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There are 25 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1. Re: Sk�lansk - History and Babel text
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
2. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
3. Re: The Need for Debate
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
4. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
5. Re: Tatari Faran Update
From: James W <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
6. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: "B. Garcia" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
7. CHAT: The Alex Charalabidis Guide to Souvlaki
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
8. Re: most looked-up words
From: Muke Tever <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
9. Re: German style orthography
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
10. Re: Looking for reference material on old Hindu legends.
From: Muke Tever <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
11. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Dan Sulani <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
12. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
13. Re: Proto-Germanic
From: Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
14. Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
15. Re: most looked-up words
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
16. Re: The Need for Debate
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
17. Re: most looked-up words
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
18. Asha'ille site update
From: Arthaey Angosii <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
19. Re: German style orthography
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
20. Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
21. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Paul Roser <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
22. USAGE: Speak-Say-Tell
From: Geoff Horswood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
23. Re: USAGE: Speak-Say-Tell
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
24. Re: Tatari Faran Update
From: "H. S. Teoh" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
25. Re: vowels: are they necessary?
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 1
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 07:27:06 +0000
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Sk�lansk - History and Babel text
On Tuesday, December 7, 2004, at 07:36 , Philip Newton wrote:
> On Mon, 6 Dec 2004 19:14:07 -0500, Pascal A. Kramm <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
>> There are some other nifty features, like VSO syntax (which is pretty
>> rare),
>
> It's used in at least some Polynesian languages -- e.g. Niuean is
> arguably VSO (if you don't consider it ergative, in which case it's
> VAP).
it's also used in Welsh as well as in Irish & Scots Gaelic. For example in
Welsh:
Bwytodd Ifan yr cinio.
Ate John the dinner = "John ate the dinner"
I was under the impression that this was also the normal word order in the
Semitic languages (tho I am not sure about modern Hebrew). I am fairly
certain there other natlangs also with this feature.
>> * It was decided to put the verb at the beginning, followed by
>> subject
>> and object, since this structure was not found in any other known
>> languages.
Presumably this means "not found in the structure of in language known to
the creators of Sk�lansk" because it was certain found in known European
languages of the time.
> I think OSV is the rarest word order, with few known natlangs using it.
Yes, I think it is. Somewhere I have some statistics on this but I can't
find them. From what I remember OS order languages are far less common
than the SO langs, irrespective of where the verb is. IIRC the most common
words orders are SVO and SOV (and I cannot remember which comes 'top') -
but in 3rd place comes VSO languages.
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
===============================================
Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason." [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 2
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 02:28:09 +0100
From: Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
--- Stephen Mulraney <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skrev:
> > Oh, quite a few. Russian comes to mind; 's' and
'v'
> > are both legitimate words (I think they're
> > prepositions).
>
> Well, phonologically, they never stand alone
(AFAIK).
> Indeed, another consonental preposition is 'k'.
Interesting. How are clusters like /s zdranat/ (I'm
making up a Russian-sounding word here, because the
only Russian I know comes from old spy movies)
pronounced?
> Many languages have a syllabic 'r' or
> > 'l' (such as Czech, Slovak and Sanskrit).
>
> Or English. (little /litl=/, better /betr=/)
D'oh! Forgot about my own native language here!
> I don't think any rules is being broken here, simply
> because (say) [s] comes from the part of the IPA
> chart labelled "consonants". As for syllable
> constraints, I guess Mandarin is a funny example:
> there are a limited number of syllables (414, IIRC)
> before tone is considered, so I'm not sure if it
> makes sense to talk of syllable constraints :)
Good point :). I forgot about the split between the
formal rules outlined in the grammars and the actual
realities of speech.
________________________________________________________________________
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Message: 3
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 07:27:17 +0000
From: Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
On Tuesday, December 7, 2004, at 08:04 , Andreas Johansson wrote:
[snip]
> Horned helmets was used back in the bronze age, in both Scandinavia and
> the
> British Isles.
Right - so that was the source for those Victorian illustrations.
> There seems to be no evidence that actual vikings used them, tho.
That's what I was thinking of. They have now become associated in the
popular mind in Britain with Vikings. "If he's a Viking he will wear ha
horned helmet" - "If he is wearing a horned helmet, he must be a Viking"
Both statements quite without foundation of course!
> Presumably they were part of formal attire rather than for combat - they'
> re rather big and clumsy.
Yes, indeed - but that does not stop the popular picture of these warriors
streaming from their long boats in the horned helmets, all set for a
weekend of rape of pillage :)
> One shouldn't make blanket statements whether the Vikings were
> destructive or
> not; _some_ certainly were mere destroyers, pillagers and killers, who
> civilization would have done better without; others were constructive,
> setting
> up cities and trade routes.
