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    Default 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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Fiery Diamond View Post
    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.
    Never heard of that Spanish idiom. Are you sure it wasn't "get someone off a donkey"? ("ponerle a bajar de un burro", meaning severely insult someone). It's the closest one involving donkeys I can think of. Mind posting the original in Spanish?

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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
    Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est

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    Default 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.
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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c View Post
    Never heard of that Spanish idiom.
    So what *would* you use in Spanish as the equivalent of standing someone up? (If you've not heard that idiom before, it basically means you invited someone on a date and they never turned up--no idea where it comes from).

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    Default 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).
    Quote Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien, 1955
    I thought Tom Bombadil dreadful — but worse still was the announcer's preliminary remarks that Goldberry was his daughter (!), and that Willowman was an ally of Mordor (!!).

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    Default 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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by factotum View Post
    So what *would* you use in Spanish as the equivalent of standing someone up? (If you've not heard that idiom before, it basically means you invited someone on a date and they never turned up--no idea where it comes from).
    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 Wolf
    Last edited by Grey_Wolf_c; 2019-06-24 at 09:26 AM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
    Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Peelee View Post
    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.
    It's all I come to the thread for, really.
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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Aveline View Post
    It's all I come to the thread for, really.
    I dunno, there's at least some pathos in some of the topics brought up. That was mostly near the start, though I can't rule out the possibility of something else coming up.
    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    We should try to make that a thing; I think it might help civility. Hey, GitP, let's try to make this a thing: when you're arguing optimization strategies, RAW-logic, and similar such things that you'd never actually use in a game, tag your post [THEORETICAL] and/or use green text

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Aveline View Post
    It's all I come to the thread for, really.
    Hooray!
    Quote Originally Posted by georgie_leech View Post
    I dunno
    Boo!
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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Peelee View Post
    Boo!
    What can I say, I can accept that irregardless is now a word, even if I twitch a little every time I hear it
    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    We should try to make that a thing; I think it might help civility. Hey, GitP, let's try to make this a thing: when you're arguing optimization strategies, RAW-logic, and similar such things that you'd never actually use in a game, tag your post [THEORETICAL] and/or use green text

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by georgie_leech View Post
    What can I say, I can accept that irregardless is now a word, even if I twitch a little every time I hear it
    The same thing happens to me every time I hear "utilize" instead of "use" (where "use" would have fit). And this is coming from someone who generally prefers Latin root words in English.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
    Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Fiery, it would help if you linked to this thread in your last post in the old thread.
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    Rockphed said it well.
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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Fiery Diamond View Post
    The English idiom: To stand somebody up

    The supposed Spanish idiom translated to "to give someone a donkey."
    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.

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    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!"
    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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Lissou View Post
    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.
    Soooo... what does it actually mean? To take someone down a peg? Or does it mean to stand someone up? If so, why?

    Grey Wolf
    Last edited by Grey_Wolf_c; 2019-03-04 at 03:42 PM.
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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
    Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c View Post
    Soooo... what does it actually mean? To take someone down a peg? Or does it mean to stand someone up? If so, why?

    Grey Wolf
    Oh, sorry. Yes, it does mean to stand someone up.

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    So, just responding to the last post Bohandas made last thread (and possibly embarassing myself):

    Quote Originally Posted by Bohandas View Post
    Speaking of toponymic food names, why is "bologna" pronounced "baloney"? The name of the city in Italy isn't pronounced that way; it's pronounced how its spelled (except for the "g" being silent)
    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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by lesser_minion View Post
    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').
    My assumption is that it is derived from the English adjective-ization of the term for 'meat from Bologna,' which would be (phonetically) 'bell-oh-neeze meet,' which got shortened to 'bell-oh-nee' and became it's own thing.

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by lesser_minion View Post
    the same treatment as the 'gn' sequence in 'gnocchi', 'champignon', or the Spanish n-squiggle thing.
    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.

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    Quote Originally Posted by The Giant View Post
    But really, the important lesson here is this: Rather than making assumptions that don't fit with the text and then complaining about the text being wrong, why not just choose different assumptions that DO fit with the text?
    Ceterum autem censeo Hilgya malefica est

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    Default 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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Aveline View Post
    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?
    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.
    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    We should try to make that a thing; I think it might help civility. Hey, GitP, let's try to make this a thing: when you're arguing optimization strategies, RAW-logic, and similar such things that you'd never actually use in a game, tag your post [THEORETICAL] and/or use green text

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Willie the Duck View Post
    My assumption is that it is derived from the English adjective-ization of the term for 'meat from Bologna,' which would be (phonetically) 'bell-oh-neeze meet,' which got shortened to 'bell-oh-nee' and became it's own thing.
    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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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by lesser_minion View Post
    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.
    The... well, I was gonna say "meat," but... the processed meat stuff is usually referred to as balogna on this side of the Atlantic, as far as I can tell.
    Last edited by georgie_leech; 2019-03-08 at 04:06 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    We should try to make that a thing; I think it might help civility. Hey, GitP, let's try to make this a thing: when you're arguing optimization strategies, RAW-logic, and similar such things that you'd never actually use in a game, tag your post [THEORETICAL] and/or use green text

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by georgie_leech View Post
    The... well, I was gonna say "meat," but... the processed meat stuff is usually referred to as balogna on this side of the Atlantic, as far as I can tell.
    I'm pretty sure I knew about the processed meat as a thing that exists, I just haven't been exposed to it in years.

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by lesser_minion View Post
    I'm pretty sure I knew about the processed meat as a thing that exists, I just haven't been exposed to it in years.
    I just meant that when I see it in stores, it's still spelled "bologna," not "baloney."
    Quote Originally Posted by Grod_The_Giant View Post
    We should try to make that a thing; I think it might help civility. Hey, GitP, let's try to make this a thing: when you're arguing optimization strategies, RAW-logic, and similar such things that you'd never actually use in a game, tag your post [THEORETICAL] and/or use green text

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by georgie_leech View Post
    I just meant that when I see it in stores, it's still spelled "bologna," not "baloney."
    That's because "Oscar Mayer has a way with B-O-L-O-G-N-A!"

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by lesser_minion View Post
    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').
    It's because, or so I've been told by people in the know, that places like Sicilia (which is Sicily) took the IA to be a Y sound and it just transferred over to other Italian places.

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    Default 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.
    Quote Originally Posted by J.R.R. Tolkien, 1955
    I thought Tom Bombadil dreadful — but worse still was the announcer's preliminary remarks that Goldberry was his daughter (!), and that Willowman was an ally of Mordor (!!).

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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Vinyadan View Post
    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.
    You talking about Indy?
    Last edited by Peelee; 2019-04-13 at 07:18 AM.
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    Default Re: Unimportant 'Language Missuses' 2: Mother May II

    Quote Originally Posted by Lissou View Post
    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.
    Quote Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c View Post
    Soooo... what does it actually mean? To take someone down a peg? Or does it mean to stand someone up? If so, why?

    Grey Wolf
    That seems likely to refer to greyhound racing, perhaps with older styles of it, though it seems more apt with the current style where the "rabbit" is a stuffed toy on a rail.
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