Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 March 2

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March 2

Interpretation of a symbol:くぁ

Can くぁ represent both qa and qwa?Asrghasrhiojadrhr (talk) 06:40, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Sure, but there's one problem: that isn't used in Japanese except in unusual giseigo (onomatopoeia). ···日本穣^{? · Talk to Nihonjoe} 07:07, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

If you're looking for [kwa], it existed in Late Old and Middle Japanese before merging with [ka] during Early Modern. However, it would have been written as くゎ or く_は. Bendono (talk) 07:54, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Definitions of the word "interesting"

Is it true that no-one has properly defined the word interesting?86.27.184.127 (talk) 08:08, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

No, it's not; it's in all my dictionaries. Pray tell, where did you get that idea?

What I find interesting is that you choose to hyphenate "no-one", which seems a little odd to me; why? +ILike2BeAnonymous (talk) 08:13, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I've seen enough people hyphenate no-one recently that it now looks correct and I've found myself doing it. kwami (talk) 08:20, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I think the point was properly defined, not whether it's in the dictionary.

BTW, did you know 'gullible' is not in the dictionary? kwami (talk) 08:34, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Zing. Good one. +ILike2BeAnonymous (talk) 08:39, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I have seen a dictionary of English that didn't have "gullible" in it. However, it was not a current one; I had a co-worker who collected old dictionaries. (I forget which on this was.) And it did have the root word in it, the verb "gull". --Anonymous, 21:35 UTC, March 2, 2008.

(squeeze): In my dictionary "gullible" is defined as "pertaining to or having the properties of a Kurt shaped box". --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 10:32, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

No-one has long been accepted along with no one. Check SOED. Interesting, yes?

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 09:24, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Also Random House, but not the full OED. Well, since it's made it into the dictionaries, I won't feel stupid using it. I always thought it was rather silly to spell it as two words. kwami (talk) 09:50, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

And in Chamber's, Kwami. OED (CDROM of 2nd edition) has about 30 instances of no-one in all of its examples; but you're right: it doesn't mark this as an alternative spelling. It has about 1200 instances of no one.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 10:04, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Duh, didn't even think of doing a search. It's recent, but not as recent as I expected. Earliest was from 1852 (not counting a genitive "no-one's"), then nothing for half a century, then the pace picks up. Considering how few quotes there are in the OED from the late 20th century, there were a lot of hits. kwami (talk) 10:59, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I use noöne when I'm feeling fancy. 199.67.16.60 (talk) 17:26, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

Since this is about "interesting", it's interesting that people have taken the perfectly lovely 2-word expression "no one" and joined the words together, but quite revealing that they then appreciate the need to backtrack by inserting a hyphen (or even a diaeresis in their fancy moments). Why all this fiddling with perfection? If it ain't broke, don't fix it, I say (btw, that's another perfectly valid use for "ain't" - one would never say "If it isn't broke(n), don't fix it" and expect to be taken seriously). But then, I am an arch-anti-over-hyphenationist. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:41, 7 March 2008 (UTC)

consuelos consuegros

Anyone know if there's an English word for consuelo: The relationship between people whose children are married to each other? That is, the parents of my son/daughter-in-law are my what? kwami (talk) 08:25, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

There isn't really an accepted term for this in English, but there are similar terms in the kinship terminologies of other languages, such as mekhutan מחותן in Hebrew. AnonMoos (talk) 09:39, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

There's also a modern Greek term συμπέθερος (feminine συμπεθέρα)... AnonMoos (talk) 11:07, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Wouldn't that be 'matchmaker'? Or is it ambiguous, or shifted over time? kwami (talk) 11:24, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

