HDTenEightyP/NetNews huggingface dataset:
From: cad28526@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Chuck Douglas)
Subject: Re: Chrismas presents for you.
Organization: University of Illinois at Urbana
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 1992 09:33:18 GMT

ryoichi@athena.mit.edu (Ryoichi Hashimoto) writes:

>Merry Christmas!
> As some of you have provided examples of funny mistakes in Japanese,
>and I really enjoyed it, here's my OKAESHI (counter-gift :-). The
>followings are my mistakes in English conversations. Enjoy them!

>1) Like most of Japanese, I feel very unhappy when I say "no," even when 
>I know that "No"  is the politest answer in some context.  One day my
>friend in my office asked me,
>  Friend: "Ryoichi, would you mind if I read your new magazine first?"
>  Me:     "_Yes_, of course, ... oopes! Well, well... I mean it's OK!"
>I sometimes feel difficult even to say "No thank you."  

This is a problem that even confuses native speakers.  Even when I
ask this question, I sometimes have to re-ask to make sure the person
understood my question and that I understood their answer!

I think the problem comes from the confusion of 2 questions that can
be asked to seek permission:

1)  "Do you mind if I do such-and-such?"

2)  "May I do such-and-such?"

The first question should be answered "No" if you are granting permssion
and "Yes" if you wish to deny permission.  The opposite holds for the 2nd
question.  The first question is by far (to me) the one that causes the
most confusion because you are indirectly asking whether you can do 
something and you are getting a reply that would be opposite to whether
or not you are being given permission.

This type of pattern exists in Japanese and confuses us (me) non-native
speakers just as much.  I don't think that native Japanese speakers have
the same problems with this pattern in Japanese because Japanese seems more
geared toward asking for something indirectly whereas English seems more
geared toward directly questioning someone.  And it is wonder why
Americans are considered rude! :-)

>Have a happy new year!  RAINEN MO DOUZO YOROSHIKU!
>-- ryiochi

And to you as well!  Ryiochi-san mo!
-- 
Chuckers -- a computer operator/programmer/benthic sorter/emaciated aryan.
cad28526@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu	          |"You know I'll give you everything
Novanet:  douglas/o/nova douglas/cerl/nova|I've got for a little peace of mind!"
douglas-cerl OR douglas-o@nova.novanet.org|--"I'm So Tired" by The Beatles
Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: sommar@enea.se (Erland Sommarskog)
Subject: Re: If I ever get to speak to Cyril and Metodius...
Organization: Enea Data AB
Date: Sun, 13 Dec 1992 11:43:13 GMT

Ivan A Derzhanski (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk) writes:
>But there always is a difference, while "I" and "l" are often cut
>identical.

But that is a problem with font design, not with the script itself.

><Edification???? Who talked about edification????
>
>The Buddha did.

He did? Apparently his article didn't make it to my site. Can anyone
send me a copy?

>Look, we're talking of a time when no one thought standardisation was
>attractive in any way.  Using the script of language L1 for language L2
>unequivocally meant declaring language L2 (speakers, culture and all)
>subservient to language L1, with all the social, political etc. consequences
>of it that you care to imagine.

Yes, those were the heydays of propetiary systems.

><And the value of diacritics in Unix had not yet been clear
>
>It is not clear to me now.  I much prefer distinct letter shapes.  The
>Romans spoke an utterly idiotic language which didn't even have any
>palatoalveolar consonants, let alone palatalised ones.  Consequently,
>their alphabet was an awkward choice for Slavic, which is why Polish,
>Czech and friends are so overloaded with diacritics and digraphs.

But still Czech and Polish names and words can be somewhat consistently
rendered even in a poor ASCII environment. Russian on the other hand,
appears in one way if the surrounding language is Swedish, another if
it is English a third if it's German etc with good chances for confusion.

And as for diacritics and digraphs, they appears in Cyrillic script
as well, at least for Russian so the functional difference is scarce.
-- 
Erland Sommarskog - ENEA Data, Stockholm - sommar@enea.se
From: Polytech@azbuka.kharkov.ua (Kharkov Politechnical Institute)
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Information about Conference on "Corrent Problems of Lexicography"
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 92 08:56:12 +0300
Distribution: world
Organization: INFOCOM LTD, Ltd.
Reply-To: Polytech@azbuka.kharkov.ua


D E A R   C O L L E A G U E S !

The International Conference / workshop on "Current Problems of Lexicography"
will be held from 19th to 23rd of April 1993 in the town of Alushta on the
Southern Coast of the Crimea.

