Language desk
< October 18	<< Sep \| October \| Nov >>	October 20 >

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is a transcluded archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

October 19

what is the current authority for creation of new words in english language

i need more and more new words to substitute for long sentences in talks, both real life and online. i would send requests to the authoritiesMinimobiler (talk) 06:43, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Unlike French, which has the Académie française, there is no such authority for English. If you need a new word, you just make it up yourself, use it and hope it sticks. --Viennese Waltz 07:12, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Viennese Waltz and others, requesting to tell the name of all the authorities in general. example:merriam webster, oxford, british council etcMinimobiler (talk) 07:20, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

You don't seem to understand what VW just said. Dictionaries only record usage, they don't make up words. Your best bet is to make up a word yourself, use it and see how it flies. Btw, even in French the Academy can only propose, it has no way to impose. Many of its coinages go nowhere. In other cases French speakers take matters into their own hands and do not wait for the Academy. That's how you get different solutions in different parts of the Francophony. For example a web browser is called a navigateur in France and a fureteur in Quebec. In some other cases no one was able to come up with anything acceptable and the English word continues to be used, e.g. un making of. If the Academy's come up with a purely French equivalent I have never heard (about) it. Basemetal 07:30, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Btw, even in French the Academy can only propose, it has no way to impose. -- unlike them, Academy of the Hebrew Language does have enforcement powers: every TV show or radio broadcast must be signed off by them for proper use of the language. There was a recent story about an Israeli pop star (don't remember which one) who couldn't get her song, hugely popular online, onto the Israeli radio because she mispronounced a word in the refrain; to get it accepted, she had to re-record the song with amended pronunciation. --217.140.96.140 (talk) 09:41, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wow. Is this a real story, not an apocryphal one? I'd really love it if someone could find out what word it was and how it was mispronounced, as mispronunciation of Hebrew is a national pastime in Israel and among Jews elsewhere (the latter more of course). The Israeli national anthem itself mispronounces words (I mean the music forces you to mispronounce them) e.g. כֹּל עוֹד בַּלֵּבָב פְּנִימָה נֶפֶשׁ יְהוּדִי הוֹמִיָּה "Kol ‘od balevav penimah Nefesh yehudi homiyah". The word לֵבָב "levav" (heart) and יְהוּדִי "yehudi" (Jewish) are accented on the ultimate whereas the song gives them a penultimate accent. Just two examples. Basemetal 10:50, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

[1] --217.140.96.140 (talk) 12:31, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This doesn't seem to be the example you had in mind originally because, as far as I know Harel Moyal is not a woman and the mistake is not one of pronunciation (although the article does call it that but I disagree). Also it looks like the radio station (he:רשת ג) took the intiative by themselves w/o the need that the Academy act. The article does say that singers are encouraged to seek the advice of the specialists at Kol Israel or at the Academy and that radio has started enforcing those things more strictly. I'm still interested in examples where the Academy itself took the initiative and forced the radio station to stop airplay. Now that would be enforcing powers. Also, does anyone have examples of mistakes that did not prevent airplay, because clearly this sort of nonsense is an opening for a bureaucracy to start acting in arbitrary ways. In this case what made it worse I suppose was that the mistake involved a word, the main word actually, in the title. If you're curious this is the "corrected" song, rerecorded anew to get rid of the mistake. If anyone has a link to the old version containing the mistake please leave it here (or on my talk page). The mistake is pretty bad and the singer is a native Hebrew speaker, born and bred in Israel! What was he thinkin? Is "mekir" for "makir" now common in Israel? If yes, what binyan do people who say that think that verb is? Do they also say "metkhil" for "matkhil" and "mergish" for "margish"? It could be compared to someone saying "I writ" instead of "I wrote" in English. Still, I can't imagine any radio station in an English speaking country refusing to play someone's song because they didn't approve of the way they used the past tense. Basemetal 16:13, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I wish the BBC could have done that to Midge Ure.... Tevildo (talk) 21:20, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Indeed, my memory of that case was mixed up with a more recent one where the initiative came from the Academy (but the singer refused to re-record the song). As to the binyan, verbs such as "makir" and "mabit" belong to the same binyan as "mevin" and "mesir", so neither the binyan nor the spelling indicate the correct pronunciation, and there's a fair bit of confusion, even among native speakers -- especially among native speakers, who get used to all kinds of ungrammatical speech before they have a chance to learn binyanim. --217.140.96.140 (talk) 21:29, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Oh I see how that mistake could have originated. Since geminates have disappeared from actual Hebrew pronunciation a little kid learning Hebrew as his or her native tongue has no way of knowing that, since the letter carries a dagesh hazaq the pattern to be followed is that of "margish" (which has two consonants between the vowels) rather than "mevin" or "mekhin" (two examples with the two letters of "makir" and "mabit" but w/o the dagesh hazaq) which has only one. At least for "makir" that is understandable since the little kid has no way of knowing that it is a kaf with dagesh hazaq rather than a qof, which doesn't need a dagesh hazaq to have the k sound. For "mabit" the mistake would be less understandable since in that position the b has to carry a dagesh hazaq and there is no alternative choice that could create any confusion. Clearly the little kid has no idea what a dagesh hazaq is but he or she may instinctively realize that in the case it is b and not v between vowels the form has to pattern after verbs that have two radicals between the vowels. In any case I would expect the mistake to be less common in the case of "mabit" than in the case of "makir". Talking of mistakes in songs, do you know the song "HaAnashim HaHadashim" by Ivri Lider. There's a line in the song (about 2 mins 15 seconds into the song): אולי הצו גיוס יחזיר אותך בחזרה. Is הצו גיוס correct grammatically speaking? Shouldn't it be צו הגיוס? Basemetal 22:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

