Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2009 April 15

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April 15

A word meaning misplaced nationalism

I can't for the life of me place it. I think it begins with a z, and Gordon Brown was once accused of it. In my mind, it connotes nationalism based on unfounded dogma, but in a predominantly harmless way. Much love goes to anyone who can nail this. And if I'm inventing this, then it's a great feat. Seegoon (talk) 02:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• Xenophobia? Jingoism is another possibility, but I'm not sure that I would characterize it as harmless. Deor (talk) 03:00, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

• • Jingoism! Spot on. Yeah, my mental definition was obviously pretty misguided (begins with a z?), but still. You've filled in a niggling gap. Thank you! Seegoon (talk) 03:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

There's also chauvinism. Gwinva (talk) 04:05, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Zealot?--Sonjaaa (talk) 04:33, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Ultranationalism. StuRat (talk) 13:19, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Navy SEALs

Why are US Navy SEALs referred to as "operators"? Dismas|^(talk) 03:38, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Just guessing, but I think it's because they execute "special operations". Someone who carries out operations is an operator, right? Indeterminate (talk) 10:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

That's the only conclusion that I could come to as well but I came to it on my own and thought someone might have a reliable source for the final answer. Dismas|^(talk) 15:40, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

conjugation of the english verb come in the phrase "which must shortly come to pass"

I need to know what the conjugation of the verb "come" in the phrase "which must shortly come to pass" works out to beOneofHIS (talk) 03:58, 15 April 2009 (UTC) I would appreciate your help and your answers, as this is very important to me.

The conjugation of "to come" (verbs should always be given in their infinitive form) in the context provided is "third person singular". Only I am confused about why this is so important to you... --PST 04:21, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Huh? I would think it's an infinitive...the third person singular of "to come," after all, is "comes"... -Elmer Clark (talk) 04:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

And why do you think you're the only one confused, Point-set?  :) -- JackofOz (talk) 05:27, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

It is most certainly an infinitive, modified here by the modal verb 'must'.--92.41.192.138 (talk) 05:49, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I would say it is governed rather than modified by 'must'. —Tamfang (talk) 06:14, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Modify means add/change the mode, I believe, and fits in well with the name Modal verb ('modal' also coming from 'mode'). Also, I would say it did, in fact, modify the meaning from simply happening to the necessity of it happening. I can't see how it governs it, as it does not alter any endings, as would, say, a noun for an adjective in Latin.--KageTora (talk) 10:35, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

But in linguistics, modifying is what grammatical modifiers do, and modal verbs aren't modifiers. But the relationship between a modal verb and its main verb does seem to be a kind of government. —Angr 10:55, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Beware the etymological fallacy, KageTora. While 'modify' undoubtedly is derived from the same Latin root as 'mode', its meaning today is nothing to do with modes. (The word 'mode' occurs three times in the OED entry for 'modify': once in the etymology, and twice in the definition and examples of meaning 4b, marked as Philos. and obsolete.) --ColinFine (talk) 23:30, 15 April 2009

Awesome, I appreciate the info you've given. I am trying to discover a unused way to translate the actual meaning of text recorded originally by hand in old English from other ancient languages, I don't have the education to do it on my own. I am happy that each Of you have given me a good beginning...I hope to be able to acquire a better understanding of the text by using English grammar to clarify its meaning.( in particular, the conjugation of verbs) Thanks again,oneofHIS--(talk) 03:29, 19 April 2009 (UTC)

Who knows the most number of languages?

Just out of interest, who is it that knows the most number of languages? Are there particular statistics which give the average number of languages a person may know? What about the average of this data restricted to a particular country? Europeans in particular are known to be very learned in this respect; many usually know 3-5 languages. --PST 04:31, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

