Search found 66 matches
- Mon Jun 06, 2011 11:39 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Help with labialization, palatalization, and aspiration
- Replies: 37
- Views: 7568
Re: Help with labialization, palatalization, and aspiration
Great, I thought I got it, and now listening to these sound samples, I clearly don't. Anyone know of a sound example that contrasts (for example) [kʷ] and [kw]. The examples I find contrast [kʷ] with [k], and I'm still lost. Sigh. More work to do. Honestly languages which contrast [kʷ] and [kw] are...
- Fri Jun 03, 2011 11:40 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Help with labialization, palatalization, and aspiration
- Replies: 37
- Views: 7568
Re: Help with labialization, palatalization, and aspiration
Great, I thought I got it, and now listening to these sound samples, I clearly don't. Anyone know of a sound example that contrasts (for example) [kʷ] and [kw]. The examples I find contrast [kʷ] with [k], and I'm still lost.
Sigh. More work to do.
Sigh. More work to do.
- Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:58 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Tone as grammatical marker rather than phonological
- Replies: 21
- Views: 5313
Tone as grammatical marker rather than phonological
The title is badly phrased, but my question is basically: Are there examples of languages that use tone to mark grammatical features rather than acting as phonemes? I know phonemes is the wrong word, but I'm not sure how to ask if tone can be used for marking case and inflecting verbs, rather than h...
- Thu Jun 02, 2011 12:52 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Words that are their own opposites
- Replies: 107
- Views: 14680
Re: Words that are their own opposites
My favorite example is 'dust.' It can mean to remove small bits of particulate, or to add small bits of particulate.
There's also a couple of good examples in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym
There's also a couple of good examples in http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Auto-antonym
- Sun Apr 24, 2011 9:02 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Syntax question worth asking
- Replies: 13
- Views: 2534
Re: Syntax question worth asking
Since (by all the arguments) 'worth' seems to be either an adjective with a few unique properties, or a preposition with a few unique properties, I'm happy to give up on coming up with a categorization we're all happy with..
- Tue Feb 15, 2011 5:32 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Tritransitivity?
- Replies: 30
- Views: 10204
Re: Tritransitivity?
Ah, I counted wrong. x-transitivity vs x-valency.
- Thu Feb 10, 2011 2:24 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Tritransitivity?
- Replies: 30
- Views: 10204
Re: Tritransitivity?
How's this for an English example: I gave Mary herpes.
Disclaimer: I did not give Mary herpes.
Disclaimer: I did not give Mary herpes.
- Tue Dec 21, 2010 1:42 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Yonagu idea: Essay collection
- Replies: 75
- Views: 12858
Re: Yonagu idea: Essay collection
I'd like to contribute. Would you be looking for academia-style texts with citations and pointers for further research, or a more relaxed "ideas on..." style? I'd happily write an essay on gender or number. Or both. I wrote my dissertation on grammatical gender and social gender in French, so I kin...
- Sat Dec 11, 2010 3:22 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Do phonemes exist? (Travis bait)
- Replies: 58
- Views: 10224
Re: Do phonemes exist? (Travis bait)
6. People are surprised by phonetic facts, such as [...] the fact that affricates are composed of several phones [...] Side note: I was under the impression that affricates were a single phone, i.e. that [tS] was not a [t] followed by a [S] but a single sound, with a stop followed by a fricative re...
- Sun Oct 17, 2010 11:48 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Possible minimal pair between unaspirated and aspirated 't'
- Replies: 7
- Views: 2128
Possible minimal pair between unaspirated and aspirated 't'
... in English. This is somewhat contrived, but I've been thinking about it, and I think there's a situation where [t] and [t h ] form a minimal pair. Consider the following words: bank stop (a phrase I made up to refer to, I don't know, a stop sign by a bank, which becomes known as the bank stop) a...
- Wed Oct 06, 2010 8:30 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Language revival
- Replies: 16
- Views: 3804
Um, the founding of Israel was far later than the revival of Hebrew. I know that. What I was saying is that I'm not sure Hebrew would've survived, at least to the extent it has, without the massive state support Israel then provided it with. I was under the impression (incorrectly?) that prior to I...
