Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2017 January 12

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January 12

Teaching your son Klingon

In follow up to @Jayron32:'s speculation that a child had been brought up in Klingon, here is a link http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1229808/Linguist-reveals-I-spoke-Klingon-son-years.html. The child began refusing to use it when he found out others his age did not. μηδείς (talk) 04:02, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Klingon language#Speakers already mentions this case, and has included it since Feb 2012. --217.140.96.140 (talk) 13:46, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

It's not only Klingon. I previously posted the example of Nicolas Slonimsky teaching his daughter (Electra) Latin, which he wrote about in his memoirs. He later writes '"One day Electra announced, with a suspicious look in her eyes, 'Daddy, other kids don't speak Latin at home.'" Revealingly, in both cases the language willingly used was the one used by their peers, and not their parents. Double sharp (talk) 09:23, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

Why is there an apartment brand called "Doosan We've the Zenith"?

Is this a pun in Korean or something? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 16:37, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

May have to do with Zenith Electronics, which was a US company, now owned by LG in South Korea. Does LG by any chance own the apartment complex ? StuRat (talk) 16:43, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Maybe not. The article says it's launched by Doosan Engineering & Construction (a subsidiary of Doosan Group). LG is not a subsidiary of Doosan Group. I don't know if LG has a contract to include the word Zenith in the name in return for a sum of money, though. Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 17:10, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Or it might have to do with the word Zenith, and possibly a less than idiomatic translation. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 16:47, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Yes, a pun is a double meaning, and these are the two ("We have the best" and "We have the electronics company"). StuRat (talk) 16:52, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

I don't see anything in Doosan Group that suggests a connection to the former Zenith brand or its current owner. The Doosan Group seems to be mostly in the construction business. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:22, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

South Korean companies tend to be highly diversified. Look at everything Daewoo was into, before they were broken up. StuRat (talk) 04:00, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

Or maybe "we've" here is not the contraction of "we have", as we are all assuming, maybe it's just a made up brand name ("wee-vee") with a funky apostrophe for no reason. --165.225.80.115 (talk) 17:37, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

If you do a bit of digging on their website, you will encounter a sort of story about this, @ [1]:

• Brand Meaning
• We've got everything.
• Doosan We've is a residential space that has everything, and it is a residential space that modern people want and want to live.
• The Weave is a space where we grow love for life (We live), designed to show the dignity of life (We save), and a comfortable and convenient space where we solve all our needs.

I'm confused already.

• Our Brands
• Weave
• Doosan E & C's Weave is a residential space with all the things that Doosan E & C, born in 2001, is a place where modern people want to have a place to live and love for life.
• Weave means a convenient space where all the needs of life are solved, designed to be able to fully utilize all parts of the house.
• Weave's Brand Identity is based on the Doosan logo, which is based on a blue rectangle. It has a place of joy (Live), a place of love and happiness (Love), a place of want (Have) It is a symbol of Doosan E & C's promise of solving all the problems of life.

The logo, however, says We've, not Weave.

Elsewhere on their website, I read:

• Doosan Weave is leading the world-class residential culture from design to construction to after-sales service based on a unique sense and the best technology.
• Through this, Doosan We've created a community culture that enables customers to live a comfortable and happy life and grow into a respected society.

More confusion.

At the bottom of most pages is:

• Doosan Is 've We Doosan Engineering & Construction 'S Family Brand for residential Buildings.

I think this should read:

• Doosan We've is Doosan Engineering & Construction's Family Brand for residential Buildings.

The site is written in Korean, and does not offer its own in-house English version. Google translate does that job as well as it usually does; not well at all. So, somewhere between the Koreans' sense of word play and Google's bumbling efforts the truth lies. From the above, I deduce that the physical place is the WEAVE, and the brand name for it is WE'VE, a play on "We've got everything". But don't quote me. Welcome to "anything goes" English. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 21:26, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

This spells the building complex "We've" and it's photo is captioned "We've the Zenith Towers in Marine City, Haeundae District." Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 22:10, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

Somehow Korean company names don't translate well into English. LG originally meant "Lucky Goldstar", which sounds like something you might give your toddler for tinkling in the toilet. They shortened it to just LG now (just as Kentucky Fried Chicken shortened their name to KFC in hopes that we will forget how unhealthy it is if we don't see "Fried" in the name). StuRat (talk) 21:39, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