See Multilingualism#Polyglots for some candidates. -Elmer Clark (talk) 04:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure you can generalise about Europeans. We British are infamous for being exceptionally poor at learning foreign languages, possibly because of our years of empire, which fostered the belief that rather than learning Hindi or Malay you could just shout loudly in English at your bearer or your amah and possibly hit them with a stick and they'd jolly soon understand you. In Europe (and this is my own WP:OR and WP:POV) it tends to be people from countries which speak less widely-spoken languages such as Dutch or Danish who are more fluent in the "commoner" languages (a case in point, a relative of mine is Danish and is trilingual in Danish, English and Romansh; she's brought up her children in the UK as English-only monoglot; her view is, "Who speaks Danish?" Please note I intend no slur on the Danish language or people here Tonywalton ^Talk 09:52, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Not bothering to learn the local language during the days of the Empire is a myth or false stereotype. I've read a fair amount of autobiographical accounts from those times, and being able to speak the local language was commonplace. It may have been that not being able to speak the local language was rare, but I have not done a statistical study. Usually the purpose of being in the colonies was to interact with the locals in some way, such as being a judge or planter for example, so knowing the language was essential. Many british people would have been born in the country and brought up by local nannies, so they often would have spoken the local language before they spoke english. See Rudyard Kipling. New entrants to the colonial service had to have a degree, although I'm not sure how far back that went, and I would guess they would be required to learn the local language otherwise there would be little point in employing them. I think I have a faint memory of reading about someone having to learn a local language before being sent out. Even common soldiers posted there picked up some of the local langaguage which in some cases became part of (now old-fashioned) British slang eg char for tea. 78.149.207.226 (talk) 12:46, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

I can totally understand a Dane learning English, but Romansh seems a little strange. I would have thought that she would probably have learned German or French before learning Romansh as a second (third, fourth ...) language. Do you know the circumstances around her learning Romansh? -- 128.104.112.117 (talk) 14:53, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In a nutshell: Born in Denmark, parents Swiss and spent a lot of time travelling for work, she spent a lot of time with her Romansh-speaking grandparents in the Arosa region. She does speak German, but freely admits mine is better. Tonywalton ^Talk 15:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In countries where the modern political boundaries (i.e. borders) were drawn up by colonial powers after they left, you will find that the majority of people will have at least a working knowledge of a number of languages in each area.--KageTora (talk) 10:31, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

For some of these areas, you might like to look at List of multilingual countries and regions. Best, WikiJedits (talk) 14:28, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

According to the map on that article, Sweden has no official language. Is this true?--KageTora (talk) 16:50, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Yup. Somewhat paradoxically, it does have legally-recognized minority languages though. --Pykk (talk) 10:53, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

In areas with a large number of tourists from various European countries, you will often find locals with amazing linguistic abilities. For example, in Marrakech, many of those working the tourist trade speak a Berber dialect, colloquial Moroccan Arabic, Modern Standard Arabic, French, and one or more of Spanish, English, German and Italian. The really gifted ones will also know some Russian and Portuguese. These are small shopkeepers, waiters, guides, etc, who do not otherwise have much formal education. --Xuxl (talk) 13:51, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

This reminds me of an incident — I spent some months in Switzerland, where instead of soixante-quinze ('sixty-fifteen') they say septante-cinq ('seventy-five'). During that time I visited Tunisia, where a shopkeeper said soixante-quinze and then, seeing my mute distress, repeated septante-cinq. —Tamfang (talk) 19:50, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Spaniards who visit their supposed hispanophone cousins in Latin and South America often think they've come to the wrong country, due to the large amount of different vocab used in different Spanish-speaking countries. Also true in the anglosphere, but to a lesser degree. -- JackofOz (talk) 20:55, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

When I was in Nepal, I found that most people spoke near perfect English, as well as Nepali, plus numerous other local languages, and Hindi. This included kids as young as 5, and beggars on the streets, who had had no education whatsoever.--KageTora (talk) 16:45, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

The Filipino-Chinese I know can speak Fokkien, Mandarin, Tagalog, and English fluently. bibliomaniac15 The annual review... 03:28, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks for all of your comments! I am somewhat sure that most schools in Europe teach both Greek and Latin. Germans are usually likely to learn French as their second language (I think) but some choose to learn English also. I am very interested in linguistics but know not much about it. Going onto a different topic, are there common languages (apart from Esperanto, Ido and other man-made languages) whose grammar is very simple, and contains very few irregularities (irregular verbs, irregular formation of plurals of nouns, many distinct conjugations...). In my experience of language learning, I have seen Bengali and Afrikaans to have simple grammatical structure. Of course, the most common of languages tend to be more complex. Thankyou for any examples and comments! --PST 11:06, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Usually, in Germany, you would learn English as your second language (or "Erste Fremdsprache", "First Foreign Language"). I did French first, and that was followed by Latin and Ancient Greek (but that wasn't common 25 years ago, and is even less common now). Lectonar (talk) 12:22, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, if you dislike irregular words, any isolating language will be just what you're searching for, as these have no morphology that could ever be irregular. That doesn't always make them "very simple", however, as they tend to express a lot using all kinds of syntactic constructions. MuDavid 15:21, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Swahili and Turkish are known for having very regular grammar. However, their vocabulary can be challenging for the typical Westerner, and in the case of Turkish, the grammar may be regular but it features a number of concepts unfamiliar to most English speakers (case endings, unusual verb tenses, etc). Grammatical exceptions are only one of many possible sources of linguistic complexity.

