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(Fun) The internet should be more british

Started by An_dz, March 06, 2012, 12:09:42 AM

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jamespetts

I think that a goodly number of other people would have to join me, but only temporarily, for my usage, once the standard, and still considered by some, including me, to be so, to be a fad.
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IgorEliezer

#36
Quote from: AP on December 15, 2013, 09:16:55 PMIndeed. Although for speed auto-correct is very useful for such things, especially for words wanting ligatures/diaeresis; naïve, coördinate, archæology, &c. which are a right pain to type.
We Brazilians abolished the diaeresis or umlaut ( ¨ ) in the last orthographic reform that went into effect in 2009.

What a sad, I always thought it was cool to use diaeresis in worlds like freqüente (EN: frequent, pronounced /fra.'kwin.tə/) so we could make distinction between the "qu" pronounced as /kw/ and "qu" pronounced as /k/; the same goes for "gu" which can be pronounced as /gw/ or /g/. I had to ask for a few times how pronounce proper nouns, specially name of localities, when they are spelled with "qu" or "gu". :(

An_dz

Quote from: Ters on December 15, 2013, 08:03:18 PM
Not understanding such things is the price one pays for going to Britain without having watched British comedies first
I don't see where Mr. Bean helps me on this. ;D

@Igor
Agree with you Igor, now lingüiça will never be the same. They should had abolish the grave accent, no change in meaning, no change in pronunciation and hard to remember to use.

IgorEliezer

#38
Quote from: An_dz on December 16, 2013, 01:45:06 AMThey should had abolish the grave accent, no change in meaning, no change in pronunciation and hard to remember to use.
Don't get me started. D:<

The grave accent does change the meaning in a written Portuguese, not in speaking language. The grave accent rule is incredibly easy: you use "à" when the preposition "a" (EN: "to") overlaps the letter "a" in a pronoun or article.

a + a = à = to the <female noun>
a + as = às = to the <plural female noun>
a + as quais = às quais = to which
a + aqueles = àqueles = to these

The thing is, people simply refuse to use the preposition "a" in favor of "para" (EN: "for").

An_dz

Can you give an example? I never found one.

IgorEliezer

#40
Quote from: An_dz on December 16, 2013, 01:00:44 PM
Can you give an example? I never found one.

"O homem pinta a máquina" (objeto) = "The man paints the machine"
"O homem pinta à máquina" (à moda de) = "The man pains (something) by using a machine"

"O deputado depôs a CPI" = "The congressman overthrew/deposed the parliamentary commission of inquiry"
"O deputado depôs à CPI" = "The congressman testified to the parliamentary commission of inquiry"

"Caiu a sombra" = "The shadow fell"
"Caiu à sombra" = "(Something)/It fell by the shadow"

"Cheirar a laranja" (aspirar) = "Smell the orange"
"Cheirar à laranja" (feder a) = "Smells like orange"

"A noite chegou" = "The night [has just] arrived"
"À noite chegou" = "He/She/It arrived at the evening"

"Compra a vista" = "Buy the view/skyline/landscape"
"Compra à vista" = "Cash purchase"

"Comer a mesa" = "Eating the table" (Where are your manners?!)
"Comer à mesa" = "Having a meal at the table" (That's better.)

"Bater a porta" = "Hit/Slam the door"
"Bater à porta" = "Knock on/at the door"

Junna

Quote from: kierongreen on December 15, 2013, 09:29:40 PM
I'd say you create your own. 'buses and connexions being a couple I've noticed. I hadn't seen to-day before but it fits the pattern. Those aren't ways of writing used by most people, and English doesn't have any official standards, only what is used by the majority...

I have generally used connexions in writing for a long time (likewise I make an effort to write naïve and coördinate)... I assume 'buses is a compromise between omnibus and the modern derivative bus. Tingling Victorian sensations.

Quote from: Ters on December 15, 2013, 09:24:30 PM
At least when I write "tomorrow", I use all the letters. I don't do the same with the corresponding Norwegian word.

You don't? Does that mean you are one of those ravagers of words, contributing to the decay of modern language, the pollution of the tongues by dubious abbreviations and mobile-phone laziness? Even when I grew up, other kids would complain that my Swedish was excessively hard to understand due to rarely utilised words and what-not. These days my Swedish is in free-fall, for I do so rarely use it, that I myself am guilty of several cardinal sins, such as writing words apart and occasionally slipping up on grammar something fiercely, whereafter I find myself in a difficult position to whinge about the yearly choices of imbecilic "New Words" to be included in the degenerate dictionary.

