Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 September 10

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September 10

Punjabi

how different is the Punjabi spoken in Punjab(Pakistan) and Punjab(India)?(i mean writing,accent,etc) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 175.110.242.217 (talk) 09:04, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

have you looked at the articles Punjabi language and Punjabi dialects? ElMa-sa (talk) 11:21, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Is "onto" one word

The use of the word "onto" is made in sentences, but is using the term "onto" right i.e. is it proper to use "onto" as one word or is it proper to use it as "on to". 10:30, 10 September 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Aniketnik (talk • contribs)

As with most things in language usage it depends. 'He ran onto the court' seems fine to me but in the case of 'after losing the first set, he went on to win' it needs the separate words. Mikenorton (talk) 10:54, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Another pair of example sentences (one of my favorites) is: I passed the cake on to my mother vs. I pushed the cake onto my mother. Angr (talk) 11:02, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Basically, when on is used as an adverb (often as part of a phrasal verb, like "went on" and "passed on" in Mikenorton's and Angr's examples), it's usual to spell "on to" as two words. Otherwise, onto is a perfectly acceptable and widely used preposition. There is, in some cases, a certain amount of ambiguity, leading to mixed usage: "Hang on to the rope" and "Hang onto the rope", for example, are both in fairly wide use (though I prefer the former). Deor (talk) 13:53, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

The latter is sheer ignorance. It fails to recognise the verb is "to hang on" and the "to" is a connector that only occurs in certain contexts. We can quite validly say "Hang on!", but we could never say "Hang onto!". There's no case for concatenating the "on" with the "to" in this example, just as there's no case for sticking "a" in front of "lot" or "while", or connecting "in" and "fact", or a whole pile of other crazy spellings we see these days. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 20:40, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

I would say that "hang onto" (or "hang on to") is a different phrasal verb from "hang on". --ColinFine (talk) 11:09, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Really? How would the meanings differ? A person whose lifeless body is swinging in the breeze from a noose tied around his head could be said to be "hanging onto a rope", although the usual expression would be "hanging from a rope" or "hanging by a rope". But someone who is holding a rope with his hands is "hanging on to a rope", analagous to "hanging on by the skin of his teeth" or "hanging on for dear life". -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 05:28, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

English is allowed to have two words/phrases with the same meaning. There is plenty of evidence that "hang onto" has long been considered standard (e.g. Cambridge Dictionaries[1], Google Books search [2]). This is the reference desk, not the unsupported opinion desk. --Colapeninsula (talk) 10:49, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Guards, have that man killed. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 09:29, 13 September 2011 (UTC)

Or writing "today" as one word, rather than hyphenating it. Yes, I'm in a 1900 mood today. There certainly is a case for concentrating commonly used phrases as one word, it's what naturally happens in language. - filelakeshoe 22:26, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

That must explain why most people are spelling "cannot" as "can not" these days.  :) -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 22:31, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

See http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/onto.html and http://public.wsu.edu/~brians/errors/into.html.

—Wavelength (talk) 15:41, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Language extinction - a recent phenomenon?

Hey, you know how you always hear from linguists that languages are going extinct all around the world, that most of the world's languages will probably be extinct by the next century? here Well, I just heard a quote from Stéphane Dion [3] that said something new: "For the first time in human history, the number of languages spoken in the world in diminishing rather than increasing." (emphasis added). Is this true? Has language extinction never surpassed the formation of new languages until now? How does Stéphane Dion know this? Have other linguists or scientists said this too, or was he just being overly emphatic? I would be very interested to know more about this -- if it's true, it'd really put a damper on the argument that language extinction is natural and healthy... Jonathan ^talk 14:54, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

The ongoing development is definitely unprecedented. Never before have so many languages gone extinct in so short a time.

Language extinction is a natural process, it has always happened. Whether it is healthy depends on your POV. If you don't have emotions for languages and the cultures connected with them and if you are interested in a world where everybody can have conservations with everybody else in the world it's healthy. If you have emotions for languages and the cultures connected with them and like cultural diversity it's extremely unhealthy.

