Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2017 November 27

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November 27

Bad Hand?

What does it mean in this context? Thanks in advance. Omidinist (talk) 07:51, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Sounds like he has sustained an injury to it, or it is damaged in some way. The allusion would presumably have been explained earlier in the book. --Viennese Waltz 09:08, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Agreed, see bad heart/leg/back etc. Alansplodge (talk) 09:15, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Yes, you're right. Many thanks. Omidinist (talk) 09:17, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

A hard one... ["This is nothing of which I would say I am proud of"]

(after precipitate auto-archiving) @Trovatore: Now, to recapitulate: Are we speaking in terms of style or grammar here? This is not something about which I would say I am proud of — is that grammatically (!) wrong or not?--Herfrid (talk) 14:49, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

"This is not something about which I would say I am proud" or "this is not something which I would say I am proud about" - with the first being the pedantically correct form avoiding the preposition at the end of the phrase. You can not add an "of" at the end - in this case you are saying that you are not proud about something, rather than that you are not proud of something. Adding the "of" when you have already used the preposition "about" is a grammatical error. You could say that you are proud of it, or proud about it - but never that you are proud about of it (or proud of about it). You can use of, or about, but not both together. Wymspen (talk) 16:05, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

Agreed, it's an ungrammatical pleonasm to use two prepositions here. μηδείς (talk) 18:17, 19 November 2017 (UTC)

@Wymspen and Medeis: Hello and thank you both! My point is: "about" is supposed to refer to "say" (i. e. "to say sth about sth", meaning "to give a certain comment on sth"), not "proud"! Now, assuming we wanted to rephrase the sentence a bit, one could say: "I would not say about what happened that I am proud of it". I admit, this sounds very stiff and artificial, but from a purely grammatical point of view it should be correct, shouldn't it? If so, then it would consequently also have to be correct with the given relative clause.--Herfrid (talk) 22:57, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

No, it would still be a pleonasm, and horrible style, if technically grammatical. No native speaker would be comfortable with it. Your options are:

"I would not say I am proud [of what happened]," or

"I would not [say about it] that I was proud."

The emphasis is different, and the verbs are phrasally really different. One is "say" and the other is "say about". Consider:

"I would not say I am proud [of what happened], but of my reaction" or

"I would not [say about it] that I was proud, so much as relieved."

They are not interchangeable, and the sorts of phrases they contrast with are different, as you can see. μηδείς (talk) 03:23, 22 November 2017 (UTC)

@μηδείς: Thanks once more, though what I unfortunately still don't quite get is why exactly you call it a "pleonasm" here. Is it really a pleonasm to say about something that one is not proud of it? I don't see that you could leave out either about or of in this wording.--Herfrid (talk) 12:59, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

"This is not something about which I would say I am proud of" has a built-in redundancy or pleonasm. You would either say "This is not something about which I would say I am proud" or "This is not something [which] I would say I am proud of". Which one to use depends on how formal you're trying to be. Or better yet, "I am not proud of it". ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 13:21, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

The issue, Herfrid, is that "something about which" and "of it" are both referring to the same object. The it and the something are the same. Good English usage avoids that, and good style hisses at it. μηδείς (talk) 03:16, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

@μηδείς: Thank you once more! I guess I see what you are trying to convey – however, consider e. g. this sentence for comparison: "I told you about my brother that I am very proud of him." Wouldn't you consequently have to call the "him" a redundancy here, too, then, according to your logic above? Yet, IMHO the "him" is necessary here as "that" does NOT introduce a relative clause in this case! Therefore, from a strictly grammatical POV (thus leaving out the question of style), I cannot agree to your redundancy thesis for the original instance either.--Herfrid (talk) 16:09, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

"I told you about my brother that I am very proud of him." - No native English speaker has ever been known to utter such a sentence. Possibly it could be "I told you about my brother, and that I am very proud of him." But most likely "I told you (that) I am very proud of my brother." -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 20:24, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, @JackofOz: but that phrase is indeed attested here, even if it's a hapax legomenon. μηδείς (talk) 02:08, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Silliness aside; as I said, No native English speaker has ever been known to utter such a sentence. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:04, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

"Standard German is probably the closest to Russian outside the existing Balto-Slavic languages"*