I don't think many people try analyzing the words such as מכיר for "is it kuf there, or is it dagesh?" The verbs with tzere are the majority (me'it, me'ir, mevi, mevikh, megiv, meziz, metis, memir, memit, meniv, menia, me'id, me'if, me'ik, me'ir, mefik, metzik, meki, mekim, meriakh, merim, meshit, and probably others), so the minority with patakh (magia, mazia, masia, mapil, makish, matzit, matir) are assimilated into the majority. The choice between the two mishkalim never interferes with the meaning, so in the vernacular, they just get merged into one.

As for the ungrammatical but increasingly popular constructions such as הצו גיוס, hewiki itself notes: בעברית מדוברת נפוץ גם יידוע של הנסמך בלבד: "הבית-ספר".

--217.140.96.140 (talk) 10:11, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Note the Academy and Kol Israel didn't attempt to blackmail Ivri Lider to get him to comply to any stupid demand that he change his song and yet I don't see why this mistake should be ok and not Harel Moyal's. In both cases I take from your explanations that the mistakes are widespread. So the Academy are the sole judge of when to pick a fight, and do not have to justify their decision to anyone? Frankly I much prefer the situation as it is in English. Basemetal 18:43, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Luckily for Hatikvah, the Academy of the Language didn't yet exist in 1948, or else it'd surely require amendments :-) --51.9.188.8 (talk) 12:50, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

See List of language regulators, from which English is notably absent. -- Jack of Oz ^{[pleasantries]} 12:14, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict) See also Linguistic description, which is what dictionaries do, versus Linguistic prescription which is what bodies such as the Academies Francaise does. --Jayron 32 13:24, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

While not an authority in the French style, the Oxford English Dictionary does have a certain status as the arbiter of new words. They publish an annual update - http://public.oed.com/whats-new/ - which tends to receive considerable media coverage as an indication of which new words have now become an accepted part of the language. Wymspen (talk) 13:23, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Descriptive nonetheless, rather than prescriptive. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 14:53, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Prescriptive too. The fact that a language doesn't have a central authority does not mean there are no prescriptive sources of authority. Dictionaries and grammars, even in English, while they do not create language, and only record usage, still often characterize that usage as correct or incorrect, standard or substandard, etc. By definition any time you say something people say is incorrect you're doing prescriptive linguistics since descriptive linguistics would limit itself to observing what people say, period. Any time, even in English, someone turns to a dictionary or grammar to find out what they should say as opposed to what people do say (presumably they would not need any book to inform them of what they personally say) they use that dictionary or grammar in a prescriptive capacity. Basemetal 15:36, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, prescriptive derived from the descriptive. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 17:33, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

^{[citation needed]} Here are two sources that discuss how many aspects of linguistic prescription are based on nothing more than the writer's fancy [2] [3]. SemanticMantis (talk) 18:10, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