Topics to be discussed include five groups of issues:
1. Methodological Problems of Lexicography;
2. Terminology and  Dictionaries;
3. Types of Dictionaries;
4. National Cultures as Reflected in Lexicographical Practice;
5. Computers in Dictionary-Making;

The conference is organized by the newly-founded Kharkov Lexicographical
Society which is co-ordinating the work of diffirent teams of authors
developing projects in the field of lexicography.

The conference will be run according to the following plan:
April 19 - Rendezvous in the town of Simferopol(the capital of Crimea)
           at the railway station or at the airport on your prior
           notice. We can also arrange for picking you up in Kiev or
           in Moscow. Registration and accomodation at the hotel
           "Severnaya Dvina".
April 23 - Plenary Session. Discussion of papers delivered. Beginning
           of sectional meetings.
April 21 - Continuation of sectional meetings.
April 22 - Round-table discussion. Tea party. Closing ceremony.
April 23 - Post-conference tours.
           Bus excursions available include:
           Vorontsov's Palace (Alupka), Chekhov Museum (Yalta),
           Nikitsky Botanical Gardens, the town of Bakchisaray
           (former Tartar capital).
           Return drive to Simferopol (optional).

The working languages of the conference are Russian, Ukrainian, English.
Translation can be provided for contributions presented in German, French
or Italian.

Full board and accomodation in single or double rooms of the hotel are
provided. Accomodation, full board and conference fee total $ 220, payable
upon arrival.

A collection of all papers and abstracts will be available at the
conference office.

We are ready to give you an opportunity to present your report and publish
it in the next collection of papers and abstracts of the Kharkov
Lexicographical Society.

Kharkov Lexicographical Society
Preparatory Faculty of
Kharkov Polytechnical Institute
5-A, Vesnina Str. Kharkov 310023 Ukraine
Fax : (0572) 435-094
E-Mail : polytech%azbuka.kharkov.ua@relay.ussr.eu.net
From: connolly@memstvx1.memst.edu
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Correction (was: Re: Surprising cognates)
Date: 14 Dec 92 09:00:52 -0600
Organization: Memphis State University

Correction!  I just posted a lengthy analysis of some Indo-European
roots.  I mis-stated the form of the root for 'wind'.  Beside the
forms with apparent initial _w_ such as _wire_, we find forms with
initial _au-_.  The 'wind' base must therefore have had an initial
a-coloring laryngeal.  So _week_ would reflect PIE */AwHi-g-/, not
*/wHi-g-/.

--Leo Connolly
From: connolly@memstvx1.memst.edu
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: Surprising cognates
Date: 16 Dec 92 00:43:25 -0600
Organization: Memphis State University

In article <8364@charon.cwi.nl>, aeb@cwi.nl (Andries Brouwer) writes:
> connolly@memstvx1.memst.edu writes:
> 
> (answering a post that I cancelled because I noticed a typing mistake,
> and also because I wanted to add some more details - maybe the
> cancelling failed to work)

The revised version is now available here.  I answered your post late
last night (c. 12.30 Memphis Time, but 6:30 GMT).  Perhaps I read
it before you canceled it?

[stuff omitted]

> My suggestion was not that the word borrowed meant `week', but that it
> was the Latin word "vicis", and hence meant just what Latin "vicis" meant
> (something like `turn', for example). In my repost I show a Bible fragment
> where the Greek text with Latin translation containing "vicis"
> has Gothic translation containing "wikon" - showing that in that
> context at least the Latin and Germanic words have the same meaning.

Yes -- but since Wulfila worked primarily from the Greek, I don't know
what that proves.  (Of course, he did know Latin too, so perhaps there
is a connection.)

>>> [Not that it matters, but Kluge supports the idea "borrowed from Latin".
>> 
>>Are we looking at the same edition of Kluge?  Mine -- the 21st edition
>>of 1975 -- says "Dieser Begriff [not: "Dieses Wort"!] ist in vorschrist-
>>licher Zeit von den Roemern zu allen Germanen gelangt."  True, he calls
>>the etymon 'week' "gemeingermanisch" rather than "urgermanisch", but
>>he says nothing about borrowing.
>> 
> My edition is older.

Amazing how Kluge kept changing his mind so long after his death,
isn't it?

