Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 July 13

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July 13

Locations with the name -sex

Resolved

What is the sense in which -sex is a suffix in the names of many locations -- Sussex, Essex, Wessex, etc. I'm assuming it has nothing to do with lewdness. DRosenbach ^{(Talk | Contribs)} 01:53, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

It comes from the Old English Seaxe, meaning Saxons. The three names refer to three different Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, inhabited by the South Saxons, East Saxons, and West Saxons respectively. Lesgles (talk) 03:24, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

For completeness, I should point out that there was a Middlesex as well (now swallowed up by the London sprawl) - though no North-sex (the Nor-folk and the Suf-folk were already there - Angles of course...) AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:04, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

The joke I had always heard was that there had been breifly a Kingdom of the North Saxons, but they died out in a single generation for obvious reasons (obvious if you follow the naming conventions for Essex, Wessex, and Sussex). --Jayron32 04:44, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

"In England they have a Middlesex. Here in the US, we only have the two." :-) StuRat (talk) 04:58, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

"I have three wonderful children, one of each sex."  :) -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 06:38, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

In fact the USA has at least three Middlesexes. In Connecticut, Massachussets and New Jersey. Don't ever forget where your ancestors came from ;-)) Richard Avery (talk) 14:13, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Isn't the plural of Middlesex Middlesices? Angr (talk) 14:27, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Only if one could validly ask "What are the sices of your three children?". -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 19:21, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Those with an interest in heraldry will know that the counties of Essex and Middlesex have an Old English pun on their coats of arms; a picture of three Seaxes. Alansplodge (talk) 22:02, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Changing words from English to English

I think that this was answered, at least in part, once before on the RD somewhere but I can't think (or find) where. It's been noted that books originally in an English variant that spells "labour" with a "u" will, when published in the US market be spelt "labor" as will "colour" and "color". My first question is does this happen in reverse and is the "u" added to words. Now I have seen books where the "u" is dropped but non-American words and phrases are used rather than their North American equivalent. For example a book may contain reference to a bonnet or a boot and people may play draughts. So why would these words not be converted as well? Bonus points question. Would the British word rubber be converted due to possible confusion with the US slang word rubber? CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 03:31, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

This is really a matter of print runs and costs. Publications in the USA tend to have large print runs, so it is more common to re-set the type with US spelling when books with non-US English spelling are published in the US. The reverse is less common. Novels published in the US are regularly marketed in the UK without spelling changes. We just get used to mentally inserting the missing letters. Regional words are seldom changed in novels because they enhance the realism of the setting. Technical manuals are often, but not always, "translated". Savvy teachers in the UK tend to refer to erasers rather than rubbers when they have pupils familiar with US slang. Dbfirs 06:08, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Here in Germany, English books sold in bookstores are generally the British editions, so most of the Stephen King novels on my bookshelf were printed in Britain for the British market. American spellings and usage are left intact, as far as I can tell (of course I've haven't compared these books word-for-word with their American counterparts). And I've seen American editions of British novels, and even though I'm American myself, it irritates me to see people in the Mapp and Lucia novels talking about doing someone a "favor" or writing a "check", as it seems to rob the books of their local colo(u)r. And although I've only ever read the British editions of the Harry Potter novels, I've heard tell that not only spelling but also vocabulary is Americanized in the American edition (e.g. booger replaces bogie). But that may be because they're thought of as children's books (or at least YA novels), and American publishers are under the impression that everyone under 18 is a drooling imbecile incapable of understanding anything not written in their own dialect. When it comes to books for adults, perhaps publishers who change centre to center but leave boot and bonnet alone think that changing a spelling is merely a proofreading change, while changing vocabulary is more editorial and shouldn't be done without the author's approval. Or maybe they just run an American English spellcheck, which won't catch words like boot and bonnet. Angr (talk) 06:27, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

