Today I learned something about the infamous "Junk"

[snowblizz]

I just want to point out that English is your third language and yet you speak it better than like 80% of native speakers.

I believe you mean I *type* it very well. Benefits of the world's best primary school system. And like I was saying, absolutely works more like a second language.
The point I was trying to make clear though was that any point I make about "America centricness" comes as an outsider. Because I know I can fake being a native speaker quite well online.

And today I learned that both Swedish and English are both Germanic languages. I always had in my head that English was a Romance language due to how much French/Italian/whatever I'm able to read just by knowing English. Turns out that's just a combination of Roman influence and English's tendency of bonking other languages on the head and rummaging through their pockets for handy words.

An interesting thing I learnt some years ago is that English and Scandinavian languages are much more similar than what has been thought. Unlike other languages English took words from, when it comes to Scandinavian languages (or more properly ancient Norse I guess) English seems to have taken on grammar and other linguistic structure. It may well be that English tried mugging the wrong viking in a York backstreet and that today's English is really Norse wearing a stolen coat with 1 previous owner.

A good education system which introduces them to English right off the bat would be my guess. That's why my English is as good as it is (that, and continuous practice, mind you... some of my school fellows have by now managed to forget what they learnt).

GW

That's absolutely one major factor. The other part is probably as Quebbster suggests being thoroughly exposed to English language by getting the vast majority of English speaking programming with text and not dubbed. Not to mention being so exposed to "anglo-saxon" culture too. Other European countries have large domestic markets, in Scandinavia we got to fill the void with something, and that something is usually something in English.

Hm. I wonder if the rest of Europe has a similar problem with the European Union.

Well the English might (see what I did there?)*, but then again since last year we stopped careing what they thought about the matter. Today though, the EU covers the vast majority of countries that would be described as "European", and quite a few of those left aspire to join.



*In many places UK, Britain and England are essentially synonymous, I hazard to say most europeans who speak about England mean the whole thing ruled by the iron fist of Queen Bessy Deux and not just the Southern 2/3rds or however much it is.

[factotum]

An interesting thing I learnt some years ago is that English and Scandinavian languages are much more similar than what has been thought. Unlike other languages English took words from, when it comes to Scandinavian languages (or more properly ancient Norse I guess) English seems to have taken on grammar and other linguistic structure.

Parts of what are now England were actually under Scandinavian rule for well over a century--see the Danelaw, which existed from around 800AD to 954AD. The languages mingled a lot back then.

[Peelee]

*In many places UK, Britain and England are essentially synonymous, I hazard to say most europeans who speak about England mean the whole thing ruled by the iron fist of Queen Bessy Deux and not just the Southern 2/3rds or however much it is.

Yeah, but it's not like England is a real country or anything. He says as he starts making for the exit, whistling innocuously.

[snowblizz]

Parts of what are now England were actually under Scandinavian rule for well over a century--see the Danelaw, which existed from around 800AD to 954AD. The languages mingled a lot back then.

In addition to language skills my primary school taught me history and geography thank-you-very-much.

Neither before nor since has English borrowed so many fundamental words and underlying grammar, it was argued IIRC. Unlike later on and how it normally goes, not only did English take words for new things, but they replaced existing basic words for everyday occurences.

This article http://sciencenordic.com/english-scandinavian-language here explains the idea quite nicely. I find it rather compelling.

[Samzat]

So we started this talking about Hinjo's junk and ended up in linguistics? Only on GitP would this, and not the opposite, occur
samzat scared. talky men all over, talk so brain hurt

[factotum]

In addition to language skills my primary school taught me history and geography thank-you-very-much.

The Danelaw isn't something I learned in history at my school here in the UK--history pretty much started at 1066 as far as they were concerned. I guess the reach might have got a bit broader if I'd studied history at higher level, but alas, I went the physics/mathematics route.

[Onyavar]

So we started this talking about Hinjo's junk and ended up in linguistics? [...]

Naturally.

Well, I wonder how the Chinese would think about this comic. After all, a junk is just a '帆船' (fanchuan) in chinese. The first of the characters means 'sail'. The second 'boat'. Boat has a sail? --> Junk. (except that the Chinese noticed there are other types of ships, eventually, and renamed their junks into "chinese sailing boat".

Imagine how hard it must be to translate the joke into Chinese!

Well, I just think that America-centric behavior is a negative and needs to be called out publicly. We all need to think globally if we're ever going to make any progress. I never realized how inaccessible a lot of the humor is before this thread.

Hm. I wonder if the rest of Europe has a similar problem with the European Union.

The rest of Europe isn't that much, actually. Some countries who really want to join but aren't yet allowed, and some others who are so well off that they don't need to join the club.