OED doesn't prescribe anything, but they do make recommendations, as all good grammar teachers do. Teachers in the old days were just trying to get people to speak and write better. No harm in that. Although they probably didn't foresee text-speak, such as "R U OK?" In the section on the split infinitive, they left out maybe the most obvious one: "To boldly go where no (man/one) has gone before." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 19:12, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

"OED doesn't prescribe anything, but they do make recommendations". Could you please explain the difference? You seem to have a pretty radical view of what "prescribing" means. "Prescribing" is not putting a loaded gun to someone's head and slowly saying "You gone split that infinitive? Go ahead, and make my day!" Making recommendations is prescribing. The notion that there is a way to "speak and write better" is precisely what linguistic prescription is based on. It's not necessarily evil. But it's not linguistic description. Basemetal 19:43, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Somewhere up above, someone said, "Dictionaries only record usage." ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:32, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

No. Somewhere up above someone said "dictionaries only record usage they do not create words", but that "they often characterize that usage as correct or incorrect, standard or substandard" which is a kind of recommendation hence of prescription. In fact somewhere else up above someone else said "the OED do make recommendations". Basemetal 22:38, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It's clear that your concept of "prescriptive" is different from mine. And don't forget to aim some of your wrath at the user who said "Linguistic description, which is what dictionaries do, versus Linguistic prescription which is what bodies such as the Academies Francaise does." I'm sure the OED would like to consider itself the equivalent of Academies Francaise, but it ain't. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:10, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wrath? I sure hope everyone is fully relaxed enjoying a pleasant conversation among friends cause there certainly isn't any wrath on my part. In context Jayron's statement was perfectly accurate. The OP asked for an authority that could create words and even seemed to believe Merriam-Webster could do that. Clearly only a prescriptive body such as the Academy in France or Israel can do something like that, since in the case of a word that's just been created there's no preexisting usage to describe. A dictionary's job is (at least in the case of big languages with long histories of being used as the medium of communication in advanced societies and no "special needs") to describe usage not to create it. I did not construe Jayron's statement as implying dictionaries never take on a prescriptive role or are never used that way. Basemetal 00:10, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

It grates me that STNG missed an opportunity for perfect iambic pentameter: "to boldly go where none have gone before. Particularly since Starfleet isn't big on individual action. —Tamfang (talk) 21:09, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

A real language pedant would insist on ". . . none has gone before." {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.27.88 (talk) 23:07, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

What would be the practical difference between a pedant and a prescriptivist (if there is such a word)? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:12, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

To answer your question, Bugs, although Tamfang and I clearly indicated that we were at this point joking, a prescriptivist (yes it is a real word, try searching/following a real Linguists' blog, such as Language Log) would acknowledge that they were taking a particular approach which could be contrasted to others, a pedant would insist that theirs was the only correct approach.

Notice that I deliberately used, in descriptivist fashion, indeterminent singular "they, theirs" where a prescriptivist would prefer and a pedant would insist on "he or she" and "his or hers". {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.197.27.88 (talk) 14:54, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

None is not one. The IP 90 is correct, none agrees with has, not have. μηδείς (talk) 00:08, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This is linguistic prescription. Whatcha gonna do if we do find "none have" in Shakespeare? Send Shakespeare back to school? In any case see what Oxford have got to say about this. Basemetal 00:21, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

And your point is what, exactly? That prescriptivism should be proscribed? Do you also think people who judge people are evil? μηδείς (talk) 00:47, 21 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Yeah. "No freedom for the enemies of freedom" (Saint-Just) No, I was in a very anti-prescriptivist mood yesterday, being still under the impression of a singer made to re-record their song because they made a mistake in Hebrew. I do wonder if I'm not too impressionable. Basemetal 04:53, 21 October 2016 (UTC) [reply]

Thanks. Given the question dealt with "authority" it seemed relevant to give a prescriptive answer. Ironically enough, I watched Richard III @Basemetal: the other night after this exchange, and the term "none have" was indeed used. μηδείς (talk) 20:30, 23 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sorabe script

Does anyone know (or can discover) anything about the present status and usage of the Sorabe alphabet in Madagascar? I understand that for everyday purposes it has been replaced by a Latin alphabet, but I wonder whether it is still read or used or understood in any specialist (e.g. religious) contexts, or whether it is now completely unused. I can't seem to find any information about this. 31.49.180.169 (talk) 20:57, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sumerian language, where and when was last use, and in what form, written or conceivably spoken?