As someone who spends some of his editing time here re-correcting incorrect spelling variant "corrections", it's been my observation that almost all of these are where UK English has been incorrectly "corrected" to US spelling by an enthusiastic editor trying to improve Wikipedia. That would fit the above scenarios. UK English users are familiar with US spelling, and can cope with it when it's used in the right context, whereas some US English users aren't even aware that there is another perfectly correct way to spell. HiLo48 (talk) 06:49, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

There's a curious phenomenon in Australia. Because international publishers often prepare two editions, one American (with color and harbor) and one British (with colour and harbour), and Australia uses predominently British spelling, it's the British version that gets sold in Australia. That's all well and good, except that the British version would also use pounds sterling and other specifically British units of measure - especially in non-fiction books. So you get this weird situation where you might be reading a book by an American author and dealing primarily with the U.S. and yet having to do a lot of mental arithmetics to convert from sterling into dollars. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 06:59, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

HiLo, my experience here is the opposite - I mostly see people incorrectly "correcting" American spelling to British spelling at Wikipedia, often even in articles dealing with an American topic. Angr (talk) 07:26, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Oh well, let's just keep correcting... HiLo48 (talk) 07:40, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Culturally, we are sort of at the crossroads between British and American influences here in Australia. In our national Parliament, the House of Representatives was modelled on the UK House of Commons (and the system as a whole is the Westminster system), but the Senate was modelled after the US Senate. We have a head of state who resides in the UK, and the UK was traditionally the "mother country" for many Australians, but since WWII we've become a lot more influenced in our language and popular culture generally by the US than by the UK. And it's accelerating: in the past week alone, I've five times heard TV journalists and lay people use the adjective "alternate" (the alternate suggestion), with the stress on the first syllable in the American style, rather than the word we always used to use and I will be continuing to use, "alternative", which has the stress on the 2nd syllable. The only "alternate" I recognise is a verb (The seasons alternate between hot and cold). But that's me. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 08:55, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Really? I can understand not liking the alternate suggestion (I've stopped using that myself) but do you really object to they sweep the street on alternate Mondays? --Trovatore (talk) 08:58, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

"They sweep the street every other Monday". DuncanHill (talk) 09:03, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Other than what? I've never actually understood that usage. I know it's common, and know what it means, but one doesn't want to dig too deep for the meaning. I like "every second Monday". HiLo48 (talk) 09:06, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Yes, I do object, Trovatore. It's not about the difference in meaning your examples demonstrate. The word "alternate" was never recognised as an adjective here at all; and even when people got slightly confused and said "alternate" rather than "alternative", they still stressed it on the 2nd syllable - all-TER-nuht (based on all-TERN-ativ), not ALL-tuh-nuht. The latter is an echt-uber-American pronunciation; like VAJ-uh-nul ("vaginal"), rather than our va-JY-nuhl; and IN-kwuh-ree ("inquiry") rather than our in-KWY-ree. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 09:19, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

I've noticed a few features of American pronunciation creeping into UK speech - for example, "news" is increasingly being pronounced "noos" rather than "nyoos". Give it a while, maybe the English will become rhotic again. --Nicknack009 (talk) 10:21, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

I don't think "nooz" is quite part of high General American, though I'm not sure exactly what region it's a regionalism of. Personally I switch between "nooz" and "nyooz" fairly freely. --Trovatore (talk) 21:03, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