This stuff about "America != USA" is a load of stink, in my opinion. The same people (in Europe and all over the world) who whine about this pervasive "American culture" as a bad thing, are probably not complaining about Fajitas, Samba and cuban cigars. No, they mean movies, software, coke and burgers, and they feel bad about having access to - or god-forbid even enjoying - these products.

Who do you call "American", "European" (or "Asian")? It boils down to the question if you feel that you're part of an identity behind that name. "Europe", like "America", is a political fiction. The more people believe in it, the more they're part of this identity, this fiction. And the more united they can be about it. Be it good or bad or neither.

[P.S. I'll shut up now, before I start becoming political]

[2D8HP]

Parts of what are now England were actually under Scandinavian rule for well over a century--see the Danelaw, which existed from around 800AD to 954AD. The languages mingled a lot back then.

Don't forget the MOST IMPORTANT legacy of the Scandanavian occupation of Britain:

This Song!

[Dr.Zero]

Also, did you guys hear about the pun that (supposedly) works in every language?

Where do cats go when they die? Purrgatory. (English)
¿A dónde van los gatos cuando mueren? Purgatorio. (Spanish)
‘Dove vanno i gatti quando muoiono? Nel purGATTOrio’ (Italian)
Où vont les chats quand ils meurent? Au purCHATtoire” (French)
“Para onde os gatos vão quando morrem? Para o purGATOrio” (Portugese)
Billiyan marne ke baad kahan jaati hain? Purrlok (Hindi)

I don't know if any of these make sense, I'm just quoting unverified stuff off the internet.

It works in italian (I heard it before) and it seems legit in spanish and portuguese, for what I can say.
But, oh my, you'd get a lot of rolling eyes with this one.

[Peelee]

I just want to point out that English is your third language and yet you speak it better than like 80% of native speakers.


Also, did you guys hear about the pun that (supposedly) works in every language?

Where do cats go when they die? Purrgatory. (English)
¿A dónde van los gatos cuando mueren? Purgatorio. (Spanish)
‘Dove vanno i gatti quando muoiono? Nel purGATTOrio’ (Italian)
Où vont les chats quand ils meurent? Au purCHATtoire” (French)
“Para onde os gatos vão quando morrem? Para o purGATOrio” (Portugese)
Billiyan marne ke baad kahan jaati hain? Purrlok (Hindi)

I don't know if any of these make sense, I'm just quoting unverified stuff off the internet.

Also, there's a man of comedy - really, a man of legend - who was able to make countless jokes work in across virtually every culture.

Spoiler: A true joke that transcends all language.

Show

[dtilque]

Don't forget the MOST IMPORTANT legacy of the Scandanavian occupation of Britain:

This Song!

And this important contribution

[2D8HP]

And this important contribution

Well done.

Well done indeed.

[Bohandas]

I just want to point out that English is your third language and yet you speak it better than like 80% of native speakers.


Also, did you guys hear about the pun that (supposedly) works in every language?

Where do cats go when they die? Purrgatory. (English)
¿A dónde van los gatos cuando mueren? Purgatorio. (Spanish)
‘Dove vanno i gatti quando muoiono? Nel purGATTOrio’ (Italian)
Où vont les chats quand ils meurent? Au purCHATtoire” (French)
“Para onde os gatos vão quando morrem? Para o purGATOrio” (Portugese)
Billiyan marne ke baad kahan jaati hain? Purrlok (Hindi)

I don't know if any of these make sense, I'm just quoting unverified stuff off the internet.

The italian, franch and portugese versions rely on a different cat pun than the english version (the spanish and hndi versions may too, I'm not sure)

[Knaight]

The italian, franch and portugese versions rely on a different cat pun than the english version (the spanish and hndi versions may too, I'm not sure)

I suspect it does; I can't verify the standard onomatopoeia for a purr in Spanish but can verify that there's a pun in "Purgatorio" involving the word for cat (gato).

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I can't verify the standard onomatopoeia for a purr in Spanish

"Ronronear", so it does not work as a pun of purgatory.

GW

[Knaight]

"Ronronear", so it does not work as a pun of purgatory.

GW

I assume that it has heavily rolled "r"s?

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I assume that it has heavily rolled "r"s?

Thankfully Spanish, unlike English, has really strong rules, with few or no exceptions. The rule for 'r's is that an 'r' is "rolled" (in Spanish, it's called "strong r") when not surrounded by vowels (including when it's the first letter of the word). Therefore, ronronear does indeed have two strong ("rolled") 'r's. I'd have to check with a local if the last one too is considered a strong R, though - I think it technically is, but not sure it can be pronounced as such - I can't anyway.