On another point you made, the teaching of Latin and Greek is pretty much dead in the standard European curriculum. The advantage many Europeans have is that most EU countries encourage the mandatory teaching of two foreign languages to all secondary school students, which is usually English plus the language of a neighbouring country. --Xuxl (talk) 15:33, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

P.V. Narasimha Rao ([1]) knew 13 languages. Even though most of them are Indian languages he also spoke French, Arabic, Spanish and Persian.

I need help understanding two lines in an article.

I'm reading an article on retention that says:
"“Successful” retained students were significantly more ready than all retained students on their early readiness measures. (...) “Successful” or “highly successful” retained students did not appear to have initial scores on any of their early readiness measures, indicating that they were initially significantly delayed."
Is the following interpretation correct: - all retained students were initially significantly delayed on their early readiness measures, but the successful retained students were less delayed than all retained students.??? Lova Falk (talk) 07:20, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

You might be right. That looks like one of the most egregious examples of gibberish or possibly technobabble I've seen in a while. Tonywalton ^Talk 09:37, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Isn't it terrible! The whole article is written in this way. :( Lova Falk (talk) 10:14, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Is it a Wikipedia article, or an article from somewhere else? —Angr 10:17, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

No, if it was a Wikipedia article, I could put tags and ask the editor.... This is the source: P. Ferguson, S.R. Jimerson and M.K. Dalton, 2001. Sorting out successful failures: Exploratory analyses of factors associated with academic and behavioral outcomes of retained students. Psychology in the Schools, Vol. 38(4). Lova Falk (talk) 10:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Well, I don't pretend to understand what all (or even any of) these technical terms mean, but if "successful" or "highly successful" retained students did not appear to have initial scores on any of their early readiness measures, how can they be judged to have been significantly more ready than all retained students on their early readiness measures? If I don't have a score on some scale, how can you compare me on that scale to other people? —Angr 10:59, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Maybe they were judged mainly on the "later" scores of the early readiness measures. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 11:04, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I don't think we can infer anything about the delayedness of the retained students that weren't "successful" or "highly successful". Zain Ebrahim (talk) 11:07, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I think we can though. "Successful" retained students were more ready than all retained students, therefore students that were not successful should be less ready than successful students. Lova Falk (talk) 18:47, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Of course, but that's not what I'm talking about. Given your extract, we can only compare "successful" (or "highly successful") retained students with other retained students regarding their readiness. We have no basis to compare them reagrding how delayed they were initially. If readiness is somehow related to the how delayed they were, you need to give us more information. Zain Ebrahim (talk) 07:15, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I think the problem is mostly with that comma. I don't know if it's what they meant, but it parses better for me if I ignore it. The comment seems to be regarding the validity of the "initial scores". "Successful students did the best on the initial readiness tests. Successful (or highly successful) retained students did not have initial scores indicating any delays." The point appears to be that the initial test did a good job of identifying which students would become successful. Why they didn't just say that is a mystery. Matt Deres (talk) 15:39, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

A completely different interpretation! Wow. Sigh. Lova Falk (talk) 18:47, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

We aim to please! My interpretation is based largely upon that comma being a typo, because the sentence makes no sense to me with it being there. "“Successful” or “highly successful” retained students did not appear to have initial scores on any of their early readiness measures..." seems nonsensical in itself. They had no scores? It doesn't work. Removing some of the jargon and peacock phrasing, we get "Successful students did not appear to have scores on any of their tests, indicating that they were initially retarded." Well, I suppose if they were so dumb that they couldn't figure out how to mark down answers on the test, that would account for them not having scores, but it doesn't explain how they later became successful ;-). Removing the comma makes the "...indicating..." portion modify the score, which then makes sense. In any case, that editor needs to be thrown down a well or something. Matt Deres (talk) 20:16, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Surely "projected in a vertically-enhanced direction with reference to the prevailing plane surface within, a tube intended for the accessing of hydrological resources". Tonywalton ^Talk 20:25, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I think the passage makes more sense if you change the first instance of "early" to "late", and change "initial" to "initially higher". If you do that, it reads:

"“Successful” retained students were significantly more ready than all retained students on their earlylate readiness measures. (...) “Successful” or “highly successful” retained students did not appear to have initially higher scores on any of their early readiness measures, indicating that they were initially significantly delayed."