"Nooz" is definitely part of "high General American" as you put it. Yod-dropping after coronals is the norm in America; only some Southerners would say "nyooz" naturally, as the map you'll see if you click the link shows. If I heard it from anyone else, I'd think they were either excessively speech-conscious or putting on an affectation. (I pronounce new and tune "nyoo" and "tyoon" when I'm singing, but that's a conscious affectation because I sing in a choir that's predominantly British.) Angr (talk) 07:15, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Ah, well, may be my Southern heritage, then. "Nooz" sounds sort of lazy to me. "Tyoon" does indeed sound affected, though, except in a song. --Trovatore (talk) 11:17, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Some Australian sports commentators have developed the flexible ability of putting the emphasis on the first syllable of defence when discussing football, and the second syllable when covering basketball. (Now we can argue about the spelling.) HiLo48 (talk) 10:45, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Sports commentators have invented a totally new language, or so it often seems. My pet peeve is when they're calling a match where the result is not in any doubt but the match is still in progress, or maybe it's only just finished. They'll call it "a famous victory by the <whoevers>". Famous? Maybe deserving of fame, but that's for the future to decide. Or the ubiquitous "So-and-so has delivered the <koo de grah>". Grrr, more likely. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 12:25, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Ah yes, the coup de gras, or "blow of fat". That's when someone throws a glob of grease in your face after defeating you, to increase your humiliation. Angr (talk) 12:27, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Or fleur de lit, the flower of bed. --Trovatore (talk) 20:59, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

In some cases, some of those other words are converted; the example the immediately came to my mind was Harry Potter, and of course we have an article - Harry Potter in translation#Americanisation as translation. --LarryMac | Talk 12:50, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Some great answers thanks. @ HiLo48 and Angr. Canadian articles tend to get changed in both directions from time to time. As an aside I once had someone tell me that "centre" meant middle and "center" was used to indicate a physical object like the Community Center. As to the Harry Potter books the ones I have were printed in Canada and besides the title, "Philosopher's" rather than "Sorcerer's", they seem to have retained the British spellings. While looking at them I noticed a UK book reprinted in the US where the title, not sure about the rest of the book, retained the u spelling. CambridgeBayWeather (talk) 01:13, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Hey, I've wondered about that. Why DID the Sorcerer turn into a Philosopher? They are words with quite different but clear, non-problematical meanings to me. Is a sorcerer something really bad in North America? HiLo48 (talk) 07:25, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

You have it the wrong way round, the original British version used Philosopher and the US translation Sorcerer. The explanation I heard is that the US publishers thought that having Philosopher in the title would put kids off, making them think it was intellectual and serious rather than exciting and fun. -- Q Chris (talk) 07:32, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

I bet if it had been any Harry Potter book other than the first, they wouldn't have bothered. Later books could have been called Harry Potter and the Drying Paint and still would have flown off the shelves. Angr (talk) 07:44, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

Did later books retain words like jumper? —Tamfang (talk) 03:55, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

See philosopher's stone. —Tamfang (talk) 03:55, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

On my first visit to England, I saw a poster for The Colour of Money and chuckled because the title makes sense only in American: it relates the green baize of pool tables to the green backs of US currency. —Tamfang (talk) 03:55, 29 July 2011 (UTC)

Translating historical fiction into French - tu/vous

I'm attempting to translate my webcomic, The Cattle Raid of Cooley, into French, and I'm looking for guidance on the second person singular. I know the basic rule - tu is singular and familar, vous is singular formal, and plural whether familar or formal. I just don't know how to apply it in the context of my comic, which is set in the Iron Age in an aristocratic warrior society.

For example, I have a couple of characters, Fergus and Cormac. Fergus is Cormac's foster-father, he brought him up and they are very close, but Cormac is the son of a king and therefore Fergus's social superior. How would they address each other, and would they address each other differently in private and in public? A similar example is the hero, Cú Chulainn, and his charioteer, Láeg. Cú Chulainn is Láeg's social superior and outranks him militarily, but Láeg is older, and has a tendency to familiarity, and they like each other. How would a king or queen address their vassals and subjects? How would a king and queen address each other, and would it be different in public and private? How would a king of one kingdom address a king of a rival or allied kingdom? How would a god address a mortal, and vice versa, and how would a god address another god?