Can Medeis or someone else elaborate on that? I did once see in linguistic literature the assertion that after the Baltic branch, it is the Germanic branch that is the closest to the Slavic branch within the Indo-European family – but there was no further discussion on the matter. Personally I've always thought of the Romance languages and Greek as being closer, at least typologically, to the Slavic languages than the Germanic languages are, but that's just my uneducated opinion. I'd like to know more. --Theurgist (talk) 17:31, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

File:IndoEuropeanTree.svg has Germanic and Balto-Slavic branches leaving the tree at near the same point. I have no idea what that means, but maybe it's a start. --Jayron32 17:52, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

The article Centum and satem languages does not directly address the question, but may be of some interest. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.208.173.186 (talk) 18:14, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

• The Centum/Satem split is generally discounted as a true primitive isogloss. Slavic went through three stages of palatalization itself. The connections between Germanic and Balto-Slavic as a whole include the use of -mos instead of -bhyos in the dative/ablative and the Corded Ware culture covers their common homeland (Mallory & Adams). There is also shared vocabulary such as Leute/Ljudi (OE has a cognate found in Beowulf) for the "people", as well as the use of strong and week adjectival endings to imply something like definiteness in the noun. The best treatment of this is in Gamkrelidze and Ivanov who expend an entire chapter on the evidence for the relationship, which they find conclusive, with Germanic splitting off from Balto-Slavic prior to BS's first palatalization. Unfortunately, my copy is in storage in Massachusetts. I'll see what else I can dig up. μηδείς (talk) 18:36, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

I speak Russian, German, Spanish, and French (plus some others), and I have always felt strongly that German was the closest to Russian after the Baltic languages. The key feature of Russian, the one that causes students of Russian so much anguish, is the verbal aspect. Russian verbal aspect works predominantly by the verbal prefixes (and also by an imperfective infix -ива- similar to the Spanish -aba suffix): без-, в-, вз-, воз-, вы-, до-, за-, из-, на-, над-, недо-, низ-, о-, об-, от-, пере-, по-, под-, пона-, пре-, пред-, при-, про-, раз-, с-, у-. These verbal prefixes have prepositional/adverbial counterparts as separate words, such as: без, в, до, за, из, на, над, вниз, о, от, перед, по, под, при, про, раз, с, у. These (the prefixes and the independent words) are very reminiscent of the German verb prefixes and separable prefixes, such as: ab-, an-, auf-, aus-, be-, ein-, ent-, er-, ge-, her-, hin-, mit-, nach-, um-, ver-, vor-, weg-, zer-, zu-. Even our English, being a Germanic language, has something similar in: up, off, over, out, away, back, in, down, through, into, across, after, on, by (for example: burn up, burn down, burn in, burn out, burn into, burn off, burn through, burn across). —Stephen (talk) 12:14, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, —Stephen, that's very interesting. The phenomenon actually seems to be pan-PIE, given it occurs in Latin as well, with in-spect, ex-spect, pro-spect, con-cieve, per-ceive, and de-ceive, and soforth. I know Sanskrit has such prefixed forms, although my knowledge of it is extremely limited. One thing that struck me was that Russian treats third-person pronouns and other agreements similarly to German, with gender in the singular, but not in all instances in the plural. μηδείς (talk) 03:11, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

Why did you mention prefixes in Russian and in German, but not prefixes in English? Like the prefixes: after (aftercool, aftersee, afterthink), by (bycatch, byline, bypass), down (downbear, downclimb, download), for, (forbid, forget, forgive), in (inform, inhabit, input), off (offbear, offcast, offhold), on (onhold, onlook, onpass), out (outbid, outfit, outrage), over (overact, overcome, overthrow), under (undergo, understand, undertake), up (upgrade, upload, upset), with (withbear, withdraw, withhold), and so forth. HOTmag (talk) 08:51, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Those words Stephen provided are examples: it's so obvious to a native English speaker that these particles also form part of the verb that he wouldn't bother to mention it - e.g. "bypass" and "pass by". 92.8.221.62 (talk) 12:02, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

It's clear to me that he wanted to show examples - of English prepositions - rather than of English prefixes of verbs. Why? First, because some prepositions (being "into", "through", and "across") he provided, cannot be prefixes of any verb. Further, he chose the verb "burn" as an example for his prepositions, whereas most of the prepositions he provided with that verb (except for "burn in" and "burn out") cannot be prefixes of that verb.

