voiceless alveolar lateral fricative

(blog is inactive but i'm keeping everything here as an archive of cool linguistics posts) A sideblog for linguistics and language, especially phonology, internet linguistics, translation, conlanging, and a lot more. I'm not a linguist, but the subject interests me! I'm fluent in English, fairly proficient in Spanish, and I know some Japanese and a little Welsh too. (the icon is my favorite IPA symbol; the title is my favorite IPA sound)

[phonotactic]

hmm this blog is pretty inactive as i’ve mostly been reblogging language/linguistics stuff to my main instead, so follow me on @eldritch-elrics if you’d like more content from me (but mostly not language stuff) :0

[balzabul]

I remember seeing many maaaany years ago like within my first years of Tumblr, a handy post/chart for learning the differences between shared (and unshared) symbols used in Chinese, Korean and Japanese, and so I wanted to throw something together quick to help people learn the differences between languages using the Arabic script– they’re not all Arabic!! These are just some of the more common ones you see online.

Many many languages use a modified Arabic script, and I couldn’t possibly detail each and every one, so here are links to some info about others as well! Including:

Azerbaijani

Sindhi

Balochi

Luri

Mandinka

Arabi Malayalam

Kyrgyz

Pegon script (Javanese, Madurese, Sundanese)

This is also just a basic list of all languages current using a modified Arabic script in one way or another

[awed-frog]

WHOA

[dulcewhisperlea]

[tywysogannwn]

this is one of the reasons it’s so hard to translate on the fly 😭 monoglots just don’t understand and think you’re bad at the source language 😟

[1esknineteen]

[decoy-ocelot]

Oh, oh, this reminds me of the only known bilingual palindrome:

Anger? ‘Tis safe never. Bar it! Use love.

Spell that backward and you get:

Evoles ut ira breve nefas sit; regna!

Which is Latin for:

Rise up, in order that your anger may be but a brief madness; control it!

[pinglederry]

@copperbadge

[copperbadge]

Whenever I see stuff like this I wonder how people even come up with it. 

[antique-scarecrow]

i’m so glad you people are out there being clever so i don’t have to be

[allthingslinguistic]

One of the occupational hazards of being a lexicographer on social media is that you are often subjected to arguments about whether something is a word or not. Lexicographers see these complaints a…

Kory Stamper has a snappy post up at Harmless Drudgery about lexicography and “real” words. Excerpt: 

I think [insert reviled word here] isn’t a real word.

Let’s back up. Why do you think it’s not a real word? Because by a linguist’s definition, if it communicates meaning to an audience, then it’s “a real word.” […]

But it’s illogical/ugly/stupid.

Just because you don’t like it doesn’t make it somehow “not real.” This is one of the more absurd notions that people have about language: that the mere dislike of a word invalidates its very existence. […] I hate heat, for instance, and think temperatures above a very dry 80F can just nope right on out of here–but summer arrives every year, like clockwork, just to piss me off. Should my personal feelings about the power of the sun ruin everyone else’s beach vacation? […]

Okay, let’s try this: how do I know when a word isn’t real?

Not to get all ontological and shit, but if it is a signifier of meaning used in the course of communication between people, it’s real. Even if it’s unintelligible to you! I don’t speak Polish, but I’m not going to say that Polish words aren’t real just because I don’t understand them.

You’re making me sound like a massive prick.

What’s the point, really, of declaring that a word isn’t real? It’s ultimately a show of power or superiority over someone else, and so, in that sense, it is the marker of an absolute unit of shittiness. I’ve made my feelings about correcting people’s speech known before, and this is just another variant of it. It centers someone else’s language in your own experience, and it’s ridiculous to think that yours is the default experience for everyone. Language is bigger than just one person! That’s a feature, not a bug!

Read the whole post

Perhaps the simplest way to sum this up is: “X is not a real word” is almost always a logical fallacy. Unless we’re talking about literal keysmash (asljfalkfslf is not a real word, but no one really bothers to go about declaring this), what confers real-word-hood is simply people using something as a word, not a dictionary or lexicographer or linguist. 