That's not what my small Oxford modern Greek dictionary says. Simbetheros is an almost exact morpheme-for-morpheme Greek translation of Spanish Consuegro... AnonMoos (talk) 17:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I noticed the correspondence. However, I also came across a Bulgarian translation of сват, one of the Slavic roots I actually recognize - unless in Bulgarian сват has shifted in meaning to consuegro. Or maybe it's just a poor translation. kwami (talk) 19:17, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Yeah, I've found it in Hebrew, Turkish, and Korean. But no English. I thought there might be a little-used term, like sister-wife for the relationship of two women married to the same man. kwami (talk) 09:43, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't think there's a term either. Time to coin one! Related is the fact that we don't have a word for (say) one's sister's husband's brother, i.e. the person who is my sister's brother-in-law and my brother-in-law's brother is my what? No word for it, though I've used "brother-in-law-in-law" informally. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 10:20, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I just call him my brother-in-law, though I don't know what to do with his wife! (Separation through two degrees of marriage is too much — that for me would be a sister-in-law in law.) Similarly, I call my sister's husband's mother my mother-in-law. No-one in my family even notices, but other people get confused. kwami (talk) 10:38, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Some languages have a specific term for "wife's sister's husband" and/or a specific term for "husband's brother's wife" (and sometimes the "husband's brother's wife" term is also used by two wives of the same man to refer to each other), but I don't know of any language with a specific term for sister's husband's brother (though in some languages such a relationship would be terminologically grouped together with some more basic kinship relationship). By the way, is it consuelos or consuegros? AnonMoos (talk) 10:55, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Argh! You're right. Probably reanalyzed consuelo per the name Consuela and the kin term abuela.

And the Spanish derivation is transparent. Too bad we can't adopt it into English. I guess you could say "we're co-inlaws", but that's not very precise. kwami (talk) 11:10, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I used to call them "outlaws".

As I was divorced, I can but speculate on the popularity of this endearing terminus. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 13:31, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I've heard "outlaws" used to describe one's gay partner's parents and siblings. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 14:12, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Oops, now that you mention it: I always thought that one of us three was a bit odd. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 17:53, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

亲家, pinyin qìngjiā or qīngjiā is the Chinese term for "my child's parents-in-law". There are various other terms for the other members of the in-law clan. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 13:38, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Yes, Chinese does have a nicely developed kinship system, though when I ask people, I find they don't actually know many of the more peripheral terms. (But then, not many English speakers know what a 'second cousin once removed' is.) kwami (talk) 19:17, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Looks like 亲家 is missing from Chinese kinship. Maybe you could add it? —Preceding unsigned comment added by Kwamikagami (talk • contribs) 19:26, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Have added it to article - hopefully correctly. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 23:23, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

On the original question, the movie The In-Laws used the plain word "in-law" for this relationship. But it was clearly a humorous neologism. --Anon, 21;38 UTC, March 2, 2008.

is there a hungarian version of this reference desk

I can't see one to the left... —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.122.66.157 (talk) 11:29, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Even the main WP:Reference desk page doesn't seem to have a Hungarian equivalent. I see it has a Welsh equivalent at cy:Wicipedia:Y Ddesg Gyfeirio, but looking through the history, it seems no one has ever asked a question there. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 11:36, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't see what Welsh has to do with it??? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.122.66.157 (talk) 13:12, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The Welsh example shows that, even when an interlanguage link to another reference desk is given, this is still no guarantee that there is a thriving desk at the other end. Conversely, the omission of an interwikilink needn't mean the corresponding foreign language Wikipedia doesn't have a reference desk. So I looked through the Hungarian WP, but found no refdesk equivalent. ---Sluzzelin talk 14:33, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Of course everyone in wales now speaks English, so unless there was a question specifically related to the Welsh language they would probably get a better reply here. -- Q Chris (talk) 20:13, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Is there nobody who feels it their moral duty to alleviate the sad under utilisation of the Welsh reference desk by being the first of all Brythonic inquisitors since the establishment of the RD in November 2003?

