Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 December 7

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December 7

Chert in Spanish?

I would like to create an article for Chert in Spanish by translating the English one but I don't know how to say it. I only found sílex on my own but that seems to be flint. What can I do? I speak Spanish fluently and can't recall as I am not well verses in rocks.Luciferwildcat (talk) 03:20, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Doing some digging, "ftanita" may be the Spanish word. My spanish is super rusty (basically comes via my knowledge of French mixed with some heavy guessing), but Google Translate lists that as a possible hit for "chert", and all of the other possible hits are Spanish names of other rocks (shale, slate, flint, etc.) Ask around and see if that fits. --Jayron32 04:23, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

es:Puriscal mentions ftanita in the "Geología" section, and Google Translate likes "Chert" for it there. --Jayron32 04:25, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

"ftanita" looks close enough, but I'm not sure if the word "chert" can or should be translated exactly. "Chert" is a collective term that includes multiple distinct types of quartz and the word with that exact meaning simply may not exist outside English.--Itinerant1 (talk) 05:17, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

How to read this handwriting

I want to see how Deng Xiaoping's name is spelled in Deng_xxixian.jpg

It seems to be "Teng Xi Xian" - Is this correct? Thanks, WhisperToMe (talk) 04:24, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

That link's no good. Is that pic in Wikipedia or just on your computer ? StuRat (talk) 04:42, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Sorry, it should be File:Deng_xxixian.jpg - It's actually on the Commons WhisperToMe (talk) 05:15, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Looks to me like Teng Hi Hien. See here (second paragraph). Deor (talk) 13:11, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Looks right to me. Thank you very much! WhisperToMe (talk) 13:57, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Deng was Hakka, whose language is quite different from Mandarin, so it's not surprising he would spell his name differently than the way Pinyin spells it. I don't know Hakka, though, so I don't know if that's the reason for this. rʨanaɢ (talk) 14:51, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

It is also possible that this was Deng's given name and that he adopted another name later in life, which is not an uncommon practice among the Chinese. See "Chinese name#Alternative names". — Cheers, JackLee ^–talk– 18:33, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

There is no standard for transcribing Chinese at that time (early 1920s). Deng was descent from a Hakka family in Sichuan, however he did not speak Hakka, he spoken Southwest Mandarin. Deng Xiaoping's name was Xixian after entering school, and changed to Xiaoping in 1927 during the harsh time after CPC-KMT split--刻意(Kèyì) 14:30, 10 December 2011 (UTC)

Spain and France

Hello. A brief resumen of myself: I am ethnically Chinese but adopted by a family of linguists and from my early life my mother spoke only Spanish to me and my father only French, and we lived in the united states (except for frequent travel with my parents' professions) so I grew up speaking three languages natively o.0 I share my adoptive parents' love of travel and I have found a strange trend that in France people don't bat an eyelash that I speak native-like French but in the Latin American countries they stare. I think it is because of my racial appearance, but then why the difference between le monde francophone and el mundo hispano? Thanks. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 110.138.215.48 (talk) 04:41, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

Perhaps there are more French-speaking Asians than Spanish-speaking ? The former Indochina spoke French, and, even though they aren't Chinese, many Occidentals lump them all in together. As for Spanish-speaking Asians, there's the Philippines (although they haven't been a Spanish colony for over a century now), and, if you consider Portuguese to be close enough, there's Macau. StuRat (talk) 04:49, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

There are Asians in many parts of Latin America, one even became President of Peru, see Alberto Fujimori. The issue may have been with your Spanish rather than with your appearance; the varieties of Spanish spoken in the Hispanophone world are quite distinct, and speaking a particular variety will mark you, for example someone speaking Castilian Spanish in, say, Cuba or Mexico would seem out-of-place. --Jayron32 06:11, 7 December 2011 (UTC)

It's clearly your accent, not your appearance. The way of pronouncing "c" or "z" in Spain may be taken as a gay code elsewhere (no offense, I'm serious). 1947rogs (talk) 11:06, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

At least tell us which pronunciation is a gay code! --Colapeninsula (talk) 11:11, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

"Z" and "c" (as in ce-, ci-) are pronounced the same as "s" most everywhere (this side of the pond). But e. g. "zumo" starts with your tongue against your front teeth in official Castillian Spanish, right (except for seseo, I think)? This is the pronunciation that may be used as a gay code.1947rogs (talk) 13:12, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

So Spanish has a gay lisp too? Angr (talk) 13:30, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

From Sondheim's "The Boy from...", a parody of "The Girl from Ipanema": "Why does he claim he's Castilian? / (He thays that he'th Cathtilian.) / Why do his friends call him "Lillian"? / And I hear at the end of the week / He's leaving to start a boutique." - Nunh-huh 23:52, 8 December 2011 (UTC)