Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2006 September 28

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English definition

In words such as Self-Esteem which is considered a compound word.

02:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)124.254.92.41Lio124.254.92.41 02:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)What is the term used for the first part of the word left of the hyphen? and what is the term used to the right hand side of the hyphen?

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— X [Mac Davis] (SUPERDESK|Help me improve)04:56, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

spelling help

i am going to participate in a spelling competition , so could you give me a list of words that that are diffficult or confusing to spell along with their meanings ( british english only please)

thankyouMightright 05:28, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Survival of the Latin "-que"

In Latin, adding "que" to the end of a word has the same effect as putting "et" before it. (An example being the famous Senatus Populusque Romanus, rather than Senatus et Populus Romanus). As far as I know, this doesn't survive in languages such as French or Spanish, although maybe I'm wrong. Are there any languages which do retain it, or has it died out completely? -- Vardion 09:31, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Don't know the answer, but the equivalent usage in Ancient Greek (use of enclitic τε) certainly has not survived in the modern language. Maid Marion 09:47, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

There's common cognates in several old Indo-European languages, as far as I know, it might have survived in Indo-Iranian or something... 惑乱 分からん 09:53, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I believe this can be called a postpositive coordinator (might help your search). The Kannada language, still spoken though ancient, seems to use the suffix -u for conjunctions. ---Sluzzelin 10:11, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Though it should be added that Kannada is not an Indo-European language, so this suffix, as far as we know, is not cognate with Latin -que. Marco polo 14:51, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

There are still some French words that have it, indirectly, like jusqu'à (from usque, which was itself ubisque in very archaic Latin), or quiconque (from quicumque, qui + cumque, itself cum + enclitic -que). Adam Bishop 16:26, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Having looked around a bit, I think that it is safe to say this suffix does not survive in productive use, nor do any cognates of this suffix, in any of the Romance languages descended from Latin. Marco polo 20:11, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Gothic apparently had the cognate -u, but afaik, it is lost in all Germanic languages, the most common ones for additions in modern languages include words derived from *unda (originally next, in front of) and and *auk (originally increase, something increased) such as English verb eke and German auch. Still hoping for some Indo-Iranianist to work his wonders... 惑乱 分からん 21:49, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

the Finnish suffix -kin can be used, among other things, to mean and, too. Not cognate to -que, though. --Janneman 23:39, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

OK, here goes: there's no decent way of linking the results of this database, but search Pokorny's Indogermanisches Etymologisches Woerterbuch here for English "and (encl.)" and ye get yer cognates. Most of them are dead, dead, dead, but Armenian -k as in o-k might be still in use, as is Polish acz, "although", though not as a suffix. --Janneman 00:17, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

Catch - 22 (logic)

Where does the term 'Catch-22' (referring to logic) come from? Chatrampo 10:26, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

See Catch-22 as well as Catch-22 (logic). Dismas|^(talk) 10:30, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

My, that was a good book. *goes all teary-eyed and reminisces* -- the GREAT Gavini 15:25, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

I had heard that it was based on a foreign word, "katcha" (spelling unknown) meaning something like "subsection". The story is that there was a list of laws, and one of them "katcha 22", perhaps, said that "we can ignore any of these laws and make up new laws as we see fit, without notifying anyone", thus effectively invalidating the rule of law entirely. This may have been for Italy under Mussolini. The meaning and number later morphed into the current catch-22 concept. Is there any truth to this story ? StuRat 15:12, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

Italian caccia means "hunt", so maybe there's a story in there... Katcha (Russian Кача) is a place in Crimea, so it ain't Russian (but Crimea -> War -> World War II). Hmmm. I think I'll stick with the convincing explanation on the Catch-22 article. -- the GREAT Gavini 20:21, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

But those articles don't explain the number 22, something I wondered about when I started reading the book (never finished it, though). Are there 21 other catches? It seesm the original title was Catch 18, so it seems to be a random number. But why a number in the first place? Just because 'Catch' would have been too short a title? :) DirkvdM 06:40, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Based on the story I heard, it was just the 18th subsection of a list of laws, then the number was later changed to 22. StuRat 13:26, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

THe word 'catch' on its own just doent grab one, does it?--Light current 13:10, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

A mon avis, Catch wouldn't be a bad title for a book (but there's already a book by Will Leitch called Catch). It's only when books have a title like The Adventures of..., etc. when it gets annoying. -- the GREAT Gavini 15:56, 29 September 2006 (UTC)