|
Post by Little Jack Horner on Nov 7, 2022 16:52:39 GMT
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 11, 2022 19:18:26 GMT
Not only had I nothing to post, but I've spent 12 days without internet – courtesy of storm damage to towers and flooding that prevented repair crews from accessing the sites to repair them. However, with connection restored overnight, I can now post once more. See that item in the Nominative Determinism thread.
|
|
|
Post by Little Jack Horner on Nov 14, 2022 13:20:12 GMT
It is strange that this thread has received 45 views and only one reply. Who are all these viewers who don’t contribute?
It is the case that many place names in Cornwall and many family names originating there begin with one of the triplets tre, pol or pen. Think Trelawney, Poldark and Penzance. My mother sometimes used to quote the rhyming couplet “By tre, pol and pen, shall ye know all Cornish men”. The other day it occurred to me to wonder from whence that came. I decided to google it. I typed in “by tre” followed by a space. Before I had time to type in the next letter, P, Google completed the whole of the first part of the phrase. I think that is amazing and I want to share it with people.
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 15, 2022 9:11:57 GMT
Oh no! The sky is falling! (reprise)For want of anything deep and meaningful, yet still language related: Where have I heard this before today? (Warning: possibly a variety of teacher-bashing!)A senior education CEO isn’t focused on her own grammar …Interim S[outh] A[ustralia] Certificate of Education (SACE) chief executive, Michaela Bensley, said [in response to questions concerning students' use in exams of computer-based assistants such as spell checkers, grammar checkers, and other writing assistance applications including one called Grammarly] “… The focus is on students’ ability to communicate their understanding of concepts, ideas and perspectives … grammar[1], spelling[2] and punctuation[3] isn’t the focus”.Well yes, obviously. Haven't the apologists for the 'new education' always trotted out that same old excuse for suboptimal (if any) teaching of language? The sky didn't collapse on any of the previous occasions when a 'decline in teaching standards' was declared and it's unlikely to do so at Ms Bensley's wee slip – but it's something to masticate during a quiet month.
|
|
|
Post by Twoddle on Nov 15, 2022 11:38:21 GMT
Thanks for the tre, pol and pen post, LJH; I'm rather partial to place-name etymology, so that was of interest to me. More Googling (or DuckDuckGo-ing) reveals that: "In Cornish Tre means a homestead ... Pol means a pond lake or well ... . Finally, Pen is the Cornish for hill or headland."
|
|
|
Post by Dave Miller on Nov 15, 2022 14:32:58 GMT
So a frozen Cornish pond would be … police 😄
|
|
|
Post by Dave Miller on Nov 16, 2022 11:49:51 GMT
Oh no! The sky is falling! (reprise)A senior education CEO isn’t focused on her own grammar … This is one of those cases where what the speaker has in mind is of different number from what the sentence actually says. (E.g. when we're thinking of the many players in a team, we might say "Preston are through to the Final" or something, when the team, or town is grammatically singular.) Here, we've a clash between a singular "focus" and the plural items covered by that singular focus. "grammar[1], spelling[2] and punctuation[3] isn’t the focus” surely needs an "aren't" ... but when you express the sentence the other way round, the singular "is" is just fine. Proof? How wrong does this sound: The focus aren't grammar, spelling and punctuation. I think I forgive the poor lady.
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 21, 2022 2:21:03 GMT
Previously, we discussed the slang twat in its various meanings, contexts, and pronunciations, including the working-from-home (WFH) phenomenon Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. Now I find it listed in the Macquarie Dictionary's Word of the Year longlist (bottom of page 2 of 14). To view just the shortlisted terms (of which there be only 19), look here. I found none of the offerings exciting, but perhaps that's just this quiet November.
|
|
|
Post by Little Jack Horner on Nov 21, 2022 12:39:36 GMT
I wonder how Macquarie chooses these words and phrases. I thought the words of the year, rather than being merely interesting, were selected based on the frequency with which they have come into use. I have never heard of any of them. I know that Oz is famous for creating new slang but are these really common usage in Australia?
|
|
|
Post by Dave Miller on Nov 21, 2022 15:57:10 GMT
I’d heard of quiet quitting, toolbox talk and magnet fishing. Only the first of those is new to me.
