Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2014 October 9

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October 9

The difference between physics and physiology - etymologically

What is the difference etymologically between physics and physiology? (and between physician to physicist) 5.28.188.65 (talk) 11:08, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Physics comes from classical Latin physica, natural science, (ultimately from Greek τὰ ϕυσικά natural things). Physiology is really from the same root, but via French physiologie and maybe from the Greek ϕυσιολογία as used by Aristotle. The word physician has a more roundabout derivation via Old French and Anglo-Norman ficiscien, but physicist is much more recent, coming directly from the English word physics in the nineteenth century (though the word was used rarely and briefly for a medical person in the eighteenth century). Dbfirs 12:29, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Thank you. But what is the relationship between physiology that comes from the old Greek word "physis" that means 'nature', to the new meaning of the science of the living function? 5.28.188.65 (talk) 19:31, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

The OED lists as its first, obsolete meaning of physiology "Natural philosophy, natural science. Also: a particular system or doctrine of natural science", before the current meaning (attested from 1598). Etymology can tell us the route a word took to get to us, and often the variations of meaning it went through. It cannot usually tell us anything about why a word acquired one particular meaning or lost another one. So I don't think there is an answer to your question. --ColinFine (talk) 20:23, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Influence of Cantonese

Is it just me or is the statement "overseas Chinese mostly speak Cantonese and write traditional characters" really outdated? This may be true half a century ago, but today there are probably more Mandarin speakers outside China than Cantonese. Cantonese seems to be known in the US due to immigration, which led to the stereotypical depiction of the sound of "Chinese", mocking all Chinese languages including Mandarin, which has 16 times more speakers than Cantonese. Many people don't know that Cantonese is only ranked third in number of speakers following Wu. I don't know about the US, but in Europe, at every event organized by Chinese I attendeded, people were talking Mandarin not because in order to understand each other but because they were really from the north and the east. The article for Cantonese says it's native to overseas communities, which links to the article "Overseas Chinese" in general. I think it's a bit misleading. There may not be organized Mandarin communities, but most Chinese you'll encounter speak Mandarin, at least in Europe. --2.245.211.141 (talk) 14:47, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

If you have source indicating that the situation has changed, feel free to update. Anecdotal evidence isn't enough. Mingmingla (talk) 16:49, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

In addition, many most Chinese migrants to the UK originated in the former British Crown Colony of Hong Kong, where Cantonese is the main dialect. "The majority of Chinese in the UK speak Cantonese due to the close ties between Hong Kong."[1] Alansplodge (talk) 17:51, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

That doesn't make sense. The fact that the UK and Hong Kong have close ties has nothing to do with how many Mandarin speakers live in the UK and it doesn't represent whole Europe. So you still believe there are more people from Guangdong (without the UK, Hong Kong would be Guangdong too), one of some 30 provinces, than from the rest of China? Moreover, the UK has lost most of its influence in Hong Kong (they should deal with Scotland first before they can judge any other country). Today, a large amount of Chinese go abroad to study. This surpasses the number of Chinese emigrated. I could provide some English sources, but you would argue that they are biased. So whatever "evidence" I'll bring up, you won't consider them as your attitude to this topic is already shown in the two sentences you wrote. --2.245.211.141 (talk) 18:35, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

It makes as much sense as "What is the difference between a chicken?", viz. plenty of sense for those with the capacity to accommodate such things. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 18:58, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

(Edit Conflict) So you assert something as your personal opinion but refuse to provide Reliable Sources to back it up, because you pre-suppose that "we" (i.e. thousands of volunteer editors with no axes to grind) will all be biased against them. This does not suggest that you come to this Desk without a previous agenda, and is insulting to the previous respondents who were only trying to be helpful to you.

I notice you have not even bothered to link to, or say where on, Wikipedia the statement "overseas Chinese mostly speak Cantonese and write traditional characters" that you dispute actually occurs (if it does). This makes it irksome for others who might be willing to examine your complaint on its own merits in the correct context.

Speaking as a UK native and resident, I have encountered scores of Cantonese speakers in the UK (disclosure: I used to live in Hong Kong) but do not particularly remember meeting any Mandarin speakers in the UK outside of an academic setting. However, my personal anecdotes and suppositions carry no more weight than yours, 2.245.211.141. Here, we work from published references, and await yours. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 212.95.237.92 (talk) 19:14, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