Unfortunately, I live in the old province of Noricum, where the Noric language is long extinct and virtually undocumented. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 20:31, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Hungarian Wikipedia does have hu:Wikipédia:Kocsmafal (helyesírás). Generally, the various "kocsmafal" (tavern) sites correspond to our village pump, but this particular one is on spelling, style, naming and other things pertaining to the Hungarian language and WP articles. It has no exact equivalent at en.wikipedia, and it's the closest thing to the language reference desk I was able to find. ---Sluzzelin talk 21:01, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Use of Latin across the Roman Empire

How widespread was Latin throughout the Roman Empire? How much was it used by non-Romans in conquered countries? Were there some countries that used it more? Are situations in films like Gladiator where all the slaves can converse fluently on first meeting (obviously necessary in a Hollywood film) a realistic depiction of linguistic barriers in the Roman Empire? Thanks for any answers! 81.96.160.6 (talk) 13:03, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Well, it was almost certainly widely used by non-Romans in the countries where the modern Romance languages have evolved. The eastern part of the empire (even before the official split into the Western Roman and the Eastern Roman Empires), however, used Greek as its lingua franca. (Still, I suppose Latin rather than Greek must have predominated in Dacia, since Romanian is derived from Latin.) In Britain, Latin never displaced the native Celtic language, although Welsh still has an enormous number of loanwords from Latin. I don't know how widely Latin was spoken in western North Africa, though. I've never heard of a Romance language (other than French and Spanish!) spoken in Morocco, Algeria, and Tunisia. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 14:53, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The article on Romance languages shows a map from around 20 CE the spread of Romance languages in the 20th century and is irrelevant to this question. The article on Vulgar Latin might interest you as well. ---Sluzzelin talk 15:21, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I don't care what the image description of that map says, that's the distribution of the Romance languages in the 20th century ("20c"), not in "20 CE". —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 15:27, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Sorry, my bad. Thanks. ---Sluzzelin talk 15:30, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

---

In the Balkans, there's the Jireček Line, while along the western frontiers of the empire ca. 400 A.D., Latin / Vulgar Latin basically prevailed south and west of the Rhine-Danube line. There's a map on page 175 of Les Invasions: Les Vagues Germaniques' by Lucien Musset, which shows how the Romance-speaking area contracted west of the Rhine and south of the Danube from ca. 400 A.D. to ca. 850 A.D., but how the border between Romance-speaking areas and Germanic-speaking areas has only undergone rather minor perturbations over the last 1,100 years.

Elsewhere in the eastern hemisphere, the Latin-speaking areas of the late Roman empire were somewhat similar to the Romance-speaking areas of today, with the major exceptions of the loss of Britain and the province of "Africa" (i.e. northern Tunisia and northeastern Algeria). AnonMoos (talk) 18:19, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Accessible current studies of this and related questions are Nicholas Ostler's Empires of the Word (a more general and comparative account of the spread of languages) and Ad Infinitum (a thorough study of Latin's penetration). Easy to find at Amazon.

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 21:32, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Grammar correct?

Is the following sentence grammatically correct?

"Unlike the Jack's poem, Jason's poem to John is full of joy and happiness, albeit false"

The part in questions is the last part the "..., albeit false" part. Is that correctly used? 99.240.177.206 (talk) 19:04, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

"the Jack's" is wrong. kwami (talk) 19:37, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

But "albeit false" is grammatical. --Anon, 21:43 UTC, March 2, 2008.

Well, grammatically it says that Jason's poem is false, not the joy and happiness. That is only inferable through context. To be pedantic, here "false" is an alternate predicate. To specify the correct meaning for a machine translator that can't make such inferences, you'd need to to say "albeit false joy and happiness", which of course don't sound too good. kwami (talk) 06:03, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Kwami ... your comment (more or less) went over my head ... at least the "pedantic" part of your note. Is the following correct to get across what the OP is trying to say, or is something still off?

Jason's poem to John, unlike Jack's, is full of joy and happiness, albeit false.

Does that work or not really? Thanks. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 17:36, 3 March 2008 (UTC))

If all you're focussing on is whether this way of using "albeit" is correct, then both versions are ok. But I'm having trouble understanding the meaning. I disagree with Kwami as to what 'albeit' refers to. To me, it can only refer to 'joy and happiness', not to 'Jason's poem'. But what's false joy or false happiness? If Kwami is correct, what's a false poem? -- JackofOz (talk) 22:32, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Hey, it's poetry. It doesn't need to make literal sense. I mean, what are "blind mouths"? Literal nonsense, but they convey quite a strong impression.