Sorry to spoil all the Korean pun fun, but Doosan We've the Zenith isn't the most robust article on a company (or isn't it just a company brand styling?) that I've ever seen. I'm a little surprised it hasn't been hastily deleted. Martinevans123 (talk) 21:43, 14 January 2017 (UTC)

Birket, in English or French

What is a birket? It is mentioned in an article on Ijzim, a depopulated Palestinian village, and, my curiosity piqued, I followed a few lines of enquiry. The original comes from the description of an 1870 overnight stop by the French explorer Victor Guérin, who wrote:

Près de là [le puit] est un birket actuellement hors d'usage et à moitié comblé.[2]

This was translated by the Survey of Western Palestine (1873) as:

Near the well a birket, no longer used, and partly filled up. [3]

There is no entry for "birket" in the OED. In an advanced search, there are 16 results for quotations and 15 for full-text, but, unless I'm missing something, these all appear to be references to surnames of authors cited. Any ideas? Carbon Caryatid (talk) 16:54, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

It's an Arabic word for a cistern. See, for instance, this glossary in Doughty's Travels in Arabia Deserta and our article Birket Israel. Deor (talk) 17:13, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Prompt, plausible, and well-referenced (though I can't see inside the book mentioned). The best of the RefDesks: thank you. Carbon Caryatid (talk) 18:20, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

The glossary that you can't see contains the simple entry "Birket, cistern", as well as a few entries for specific, named birkets that are referred to in the book. Deor (talk) 19:17, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

If I understand correctly, the word in question is wikt:بركة#Etymology 2 (in the construct state), translated in Wiktionary as "pond". --31.55.51.84 (talk) 20:00, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

"translated in Wiktionary as "pond". And in the context of a nearby well for drinking water, perhaps reservoir would be appropriate. Akld guy (talk) 21:59, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Word not found in common French dictionaries. "Une birket" seems to name a kind of artificial reservoir (a pool) used in the Middle East. Examples of use here, here or here — AldoSyrt (talk) 13:37, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

In "French" the plural of "birket" is "birak"!!!! Definitely a word loan from Arabic. See here — AldoSyrt (talk) 17:35, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

Equivalent to German "einordnen"

Wie würden Sie die jüngsten politischen Geschehnissse einordnen? – How would a native English speaker express that properly?--Hubon (talk) 22:40, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

What translation to use for einordnen largely depends on the context of the question, but "How would you classify the most recent political events?" is a possibility. Deor (talk) 23:19, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! The context would be a presenter asking a foreign correspondent about his view on current events in the respective country. Could "classify" then still be used?--Hubon (talk) 23:35, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Hmm, maybe "summarize"? It really depends on what sort of response the questioner is looking for. Deor (talk) 23:44, 12 January 2017 (UTC)

Okay, let's say he wants to know what long-term meaning can be attached to recent political events in the foreign country...--Hubon (talk) 01:14, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

I think you'd probably say something like "How would you assess the most recent political events?". "einordnen" does have the literal meaning of "putting something at its right place within a system" (shelving, filing, classifying), but I'm not sure that literal meaning can be translated to English without making the question sound unusual (while "Wie würden Sie die jüngsten politischen Geschehnissse einordnen?" does indeed sound like something a news anchor might ask a reporter or expert, and I've probably heard it, verbatim). ---Sluzzelin talk 06:37, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

"einordnen" invokes this idea of categorizing or pigeonholing something onto an implied ideological (or some other) continuum. I've never come across an English expression that conveyed that notion idiomatically. I've come to think it's a metaphor (or rahter a metaphor-turned-cliche) that exists only in German. Asmrulz (talk) 11:05, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

"Can you put the recent political events into context"? would be my translation in this context. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 11:52, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

The verb “einordnen” is closely related to priorities and to mutual relative importance. Maybe “…how would you rank recent political developments…” would be the most concise equivalent as it does address the idea of ordering (einordnen) these events. --Cookatoo.ergo.ZooM (talk) 12:22, 13 January 2017 (UTC)

Many thanks to all of you for your kind proposals! Best--Hubon (talk) 18:56, 17 January 2017 (UTC)