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2019-03-03, 05:14 PM (ISO 8601)
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Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Thread two is now operational! You can find the original thread here.
One issue I was thinking about earlier was the use of idioms. Sometimes we get so used to the idioms in our native language that we start to forget that they're idioms. This doesn't always happen - I doubt any English speakers think "raining cats and dogs" or "beating a dead horse" aren't figures of speech - but sometimes an idiom isn't overt enough to trigger recognition. A humorous incident that occurred when I was in school happened in my Spanish class. We were doing a unit on Spanish idioms; we were given the idiom, its literal English translation, and its actual meaning. This was fine for most of the idioms - but there was one that completely confused me, because the "actual meaning" we were given was an English idiom. Nobody else recognized that the English phrase was an idiom, and were thus completely perplexed that I struggled to understand: I had somehow never heard the English phrase before and didn't know what it meant, despite being familiar with the actual thing that the phrase refers to.
Side note: I'm unable to find reference to the supposed Spanish idiom on Google, which makes me doubt our textbook, so if any Spanish speakers can confirm or deny that this particular idiom exists in Spanish that would be interesting.
The English idiom: To stand somebody up
The supposed Spanish idiom translated to "to give someone a donkey."
Idioms: things people need to recognize are difficult to work out the meanings of, especially without context.
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2019-03-03, 07:17 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Interested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
Deep in the corners of your mind
Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est
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2019-03-03, 11:09 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Ahhh, a fresh thread where I can sit in a lawn chair with a metaphorical rifle, waiting for prescriptivists to chime in with grammatical statements I can shoot down.
It's gonna be a good thread.Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
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2019-03-04, 03:12 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
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2019-03-04, 06:46 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Last summer, I went to England on vacation with some friends. We had to meet at the hotel at 9pm. It starts to get dark, and I discover that I forgot my watch.
I find someone to ask.
ARE YOU WIMBLY FOURS MATE!? IM CRIMBO NINAN SIX APPLE SMIBBLY DID BIBBLY CHAP
I have no idea what he just said, and ask him to repeat
YOU WOT MATE?
He starts to laugh maniacally
Big Ben rings out
everyone stops in the friggin street
a carriage with the initials HM rides down the street
the friggin queen herself sticks her head out
OI YOU GITS DID YE HEAR THAT!? IT BE 6 BONG
driver pokes his head out
6 BONGERS!?
people start pouring out in the street
YA WANKERS IT BE CRIMBO SIX-A-BONG
store clerks and chimney sweepers chanting SIX A-BONG SIX A-BONG
I try to get away, the crowd is chocking me
SIX A-BONG SIX A-BONG OLLY JOLLY ITS SIX A-BONG
the lyrics drown everyone out, can't avoid dancers
BANG UP THE KNACKERS AND SMACK YER MUM-
ALL IN THE STREETS ITS SIX A-BONG
fish and chips being thrown into the air en masse at this point
(story not by me).Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien, 1955
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2019-03-04, 07:55 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Rather famously, international tensions escalated for nearly the entire tenure of the USSR's Soviet First Secretary Nikita Khrushchev because people did not recognize his comments, "We will bury you (-transl.)!" as an idiom equivalent to the common US/British idiom, "It's your funeral!"
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2019-03-04, 09:07 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
I don't know. "Leave thrown" ("Dejar tirado")? I just can't think of an appropriate idiom involving donkeys. I'm hardly an expert in Spanish idioms, though. Most of my knowledge comes from once spending a few weeks at a place where there was a courtyard tiled in idioms where I used to wonder and/or study, so I got to see them every day. Not that it helped me understand them - for example, to this day, I'm not entirely clear what they mean to imply with "When your neighbour gets their beard cut, soak yours" ("Cuando las barbas de tu vecino veas cortar, pon las tuyas a remojar"). Something about being ready for the inevitable?
ETA: it occurs to me that it may very well be a Central or South American Spanish idiom rather than a Castilian one. I would really not be familiar with those at all.
Grey WolfLast edited by Grey_Wolf_c; 2019-06-24 at 09:26 AM.