I'm not sure now about the parsing. You can simplify it to

the-poem is full-of-joy, albeit (it is) false

Now, to me it is clear that the meaning is that the adjective 'false' modifies 'joy', the noun embedded in the adjectival phrase full of joy:

the-poem is full-of-joy, albeit (it is) false-joy

So, Joseph, yes, to me it makes sense.

However, if you look only at the structure, I thought at first that, grammatically, the adjective would have to substitute for the adjectival phrase:

the-poem is full-of-joy, albeit (it is) a-false-poem.

(That is, A = X, albeit = Y could be A = X, albeit A = Y: 'the poem is joyous, albeit the poem is false'.)

If you substitute 'joyous' for 'full of joy', then you force this reading:

The poem is joyous, albeit false

can only mean that the poem is false.

The problem is what the unstated 'it' in (it is) false refers to. That's simply ambiguous, and cannot be recovered through parsing. You have to take the context and semantics into account. So, grammatically, I suppose you could argue that either reading is acceptable. However, only one of them makes sense here.

If you created a similar structure, where either reading works semantically, then it becomes completely ambiguous:

the essays are full of quotations, but they're incoherent.

Are the essays incoherent, or the quotations? We have no way of knowing. kwami (talk) 23:42, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I took the original sentence to mean that the poem was full of joy and happiness ... and that joy and happiness was false. Meaning, that the joy and happiness were disingenuous / fake / insincere / contrived / etc. Something along those lines. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:17, 4 March 2008 (UTC))

Contextually ... joy and happiness can be "false" (although there are much better word choices, as in my prior post) ... a poem cannot be "false". I'd say. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 04:20, 4 March 2008 (UTC))

The obvious mistaken use of "the" aside, this is about usage, not grammar. "Albeit" is not a word people say around here (Middle Atlantic, USA) very much. Let me put that another way: nobody uses "albeit" in speech here, ever. It is a wholly literary, high-register word that therefore has no natural usage to it. It does, however, have an environment it looks comfortable in (how's that for ending with a preposition?), and I would say that in the sentence in question it is missing an element of that environment. It's time for Satan to break out the earmuffs, because I'm about to use Encarta: "even though: used to introduce a statement that modifies a statement just made a difficult, albeit rewarding job". We can talk about the comma later. You need the other thing after "albeit" sets up for it. "Albeit" is often defined as "though", but it is not "though" and requires special handling. If you must use "albeit" there, you have to put "joy and happiness" after it. --Milkbreath (talk) 12:30, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

Use of the signal sic

Can someone please take a look at the introductory sentence of the following article: Writers Guild of America, west ... and notice its use of the signal sic ... not only once, but twice. I'd like to know if the sic is used correctly or incorrectly in this case. The organization has a right to name itself whatever it chooses to name itself -- independent of "conventional" punctuation, etc. I guess the idea is that, if indeed the organization had used proper and correct punctuation, there would be an apostrophe in the word "Writers" and a capitalization of the word "west". (I guess.) But, still, those are not mistakes per se -- but, quite the opposite -- likely very intentional naming techniques on the part of the organization. (They are, after all, a group of writers!) Now, the signal sic is generally used to indicate an error / mistake ... or also to indicate something unexpected (mistake or not). I am just curious if its use is appropriate in this particular instance. I am not sure. Furthermore, it's rather jarring to read the article and -– within the first few words -– a reader gets slowed down not by one, but two, of these sics. And probably has no idea what they even mean. On the article's Talk Page ---> Talk: Writers Guild of America, west#"Sic", I expressed some other thoughts and comments related to this. It may be helpful to read that posting also, as I believe that I included extra information there, as well. Any thoughts / ideas/ comments / feedback / input on all of this? Thanks. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:50, 2 March 2008 (UTC))

Update: Since the article has been (since) edited, the original introduction to the article read as follows:

Writers [sic] Guild of America, west [sic] (WGAw) is a labor union representing writers of television and film and employees of television and radio news. The 2006 membership of the guild was 7,627. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 17:38, 3 March 2008 (UTC))

I think the use of even one "[sic]" there is pedantry, and the use of two is downright assholery. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 21:55, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Well ... to be fair ... it does have its place. I am not sure if it does here, though? Thanks. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 21:56, 2 March 2008 (UTC))