[phonotactic]

Do you meed to know how to speak multiple languages in order to be a linguist? I ask because I find linguistics fascinating but I spent 4 years trying to learn Spanish, it was hell and I barely scraped by in my classes. I've lost most of it after like 6mo. Maybe there's a different way I could learn but if pursuing this interest would mean having to learn multiple languages well, it might be better to drop it.

honestly i’m really not the person to be asking this question to! i think you could very well do linguistics without learning multiple languages, but i don’t know for sure. if you have an academic advisor or something i’d speak to them

alternatively, maybe trying out a different language would be more fulfilling? ex. i hated learning spanish but i’m having a really fun time learning japanese currently

[codarsneachta-deactivated202006]

In Irish, “December” is “Mí na Nollag” which is literally “The Month of Christmas” so I feel completely culturally justified in treating today like the beginning of one long holiday, honestly.

[pog-mo-bhlog]

In scottish gaelic its ‘an Dubhlachd’ which effectively means the blackness and i feel like this is one of the fundamental differences between irish and scottish gaelic.

[queen-susans-revenge]

In traditional Irish folktales, the elves only understand/respect Gaelic: the English language revolts them, so don’t expect to be winning any of those famous riddle contests or song tournaments in English. I’ve idly considered making one of those memes where it’s like [THE IRISH] *brofist* [THE JEWS] and the point of agreement is “our language is magic,” but the joke would take too much explaining to be funny. A lot of Irish Gaelic is structured around speech and the power of language. There isn’t, for example, a word for “yes” or “no.” In order to answer a direct yes/no question, you have to use a form of the verb that was used to ask the question. So basically, if the question is–say–”did you murder your wife” then there is no way to simply say “Yes, Your Honor” or “No, Your Honor.” Your minimum required effort involves using the verb that was invoked in the question: “I murdered,” or “I didn’t murder.” Of course you can just as easily, in just as few syllables and maybe fewer, change the verb. “I was framed,” maybe. Which is to say that the most basic speech acts in Irish involve constructing a narrative, assenting to others’ narratives or challenging them, and most crucially elaborating on the narratives that have already been established. 

(I chose murder just to be a colorful example, but actually I need to go back to my language reference books and check because I bet this interacts interestingly with the tendency in Irish for the narrator never to be the subject of her own story. You’re always the object, in Irish: you can’t drop a plate, for instance, the plate drops itself at you. You’re not thirsty but a powerful thirst is on you. You didn’t murder that woman but she very well might have gotten murdered in your general vicinity.) You see this lots of other places in the language too. For instance there’s also no word for “hello” or “goodbye.” If you want to greet somebody your required minimum is to cough up a formulaic blessing: Dia duit, God be with you. Here’s the thing. The second person can’t just be like “yup, uh huh. dia duit.” No. The stakes have been raised. The second person’s required minimum answer is now Dia’s muire duit, God and Mary be with you. If a third person joins they have to invoke St. Patrick on top of the two already mentioned. I’m not kidding. At four people you do hit a limit where you’re allowed to just say “God be with all here,” but in the very traditional country pubs it’s an insult to cross the threshold without saying at least that to cover everyone inside. Actually worse than an insult; basically a curse. That’s the burden you bear when you start speaking a magic language.

[magistralucis]

Could you please tell the long and absurd story about the elder scrolls cat term? :3

Okay, if only for the reason that it’s a very absurd story.

You’re familiar with Khajiits if you’ve played the Elder Scrolls series. Cat people, so far so good. There’s a lot the Korean fandom has to say about the series, both in general and in terms of memes, but the meme I’m going to talk about probably has the most traction in the Korean internet.You see, we really like Khajiit merchants. Not just because they have wares if you have coin, but because they invite you to ‘take a look’. Ri’saad’s audio for this phrase is uniquely memetic among Koreans:

To a Korean, his ‘take a look’ sounds mesmerizing. It wasn’t long until people transcribed what that sounds like into Korean and spread it around: 떼껄룩, or ‘t’ekaaluk’. Korean is a very mimetic language; although I’m not enough of a linguist to explain why, the combination of sounds in 떼껄룩 is absolutely hilarious to us. It really sticks in your mind. I don’t know why, but it does.