Interested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
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2019-03-04, 11:10 AM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-04, 02:04 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-04, 02:12 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-04, 02:18 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-04, 02:28 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Interested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
Deep in the corners of your mind
Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est
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2019-03-04, 03:01 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-04, 03:41 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Interesting! The French idiom "poser un lapin à quelqu'un" means "put down a rabbit to someone". As in, take the rabbit and put it down, not the euphemism that means killing it.
I was taught a similar story about a French leader sending the US the message "we demand your help" (that was during a war, can't remember which), not realising that "demander" (to ask for) and "to demand" (exiger) weren't the same thing. The US was not impressed.
As a side note, Google still tells you that "to demand" translates as "demander" in French.
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2019-03-04, 03:42 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
Last edited by Grey_Wolf_c; 2019-03-04 at 03:42 PM.
Interested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
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Where reality is an intruder
And myth and legend thrive
Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est
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2019-03-05, 01:54 AM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-08, 02:19 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
So, just responding to the last post Bohandas made last thread (and possibly embarassing myself):
It's not a place name I've heard spoken aloud before, tbh, but the way I'd try to pronounce it "how it's spelled" comes out as something like 'ba-loan-ya', with the first syllable rhyming with the start of 'balloon' and the third syllable getting the same treatment as the 'gn' sequence in 'gnocchi', 'champignon', or the Spanish n-squiggle thing.
There doesn't seem like that much drift from there to 'baloney'. Or indeed from where you'd get if you didn't pronounce the 'g' at all ('ba-loan-ah').
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2019-03-08, 08:05 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
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2019-03-08, 09:06 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
The following language/letter combinations all produce that sound (/ɲ/), which as far as I know does not exist in English:
Spain/ñ (possibly the most famous, because the bastards put it in their country's name)
French/gn
Italian/gn
Portuguese/nh
Catalan/ny
Duth/nj
Googling it now, it seems Irish uses nn for the same. Wikipedia also goes into some detail over the difference between the /ɲ/ and /ni/ phonemes. I tend to use the latter, and feel bad about it.
Grey WolfInterested in MitD? Join us in MitD's thread.There is a world of imagination
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2019-03-08, 10:47 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
I decided recently that I should always use the anglicized spelling "baloney" rather than Bologna when describing something fraudulent, to divorce that sense of the word from the real city of Bologna. I wouldn't like it much if my own hometown's name were given that sort of widespread double meaning. Or I suppose I could just abandon that meaning entirely - it wouldn't be the first word I've eschewed.
Thoughts?Last edited by Aveline; 2019-03-08 at 10:49 AM.
This signature was written by me, Aveline, to indicate that this message was written by me, Aveline.
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2019-03-08, 10:54 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
You wouldn't be the first. I don’t think I've ever seen the Italian City version when I see someone call out something as false.
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2019-03-08, 03:41 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
I guess the intended pronunciation was probably closer to 'bolognese' (which would Anglicise roughly as "bollonnase"). Which I probably should have picked up on earlier, but my brain was probably disconnected at that time in the morning.
Like a few other people here, I've never seen 'Bologna' used to refer to anything other than the place, though. And I'm not that familiar with 'baloney' as a foodstuff either.
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2019-03-08, 04:05 PM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
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2019-03-08, 04:26 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-08, 04:38 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-03-08, 05:13 PM (ISO 8601)
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2019-04-13, 06:31 AM (ISO 8601)
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2019-04-13, 06:45 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
In general, you can see -ia and -ius turning into -y in English pretty much everywhere. Italy, Pliny, Livy, Sicily, Hillary, glory, gay, history, Lucy, dysentery...
EDIT: By "Everywhere" I mean very frequently. There obviously are lots of -ia words that stayed that way, like India.Last edited by Vinyadan; 2019-04-13 at 06:55 AM.
Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien, 1955
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2019-04-13, 07:15 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
You talking about Indy?
Last edited by Peelee; 2019-04-13 at 07:18 AM.
Cuthalion's art is the prettiest art of all the art. Like my avatar.
Number of times Roland St. Jude has sworn revenge upon me: 2
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2019-04-13, 10:03 AM (ISO 8601)
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Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II
The end of what Son? The story? There is no end. There's just the point where the storytellers stop talking.