I've removed them from the article. No reason not to be WP:BOLD. Deor (talk) 22:01, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Deor ... no offense ... I am neither timid ("unbold") nor incapable of editing the article. I am interested to know whether or not this use was correct and appropriate (or not). People can agree to disagree ... as I am sure that the editor who placed both "sics" felt that it was justified and warranted. (I highly doubt some young middle school kid did it for kicks to vandalize Wikipedia.) So, I'd like to solicit the difference of opinions either in favor of or against its use in this very specific instance. Thanks. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 22:12, 2 March 2008 (UTC))

Joseph, I did say "the use of even one '[sic]' there" (emphasis added), referring to the specific place where it was used in the article you mentioned. Of course sic has its place. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 22:05, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

OK. That makes more sense. I missed the word "there" in your original posting. Thanks. (Joseph A. Spadaro (talk) 22:08, 2 March 2008 (UTC))

The sic after "Writers" was particularly egregious. The use of attributive plurals in names of organizations and elsewhere (Veterans Day, for example) is so common that it's unworthy of comment. If it's thought likely that editors may try to capitalize "west" (or move the article to a title with capitalized "west"), one can always add a hidden note about the correct capitalization at the beginning of the article. Deor (talk) 22:18, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I've made similar comments on the relevant talk page. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:27, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

NAEYC

Hi. Is NAEYC (= National Association for the Education of Young Children) an acronym (like AIDS, snafu) or an alpha abbreviation (like NBA, POW)? Or can it be both (like HOV = "high-occupancy vehicle", at least where I am)? Or is it a combination of both types (like IHOP = International House of Pancakes)? I dont know the convention for pronouncing this one. – ishwar  (speak) 22:07, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article on the subject, Acronym and initialism, suggests that there is no ready answer to your question (and indeed, suggests that the distinction between the two is rather unclear, if it exists at all). Carom (talk) 22:18, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

There is certainly an answer to his real question, which is, "How is NAEYC pronounced? Does one say 'en ay ee wye cee' or something along the lines of 'nake' or 'nay-wye-cee'?" —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 22:22, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

If it's pronounced as a word, my guess would be "NAY-ik." Their Web site includes an e-mail address; why don't you ask them, Ish? Deor (talk) 22:29, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

(ec) In some schools of thought, if the group of letters can be, and usually is, pronounced as a single word (such as radar, QANTAS, ...), then it's an acronym; but if we say each letter separately (FBI, CIA ...) then it's not. This seems a useful and clear distinction to me, but others differ. There are grey areas. There are always grey areas. -- JackofOz (talk) 22:25, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Ok, I've found an NPR radio archive (From School to Summer Camp) with a pronunciation by Jerlean Daniel who is?/was? the director of NAEYC. She pronounces it [ɛneiwaɪsi] (en-ay-why-see), i.e. as an alpha abbrev. I'll take her pronunciation as definitive unless there's any contradiction here.

Carom: there is often a general way that these are pronounced. But, if you dont know, then you dont know (and I didnt know). There may be some variation, but I havent really noticed much. I mentioned HOV because it is always possible there are variant pronunciations. (In Texas there is some variation with HOV: most, in my experience (& I'm not from TX), say it as an alpha abbrev. but I have heard it as an acronym (where it rhymes with dove). Some Texans I've asked react against the acronym pronunciation as being decidedly "incorrect".)

Deor: yeah I dont really want to bother them at work with this question.... I figured Wiki folks like these kind of questions, so I asked here.

Anyway, if anyone actually says this word or has heard it spoken out loud before, then please leave a note. – ishwar  (speak) 00:09, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Which dove does it rhyme with? dove or dove? —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 05:13, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Both! My sister says /ˈhoʊv/ and my bro-in-law /ˈhʌv/. I believe the latter may be more common, but I don't really know. kwami (talk) 05:48, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

