mostly linguistics & language stuff tae * 36 * canadian * queer * en/fr bilingual sideblog is glittery-phonaesthemes phonestheme: a sound that, because it appears in a number of words of similar meaning, has a recognizable semantic association.
Last active 60 minutes ago
Don't wanna be here? Send us removal request.
Text
The origin of "chef" as an English word to mean "one who cooks" comes from the French term chef de cuisine, a title still used in restaurants to this day to denote a cook in a managerial role. What makes this an interesting bit of etymology is that while in English, "chef" is only ever used in the context of cooking and restaurants, in French chef just means "chief", "head" or "leader" and there are many common titles in French that include this word. A Head of State is the Chef d'Etat, a musical conductor is the chef d'orchestre, a business owner is the chef d'entreprise, and so on and so forth. So with this in mind, one could make the argument that as a gender neutral term denoting authority, "chef" could potentially have utility in BDSM as a
8K notes
·
View notes
Text
linguistics professor: so we've covered prefixes and suffixes. does anyone know what an infix is?
student: abso-fucking-lutely
999 notes
·
View notes
Text
comment. comment je traduis "fuck it we ball"? besoin d'idées
456 notes
·
View notes
Text
One of the things that i really really love about the expanse is the attention it pays to the language the characters speak. Obviously for practicality reasons the belters have to speak mostly english but the little bits of belter creole we get here and there are so distinct and feel so lived in, and i love that the show just. Refuses to translate them. You just kind of pick up the dialect over time.
I also really love the care that was put into the characters accents. Like i dont know if ive ever watched a show where a character audibly code switches like Naomi Nagata does. When we meet her she's speaking pretty standard English but when she's back with other belters her accent comes on pretty strong. Which is so cool! I feel like the only time we see characters with more than one accent is when one of them is fake because theyre like. In disguise or pretending to be someone else. Its really cool to see a character who just talks differently in different situations and it makes the whole world feel so grounded and real even tho obviously theyre like. In space.
163 notes
·
View notes
Text
horsethoughtbarn 5 name
if horses werent called horses what do you think they should be called
8K notes
·
View notes
Text
Hall, B. 1979. Accounting for Yiddish Word Order or What’s a Nice NP Like You Doing in a Place Like This.
Series: Great Titles in Linguistics
Thx @ppasdeprobleme
91 notes
·
View notes
Text
"you caught me unawares" more adjectives should end in plural. you caught me undecideds
6K notes
·
View notes
Text
I'm sure false etymology posts aren't like actually more common than any other type of misinformation on this website, it just happens to be a type of misinformation I'm better at spotting and a type of misinformation that shows up in the type of posts people I follow tend to reblog. but dang false etymology posts sure are common
4K notes
·
View notes
Text
love it when you look up a word’s pronunciation and only get the formal Linguist zalgotext-style version. like damn i guess i’m not using that word.
10K notes
·
View notes
Note
Hi! I'm trying to learn Finnish and I have a grammar question (probably several questions). Finding access to an in-depth language-learning program or class has been extremely difficult and I have weird gaps in my knowledge that I've tried to overcome with grammar workbooks and immersing in Finnish media. Given that Finnish media/native speakers often don't use kirjakieli, and the programs & grammar books I've used have taught exclusively kirjakieli... I keep finding that what I'm learning still isn't *super* helpful in understanding. Like. I'm over here having "Minä olen..." drilled into my brain, while I've never watched a video, listened to a song, etc where anything but "Mä oon..." has been used. I was BAFFLED when I finally learned they meant the same.
Anyway!
In your recent post about Riihimäki, you started it with, "Mulla ei oo"
I am *pretty* sure that in kirjakieli that would be "Minulla ei ole".
So. This is probably a silly question. But. Does "Minulla on" similarly become "Mulla oon" or "Mulla on"?
Also... Any tips for recognizing shortened/informal forms of formal phrases?
Anyway. I've taken enough of your time.
Kiitos!
One of my friends teaches finnish to immigrants for a living, and she can attest that her students are frequently frustrated by the way that spoken finnish and written finnish are completely different dialects, if not downright two different languages. Also fun fact, one of the most distinct ways that different finnish dialects can be identified is what word they have for "minä/sinä". The "mä" you have heard is mainly southern finnish dialects, in some regions people say "mää", "mie" etc, there's surely ones I haven't even heard of.
You're correct that in your assessment, "mulla ei oo" does indeed mean "minulla ei ole", and "minulla on" is indeed "mulla on". I have no idea how to help with recognising shortened informal forms, but one thing that I only consciously observed after someone asked me "soitatko jotain soitinta?" ("do you play an instrument?"), and it caught me off-guard because it never occurred to me that the grammatically correct written way to shorten "do I/do you/etc" questions is completely different from the spoken finnish.
For example, a question of "are you - ?" is written in kirkakieli as "oletko sinä - ?", but since the -ko suffix already clarifies who is being addressed, the word "sinä" is almost redundant. So to ask "oletko sinä tulossa?" (Are you coming?), a character in a book or a play would say "oletko tulossa?" but in spoken finnish, the "you" word used in that dialect is just glued to the end of the verb. So someone who says "sä" says it as "oletsä tulossa?" - which itself shortens to "ooksä" - and someone who uses "sie" asks "oletsie tulossa?" - shortening to "ootsie/ooksie tulossa?"
Speaking finnish is like learning to draw - trying to aim for perfect photorealism isn't necessary to be understood, you can pretty much draw stick figures and it's good enough if people will understand what you're trying to depict. If you've heard someone say that a non-native speaker can never really learn to speak truly flawless finnish, don't be discouraged by that. Finnish is more like japanese than french when it comes to foreign learners - people are impressed that you make an effort at all.
I've met people who have lived in Finland for decades, whose adult children are fluent bilinguals, and you can tell that someone's lived here for 30 years by the way they make more advanced and nuanced mild grammar mistakes.
In conclusion, good luck.
841 notes
·
View notes
Text
people think writers make good English teachers but the opposite is true. sixth grader asks why she can’t start a sentence with “and” and im like idk girlie grammar is a construct and language is a fluid gelatinous animal. people used to write “thou” and they were being totally unironic about it. start your sentences with an exclamation point for all i care. a+
13K notes
·
View notes
Text
Heard this stupid dad joke that killed me: Which Chinese word takes the longest to write? "Friend" (朋友) because it takes two months just to write half of it
3K notes
·
View notes
Text
ive seen ppl using /gen, but what abt /nom, /voc, /acc, /dat and /abl?
4K notes
·
View notes