may be unexpected according to simple classic logic, but there are many things in human languages which classical first-order predicate logic simply is incapable of dealing with (which is why whole theories of Discourse Representation Theory, Montague semantics, Intensional logic etc. were developed). AnonMoos (talk) 20:18, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

OK, lets call it an illogical transfer of an idiom to an inappropriate adverb. Dbfirs 16:08, 11 December 2011 (UTC)

Played a blinder

What does it mean? Kittybrewster ☎ 13:13, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

performed with a lot of skill. Angr (talk) 13:18, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

The OED defines "blinder" as used here as "Something ‘dazzlingly’ good or difficult, esp. an excellent piece of play in Rugby Football or Cricket." Its earliest citation of "played a blinder" is from David Storey's This Sporting Life (1960). AndrewWTaylor (talk) 13:44, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

(e/c) I'd go a bit beyond that definition and say it's when a sportsperson performs considerably beyond their usually accepted talents. Good players may "perform with a lot of skill" on a very regular basis, but they may only put in the occasional 'blinder' where they go beyond their usual expectations. Note that less talented players can also put in a blinder at times. It's usually used in the context of sports, but can be applied to other more general situations as well. --jjron (talk) 13:48, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Which should not be confused with the other colloquial use, where "a blinder" or (more often) "a bit of a blinder" means "something that is blindingly obvious". I only mention this because there is some overlap in appropriate places to use either meaning, and there is potential for confusion (or insult!) if the similar phrases are mixed up. 86.164.79.174 (talk) 16:49, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Is this related to the verb use of blindside? Rmhermen (talk) 17:10, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

No: as has been elaborated above, a "blinder" is a performance that metaphorically "dazzles" because of its "brilliant" quality; to "blindside" is usually literally to exploit the vision of an opponent being physically blocked (by, say, intervening players), although it might be applied to outsmarting opponents (not necessarily in a sporting context) by using tactics they did not (or could not) anticipate. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.66.195 (talk) 12:49, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

When do mourir and morir take se (become reflexive)?

What distinguishes the simple forms of mourir (French) and morir (Spanish) from their apparently reflexive forms, se mourir and morirse (or se morir)? [All of these can be translated into English as "to die", for which I can't think of a reflexive or apparently-reflexive English counterpart. "To die oneself" inevitably invokes images of soaking oneself in dye.] Is there a similar distinction in Latin, Italian, Portuguese and other Romance languages? What I could find by a quick look at dictionaries didn't explain very much, so perhaps the distinction is subtle (and not one to die for). —— Shakescene (talk) 21:40, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

According to http://www.wordreference.com/fren/se%20mourir, se mourir means "to be dying" rather than to die. This wouldn't be the only place in French where a reflexive doesn't actually convey a reflexive meaning (e.g., s'en before some verbs has an "inceptive" meaning, as in je m'en dort "I'm gonna go to sleep"; je m'en vais "I'm gonna get going"). rʨanaɢ (talk) 21:58, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

It also sounds a bit archaic or poetic, or overly dramatic, like you're not literally dying, it's just hyperbole. As for Latin, there is no similar distinction, but it is interesting to note that deponent verbs in Latin (like mori) or regular verbs that can be used passively (like videri) sometimes become "reflexive" in Romance languages (in French, at least). But they're not really reflexive, more like a middle voice, which Latin didn't actually have but could represent with the passive voice. In French for example there is "se trouver", which is not really reflexive, even though it looks that way. Adam Bishop (talk) 22:07, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

I guess it's just a corollary to the progressive aspect of the reflexive form, but for my French ears (trained, though not very well, mostly by Molière, Dumas and Renaissance songs), se mourir has stronger petite mort associations than mourir. Hans Adler 00:28, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Some interesting discussion here. Not sure how reliable it is. Hans Adler 00:31, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

While no language replicates every nuance in another, does this form fill part of the need served in English by the present progressive as in "I am dying" ? My very rusty memory of French class was that je meurs means both "I die" and "I am dying" because "I am dying" can't be translated word for word; my rusty memory of Spanish class is that the present progressive form is more possible, as in estoy hablando for "I'm talking" where je suis parlant would either be meaningless, strange, or simply incorrect in French. (I think that Italians can say sono parlando or sto parlando, although I'm less sure.) —— Shakescene (talk) 04:36, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

In Italian you can say sto parlando. *Sono parlando is just wrong. Spanish has the same construction: estoy hablando; I'm reasonably sure you can't say *soy hablando.

In French, I think you can say je suis en train de parler, but it's a bit "heavier" and less usual than the solutions from languages to the south of the Alps. --Trovatore (talk) 04:40, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Oh, by the way, sto parlando is not parallel to *je suis parlant. Italian retains a distinction between the gerund parlando and the present participle parlante, and uses the gerund, not the present participle, for the present progressive.

This is a bit different from the categories in English. In English, "gerund" usually means a nominalization of the verb, and grammars will usually tell you that the present progressive is formed using the present participle. That will mislead you if you try to apply it to Italian.

As I recall, the last time this came up, it was established that the present participle is not productive in modern Spanish, though its influence is felt in many etymologies. It is productive in Italian, although it's not terribly common outside very formal usage. --Trovatore (talk) 07:21, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

I was certain that Old French had an être+gerund construction, and that that may be where English got it from, but I can't find any examples. Adam Bishop (talk) 22:04, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Second language education in the English-speaking world

In response to this question on the Humanities Desk, an editor stated, "Italian is more commonly studied than Spanish in a lot of other English-speaking countries", and later provided a link to "Second Languages and Australian Schooling" (2009), showing that in that country at least, the number studying Italian vastly outnumbered those studying Spanish. But what about other countries? Can anyone find simple graphs (such as the one on page 49 of the Australian report) that show the most popular languages studied? I am particularly interested in the English-speaking world, but information beyond that is welcome too. BrainyBabe (talk) 23:36, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

See Most Studied Foreign Languages in the U.S. — Infoplease.com

and The 3 most studied foreign languages worldwide | Antimoon Forum

and Top 6 Most Popular Foreign Language Teachers in China | Antimoon Forum

and Most Popular Foreign Languages - Forbes.com.

—Wavelength (talk) 23:54, 9 December 2011 (UTC)

Swift response! Thanks. However, I note that the first and fourth are based on the same report into US higher education, and the second and third are unsourced forum comments, verging on advertising (fond though I am of Antimoon). For the record, the ten most popular languages for American college and university students are: Spanish, French, German, American Sign Language, Italian, Japanese, Latin, Russian, Arabic. (Source: Source: Association of Departments of Foreign Languages at the Modern Language Association, Foreign Language Enrollments in United States Institutions of Higher Education, Fall 2006.) NB Chinese doesn't make the list, and Spanish has more students than the other nine added together. Can anyone offer reports of this calibre for other countries? Secondary or tertiary education is equally welcome. BrainyBabe (talk) 16:05, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

For the UK, there's some data here, with data for England alone here. Education tends to be different from country to country in the UK: England, Wales and Northern Ireland have similar systems and all take GCSEs at the end (though have different requirements particularly when dealing with languages), but Scotland has a totally separate system. The headlines are:

• In both England and Scotland, French is most common, followed by German and Spanish.
• In Wales, Welsh is most common, followed by French, German and Spanish.
• In Northern Ireland, French is most common, followed by Spanish, Irish and German.

All others are relatively small minorities. Pfainuk talk 17:16, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you. So that's most of the UK (bar Scotland) up to age 16, and the US at undergraduate level. More? BrainyBabe (talk) 20:07, 10 December 2011 (UTC)