It’s not surprising to us it gained traction, is what I’m saying.

For some time, 떼껄룩 was just a colloquial term for Khajiits on the Korean internet. But soon the term expanded to cover cat people in other games (e.g. the Miqo'te of FFXIV), and after that, the meaning extended to IRL cats - at which point the meme skyrocketed in popularity.

Not only is Korean very mimetic, we also like to make suffixes out of everything. Turns out the ~껄룩 part of 떼껄룩 (’~kaaluk’) makes a fantastic suffix for describing cats of all shapes and sizes:

Black cats are called 검은 고양이 (’geom-eun goyangi’) in Korean; using the above suffix, it’s 검껄룩 (’geomkaaluk’).

Orange tabby cats are often called ‘cheese[cake] tabbies’ (치즈태비/’chizu taebi’) in Korean; you can now call them 치껄룩 (’chikaaluk’).

The colloquial term for kittens is 아깽이 (’akkaengi’), but with the Khajiits’ blessing, they are now also called 아껄룩 (’akaaluk’).

Stray cats are called 길고양이/길냥이 (’gil goyangi/gilnyangi’) because they live on the ‘streets’ (길 in Korean). The same principle applies to 길껄룩 (’gilkkaluk’).

Tigers/lions/leopards etc. are big cats… hence 빅껄룩 (’bigkkaluk’).

It is very adaptable. It ties in with the first syllable of basically anything, general descriptors or colloquial, native or foreign. You’ll see 떼껄룩 being commonly used with bloggers, youtubers, on insta etc., either as it is or with the variation appropriate to the subject. If you can read any Korean, anyone who might be reading this… I suggest you take a look sometime.

😹

[marisexmas]

jp sign gag from the beginning of book 5 that I’m tling now because I’m inordinately amused by it for some reason~

‘rouka wa shizuka ni arukimashou!’ (”Please walk quietly in the halls!”) -> ‘rouka wa kani aruki shimashou!’ (”Please do the crabwalk in the halls!”)

[sleepbby]

PSA: no name is impossible to pronounce. no name is too hard to learn, no name is justifiably butchered. kids with 'different' names should be taught again and again that being called by their name is a right, not a privilege

[untilitdoes]

there are over 2000 unique phonemes (individual sounds) in the world’s languages, and each language has anywhere from around 20 to 60. you stop learning new phonemes it’s theorized at around age 12. this is where accents come from -- using your own language’s/region’s phonemes to speak

so no name is impossible to pronounce world-wide, but it is very easy to not have the linguistic archive necessary to pronounce a given name entirely correctly. it is a simple case of physically not knowing where to place your tongue, whether or not to vibrate your vocal chords, etc. the only one of the dictators of sound you could be shown is how to position your lips

that being said... obviously you should still try. saying a name as correctly as you physically can goes a long way for making someone feel respected and humanized, and dismissing a name entirely as too hard goes a long way to disrespect and dehumanize people. just also accept that someone’s accent interfering with their pronunciation isn’t a sign of lack of trying, but a sign of physical limits

[prismatic-bell]

This is very true. I met a baby at my old store whose name was Navajo. I did my best and actually got a bit frustrated because there was a syllable I could NOT get, and her dad was like “it’s very hard if you don’t actually speak Diné, but thank you. Most people won’t even try.”

Be the one who tries.

[krakenartificer]

I’ve got most of Dine to a decent approximation, but the glottal stops continue to elude me, which is a bit of a problem if you want to say, for example, “Thank you”‘. That said, I’ve never met a Navajo who wasn’t delighted to hear me try (once they figured out what the hell this crazy bilagaana was trying to say.) It’s really easy to try.  Try.