Ters

Quote from: Junna on December 16, 2013, 03:39:24 PM
You don't? Does that mean you are one of those ravagers of words, contributing to the decay of modern language, the pollution of the tongues by dubious abbreviations and mobile-phone laziness?

Writes the one who skips letters from "do not". ;D The letters I drop from the Norwegian equivalent of "to-morrow" is probably something of a dialect, or in any case something way older than me. Even the slang trend when I was younger in which we only used the last syllable for some nouns (for the singular indefinite form, definite and plural forms would add further syllables during declension) was not something new, as evident by omnibus->bus, aeroplane->plane and (Scandinavian only) automobil->bil.

Quote from: Junna on December 16, 2013, 03:39:24 PM
Even when I grew up, other kids would complain that my Swedish was excessively hard to understand due to rarely utilised words and what-not. These days my Swedish is in free-fall, for I do so rarely use it, that I myself am guilty of several cardinal sins, such as writing words apart and occasionally slipping up on grammar something fiercely, whereafter I find myself in a difficult position to whinge about the yearly choices of imbecilic "New Words" to be included in the degenerate dictionary.

I try to avoid the word-splitting sickness, which is a bit odd, since people still pronounce the words as one.

An_dz

@Igor
Thanks, now I finally found grave accent is useful.

Quote from: Junna on December 16, 2013, 03:39:24 PM
You don't? Does that mean you are one of those ravagers of words, contributing to the decay of modern language, the pollution of the tongues by dubious abbreviations and mobile-phone laziness?
Just abbreviations and mobile laziness? You should check how some people write Portuguese in social medias, sometimes it takes two minutes to understand, and I'm talking about native speakers.

Junna

Quote from: An_dz on December 16, 2013, 09:53:34 PM
@Igor
Thanks, now I finally found grave accent is useful.
Just abbreviations and mobile laziness? You should check how some people write Portuguese in social medias, sometimes it takes two minutes to understand, and I'm talking about native speakers.

I've heard this told to me by native Spanish speakers, that they have a hard time reading that as well; I've noticed a few myself on various lowest-common-denominator sites, such as that they never tend to write out que, instead writing "ku" or just k. While I see things like this in most languages, the degree of it present Spanish and Portuguese seem very bad. From what I was told, apparently many of these younger people also have trouble reading correctly written Spanish, is this the case with Portuguese as well?

sdog

#45
Quote from: AP on December 15, 2013, 07:51:34 PM
It must be a real issue to students of the language...  :o
Nothing that wouldn't be fixed by watching a few classic UK series on the net. If i can trust my memories, that's anyway what we mostly did in school. I've certainly seen half of Fawlty Towers there, and the Monty Python films two or three times.

Quote
Ladies and Gentlemen, this is your Captain speaking. We have a small problem. All four engines have stopped. We are doing our damnedest to get them going again. I trust you are not in too much distress.
Or flying with British Airways...
I suppose, most people immediately understood it from the context, of   gliding.

Quote from: jamespetts on December 15, 2013, 09:32:29 PM
I think that a goodly number of other people would have to join me, but only temporarily, for my usage, once the standard, and still considered by some, including me, to be so, to be a fad.
I rather like what James is doing, as it is -- i think -- important, to remind us of the etymology of words. Being ignorant of such leads to uncomfortable situations, that might exceed even the unpleasantness of bad kerning in print.


From my experience of marking student lab-reports and student essays at a Canadian University: The difference between 'connection' and connexion' is not apparent to most students who often write something that, depending on family background, would be similar to 'conaction' (learned how to spell, but limited vocabulary) or 'conashen' (learned to write from <enter celebrity> on the telly). Words of Latin or Greek origin, that could be spelled easily, by comparing a few similar pre- or suffixes, are consistently misspelled (and i suppose also not understood). I am not talking about missleading words here (eg collinear). I've seen 'avidense', 'paraboler', 'centripadle', and my favourite: a 'sentrypetal'.

Second observation, students in general, seem to understand that "not bad" is a very positive remark, they also seem to value "not bad at all" or "nicely done" much higher than "amazing", "excellent" or "very good" (which i was told to use when marking average results). I suppose, they are aware of the inflationary use of these words. Using expressions that are chiefly British, implicitly tells them a different, slightly less exaggerated, scale is used.