--Leo Connolly
From: JAREA@UKCC.UKY.EDU
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: Christmas linguistics
Date: 18 Dec 92 03:01:29 GMT
    <1gq0m3INNp2l@coli-gate.coli.uni-sb.de>
Organization: University of Kentucky

In article <1gq0m3INNp2l@coli-gate.coli.uni-sb.de>
simon@fsinfo.cs.uni-sb.de (Julia Simon) writes:
>
>As an Indo-European linguist I've learned that at some time (looooong ago) the
>Romans pronounced it "k". Later it became a fricative or affricate before "e"
>and "i" (as it still is in the modern Romance languages - "s" in French, "ch"
>in Italian and (I think) Rhaeto-Romanic, "th" in Spanish, ...).
>
>                        Julia 8-)
 
It is worth pointing out that it is _not_ true that "the modern Romance
languages" changed /k/ followed by front vowels.  Most of them did.  In
most of them it did, but in (most varieties of) Sard, it remains a stop
initially (and in some varieties medially), as in /kimbe/ 'five',
/kentu/ 'hundred'.   The last I heard "Spanish" spoken, 'hundred' was
/sjiento/:  not all Spanish is Castillian pronunciation.
 
Outside of these picky details, I refer you to Alderson's fine post for
the truth about Latin pronunciation, short of Allen's fine little book,
/vaks laetajn@/.
 
Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson)
Subject: Re: Christmas linguistics
Originator: alderson@leland.Stanford.EDU
Reply-To: alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson)
Organization: Stanford University Academic Information Resources
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 92 01:12:25 GMT

In article <01GSF2YTY5Q8I7IMKE@kiera.ericsson.se>, LMEBGO@kiera (Bengt G{llmo, L M Ericsson, Stockholm, Sweden) writes:
>My wife and I have an annual disagreement on the pronounciation of a Latin
>word.  She sings in a choir.  At this time of the year, they sing Christmas
>carols, mostly English.  Several of them include the Latin phrase "Gloria in
>excelsis Deo".  Our disagreement concerns the "c".  The choir pronounces it as
>an Englishman pronounces "ch" in "china".  I have told them that they sing
>Latin in Italian; that is how an Italian would pronounce "excelsis".  It is
>also awkward to sing.  In Latin, I claim, the "c" should simply be pronounced
>"s".  A counter- claim from somebody in the choir is that the "ch"
>pronounciation is correct if you are singing Latin from a certain century (the
>17th?), to which I reply that the phrase must have been used in church at
>least a thousand years before that.

There are a number of "correct" pronunciations of Latin.

The one taught in non-Catholic-Church-operated schools is called "classical":
<v> is pronounced as English [w] (a back round semivowel); <c> and <g> are
*always* velar stops ([k] & [g]), never affricates or sibilants; the digraphs
<ae> and <oe> represent diphthongs [ai] and [oi]; and there are length
distinctions in the vowels.

The "ecclesiastical" pronunciation, taught in Catholic schools in this country,
among other places, follows the rules for Italian.  The digraphs <ae> and <oe>
are pronounced as [e], rhyming with <e>.

The German church pronunciation uses a velar [g] for <g>, but <ci> and <ce> are
pronounced with a dental affricate [ts].  The digraph <eu> is pronounced as the
German digraph, a diphthong [oi].  (By the way, this is the pronunication used
by the Catholic Church in Poland, and is the usual one used by John Paul II.)

The French pronunication is like French.

The English pronunication scheme, used before the shift to the "classical"
scheme in English-speaking countries, pronounced Latin as if it were English,
paying attention to Latin length as English tense/height/diphthong pairs, and
pronouncing <ci> and <ce> with [s], <gi> and <ge> with [dZ] (English "j").

Finally, there is the system used in many (most?) church choirs in this
country, in which the Italianate pronunciation is used, with the additional
caveat that <exce-> is to be pronounced [egSe-], with a *voiced* velar stop.
Thus, the word above, transcribed into English words, would be

	egg shell sis

I hope that this has confused the issue sufficiently that you stop arguing with
your wife.  :-)
-- 
Rich Alderson   'I wish life was not so short,' he thought.  'Languages take
                such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about.'
                                                        --J. R. R. Tolkien,
alderson@leland.stanford.edu                              _The Lost Road_
From: iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk (Ivan A Derzhanski)
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: If I ever get to speak to Cyril and Metodius...
Date: 17 Dec 92 13:02:09 GMT
Organization: Centre for Cognitive Science, Edinburgh, UK

In article <linnan.724261356@snakemail.hut.fi> linnan@lk-hp-19.hut.fi (Matti J Linnanvuori) writes:
>Before 1918, the Russian alphabet included a letter resembling the Latin i.