[leepacey]

not to be sappy on main BUT one thing that i really loved when studying linguistics was that the more important a word is, the earlier the concept of this thing was given a word. for example, the word water is similar in many similar languages (aqua, agua, água). so, the more important a word is, the more languages it’ll be similar across and the older this word will be, theoretically and generally speaking (many other things also affect this)

AND SO in my years studying linguistics, there was one word that was nearly identical across so many regionally different languages (though there are outliers of course), from europe to most of asia to subsaharan africa to indigenous languages. across nearly all languages this is the first word people learn how to say and maybe the first word humans in general officially named and defined:

mamãe - portuguese 

妈妈 (māmā) - chinese

ਮੰਮੀ (mamī) - punjabi

mamah - mayan (yucatec)

мама - bulgarian, russian, ukrainian

ماں (mäm) - urdu

মা (mā) - bengali

mẹ (may) - vietnamese

ママ (mama) - japanese

అమ్మ (am'ma) - telugu

mama - quechua

મમ્મી (mam'mī) - gujarati

അമ്മ (am'ma) - malayalam

amá - navajo

엄마 (omma) - korean

eme - native hawaiian

onam - uzbek

aana - yupik

mema - tagish

μαμά (mamá) - greek

mama - swahili

أمي (umi) - arabic

mayi - chichewa

माँ (ma) - hindi

mam - dutch

ម៉ាក់ (ma) - khmer

แม่ (mæ̀) - thai

அம்மா (am'mā) - tamil

අම්මා (ammā) - sinhala

amai - zulu

ama - basque

आमा (āmā) - nepali

အမေ (amay) - myanmar (burmese)

mamá - spanish

mom/mum- english

this isn’t actually the first word because we teach babies this word (most likely), but because the “mama” or “ama” sounds are the easiest things for babies to say, and it’s nearly always the only thing they can say at first, and adults across all languages defined their language around that.

babies all over the world for thousands and thousands of years all started out blabbering sounds like “mama” and mothers everywhere were all like Oh Shit That’s Me! I’m Mama!

[linguisten]

I do believe Roman Jakobson pointed that out almost a century ago. 

To mess things up, add the word(s) for milk and (female) breast to the list. We’re mammals after all. 

[troi-in-monochrome]

Actually, the fact that any alien race communicates with another is quite remarkable.

[toboldlyblahblahblah]

tHIS WAS THE ONE TIME STAR TREK GOT PSYCHOLOGY RIGHT, actually!!!

Humans are biologically programmed that during the acquisition of language if something is pointed at and a word is said, we assume that word is a NOUN. Every human in every culture and every language does this. But there’s nothing to say in an alien language their biology would be the same. That word could just as easily be an adjective or a verb or the objects location in space or a million other things.

Good job Star Trek. Just this once, you managed to not piss off every psych student to watch your shows.

[allthingslinguistic]

In linguistics, this is known as the gavagai problem: 

Quine uses the example of the word “gavagai” uttered by a native speaker of the unknown language Arunta upon seeing a rabbit. A speaker of English could do what seems natural and translate this as “Lo, a rabbit.” But other translations would be compatible with all the evidence he has: “Lo, food”; “Let’s go hunting”; “There will be a storm tonight” (these natives may be superstitious); “Lo, a momentary rabbit-stage”; “Lo, an undetached rabbit-part.“  

[elfwreck]

Parent rolls a red ball in front of an infant, and says a word. Is that word:

Ball

Round

Red

Rolling

Fun

The answer tells you some essential things about the language–which details are considered most important, how they perceive the world, and so on.

An alien language might say any of those. Or it might say “floor” - look, kiddo, perceive the foundation on which things happen. Or it might say “grab” - here’s something you can grasp in your hands. Or it might say, “one” - there is one object here. Or something else.

