Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2012 December 24

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December 24

Christine Moore

Christine Moore is an English-speaker or French speaker ? Fête (talk) 02:35, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Almost all the videos I can find of her are either her speaking French, or are obviously dubbed over by an English-speaking translator. The one exception is this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MpI1O1YTQ2Q, in which she sounds really hesitant and nonfluent-- so much that it's possible that she's just reading phonetically. At any rate, her first language is definitely French. 209.159.255.226 (talk) 05:16, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Japanese word "no"

In a lot of Japanese videogame titles (and some anime), I see the word "no" in the title. What does it mean? I assume it's a fairly common word since it appears so often. --108.84.189.25 (talk) 03:28, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

It's the genitive particle, see Japanese particles; it basically means "of". If it helps you remember, it is cognate with the Finnish language and English language -en ending, as in "wooden" i.e., "of wood". μηδείς (talk) 04:03, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Very doubtful -- such cognate relationships cannot be demonstrated by accepted methods of comparative/historical linguistics. AnonMoos (talk) 06:08, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Such skepticism is the fashionable party line in the US, but it's belied by the large suite of evidence available in the works of Nicholas Poppe, Björn Collinder and Michael Fortescue, among others. See Indo-Uralic languages as a starting point. μηδείς (talk) 18:11, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

The idea that a systematic "genealogical" relationship between proto-Indo-European and any other linguistic family can be demonstrated by accepted methods in historical/comparative linguistics has never received broad mainstream support among relevant scholars. It might be more accurate to state that a number of such hypotheses are supported by various individuals in countries formerly part of the Soviet Union, with some scattered support from outside the ex-Soviet states. A cognate connection between Indo-European and Japanese could only be made as part of some kind of "ultra-Altaic" hypothesis, which might seem a little extreme even among some circles of "lumpers"... AnonMoos (talk) 21:59, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Name calling is boring, and the facts speak for themselves, as Indo-Uralic shows. Neither Poppe nor Collinder nor Fortescue (credited with demonstrating Dene-Yeniseian) is or was a Soviet citizen. Let me know when you've read Fortescue or the others. Anybody interested in the topic is invited to leave a message on my talk page if they want further recommended references. μηδείς (talk) 05:14, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Oops-that was a mistake, Fortescue only discussed the Dene-Yeniseian hypothesis. Ruhlen was the first to formulate it and give prima facie evidence--Vajda demonstrated it conclusively. μηδείς (talk) 12:30, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Whatever -- some theories of external Indo-European connections (though not necessarily a Japanese-Indo-European connection!) have some lively minority support, but they are simply not mainstream at this point (nor are they rapidly gaining support among relevant scholars, as far as I can tell). Since you are evidently not a linguist, I'm not sure what the point of you trying to tell linguists their business is... AnonMoos (talk) 05:50, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

P.S. The contrast between "lumpers" and "splitters" is fairly well-known in some areas of linguistics, anthropology etc., and is not necessarily derogatory. We even have an article Lumpers and splitters, which includes the following quote: "Much long-range comparison work has been from Russian linguists like Vladislav Illich-Svitych and Sergei Starostin. In the US, Greenberg's and Ruhlen's work has been well publicized, though it has met with little acceptance from linguists."... AnonMoos (talk) 05:57, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Your addressing me like a valley girl (what...ever...) and challenging my credentials followed by a need to attack the strawman of Indo-Japanese (!) is cute, and then to return to attack the Soviets, again, is adorable AnonMoos. Your behavior makes me wonder if you are an avatar of Lyle Campbell's? Even then I wouldn't be interested in your personal opinion when the sources are published and available for comparison. μηδείς (talk) 02:01, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

It's nice that you have an interest in languages and linguistics, and you can certainly contribute to many discussions on linguistic matters without having any particular professional credentials or qualifications. However, sometimes (as at present), when you make simplistic dogmatic sweeping pronouncements on large controversial issues, you are unfortunately going beyond your area of apparent competence, and entering into a zone where a lack of academic linguistic experience does make a difference. AnonMoos (talk) 03:51, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

"Indo-Japanese" (your word) is not a strawman if it's essential to your original assertion. —Tamfang (talk) 23:15, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

Never mind the remoteness of the purported kinship, the semantics don't match well enough for my taste: wooden is not a possessive form, and I'm not aware that Japanese no can mean 'of' in the sense 'made of (material)'. So I wouldn't recommend using that comparison even as an arbitrary mnemonic. (In Finnish, on another hand, n is the possessive suffix iirc.) —Tamfang (talk) 23:15, 26 June 2013 (UTC)