Many of the rest (in the long list) hardly deserve mention, being obvious, fairly straightforward, uses of normal words.
I’m surprised, and rather saddened, that some Australians should regard simple truth-telling as new or remarkable. 🙄
|
|
|
Post by Little Jack Horner on Nov 22, 2022 18:27:42 GMT
Having nothing better to do on a Tuesday afternoon, I have been exploring the various ways in which demonyms can be derived country names. It is possibly of interest — at least it is peculiar. Maybe I have missed some or made errors but I have done. I offer some examples.
add er New Zealand add n India add ian Egypt add ese Vietnam add lese Togo add i Bangladesh add an Belize add ien Niger add vian Peru add se Suriname
delete last letter Germany delete last letter and add a Morocco delete last letter and add ian Italy delete last letter and add n Honduras delete last letter a d add e Argentina delete last letter and add ese Bhutan delete last letter and add tian Laos * *or just delete last letter
delete last two letters and add uese Portugal delete last two letters and add egian Norway delete last two letters and add ese Lebanon delete last two letters and add k Greece delete last two letters and add ish Sweden delete last two letters and ian Bahamas delete last two letters and add ois Seychelles
delete last three letters and add ish England delete last three letters and add égasque Monaco delete last three letters an add ium Belgium
delete last four letters Kazakhstan delete last four letters add nish Finland delete last four letters and add ench France delete last four letters and add elsh Wales
delete last five letters Uzbekistan delete last five letters and add ish Ireland
delete last six letters and add anish Denmark delete last six letters and add i Azerbaijan
delete last eight letters and add ss Switzerland
delete penultimate letter and add ish Spain
delete second word Czech Republic
delete second word and last letter of first word and add ian Ivory Coast delete second word and last letter of first word and add abè Burkino Faso
merge two words, delete last letter of first word and add ese San Marino
delete last word Central African Republic
delete whole name and replace with Filipino Philippines delete whole name and replace with Dutch Netherlands delete whole name and replace with Liswati Eswatini delete whole name and replace with Basotho Lesotho
reverse the name order and add n Guinea-Bissau
add I- before name Kiribati
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 23, 2022 21:31:25 GMT
Here's the Australian National University / National Dictionary Centre Word of the Year.
Something not mentioned in the article is that teal, as a colour between blue and green, was adopted by the election candidates because, while those people came from a 'blue' background (i.e. Australia's Liberal Party – which is more like the UK's Conservative Party than anything liberal or progressive), they were concerned for matters deemed 'green', i.e. the environment. Note: This is not the same list as that published by the Macquarie Dictionary; the Macquarie is an AU-only publication, whereas the National Dictionary Centre, in conjunction with Oxford Dictionaries, is a joint effort of the ANU and Oxford. A primary difference between those two publications is that the Australian Oxford Dictionary and the Australian National Centre's preference is the use of the 'Oxford Z' where the Macquarie uses the 'Cambridge S' in suffixes. PS: How are colours used to indicate political leanings elsewhere than Australia? In AU we have blue for the Liberal Party (conservatives), red for Labor (once considerably farther to the left than today), while in the USA those colours and their meanings are reversed. It's interesting that no political party that I know of uses yellow as its mascot colour.
|
|
|
Post by Little Jack Horner on Nov 24, 2022 0:19:31 GMT
The Scottish National Party mainly uses black lettering on a yellow background.
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 24, 2022 0:57:27 GMT
The Scottish National Party mainly uses black lettering on a yellow background. Hmmm … Don't the Scots view yellow as the colour of cowardice or jealousy? Years ago, an 'expert' * in colour theory insisted that orange not be used as a major colour in logos because that colour was associated with mistrust. * Expert (according to The Goons): X is an unknown quantity and a spurt is a drip under pressure. I've known a few such 'experts' in my day.
|
|
|
Post by Verbivore on Nov 24, 2022 1:18:42 GMT
It seems that epicentres can now strike. ( para. #23)
|
|