And the words _mir_ `peace' and _mir_ `world' were spelt differently:
`peace' was myslete-izhe-rcy-er and `world' was myslete-iota-rcy-er.
Not to be confused with _miro_ `myrrh', myslete-izhica-rcy-on.

>It was replaced with the more common, current variant of i.
>Because there were plans to move to Latin alphabet, I would have thought
>the Latin looking letter would have been preserved. Why not?

Most likely because the other one (the izhe) was much more frequently
encountered, so abandoning it in favour of the iota would have been
more substantial surgery.  (The izhe was used before consonants or
pause, the iota mostly before vowels.)

The iota had its supporters in Bulgaria, too, but the izhe won out.

-- 
 `D'ye mind tellin me whit the two o ye are gaun oan aboot?' (The Glasgow
Ivan A Derzhanski  (iad@cogsci.ed.ac.uk; iad@chaos.cs.brandeis.edu)    Gospel)
* Centre for Cognitive Science,  2 Buccleuch Place,  Edinburgh EH8 9LW,  UK
* Cowan House, Pollock Halls, 18 Holyrood Park Road, Edinburgh EH16 5BD, UK
From: thorinn@diku.dk (Lars Henrik Mathiesen)
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: Surprising cognates
Date: 12 Dec 92 14:07:24 GMT
Organization: Department of Computer Science, U of Copenhagen

alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson) writes:

>LMEBGO@kiera (Bengt G{llmo, L M Ericsson, Stockholm, Sweden) writes:

>>aeb@wsinfo01.win.tue.nl (A.E. Brouwer) writes:
>>>There might also be a relation with Danish "kusse" (cunt).
>>>[I expect Norw. and/or Sw. "kusa" or "kuse" with same meaning,
>>>but my dictionaries are too prudish to confirm this. Maybe some
>>>native speakers can tell us what words they use?]
>>
>>I won't even try to tell you all those words.  There was a whole book
>>printed a few years ago with various terms for reproductive organs. 

>>But the Swedish cognate to the Danish "kusse" is probably "kutta".

My ``Dictionary of Current Danish'' (Nudansk Ordbog) claims that
"kusse" also exists in some Norwegian and Swedish dialects, but has no
guess at its origin.

>Second, "kutta" looks like a perfect cognate for English "cunt"--I
>know that PGmc. *-nt- becomes -tt- in Old Norse, and I think it's a
>general characteristic of the North Germanic branch of the family.

>Does Danish have an assibilization that Swedish doesn't?  Anyone?

Not that I know of, but if that is the explanation, it would have to
be shared with those No/Sw dialects. I would guess at a taboo-driven
change; Da also has older "fitte" and current "fisse" with related
meanings, and the series "pisse," "tisse," and "nisse" for 'urinate.'
(The first would be cognate with English 'piss;' the third has never
really caught on, and probably disappeared totally with the current
less euphemistic linguistic climate in Denmark.)

Lars Mathiesen (U of Copenhagen CS Dep) <thorinn@diku.dk> (Humour NOT marked)
Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: s0gwb@exnet.co.uk (George Battrick)
Subject: Re: Postnominal Adjectives (Was: postpositive articles in English)
Organization: ExNet Systems Ltd Public Access News, London, UK
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 23:55:28 GMT

I'm not sure where in this fragmenting thread to place my examples, but
it puzzles me that 
a) the two ways one road avoids another are called an "underpass" and a
"flyover":
b) the French airline is "Air France", but their phone company is "France
Telecom".
From: connolly@memstvx1.memst.edu
Newsgroups: sci.lang
Subject: Re: "Nominative" absolute?
Date: 17 Dec 92 23:32:49 -0600
Organization: Memphis State University

In article <1992Dec17.085109.45712@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu>, miner@kuhub.cc.ukans.edu writes:
> In article <1992Dec16.002418.4636@memstvx1.memst.edu>, connolly@memstvx1.memst.edu writes:
>> English school grammar teaches that English possesses a construction
>> known as the "nominative absolute".  Examples:
>> 
>> 	The war being over, he returned home.
>> 	Gaul having been conquered, Caesar returned to Rome.
>> ...
>> 
>> In Latin, and all other languages where I have found such a construction,
>> the case of the absolute is precisely *not* nominative.  Latin, as all
>> linguists would once have known, used the ablative, and Old English
>> used the dative.
> 
> Medieval Latin however used both the nominative and accusative
> absolutes.  An example of each from Harrington's _Mediaeval Latin_:
> 
> 	omnia genera tormentorum adhibita
> 	all kinds of torments being applied

With all due respect, how do we know that this is not accusative?