See wikt:no#Japanese.—Wavelength (talk) 06:41, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Medeis is right in that it acts as a sort of genitive particle. It is basically 'of', but comes after the word it refers to. (To complicate things further, in female Japanese, it can also be a particle at the end of a sentence expressing a question, or emphasising an answer, depending on the intonation). KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 07:29, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

I prefer to think of it as meaning "'s" rather than meaning "of". --ColinFine (talk) 11:41, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

That's the way I thought of it, and I think the answer the OP was looking for. To pick random examples

• Fist of the North Star "北斗の拳" "Hokuto no Ken" could be parsed as "Northern Star's Fist"
• Ballad of a Shinigami "しにがみのバラッド" "Shinigami no Baraddo" could be parsed as "Shinigami's Ballad"

As for の/no as a sentence-final particle, that would appear to me unlikely to appear in titles.

And for what it's worth, here's episode 71 of Feirudo Japanizu Rānā no Monogatari ("Story of a Failed Japanese Learner", or for the purposes of this discussion "Failed Japanese Learner's Story). The first time I ever understood Japanese outside the classroom was this discussion with a lecturer's six year old son.

[MaruMaru-kun]: どこ へ いくの？ ("doko e iku no?" "Where are you going?)

[Me]: To the Student Union building.

[MaruMaru-kun]: 一緒に, 一緒に! ("issho ni, issho ni!" Literally "With you, with you!", in context, "Can I go with you?")

[Me]: You'll have to ask your mum first.

--Shirt58 (talk) 09:18, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

When you say it is unlikely to appear in titles, I have seen it many times in manga, anime, and games. In fact, a quick Google search told me that the Japanese Wikipedia has an article about a "love-adventure game" called "何処へ行くの、あの日?" (Where are you going on that day?). KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 19:03, 27 December 2012 (UTC)

kung fu

Can the word kung fu be pronounced /ˈkʊŋ ˈfuː/ ? Fête (talk) 15:31, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Sure, knock yourself out. Matt Deres (talk) 19:33, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

... or read the answer provided for you when you asked the same question at Wiktionary. Dbfirs 15:34, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

ticket

Can the word ticket be pronounced /ˈtɪkɛt/ ? Fête (talk) 21:01, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Yup. I have a question for you: Can 'Fête' be pronounced as "I am a troll, and on the way to being blocked from the Wikipedia Reference Desks for repeated behaviour despite several warnings"? KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 21:18, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Yeah, seems legit.203.112.82.2 (talk) 21:45, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

He's tempting fête. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 04:27, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Fate comes to us all, BB. Life starts as fetal and ends as fatal. KägeTorä - (影虎) (TALK) 07:01, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

And it's accompanied by a never-ending supply of fecal. -- Jack of Oz ^[Talk] 07:08, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

another name for peephole lenses

Hi and merry christmas everyone!

Kurt Vonnegut in one of his novels used the word 'whosit' or some variation of that to talk about the fisheye lens peepholes in apartment doors. Can anyone tell me what the exact word is, I can't get it through google?

Thanks - Adambrowne666 (talk) 21:19, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

He uses "whoozit" in Timequake (e.g. "fitted with a whoozit, or peephole, which could also be closed and locked"). ---Sluzzelin talk 22:20, 24 December 2012 (UTC)

Excellent, thanks, Sluzzelin. Nice to see you again! (Yeah, I remember reading that word and thinking it would remain in use, but 'peephole' seems to have overtaken it - though the latter is really too general - doesn't describe the little fisheye lens set into the door...) Adambrowne666 (talk) 09:43, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

As an irrelevant, but possibly interesting aside: In German it's called "Türspion" ("door spy") or just "Spion" ("spy"). In Italian too, it's called "spioncino" ("little spy"). But my favorite is French, where it is often called "Judas optique" ("optical Judas"). ---Sluzzelin talk 14:12, 25 December 2012 (UTC)

Lovely. I wonder if many studies have been done looking at the ways people from different cultures approach certain everyday items based how those items are named - I might be less likely to use an optical Judas than a whoozit, for example... Adambrowne666 (talk) 05:21, 26 December 2012 (UTC)

Morphologically similar to fr:Vasistas from German Was ist das? (what is that?). --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 20:00, 28 December 2012 (UTC)