- Tue Oct 05, 2010 6:33 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Language revival
- Replies: 16
- Views: 3804
- Mon Oct 04, 2010 8:48 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Greek help
- Replies: 13
- Views: 3323
- Sun Oct 03, 2010 9:00 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Greek help
- Replies: 13
- Views: 3323
Greek help
This is a quick one - a lepidopterist is someone who studies butterflies, or lepidoptera. I know ptera is the root meaning wing, but the OED is really unhelpful with the root lepido-. Anyone?
- Sat Oct 02, 2010 5:14 pm
- Forum: None of the above
- Topic: Linguistic Quackery Thread, take 2
- Replies: 812
- Views: 209285
"Give me a word, any word, and I show you how the root of that word is Greek." "Kimono." "Kimono, okay, let's see. I have it. Kimono comes from Greek word, Chimonas, which means, 'winter' - and what do you wear in the winter: a robe." :D I was worried with such an international crowd here that the ...
- Sat Oct 02, 2010 10:09 am
- Forum: None of the above
- Topic: Linguistic Quackery Thread, take 2
- Replies: 812
- Views: 209285
Who said that? A turkish guy I know. I found it quite amusing. And he was serious? Oh yes, he was. "Give me a word, any word, and I show you how the root of that word is Greek." "Kimono." "Kimono, okay, let's see. I have it. Kimono comes from Greek word, Chimonas, which means, 'winter' - and what d...
- Sun Sep 19, 2010 9:02 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: "n times greater"
- Replies: 26
- Views: 6049
and the only conclusion I can draw is that phrases like "five times hotter than" sound meaningful, but aren't Well, they can be meaningful if they're included in sentences like: "It's five times hotter than the kettle is .", which would mean it's: (KettleTemp * 5), as opposed to the (KettleTemp * 5...
- Fri Sep 17, 2010 11:12 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Dalmatian Resources
- Replies: 15
- Views: 3553
- Thu Sep 16, 2010 6:29 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Dalmatian Resources
- Replies: 15
- Views: 3553
- Thu Sep 16, 2010 4:51 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Dalmatian Resources
- Replies: 15
- Views: 3553
- Thu Sep 16, 2010 1:31 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Dalmatian Resources
- Replies: 15
- Views: 3553
Dalmatian Resources
I've been looking to use some Dalmatian for something I'm working on for my creative writing class, and the resources I've found via google seem cut and pasted from Wikipedia. Does anyone know of some good resources on the Dalmatian language?
- Fri Sep 10, 2010 3:31 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: "n times greater"
- Replies: 26
- Views: 6049
I ran into this with the phrase - "five times hotter than." I was trying to think about this to determine how hot the 500 C oven we used at work was. At first I thought "it's five times as hot as 100 C, therefore 5 times boiling temp, therefore, 1060 F." But it's not. It's 932 Fahrenheit. 1060 F wou...
- Sat Sep 04, 2010 11:04 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: European languages before Indo-European
- Replies: 812
- Views: 200423
Re: European languages before Indo-European
Here is an interesting article about the linguistic diversity of aboriginal Europe. I think that pre-colonial North America is a fairly good model for pre-IE Europe (overall roughly similar climate and cultural development). Pre-colonial North America (what is now USA and Canada) had about 60 langu...
- Mon Aug 23, 2010 2:16 pm
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Phonotactics and language identification
- Replies: 17
- Views: 4105
Sound sequences aren't simply evaluated on a binary choice of "allowed" or "not allowed", but also on probability. Anyone familiar with African names knows that certain combinations are much more probable in Niger-Congo languages than they are in English, even if they fall within the realms of the ...
- Mon Aug 23, 2010 9:43 am
- Forum: Languages & Linguistics
- Topic: Phonotactics and language identification
- Replies: 17
- Views: 4105
Phonotactics and language identification
I remember reading once somewhere that one of the ways we identify words as English or not involves phonotactics - like the whole gostak things, we know that 'distims' and 'doshes' are both potential English words, even though we may not know them specifically. We also recognize a word like 'vlim' i...