I should also remark, while i have a strong bavarian (german) accent and being far from perfection, a few english idiosyncrasies and a rolling 'R' appear to be enough, to put me in an British English (as-a-second-language) category.


ps.: media is plural, of medium :-) [sorry for the pedantry, this one gave a little sting everytime, i read a certain forum thread]

pps.: speaking a second language relatively well, and very often, one slips into habits that are both wrong and hard to notice by oneself. Please, lose your polite restraints when you see recurring mistakes i made, and point them out. This helps me in two ways greatly: (i) i can learn not to make such mistakes; (ii) knowing there is someone who corrects me from time to time, is very assuring, as the frequency of such corrections is a metrum for my control of the language.

ppps: is 'what-not' chiefly BE, in particular as a noun: "hand me the whatnot, will you?"

isidoro

Quote from: AP on December 15, 2013, 09:16:55 PM
Indeed. Although for speed auto-correct is very useful for such things, especially for words wanting ligatures/diaeresis; naïve, coördinate, archæology, &c. which are a right pain to type.

The problem with auto-correct is that in certain circumstances one has to understand the meaning of a sentence to spell it correctly.  And machines have a hard time understanding.

Quote from: Junna on December 16, 2013, 11:23:49 PM
I've heard this told to me by native Spanish speakers, that they have a hard time reading that as well; I've noticed a few myself on various lowest-common-denominator sites, such as that they never tend to write out que, instead writing "ku" or just k. While I see things like this in most languages, the degree of it present Spanish and Portuguese seem very bad. From what I was told, apparently many of these younger people also have trouble reading correctly written Spanish, is this the case with Portuguese as well?

I think that has also something to do with the very bad interface old mobile phones (should I say tele-phones?) used to have.  And with SMS prices too.  When you have a tight budget as most younger people have you have to fit all you want to say in a single SMS.  The obvious choice is to make words shorter.  And all that made a custom that is kept nowadays, I think.

BTW, letter K is way cooler in Spanish than letter Q for some people, specially young people.  Hence they use it all the time...  Poor fashion-victims.

sdog

#47
Does not, knowing how to type with an outdated 9 key phone, make one rather un-fashionable, as it is a sign of being old or worse*. It's a bit like swiping vs. pecking. The latter is also an attribute of old-farts, ie iphone users. The hip-kids all have Samsung (which is, i should like to note, comparably sensible of them).

The effect of that horrible fad is that, since about 3 years, when it started, i cannot understand what half of my friends are posting on facebook. For (a) their spelling doesn't reflect the comon latin words well enough for me to identify them (b) google translate only knows spanish (and catalan), not vulgar-spanish with catalan, euskera, mis-spelled english and german mixed in. Which, on a second thought, might be not a bad things, as it gives one more reason to shun FB.

Quote from: kierongreen on April 15, 2012, 09:02:54 PM
For a comparison most people in Britain and the US seem to have problems with Indian English, which has not had so much contact over last 60 years or so.
This is constantly surprising to me, i consider english with an indian accent the most easily comprehensible form of spoken english. Or did you refer to english in india? Incidently, i am consistently not understood when ordering cake with raspberries, the sole exception are migrants who speak with an accent from the subcontinent.


*Ie ofspring of a family that wasn't afluent enough to buy their children smartphones?

An_dz

Quote from: Junna on December 16, 2013, 11:23:49 PM
From what I was told, apparently many of these younger people also have trouble reading correctly written Spanish, is this the case with Portuguese as well?
Yes, but it happens with quite a lot of older people too. It's the "More [useless technology (TV, phone)], less schools" policy of our government since the beginning. Last month a nice social program that let lower class families buy necessary furnitures, like refrigerators and stoves, now, suddenly one year before presidential election, offer tablets. I'm still wondering what's the necessity of a tablet for a low class family.

Back to grammar, this problem happens in English too, Facebook is the gem for such.

The most common errors, that I can't understand how people can make, are: Your, You're; Their, They're, There; too, to; It's, Its;

Ters

Quote from: An_dz on December 17, 2013, 03:40:48 AM
The most common errors, that I can't understand how people can make, are: Your, You're; Their, They're, There; too, to; It's, Its;

I don't fully understand either, but I have caught myself in writing such errors myself. In my case, I know the difference, so there must be some mix-up when my brain converts phonemes to letters. (In Norwegian, it's a common problem to mix up the Norwegian word for "and" and the infinitival particle, which sound almost the same. Most of the time, it should be easy to tell which is correct, but there actually are a few difficult cases.) For too->to and it's->its, it can simply be a missing keypress.

ӔO

Unfortunately, auto-correction only does spelling and not grammar.

I think the trouble with the English language is how the locals have tried to inter-operate it with their own language.


It's kind of like how imported food finds a new use that the exporting country had never imagined.
Sushi pizza would be one of those...
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