Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other langs

Discussion of natural languages, or language in general.
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Herr Dunkel
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Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other langs

Post by Herr Dunkel »

As the title says.
I often jokingly refer to myself as a "Boar", from "Boarisch", from "Bayerisch" - and "boar" in English means something totally different from the term "Boar" in Boarisch.

Do you know of any?
Better yet, do you use any on yourself?
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Šm Mepuyoš ab Duhen »

In Croatian,word for citizen of Tirana is same as the word for tyrant.So,tyrants live in Tirana.
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Astraios »

In Hebrew, the root ʕ-R-B means "Arab", but also "interfere". So when you say "Don't interfere" in Hebrew, it looks/sounds like "Don't be an Arab". Not really the same, but it's funny.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Skomakar'n »

'Slavic' in Swedish ('slavisk') might as well mean 'slave-ic', and 'Slav' ('slav') actually is the same as 'slave', but has a different plural.

'Lätt' is a common interjection meaning something like "oh, yeah", "hell yeah" (but without the swearing) or like a positive counterpart of "no way" (it literally means 'easily'). This has made 'lettiska' ('Latvian') a funny word for me and one of my friends.

'!Kung' or whatever it's called is funny, since 'kung' means 'king' in Swedish.
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Bob Johnson »

Skomakar'n wrote:'Slavic' in Swedish ('slavisk') might as well mean 'slave-ic', and 'Slav' ('slav') actually is the same as 'slave', but has a different plural.
Yes, that's how <slave> was derived.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Astraios »

Skomakar'n wrote:"hell yeah" (but without the swearing)
Hell yeah isn't swearing.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Mr. Z »

Astraios wrote:In Hebrew, the root ʕ-R-B means "Arab", but also "interfere". So when you say "Don't interfere" in Hebrew, it looks/sounds like "Don't be an Arab". Not really the same, but it's funny.
Well, I've never noticed that. However, there is a similar pun with ʕ-R-B. This is also the root for "evening"; so the adjective form of "evening" is written the same way as the word for "Arabic" or "Arab", and is sometimes pronounced the same as well. Whenever I do go to a synagogue, I think that תפילת ערבית (evening prayer) is an Arab prayer.
Boer is pronounced the same as the Hebrew word בור, "ignorant, uneducated".
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Soap »

Boor is also an old fashioned word for a stereotypically ignorant lower-class person, though according to some dictionaries it is simply a loanword of Boer and therefore not really a coincidence. (Others say it's native or a loan from a French word for farmer and thus cognate to bovine).
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Astraios »

Mr. Z wrote:Well, I've never noticed that.
Well, of course you haven't, because התערב doesn't actually mean "be an Arab" (though it technically could).

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by ---- »

Skomakar'n wrote: '!Kung' or whatever it's called is funny, since 'kung' means 'king' in Swedish.
That's not really a good example, because there's no audible k in that word, it's just orthographic convention.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Soap »

It's the way 99% of people pronounce it though. Even in academic circles, veeeeeeeery few people actually pronounce it with a click, as far as Ive heard. The only non-native speakers Ive heard pronounce clicks in any context are ZBBer's and Russell Peters in a comedy sketch with a probably made-up name.
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Rui »

Soap wrote:It's the way 99% of people pronounce it though. Even in academic circles, veeeeeeeery few people actually pronounce it with a click, as far as Ive heard. The only non-native speakers Ive heard pronounce clicks in any context are ZBBer's and Russell Peters in a comedy sketch with a probably made-up name.
Yeah, in South Africa, the majority of the non-click language speaking population (basically the Coloured and white people) pronounces "Xhosa" with an initial [k~kʰ]. Granted, the "x" click in Xhosa does have a [k] coarticulation, but I don't think anyone who doesn't speak the language would say "oh yeah, I definitely hear a [k] there with the click", it just happens to be the closest approximation.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by finlay »

Chibi wrote:
Soap wrote:It's the way 99% of people pronounce it though. Even in academic circles, veeeeeeeery few people actually pronounce it with a click, as far as Ive heard. The only non-native speakers Ive heard pronounce clicks in any context are ZBBer's and Russell Peters in a comedy sketch with a probably made-up name.
Yeah, in South Africa, the majority of the non-click language speaking population (basically the Coloured and white people) pronounces "Xhosa" with an initial [k~kʰ]. Granted, the "x" click in Xhosa does have a [k] coarticulation,
as do most clicks – the only exceptions being the ones with a [q] coarticulation uvular phonation.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Turtlehead »