That's funny. I meant the bird dove, like love, shove (but not like stove, drove, or move either). I forgot about the verb. I havent heard it rhyme with stove, drove, dove (v.). It's kinda weird that there're some people who pronounce it like stove, drove. This ...ov spelling is only really in Slavic names seems like — although there is gov (guv), but that seems a bit British — and I would guess most are with a vowel different from stove, drove. Maybe it's the fact that orthographic words dont end with v (pace shiv, rev) that's creating this phenomenon. Interesting.... – ishwar  (speak) 22:19, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

If I were going to pronounce hov as a word rather than by its letters, I think I'd say /hɑv/ with the LOT vowel, which doesn't seem to be anyone else's choice. But in fact, (1) I had never heard of HOVs [by this name; of course I've heard of carpool lanes] until this thread, (2) if I had, I would certainly have said "aitch-oh-vee". —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 22:33, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm not familiar with the word either, but there happens to be a HOV lane near my sister's place (one which reverses direction to handle the morning vs. evening rush hour — there are carpool lanes as well, but that's not the same thing). When I first saw it, I assumed it was /hɒv/ too, but have been told that's not correct.

By the way, in the US .gov is also pronounced with an uh (/dɒt ɡʌv/). Maybe that's as much a source as love or above. kwami (talk) 23:05, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

I assumed it was /hɒv/ too When did Californians (?) become British?! I'd heard that Bostonians have that vowel, but to my ears still doesn't sound very rounded. — Zerida ☥ 23:35, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Oh, that. I'm just used to editing per the Wikipedia IPA transcription system, which marks that distinction for the people that make it. Locally it would be /ˈhɑv/. kwami (talk) 08:27, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

əəəəʊ nəəəəəʊʊʊ, I didn't realize the Brits were taking over IPA transcriptions on Wiki. Actually, I probably shouldn't say that--I seem to have roused someone's ire for pointing out correctly that Egypt was occupied by British imperialists. Wouldn't it be, like, totally awesome if we used California English for, like, everything! — Zerida☥ 01:24, 5 March 2008 (UTC)

The pronunciation of .gov makes sense because it's not an acronym, it's a clipped form of government, which has the STRUT vowel. My husband, who's German, has a hard time remembering that stove and clove have the GOAT vowel. He's always asking me to turn on the stuv and chop up a cluv of garlic. It's very cute. —Angr ^{If you've written a quality article...} 06:58, 4 March 2008 (UTC)

I have worked in childcare in both FL and HI. They pronounce it differently in both of these places. FL is like neigh-see and HI is like n-eye-ack.

Narratives, use of pronouns: I or me?

Do narratives use I or me?--Backtable232 (talk) 23:09, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

That is an ill-formulated question, Back. First give an informative title, so people scanning for opportunities to help you have some clue about the topic. Then ask a focused question! Of course "narratives" use both words, I and me. What exactly do you want to know?

– Noetica^♬♩ Talk 23:27, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

Do narratives use irony ? --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 23:53, 2 March 2008 (UTC)

I'm writing a narrative about a childhood memory for my creative writing class and I was wondering if it is alright if a narrative uses I, like, "I recall a time when I went swimming", or do I have to use my name in a narrative, like, "Backtable232 remembers a time he went swimming"?--Backtable232 (talk) 01:11, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Not at all. That would convert it into a narrative in the third person, as if it were somebody else talking about you, which is not what you want. There are hundreds of examples in literature where a narrative is in the first person but the name of the narrator is never mentioned. -- JackofOz (talk) 01:18, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

Illeism... AnonMoos (talk) 05:14, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

You may, on the other hand, use the third person narrative as a dramatic device to highlight the "otherness" between your current self and the remote "me" of your infancy. In your "I recall a time when I went swimming" you already record, as an adult, an adventure of your childhood.

If you observe little Backtable´s world from the relative omniscience of the present, then the use of I (Backtable in 2008) and he (BT in 1998) seperates those two worlds and personae. Of course, it requires considerably more writing skill to use this temporal "alienation" of the Egos. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 09:51, 3 March 2008 (UTC)

You may also do the reverse in writing your story from the world of the child in 1998 ("I go swimming") and, from your infantile world, speculate what the grown up Backtable ("she" or "he") will remember in 2008, what s/he will have forgotten, what s/he will have "lost" in gaining "adulthood". --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 10:10, 3 March 2008 (UTC)