Words that call for a strong r between two vowels double the 'r' to indicate this - the classic example I'm sure I've seen in every one of my Spanish language books is pera (pear) vs perra (female dog). Since perra can carry the same connotations as English's "bitch", you don't want to get them confused.

Grey Wolf

[Cazero]

The italian, franch and portugese versions rely on a different cat pun than the english version (the spanish and hndi versions may too, I'm not sure)

The french version also breaks pronunciation of the original word to make the word for cat apparent. You can't simply emphasise a part of the word, and it radically changes the feel of the pun.

[Dr.Zero]

The italian, franch and portugese versions rely on a different cat pun than the english version (the spanish and hndi versions may too, I'm not sure)

Of course for the different reasons, yet it works.

The french version also breaks pronunciation of the original word to make the word for cat apparent. You can't simply emphasise a part of the word, and it radically changes the feel of the pun.

I don't know about french, but, for example, in italian, that is pretty simple to accomplish.
"Pur-(little beat)-gatto-(little beat)-rio."

Not sure if it works in french, since it depends on the fact that you can syllabify the word without changing the phonetic result of the totality. (Which happens normally for italian words).

[Wardog]

Parts of what are now England were actually under Scandinavian rule for well over a century--see the Danelaw, which existed from around 800AD to 954AD. The languages mingled a lot back then.

Ditto for Scotland and Ireland (mostly Norwegians, I think, rather than Danes as in England).

Spoiler: Map of Viking expansion and settlement

Show

Consequently Scots and Scots English have a lot of Norse influences as well.

[hamishspence]

Yup - mostly the islands (Orkney, for example, was Norse from 875 to 1472)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scandinavian_Scotland

[137beth]

I initially thought that it was just an old, battered boat, and hence could be considered trash (i.e., "junk") by anyone who isn't desperately trying to evacuate as many people as possible and needs every boat that even has a chance of setting sale.

[Lissou]

I didn't know either meaning when I read the strip, but I picked up both of them from context. I did know the meaning of "garbage" though.

[Vinyadan]

Hm. I wonder if the rest of Europe has a similar problem with the European Union.

I think Europe (and the EU) is just too diverse linguistically and culturally to have this kind of problem because of something as recent as the EU.

Now, if you go "Ukrainians are Russians", that is very very widespread, and they will accurately explain you the story of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and anything else before and after.

Another one is not being able to tell Norway and Sweden apart. And that Finland speaks something Germanic.

And the best one is thinking Rumanians are Slavs, which is also quite widespread (they are linguistically Latin). Or that Roma = Rumanian. Or that Moldavians are ruled by Viktor Von Doom. Or not knowing the difference between Romania and Bulgaria. Or which Balkan countries are independent and which ones aren't.

Or which one is Slovakia and which one is the Czech Republic.

[Lissou]

Just realised nobody completely explained the French version of the purgatory pun. Like the other romance languages, it uses the word for cat (chat, pronounced "shah"), not the word for purring. However, indeed the word is changed for "purgatoire" to "purchatoire" (meaning a "sh" sound instead of a "g" sound) which isn't required in the other languages.

When I was a kid, I called the cats I then had "chocolate cake" and "vanilla" cake in French. Why? Because cake in French is "gateau", pronounced like the Spanish word for cake cat (which my cousin, who is Puerto Rican, taught me when we were kids).
The cats were both grey. Not sure why one was chocolate and the other vanilla. *shrugs*.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

pronounced like the Spanish word for cat

FTFY (just a typo on your part, but might not be clear to anyone not acquainted with both French and Spanish)

GW

[Lissou]

FTFY (just a typo on your part, but might not be clear to anyone not acquainted with both French and Spanish)

GW

Thanks, I fixed it. Silly mistake :P

[halfeye]

A lot of these posters are pointing out something I hadn't considered before: how embarrassingly "America First" OOTS is. We really need to appeal to a more global audience and cut down the references that only native speakers of English will get. Sales will be higher too, who knows how many sales have been lost due to people not getting the references at all.

USAians are *native* speakers of English?

[FreddyNoNose]

Depends on if you're One Man or Another Man.



Yeah and we had to do our ThAC0 in the snow! Up a hill! Both ways!!!



Rich is from the United States. The majority of the reading population is from the United States. Dungeons and Dragons is primarily played in the United States. You'd confuse significantly more people trying to get broader appeal than keeping it the way it is. The internet is a thing and people can Google if they're confused.

You had thAC0? Luxury. We only had 6 side dice and we loved it.

[Peelee]

You had thAC0? Luxury. We only had 6 side dice and we loved it.

Well look at Mr. Moneybags over here, with his d6. Why, back in my day, we each took turns being numbers 1-20, and had the DM throw a rock at us. Whoever got hit, that was the roll.