This would mean that successful/highly successful retained students didn't stand out when first tested but showed much better scores in later tests. I suppose this could be due to some combination of natural aptitude or more effective teaching or better study methods. I don't know if this is what the authors intended, but rewriting it this way makes the passage more intelligible to me. You should try to find out if there was an error correction in a later issue of that journal. LovesMacs (talk) 03:16, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Gerund v. verbal noun

I've always understood a gerund (in English) to be any nominal usage of a verb ending in "ing". However someone has suggested to me that a distinction should be drawn between gerunds and verbal nouns, claiming that gerunds can take direct and indirect objects and can be modified by adverbs, as in this sentence:

"Constantly eating chips is good for you."

And that a verbal noun can only take prepositional objects, and is modified with adjectives and articles, as in this sentence:

"The constant eating of chips is good for you."

So is this person justified in making a distinction between gerunds and verbal nouns, or are both of those cases gerunds? --Lazar Taxon (talk) 14:48, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

It is my understanding that a gerund is a verbal noun. Your friend may be confusing it with a participle with which it shares similar form in some uses. // BL \\ (talk) 17:22, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

No, you've misread my question. My friend is not confusing anything with a participle; he's suggesting a distinction (gerund versus verbal noun) between two things that I've considered gerunds. --Lazar Taxon (talk) 17:32, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Hmm, it's a good question. It's clearer in cases where the gerund and the verbal noun have different forms, like "destroying" and "destruction": "Constantly destroying cities is fun" vs. "The constant destruction of cities is fun" (cf. *"Constantly destruction cities is fun"). —Angr 17:56, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Is "destruction" a verbal noun (a description I have only heard before in respect of gerunds) or is it just a noun, or is it really a gerund? My grammar terminology is very old-fashioned and I may well have missed a lot of changes. Is "tion" a marker for something now known as a "verbal noun"? // BL \\ (talk) 18:15, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

You can also say "the constant destroying of cities" though, although it sounds kind of weird. Adam Bishop (talk) 19:22, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

BL, I wouldn't say verbal nouns are a different part of speech from nouns; they're a kind of noun. So yes, "destruction" is just a noun, specifically a verbal noun because of its semantics (it denotes an action) and its morphology (it's related to a verb). It's gerunds that are neither fish nor fowl - they're sort of like verbs (in being modified by adverbs and in taking direct objects) and they're sort of like nouns (in being able to be the subject or the direct object of a finite verb). However, having said this, it occurs to me that the verbal nouns of Celtic languages like Irish and Welsh are not exactly like English gerunds or English verbal nouns; they have some properties of both. So maybe the exact definition and properties of gerunds and verbal nouns differ from language to language. —Angr 21:13, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Angr, I'm sure they (gerunds and verbal nouns) do differ from language to language. In Russian, for example, the so-called 'gerund' is not a noun at all, but a sort of indeclinable adjective. But I don't think there is any justification for claiming a distinction between the two in English. The distinction proposed above is in any case a syntactic distinction, not a classification of the words. (Peter Daniels, no doubt among others, denies a distinction between the 'gerund' and the 'present participle' in English: since they invariably have the same form, he thinks it absurd to give them different names according to their different syntactic roles. If you search dejanews for sci.lang, daniels and gerund you'll find something on this fairly quickly). --ColinFine (talk) 23:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Pronunciation of "MRSA"

Should the name for these bacteria be pronounced "em are ess ay", with each letter sounded out, or is the quasi-phonetic "mere-sah" also acceptable? I'm planning to mention these bacteria in a speech, and which pronunciation will be more clearly understood? 69.224.37.48 (talk) 16:14, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I (in the south of England) have never heard any pronunciation other than the spelt-out one, and probably would not understand any other pronunciation unless it was explained. Algebraist 16:25, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In hospitals in southern Ontario (Canada), it is called "marsah", (where the "a" and the "r" are both pronounced) by nurses and doctors. (I have never heard "mer-sah".) Within a hosptital, context is not a problem. Those who have had it also call it "marsah" outside the hospital. You won't be misunderstood if you spell out each letter; you might be misunderstood if you don't. Going with the letters is safer then, unless your audience is an "inside" group that has a pronunciation. I would ask the sponsors. // BL \\ (talk) 17:17, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I'm pleased to say that I have no personal experience with this acronym, but I did see a TV report on it once, probably the one on 60 Minutes a few years back, where they pronounced it mer-sah. Until then I'd always assumed it would be pronounced as initials. In a speech, the obvious solution is to use all three forms -- the full name, the initials, and one of the "quasi-phonetic" styles -- at first mention, then go with one of the short forms afterwards. --Anonymous, 18:1 UTC, April 15, 2009.