From the article:"..but Sumerian continued to be used as a sacred, ceremonial, literary and scientific language in Mesopotamia until the 1st century AD.." -where, what and how in 1st century AD?-The cited sources don't have links, and maybe they wouldn't give the further details I'm interested in anyway. Thanks.144.35.45.41 (talk) 23:16, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This website makes a similar claim, but provides no further insight. The article at Britannica.com: [4] has some more details about its use as a literary language, even citing specific historical persons who used it as such. I haven't done much more than skim this article here on the history of the use of Sumerian: [5] but it looks most promising for your research. I hope that gives a start. --Jayron 32 23:29, 19 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

This paper states that the last datable Cuneiform tablet is from 79/80 AD. It is a kind of astronomical text. Now Cuneiform does not necessarily mean Sumerian. It could be in Akkadian. But having browsed through it (pretty cursorily I'm afraid) I've got the feeling it is Sumerian. If you read through it a bit more slowly and carefully I have no doubt that you will find the answer as I doubt the authors will not at some point identify the language. Basemetal 00:56, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe someone like User:Dbachmann can answer your question? (Is it bad form to ping someone to the ref desk like this?) -24.52.24.134 (talk) 03:36, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Basemetal is quite right to distinguish the Akkadian and Sumerian languages from the cuneiform script script used to write them (and several other languages as welll). Sumerian died out as a spoken language roughly 2000 BC^[1], though just when is a matter of debate. The last time Sumerian was used extensively as an official administrative language was during the Ur III Period, at the very end of the 3rd Millennium BC. It is likely that even then, Sumerian was dying as a spoken language, being replaced by Akkadian (a similar pattery occurred during the Neo-Assyrian Period, when Akkadian was being replaced by Aramaic as the common spoken language, though Akkadian continued to be used for administrative, literary, and religous purposes). Nevertheless, Sumerian continued to be used for a variety of purposes (primarily literary and religious) for millennia afterwards, much like Latin in Medieval Europe. The latest Sumerian texts are probably those of the "Graeco-Babyloniaca": religious Sumerian and Akkadian texts from Hellenistic and Parthian Mesopotamia which have transliterations in Greek script, dating to the 1st C BC to the 1st C AD.^[2]^[3]^[4]^[5] The latest purely Sumerian texts that I am aware of are Sumerian hymns from Babylon dating to the 2nd-1st Century BC.^[6] The paper that Jayron32 linked to was to the last datable Akkadian cuneiform tablet (though there may be other, undated, Akkadian texts from the 2nd Century AD). Note that the transliteration of the text includes words and signs in all caps and also in italicized miniscules. Assyriological convention for transliterating Akkadian texts is that Sumerian logograms are written in ALL CAPS while phonetically-written Akkadian is transliterated with italicized miniscules, e.g. EN-ia, a common expression in Neo-Assyrian letters, combines the Sumerian logogram EN ("lord, master") with the Akkadian phonetic complement "ia", but the whole would have been read "bēliya" ("my lord") in Akkadian. Sumerian does not use logograms from other languages (cuneiform was, after all, invented to write Sumerian), so if you see a transliteration mixing these two, then it is not Sumerian, though it will not necessarily be Akkadian. Other languages, like Hittite and Urartian also use Sumerian logograms (and Akkadian logograms as well!), so their transliterations also mix all caps and italics. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Ushumgal (talk • contribs) 15:54, 20 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Wow, I think this is the best ref desk answer I've ever seen. -165.234.252.11 (talk) 19:34, 25 October 2016 (UTC)[reply]

References

[1] ttp://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/nimrud/ancientkalhu/thewritings/sumerian/

[2] ttp://cdli.ox.ac.uk/wiki/doku.php?id=graeco_babyloniaca

[3] ttps://www.jstor.org/stable/4199713?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

[4] ttps://www.degruyter.com/abstract/j/zava.1983.73.issue-1/zava.1983.73.1.114/zava.1983.73.1.114.xml

[5] ttps://www.unige.ch/lettres/antic/files/5214/4101/7717/dossier.pdf

[6] ttp://archiv.ub.uni-heidelberg.de/propylaeumdok/1010/1/Maul_BilingualHymns2005.pdf

[1]

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]