If it wasn't the English Wikipedia, then it was in another language. I'm not here to change Wikipedia in general, so I'm not obliged to give sources. You can easily find them on your own. It's just a general disscussion. I'm just saying that Cantonese is only mainly known in the anglosphere. In other European countries, the word "Mandarin" is only used to differentiate between Chinese languages (for people who know there are differences at all). It's usually referred as "Chinese" and when saying "Chinese", they probably mean Mandarin. There are a lot of Confucius Institutes around the world trying to promote Mandarin. I doubt that all parents who send their kids to these are Cantonese. --2.245.211.141 (talk) 19:59, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Most of the (anecdotal) evidence presented so far has come from Europe, which is not where most "overseas Chinese" live. The overseas Chinese include emigrant communities who migrated, mainly to countries in Southeast Asia but also to North America, over the course of generations. These communities number several million, including a majority of the population of Singapore and substantial minorities in other southeast Asian countries. Even in the United States, they number more than a million. These numbers are much higher than the number of Chinese students studying in Europe or anywhere else. As our article and other sources make clear, most overseas Chinese do not speak Mandarin at home. In fact, it may be that a majority of overseas Chinese, as a result of assimilation, do not speak any Chinese language, but rather speak the language of the countries where they are resident. See, for example, our article on the Thai Chinese, the largest overseas Chinese community. On the other hand, it is not clear that Cantonese (Yue) is the most widespread Chinese language spoken among overseas Chinese. It is probably still most widespread in the United States. In Southeast Asia, though, Hokkien (Min) Chinese may be more common. Mandarin is most common among more recent immigrants and is becoming a lingua franca among overseas Chinese, but it is not yet spoken by a majority. As for traditional versus simplified characters, it is probably true that simplified characters are more common as they are the most widely used written variety in Southeast Asia, where a large majority of the overseas Chinese live. Largely due to anticommunism, traditional characters are the most widely used form in North America and Europe, but the numbers of Chinese in North America and Europe are much smaller than in Southeast Asia. Also, the growing population of recently migrated Chinese in Africa are overwhelmingly from the PRC and use simplified characters. Marco polo (talk) 19:34, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I have unhatted this thread. Please just leave it open. There is nothing here to foment a debate, and the answers reflect the genuine interest in the topic. Marco polo, in particular, does not come here to debate and engage in controversy, and we are thankful for such high level replies from actual experts, which also include plenty of links to articles. Please leave this open because people may stop by and ask for follow up information. IBE (talk) 05:43, 11 October 2014 (UTC)

Well, you've got an OP posing debatable comments and refusing to back them up with any facts. Feel free to keep feeding it. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 06:28, 11 October 2014 (UTC)

Ok, I'm inclined to agree, and I was probably wrong to unhat it. I still think it would be wrong to hat it again - it's a little bit borderline, and there's a clear tendency from the OP to overengage in controversy without furthering anything ("It's just a general disscussion..."). No, it really shouldn't be a general discussion, and that is not what we are here for, 2.245. Still, others have given good answers, and not let it spiral into trouble. It's an answerable question, and we've got good answers. I admit I read the good answers (basically everyone's) and only skimmed through the other stuff very quickly, so I didn't see what the OP was doing wrong. Sorry there, but I don't think there's any real need to hat. I also see no "feeding" going on - this is going a bit far. IBE (talk) 09:43, 11 October 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, I was just somehow very disppointed by the first answer. Is there any recent research on how many Chinese outside China are from which province or anything similar? It's certainly not just Africa but also Europe. I just had the feeling that it's changing and I'm not the only one. Moreover, Singapore and Malaysia are promoting Mandarin so do the Confucius Institutes around the world. And I'm not talking about descendants of overseas Chinese people who couldn't preserve their ancestor's language due to many generations. This is different with recent Mandarin-speaking immigrants who decide to work in a foreign country after studying and start a family. Due to today's possibilities and the fact that it's only one generation, Mandarin is much more present in these families. Counting "Cantonese" people in general is wrong. Cantonese is just a language. The term somehow seems to be used to refer to people from Guangdong too, but Cantonese are not an ethnic minority. These people are still Han Chinese. However, it's clear that people from other provinces don't speak Cantonese and it would helpful to see those numbers. --2.245.169.139 (talk) 14:13, 11 October 2014 (UTC)

Is Hutterite German called Low German?

This edit states that Hutterite German is also called Low German. There are also books containing this statement, like "Language in the USA". Ethnologue distinguishes a Low-German based dialect Plautdietsch (also called Low German) and a High-German based dialect Hutterisch. So it is misleading to call Hutterite German Low German. Is it just a misunderstanding or is it really used that way? --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 19:04, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I would avoid using the terms "Low German" and "Plattdeutsch" to refer to anything except Lower Saxon. I would also distinguish between "Hochdeutsch" (High (standard literary) German and "Oberdeutsch" (Upper German from Southern Germany, Austria and Switzerland). The casual use of "low german" to mean not-Hochdeutsch is inexact, non-scholarly and confusing, and sounds just plain weird, as in this case. Dominus Vobisdu (talk) 20:07, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

I'm sure you're right. But for what it's worth, my Pennsylvania Dutch relatives will often refer to their language as "low German" or even "dirty German," though most often they just call it "Dutch." Some of the younger generations don't even speak it that fluently, and there is a common joke that if you don't know how to say something you just spit more and keep on going. Anyway, I suspect the correctness of "Low German" for these varieties comes down to contextual use of the term. SemanticMantis (talk) 20:14, 9 October 2014 (UTC)

Can't say about Hutterite specifically, but there's been a long tradition of using the terms "Hochdeutsch" ("high German") and "Niederdeutsch" ("low German") or variants thereof in two competing pairs of senses: geographically, as in "upper" (southern) versus "lower" (northern) Germany, and socially, as in "high" (standard) versus "low" (vernacular) register. Both senses have been in competition at least since the 17th century. The geographical meaning is the older one, and still the one used in the technical terminology of German linguistics, but in everyday speech the term "Hochdeutsch" has now almost completely shifted to the social level, denoting "standard German" (even when contrasted with southern vernacular dialects, which dialectologically are just as "high"). So I wouldn't be too surprised if some remnants of the logically corresponding usage, of calling vernacular varieties "low" regardless of their geographical provenance, might have lingered on in some places. Fut.Perf. ☼ 15:40, 10 October 2014 (UTC)