Another thing - Irish has no word for yes, and Hiberno-English tends to avoid the word yes as well, so I have characters responding to things like "are you ready?" with "I am". In French, if asked "Vous êtes prêt?", does it make sense to reply "je suis"? --Nicknack009 (talk) 11:50, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

For tu and vous, I would recommend reading lots of Asterix in the original French to get a feel for how the pronouns are used there. It is of course anachronistic both in Asterix and in your Iron-Age comic, since the idea of a T-V distinction didn't exist in European languages until the Middle Ages, but then using modern language at all is anachronistic anyway, so that's not such a big deal. As for the answer to "Vous êtes prêt?", I'm not a native speaker, but my inclination would be to say "Je le suis". Angr (talk) 12:07, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

"Je le suis" sounds really strange to my ears. To me, that means, "I am it", rather than simply "I am" Mingmingla (talk) 17:26, 19 July 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) An idea may be to look to works written in Early modern English which preserved English's T–V distinction like the King James Bible or the works of William Shakespeare. Usage of "thou" and "thee" roughly correspond to "tu" in French, while the more formal "you" and "ye" correspond to "vous" in French... --Jayron32 12:10, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

The King James Bible makes no T-V distinction. It uses thou consistently to translate singular pronouns and verb forms in the original languages and ye consistently to translate plural forms. Angr (talk) 12:25, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Shakespeare uses the distinction rather inconsistently (eg in the banquet scene, Macbeth says "How say you" either to Lady Macbeth or the ghost, but he addresses each of them as "thou" within a line or two). Everyman, a century earlier, shows no obvious rationale for the choice between "thou" and "you".

Based on my understanding of how this worked in early modern times, when monarchies and aristocracies were still powerful, I'd recommend the following: Fergus says tu to Cormac in private, Cormac says vous to Fergus in private. In public, they say vous to each other, unless Cormac has assumed the persona of a prince and Fergus that of a commoner, in which case their public exchange would be the reverse of their private. Láeg says vous to Cú Chulainn, and Cú Chulainn says tu in return, even when they are being familiar. Kings and queens say tu to their vassals and to each other in private, assuming they have an intimate relationship. (If, on the other hand, it is a political marriage with little contact outside of ceremonies and the occasional conjugal visit to produce an heir, then their private conversation might be no different than their public conversation.) In public, I'd say it depends on the degree of patriarchy in the society. If women are respected and sometimes powerful, they might say vous to each other. In a more patriarchal society, she would say vous to him in public, and he would respond with tu. Kings would address one another as vous, except when insulting each other. Although Christians address their god as tu, I would have mortals generally addressing gods in a pantheon as vous. The Christian god is conceived a little differently from most pagan gods, whom one was supposed to respect and fear, whereas one is supposed to be on intimate terms with the Christian god. If the religion in your society involves personal devotion to a deity, then you could have the devotees address that deity as tu. Gods would certainly say tu to mortals. Among one another, you could use the distinction to mirror hierarchies among them as in human society. (Obviously, vous is also the plural form of tu.) Marco polo (talk) 18:41, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks, that's very helpful. I don't have any Asterix books in French, but I do have a volume of Eric Shanower's Age of Bronze in French, and I'm combing that for guidance as well. --Nicknack009 (talk) 19:14, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Just two remarks on what Marco polo said (though I can't claim to be much of an expert, and my observations are cursory and superficial). First, I think it was pretty standard for upper-class husbands and wives to address each other with "vous" even in private (if this had been considered a sign of excessive formality, it would no longer have been standard). Besides French, it was reportedly characteristic, for example, of the Sephardi Jews in the Ottoman Empire - not just the upper class, but also the common folk - where husbands addressed their wives in the second person plural, while wives responded in the third singular - presumably a custom they brought from the towns of mediaeval Spain. Again, this didn't necessarily impede familiarity significantly, nor did it express an unnatural coldness, formality and lack of love. In the Middle Ages and Early Modern period, upper-class and royal spouses would not only use "vous", but they would even address each other with titles (similarly in Le Morte d'Arthur, Guenever addresses Arthur as "Sir", not to mention the "ye"; cf also the general style of the letters that the wives of Henry VIII addressed to him). If this rule was, nevertheless, violated in private at the time, I doubt that we would have any documents to prove it - it just wasn't supposed to be, so even depictions of intimate speech don't show a violation. Second, I don't know about today, but I'm sure it was common practice to address the Christian God as vous (I remember some scenes involving children's bedtime prayers and such). The same applied to the Virgin Mary (here's Thibaut de Champagne (1201-1253) addressing Her: "Douce dame, reine couronnée, Priez pour nous, Vierge bienheureuse!") and all the Saints (say, Joan of Arc would, I believe, address each of the saints who guided her in vous). The French version of the Lord's Prayer used vous up to the great modernization of 1966 (see the French article [1]) - ah, those wild Sixties! This is very contrary to the contemporary (especially American) affinity for raw passion, gut feeling, immediacy and naturalness, but the Middle Ages were, so to speak, much more Japanese than they were American. On the other hand, just what this implies for an Ancient Irish-themed comic is another matter - I guess the etiquette reflected in the actual Irish sagas becomes relevant here. As does Astérix! --91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:25, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