Between Maori and English
ate - liver; seat of affections
here - string; tie up; leash
kite - see; discover, find; recognise
mate - danger; dead; death; ill; sickness; in love; suffering
me - and; if; with; like; should
mine - to gather together
more - bare; plain, not decorated; toothless
nana - eye brow
nuke - crooked
one - beach; sand; mud
pane - head
pea - perhaps, maybe
pine - close together
poke - pollute
puke - hill
pure - ceemony to remove tapu
rite - agreed to; completed; like; equal; ready, prepared
take - beginning, cause, origin, reason; subject of discussion
toe - be left; remain
toke - worm
I KEIM HEWE IN THE ΠVEΓININΓ TA LEAWN WELX, ΠVVT NAW THE ΠVWΠVΣE FVW ΠVEINΓ HEWE IΣ VNKLEAW. THAT IΣ WAIT I LIKE TA MAKE KAWNLANΓΣ AWN THE ΣΠAWT.
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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by linguoboy »

Cymraeg ("Welsh language") sounds almost exactly like English "cum rag".

If I had a Welsh drag name, it would be "Dusky Cumrag".

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Jipí »

Turtlehead wrote:Between Maori and English
[A LIST OF WORDS THAT ARE TOTALLY NOT ENDONYMS]
Please look up the dictionary definition of the term endonym. Thank you.

Obvious funnies in English: Turkey ~ turkey; Hungary ~ hungry.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by linguoboy »

Guitarplayer wrote:
Turtlehead wrote:Between Maori and English
[A LIST OF WORDS THAT ARE TOTALLY NOT ENDONYMS]
Please look up the dictionary definition of the term endonym. Thank you.

Obvious funnies in English: Turkey ~ turkey; Hungary ~ hungry.
But those are both exonyms. The endonym for "Turkey" is Türkiye, for "Hungary" Magyarország.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Jipí »

OK, make a mark for me on the idiot tally list as well. No reason for you to be smug, Turtlehead, though.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by zompist »

In Portuguese, a turkey is a peru. (I believe it's named for the country.)

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by linguoboy »

zompist wrote:In Portuguese, a turkey is a peru. (I believe it's named for the country.)
And in Turkish, it's a hindi.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by zompist »

Hmm, supposedly French coq d'inde ( :> dindon) refers to the West Indies. Could Turkish have calqued it on French?

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Skomakar'n »

Soap wrote:It's the way 99% of people pronounce it though. Even in academic circles, veeeeeeeery few people actually pronounce it with a click, as far as Ive heard. The only non-native speakers Ive heard pronounce clicks in any context are ZBBer's and Russell Peters in a comedy sketch with a probably made-up name.
And why should you? It makes no sense to use a phoneme that isn't native to the language for one word. Words are usually adapted to the phonology of the language they're loaned into, and people on these fora should know that, if anyone. :S
linguoboy wrote:
zompist wrote:In Portuguese, a turkey is a peru. (I believe it's named for the country.)
And in Turkish, it's a hindi.
Can't join in on the fun with Swedish. :( We say 'kalkon' which just reminds me of French 'quelqu'un', which doesn't have anything to do with the subject.
Online dictionary for my conlang Vanga: http://royalrailway.com/tungumaalMiin/Vanga/

#undef FEMALE

I'd love for you to try my game out! Here's the forum thread about it:
http://zbb.spinnwebe.com/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=36688

Of an Ernst'ian one.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Astraios »

zompist wrote:Hmm, supposedly French coq d'inde ( :> dindon) refers to the West Indies. Could Turkish have calqued it on French?
More probably on the Arabic diik hindiy, which has the same meaning as the French (and is probably calqued on it, so yes, indirectly).

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by Izambri »

linguoboy wrote:
zompist wrote:In Portuguese, a turkey is a peru. (I believe it's named for the country.)
And in Turkish, it's a hindi.
And in Catalan is a gall dindi, also known as indiot, paó, pioc o titot.

In the first case, dindi is the fusion of d'indi "from India" (literally "of Indian"), that is, "from the Indies". No, not these Indies, but these ones.
Un llapis mai dibuixa sense una mà.

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Re: Endonyms that have intersting connotations in other lang

Post by finlay »

zompist wrote:Hmm, supposedly French coq d'inde ( :> dindon) refers to the West Indies. Could Turkish have calqued it on French?
Basically most places seem to have taken the name from whoever the merchants were who originally sold guineafowl to them, because turkeys were discovered in America and mistaken for guineafowl – for us it was the Turkish, and for most other places it was Indians (dinde, hindi), while for the Dutch and Scandinavians, it's apparently from the city of Calicut in India.

Some kind of weird historical mixup. So it seems likely that the French and the Turkish independently came up with the same etymology.

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