Ditto Algebraist. I was 38 minutes into an episode of House before I cottoned on! - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 19:45, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I think I heard /ˈmɝsə/ sometimes, but far less often than /ˌɛmɑɹɛsˈɛɪ/, when I worked for a hospital in California. (I'm bookmarking IPA chart for English dialects!) —Tamfang (talk) 19:41, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

If you're in the UK or Commonwealth, you'll need to spell it out. I've never heard it pronounced as a word, and never knew until this thread that anyone did. Gwinva (talk) 20:00, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

In the states I've heard "mer-sa." bibliomaniac15 The annual review... 22:21, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

As have I: mur-sah. Grsz¹¹ 03:22, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

"Ferry... cross the MRSA..." —Angr 08:27, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Not funny, Angr. I am actually a scouser, living very close to the Mersey (you can see it from my bedroom), and my Aunt recently died of MRSA in Warrington Hospital. And to recount the OP's question, it is only ever spelled out in the UK.--KageTora (talk) 08:55, 18 April 2009 (UTC)

"Arschgeburt"

Is this newly created article correct? 3DES, on behalf of decltype (talk) 17:36, 15 April 2009 (UTC) Update: Apparently not, but still, what does it mean? 3DES, on behalf of decltype (talk) 17:39, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

According to the deletion summary 'ass birth'. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 17:49, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

Yes, I noticed that, but I did some initial research, and found this de:Arschgeburt. So I figured there was something more to it. 3DES, on behalf of decltype (talk) 17:53, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

There were several texts that were deleted, the first said that 'An ass birth is a creature that is born in the ass (anal)' but were deleted for similar reasons. I have no idea if that's an actual used street definition, though. - Jarry1250 ^{(t, c)} 17:59, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I've never heard it used in German slang, but I doubt it would ever be intended literally. If it exists at all, it's probably just an all-purpose insult. I have heard Arschgesicht (ass-face) and Missgeburt (literally baby born with a birth defect, but used colloquially as a general insult), so this could be a portmanteau of those two. —Angr 18:10, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

On the de WP we also have deleted edits containing (to paraphrase) "similar to a pukebirth except that's through the mouth" and a later deleted edit offering "National Socialists" as a definition for this. Looks like what new pages controllers call pure vandalism. Tonywalton ^Talk 19:34, 15 April 2009 (UTC)

I thought I might have heard it applied to ideas, rather than humans. As in a dumb thought you pulled out of your ass. But superficial googling didn't yield any examples of this usage. On the other hand, googling "Arschgeburt eines" ("of a ..." <masculine or neuter>) and especially "Arschgeburt einer" ("of a ..." <feminine>) gives some colorful examples of apparent usage. ---Sluzzelin talk 12:06, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Alright, I did find a few examples online, where "Arschgeburt" refers to an idea or concept, rather than a human being: In this metaphorical sense, I found mostly political "ass births", such as a blogger's characterization of how Schlingensief perceives the German reunification in his movie The German Chainsaw Massacre, or referring to the European Union ("Die gesamte real existierende Europäische Union ist eine Arschgeburt.") and the Third Reich ("Das sogenannte “Dritte Reich” war eine Arschgeburt der Weimarer Republik"), but also the Universal Media Disc as an example of a techonological "ass birth". Songs such as Rhymin Simon's "Arschgeburt" (featuring Mach One and Frauenarzt), or the rhyming title "Kurt, die Arschgeburt" mean it as an insult toward specific people, however. ---Sluzzelin talk 13:37, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

I see, very nice explanation, thanks. decltype (talk) 14:04, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

"Arschgeburt" (like Angr, I have never heard it) may be a parallel term to the German word "Hirngeburt", which, again, describes a concept and does not apply to any living organism. As far as I understand it, a Hirngeburt is a - somewhat theoretical - idea born out of dissatisfaction with some status quo. It is generally used in a critical sense, or, at least, implies that the concept needs significant development and improvement. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 16:05, 16 April 2009 (UTC)

Thanks Cookatoo, I was passively looking for the original but couldn't place it, and now it all makes sense. "Arschgeburt" must be an Arschgeburt of "Hirngeburt". ---Sluzzelin talk 18:04, 16 April 2009 (UTC)