> 	quem peremptum
> 	who having been destroyed
> 
>> The question then arises: on what basis do we say that the English
>> absolute construction contains a "nominative"?  Pronouns are quite
>> rare, but for me the only natural case with an occasional pronominal
>> absolute would be precisely accusative.
>> 
>> 	Him being such a fool, of course she went off with another man.
> 
> Why not just "oblique?"

Or "objective", the term they used in my schooldays?  It hardly matters.

>> Furthermore, a nominative would be unparalleled in English, since the
>> nominative is otherwise found only before *finite* verbs, which
>> _being_ is not
>> 
>> So, people: Does anyone have an idea how the *nominative* absolute
>> made its way into our school grammars?  
> 
> The term, along with "accusative absolute," could have come from work
> on Medieval Latin.

I rather doubt it.  When our school grammars were developed, medieval
Latin was regarded as barbarity itself, which is perhaps why I've always
liked it.  Yet I must confess I can't ever recall seeing a nominative
or accusative absolute in the flesh in medieval texts.

--Leo Connolly
Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: matthew@uk.tele.nokia.fi (Matthew Faupel)
Subject: Re: Christmas linguistics
Organization: Nokia Telecommunications, Cambridge, UK
Date: Thu, 17 Dec 1992 19:13:30 GMT

In article <01GSF2YTY5Q8I7IMKE@kiera.ericsson.se> LMEBGO@kiera.ericsson.se (Bengt G{llmo, L M Ericsson, Stockholm, Sweden) writes:

>  My wife and I have an annual disagreement on the pronounciation 
>  of a Latin word.  She sings in a choir.  At this time of the  
>  year, they sing Christmas carols, mostly English.  Several of 
>  them include the Latin phrase "Gloria in excelsis Deo".  Our 
>  disagreement concerns the "c".  The choir pronounces it as an 
>  Englishman pronounces "ch" in "china".  I have told them that 
>  they sing Latin in Italian; that is how an Italian would
>  pronounce "excelsis".  It is also awkward to sing.  In Latin, 
>  I claim, the "c" should simply be pronounced "s".  A counter-
>  claim from somebody in the choir is that the "ch" pronounciation 
>  is correct if you are singing Latin from a certain century (the 
>  17th?), to which I reply that the phrase must have been used in 
>  church at least a thousand years before that.   

>  Comments, anyone?

As I understand it, if we leave aside the murdering of the pronunciation
that generally happens when speaking a foreign language, there are two
"standard" ways of pronouncing Latin: classical and church.  Classical is
the pronunciation of Latin that linguistic research has come up with based
on analysis of contemporary poetry and the like; this has a hard C.  Church
Latin is that used by the Catholic church (and so as far as singing carols
goes is probably the "correct" one) and in it C is pronounced as english CH.

Other variations are in the pronunciation of V (as english V in church but W
in classical) and the various vowels (can't remember the distinctions
without looking them up I'm afraid).



Matthew
--
---* Amnesiac the Wizard *------------------* matthew@uk.tele.nokia.fi *---
 Opinions expressed here are not those of my company.    | NB. ntl02 is EN
 They're not even my own; I plagiarised the lot of them! | TEE EL ZERO TWO
---* matthew@ntl02.decnet.nokia.fi *------------------* Matthew Faupel *---
Newsgroups: sci.lang
From: alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson)
Subject: Re: Postnominal Adjectives (Was: postpositive articles in English)
Originator: alderson@leland.Stanford.EDU
Reply-To: alderson@elaine46.Stanford.EDU (Rich Alderson)
Organization: Stanford University Academic Information Resources
Date: Fri, 18 Dec 92 23:32:15 GMT

In article <BzFH4J.21v@exnet.co.uk>, s0gwb@exnet (George Battrick) writes:
>I'm not sure where in this fragmenting thread to place my examples, but
>it puzzles me that 
>a) the two ways one road avoids another are called an "underpass" and a
>"flyover":

In the US, the two alternatives are "underpass" and "overpass."

>b) the French airline is "Air France", but their phone company is "France
>Telecom".

But that's French, rather than English.  :->
-- 
Rich Alderson   'I wish life was not so short,' he thought.  'Languages take
                such a time, and so do all the things one wants to know about.'
                                                        --J. R. R. Tolkien,
alderson@leland.stanford.edu                              _The Lost Road_
Xref: sparky sci.lang:8422 talk.philosophy.misc:2942