Language families are important for this. Related languages will tend to use the same types of words in the same types of situations: in English, Spanish, and French, it’s most likely the parent is saying something that means “ball.” In Apache, it’s likely to be “rolling.”* 

We don’t know any nonhuman language families. We don’t know what they consider to be the core elements of communication.

See also: Darmok and Jalad at Tanagra.

* Suzette Haden Elgin’s Gentle Art of Verbal Self-Defense books mention this. I don’t remember which one(s).

[morgynleri-mirrors]

@deadcatwithaflamethrower - linguistics!

[frislander-deactivated20220305]

Further point - this nouniness isn’t even a universal; one example that comes to mind is Caddoan, where many apparently nominal expressions are verbs, meaning that the ball example above may in fact literally be best translated as “it is rolling”.

[prokopetz]

It’s pretty well known that many English words meaning “bad” or “evil” ultimately trace back to the English-speaking world’s obsession with social class. “Villain”, for example, was originally just another word for peasant, and even the word “mean” simply meant “commonplace” before it picked up its connotations of brutishness and nastiness by association with, well, commoners.

Today, however, I learned one that maybe isn’t so well-known: apparently, the word “lewd” originally meant “not a priest”.

Like… I can see how you’d get from that original meaning to the one we have today, from an etymological standpoint, but it still raises several questions!

[linguisten]

Ling & Lang Bingo sets — how to play:

Multiplayer version:

Each player gets a randomly selected piece of popular journalism dealing with language(s), linguistics, or linguists. Taking turns, you could read one paragraph each, everyone crossing off what they think they detected in the presented passages. The first one to complete a row (horizontal, vertical, diagonal) shouts “Bingo!” and wins.

Note: Of course one should rearrange the table cells, otherwise there’d be multiple winners. (Do some actual copying and pasting if necessary.)

Solitaire version:

Grab yourself a news article on ling & lang or listen to anyone from outside linguistics talk about ling & lang. Make sure you only yell “Bingo!” if that doesn’t get you expelled from a lecture.

Pro tip:

If you want to make the game a little bit harder, do the same with scholarly articles.

[hilarioushumorfromouterspace]

[cfluffiness]

Someone in facebook also posted this too

[xmagnet-o]

Omg

[halcyonjester]

Mediglyphics

[klubbhead]

This shit’s infuriating

[pseudonymsobriquet]

Oh, this is a type of shorthand!

There are 3 main types, but from my research, this looks to be American Gregg Shorthand.

As you can see, there are set symbols for every letter.

Let’s break one of the words down:

Using the Gregg Alphabet as reference, we can see most of the letters in “atrophied” are present. But why no “o” vowel, and why is “ph” written as “f”?

Simple. In shorthand, you cut out all vowels in a word when writing it down, with the exception of words that BEGIN or END with a vowel (hence the “a” at the start being present), or like in the “i” in “atrophied”, to make it more readable when the sound could be harder to distinguish if it isn’t written. In “atrophied” if the the “i” isn’t written, it could be hard to tell if the writer meant a “fud”, “fad”, “fod” or “fid” sound, for example.

Also, since Shorthand is a phonetic writing system, you are encouraged to write down the phonetic sounds of words rather than the actual letter blends - in this case, write an “f” instead of a “ph”.

So in actuality, these aren’t just meaningless scribbles - it’s Gregg Shorthand, a writing system developed to take down notes more quickly than when written out in full, which is very useful in a medical or journalistic environment.

Some people can even write over 100 words in a minute! And, it’s been in use since John Robert Gregg invented it in 1888! Wow! So old!

Isn’t language amazing~?

[neeetsocks-deactivated20191026]

no language should be mocked other than french

[gareauxtrains]

Birds is “oiseaux” in French.

No letter is pronunced the way it should.

And there are seven of them.

[teaboot]

ITS PRONOUNCED “WAZO” AND YES, I WILL DIE MAD ABOUT IT

[judgejudyofficial]

oiseaux hits every vowel in the french alphabet and manages to only be pronounced with 2 goddamn syllables

[genderfluidintake]

got vowels coming out the oiseaux