Anyways, my point was as follows: He provided examples of prefixes of Russian verbs, as well as examples of prefixes of German verbs, because he wanted to explain why he had always felt strongly that German was the closest to Russian (after the Baltic languages), so I wondered why he didn't provide also prefixes of English verbs, that could show that English (besides German) could be regarded as the closest to Russian (after the Baltic languages). Got it? HOTmag (talk) 13:00, 30 November 2017 (UTC)

Glottal stops in Aussie English

Glottal stops seem to be making a resurgence in Australian English, particularly among young female TV reporters.

Expressions like "the oven", "the other one", "the apple" and so on have always been pronounced smoothly, like "theeyoven", "theeyother one", "theeyapple". But now it's become "thə oven", "thə apple" with a horribly dysphonious glottal stop in between.

Is this also happening in other Englishes? What could account for (a) the phenomenon itself, and (b) why the speakers' ears are failing to tell them how jarring and ugly these sounds are? -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 19:54, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

The linguistic process is called diaeresis, which is the breaking of vowel sounds apart (as in the word "naive"). Not about causes (linguistics doesn't have causes per se. It just has things that happen. There can be trends that are described historically, but predictive linguistics can be tricky to explain why things happen). --Jayron32 20:12, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, no. As that article explains, it's epenthesis, which is the exact opposite of diaeresis. The glottal stop keeps the vowels apart, thus preventing two vowel sounds occurring in adjacent syllables, with no intervening consonant. Henry^Flower 20:29, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, yes, you are correct. I swapped two related terms in my head. --Jayron32 13:18, 1 December 2017 (UTC)

My obsessions often line up with Jack's, but in this case not so much. I think I would use /ðiːˈʌ.vn̩/ or /ðəʔˈʌ.vn̩/ more or less interchangeably, and not necessarily remember which of the two I or another speaker had used. Californian with southern-US influences (e.g. I say "nyoo" instead of "noo", and I distinguish "caught" from "cot"). --Trovatore (talk) 20:43, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

I'm curious whether Jack's aesthetic judgment would also apply when it's Dinah Shore. In either case, it should count as a data point about "other Englishes". --Trovatore (talk) 21:04, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

Can you direct me to the exact moment(s)? I listened to it but didn't pick up any glottal stops. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:14, 27 November 2017 (UTC)

I guess he meant this moment, and again this moment: "go to the oven". HOTmag (talk) 07:44, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Ah, yes. Exactly. I listened to 7 other versions of that song (including Bing Crosby, Perry Como, Johnny Desmond, Gabardine Sisters, and Jimmy Boyd), and only one singer came even close to a glottal stop at that point (June Christy). -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 20:02, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

Well, I guess you liked the song OK. Back on topic, the Dinah Shore example seems to show that /ðəˈʔʌ.vn̩/ is not a recent innovation, at least in American English. Could be an American import in Oz? But as I say, it's a distinction I don't really notice, so it's hard for me to guess whether it's particularly American, or peculiar to a particular region. --Trovatore (talk) 21:11, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

My gut feeling is that it sounds more like a borrowing from Arabic. There seems to have developed a kind of "international ethnic" dialect that's prevalent among people living in areas where there are large numbers of immigrants (and their progeny) from many different countries (including Lebanon, Turkey and Greece). It would be impossible to say exactly what language that dialect is descended from, since it has many fathers. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:43, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I get the sense that you're talking about a much "stronger" (not sure of the right word here) glottal stop than the one Dinah uses. Is that so? --Trovatore (talk) 23:09, 28 November 2017 (UTC)

I guess so. I missed her use of it the first time, although it's as clear as day once you've heard it. But the ones I keep hearing really hit you (me) in the ear. I've been looking for some online examples, fruitlessly at this stage. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 01:25, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

• We (in the early 70's in the US) were taught that "the" is /ði/ before vowels and /ðə/ before consonants. That means it's either /ði ʌ.vn̩/ or /ðəˈʔʌ.vn̩/ with the /ʔ/ as a consonant. I follow this naturally as a matter of free variation. μηδείς (talk) 02:56, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

  That's because /i/ is a dipthong and thus already ends in a glide sound, while /ə/ is not, and thus requires at least a pause before starting a new vowel. The vocal apparatus has to transition between vowel sounds; and there's two ways to do that: with a glide or by stopping sound all together, i.e. a glottal stop. --Jayron32 15:18, 29 November 2017 (UTC)

I considered transcribing thiyoffglide, but since Ayuzdə brɔd /fonimɪk/ rather than a [fownɛt^hɪk^h] transcription, I left it out as not relevant to the OP's question. μηδείς (talk) 19:42, 29 November 2017 (UTC)