Dion's quote is most likely not factual, although I think it's hard to prove or disprove it. We don't actually know the number of languages for any point in time (not even for the present). Many languages have gone extinct since the discovery of the New World. The expansion of Indoeuropean languages must have replaced and rendered extinct many, many languages. And even in Africa the cradle of mankind the Bantu languages managed to spread across half the continent in 3500 years splitting into about 500 single languages along the way. But how many previous languages did the Bantu languages replace? We don't know it. And we won't ever know it as all evidence is lost. --::Slomox:: >< 17:06, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes -- there is no way to know that the whole inhabited world wasn't once the way New Guinea is now -- linguists have counted 1073 distinct languages spoken on that one island. Looie496 (talk) 17:12, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

It seems to me that language extinction is just a symptom of the broader issue of if we want a single, world-wide culture or many isolated cultures. Free-trade, free movement of individuals, the Internet and other global media all contribute to the development of a single, global culture. StuRat (talk) 17:48, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

A single world-wide culture and many isolated cultures are not the only options, Stu. How about many connected but distinct cultures. -- Jack of Oz ^{[your turn]} 20:31, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

If they are interconnected, they will start to use each other's words, and eventually the languages will merge. StuRat (talk) 00:18, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Generally speaking, one language will become dominant and the other will fall into (relative) disuse (and possibly become extinct from there). This is only in a scenario of invasion (in the sense of colonization), or mass immigration, though. People these days do not emigrate en masse to a single place, despite the availability of planes and other speedy transport. Even with the internet and the spead of global communications, people will still continue to use their own lanaguage/dialect at home. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 00:37, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

StuRat -- In linguistic terminology, languages are not normally said to "merge" as such. Except in certain unusual situations (such as that which gave rise to Russenorsk etc.) one of the predecessor languages is usually dominant in the results of extensive language context... AnonMoos (talk) 19:09, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Also, free trade and free movement of individuals were both around until the modern era and the writing up of borders, and the consequent restrictions. These have since been lifted, and were only temporary. I would never say they contribute to language extinction as a whole, but rather to the intermingling of languages, and even the creation of new ones (such as Swahili, Malay, Indonesian, creoles, pidgins, etc.). --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 00:14, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Free movement isn't only impeded by politics. For most of human history it was impeded by logistics. That is, most people didn't have a way of traveling very far from home. StuRat (talk) 00:18, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Ships, horses, camels, etc., have been around for a long time. This is how trade languages such as those I mentioned were created - by people from different language backgrounds and cultures being able to mix. Why, even the Greeks could get to India. The Mongols were able to get as far west as Poland, and even as far south as Java, which is remarkable for a normally non-seafaring nation. The vikings were doing trade in Africa. Trade between vastly separated cultures has been happening for thousands of years. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 00:32, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but you need a high level of interaction to result in languages merging. If less than that level, they will diverge rather than converge. If 10% of Vikings moved to Africa every generation and vice-versa, then the languages might merge. A few isolated visits just isn't enough. StuRat (talk) 02:26, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Of course, but such a merging of languages, as you suggest, normally results in a new hybrid language, and not the complete death of the parent languages. Besides, there has been a high level of interaction between France and Germany for a very long time, and neither language has been killed off and they haven't merged. There are dialects of German (such as Luxembourgish) which are indeed heavily influenced by French, but neither parent language has been killed as a result. As Jack said, 'connected but distinct cultures' is normal. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 02:55, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

I don't know that a millennium or two counts as a "very long time", linguistically. And do they have the order of interchange of populations I mentioned previously ? StuRat (talk) 03:40, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

The Normans were originally a Germanic people. In fact, the Franks, after whom France is named, were also Germanic. The two countries have a long history of invading each other. but neither language has been replaced by the other. Rather, influenced. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 04:53, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

Since creole languages seem to arise within the space of a few generations, I'd say that 'a millennium or two' was a heck of a long time, linguistically. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:10, 11 September 2011 (UTC)

French has only been spoken in Eastern France for 100-200 years; prior to that they would have spoken languages such as Lorrain, a langue d'oil which has a far greater Franconian and Luxembourgish influence. Dialect continuum may be a relevant article. --Colapeninsula (talk) 11:18, 12 September 2011 (UTC)

Note that Dion is not a linguist. He's a politician. He does have a more academic background than most politicians, but it's not in linguistics; it's in political science. --Trovatore (talk) 18:09, 10 September 2011 (UTC)

Whereas there's good reason to believe that he has a point (I find it difficult to imagine a situation in the human history where so many languages were as threatened or dying as now), what we know of prehistoric language situations is more than a bit vague. /Julle (talk) 01:28, 15 September 2011 (UTC)