One might add concerning the division between "in public" and "in private", that the entire division between "public" and "private" as separate legitimate realms developed only very gradually. During most of the time before modernity, at least in the societies in question, you were pretty much always a public person, 100% of the time, whether you liked it or not, and you were supposed to act and be treated accordingly.--91.148.159.4 (talk) 00:14, 14 July 2011 (UTC)

I am pondering with the following question: In German (the following is an extract from the T-V distinction article) works of art and literature (such as books and movies) depicting events at least several centuries in the past, or in a "past-like" fantasy setting, require an oldfashioned T-V distinction even if modern German is otherwise used in these works; indeed, using the modern Sie in such a setting would be considered an out-of-place anachronism. Thus in German there are three possible types of dialogues: Using 20th century T-V distinction appropriate for everyday life or using an out-of-date (19th century or earlier) T-V distinction appropriate for fantasy settings or, finally, a non-distinction (all T) for settings that are timeless. I wonder whether French has similar possibilities (or difficulties from the point of view of a speaker of a language without T-V distinction) --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 12:44, 14 July 2011 (UTC).

Spanish cities ending in -ona

Several Spanish towns and cities end in "ona". Barcelona, Badalona, Tarragona, Girona, Badalona, Pamplona, Cardona immediately come to mind, as well as the county of Osona. I looked through a list of Spanish municipalities, and found these as well: Bayona, Tarazona, Ulldecona, Xixona. Is there a common etymology to the -ona ending, and if so, what does it mean? --NorwegianBlue ^talk 16:08, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

What several of these place names have in common is that they were originally Latin feminine-gender place names ending in -o in the nominative and -onis in the genitive (-onem in the accusative, and so on). Normally, in Spanish, such nouns would have mutated to have the ending -ón (e.g., all of the words ending in -ción). However, in this case, these names took the ending -ona, which is the feminine version of the augmentative ending -ón, and which emphasizes the feminine gender of these words. Perhaps the name was meant to suggest the idea of la gran ciudad (the great (fem.) city). For the names that did not originate as Latin -o/-onis forms, I think that the name simply followed a feminine augmentative form. A similar pattern appears in Carcassonne and Narbonne in France and Savona in Italy, by the way. Marco polo (talk) 18:58, 13 July 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! There's also Ancona, Cremona and Verona in Italy. Ancona is according to the article derived from Greek Αγκων (Elbow), so in that case, the -on part of the ending stems from the Greek name. I now found the article List of city name changes, which lists these:

• Barcino → Barcino Nova → Barcelona
• Gerunda → Gerona → Girona
• Pompaelo → Pamplona
• Tarraco → Tarraco nova → Tarragona

So it seems that there is no single common pattern. The idea that -ona endings may have been used to suggest greatness sounds reasonable to me. --NorwegianBlue ^talk 07:19, 14 July 2011 (UTC)