Absolutely!! How I detest stereotypes.
> And, of course, most Scandinavians of the period weren't Vikings at all.
That's your story and you're sticking to it! (just kidding :)
===============================================
On Tuesday, December 7, 2004, at 05:52 , John Cowan wrote:
> Ray Brown scripsit:
>
>> Galileo's problem was....
[snip}
> His other problem was that he was a lifelong flamer, a troll, and
> a net.assassin of the very worst kind, and probably had a profitable
> sideline selling the Italian edition of "How to Lose Friends and Alienate
> People". He had the regrettable habit of calling a spade a God-damned
> shovel, even when it was being wielded by a Prince (of the Church or the
> State, it hardly mattered). As a result of having cheesed off everyone in
> Italy, he was brought up on charges of making the Pope look like a fool
> (which he had unquestionably done), was shown the instruments of torture
> (but they were never used on him), and was told to go home and stay there,
> which he duly did.
So, not a good debater, then? It seems to me he was very fortunate to have
been born in Italy at the time he was.I cannot imagine anyone like that
living long in Tudod England! To make henry VIII look a fool was to sign
one's own death warrant; and his off-spring were no better.
>>> There's also often the problem of
>>> perspective: for instance, the "barbarians" (Goths, Vandals etc) who
>>> eroded the roman empire near the end. Were they really that bad? Was
>>> there nothing important that was good to say about them?
>>
>> Yes, particularly the Goths.
>
> The reason the Goths took over the Western Roman Empire (basically just
> Italy at this point) was to protect the remaining glories of Roman
> civilization
> from the real thugs, like the Franks and the Bulgars.
Yep - and didn't they hold off the Huns a bit as well? The Visigoth
kingdom in Spain was IIRC on balance "a good thing".
--
Here lies the Christian, John Cowan
judge, and poet Peter,
http://www.reutershealth.com
Who broke the laws of God http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
and man and metre. [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
===============================================
Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason." [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 4
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 20:42:33 -0800
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
> In my L1 as spoken by my grandparents, the word for
> 'yellow' is
> [?N=:]. In my generation it has mutated into [?ui~],
> however.
>
> Also, [m=] is the negation particle both in my L1
> and in Cantonese.
>
> IMHO, all non-obstruents can conceivably be
> phonemically vocalic, esp.
> if they are voiced. Whether such sounds are
> consonantal or not depends
> merely on whether they are articulated consonantally
> or vocalically in
> a particular language's phonology. They could very
> well be both, as
> [N] and [m] are above.
>
>
What exactly is your L1? From what I can gather from
your message it seems to be a dialect (seperate
language derived from, in some cases, yes?) of
Chinese? Or am I being overgeneric, or just simply wrong?
=====
-The Sock
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
__________________________________
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Message: 5
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 09:09:39 -0600
From: James W <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Tatari Faran Update
>>>> H. S. Teoh<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 12/6/2004 12:56:28 PM >>>
>It appears that the recent lack of status updates on Tatari Faran has
>left so much despair on the list that people (including myself :-P)
>have been driven to religious/political flaming. To counteract this
>sad state of affairs, allow me to bring you this latest news from the
>volcanoes of Fara. ;-)
LOL
>The latest major change to Tatari Faran was the addition of relative
>clauses and infinitive clauses.
Always a thorn in my side...
>As you may (or may not) know from previous updates, Tatari Faran NP's
>have 3 core cases: originative, conveyant, receptive. These are
>normally indicated by a case clitic appended to the end of the NP. For
>example, _kiran_ ["ki4an] means "young man", and _kiran ka_ is the
>corresponding originative, _kiran sa_ the corresponding conveyant, and
>_kiran na_ the receptive. The case particles inflect for gender; hence
>_amaa_ [a"ma:], which means "mother", has the forms _amaa kei_
>(originative), _amaa sei_ (conveyant), and _amaa nei_ (receptive).
>Now, because case marking is indicated by clitics rather than
>suffixes, this means that adjectives, demonstratives, and other
>modifiers appear *between* the head noun and the clitic. For example,
>_kiran kirat sa_ - the young man who is tall and swift (conveyant).
>This includes relative clauses.
kirat means 'tall and swift'? Nice!
>But if you think about it, that introduces potential confusion: if the
>NP's inside the relative clause use the same clitics to mark case, the
>result would be a jumble where it is very difficult to tell which
>clitic modifies which noun, and what is in a relative clause and what
>is in the main clause. Tatari Faran deals with this problem by
>introducing a *second* way to mark core cases. This I call the
>'auxilliary case forms'. We shall see in a moment how these are used,
>but for now, let's compare the possible forms of _kiran_, our young
>man:
>
> Main clause Relative clause
> (Auxilliary case forms)
>Originative kiran ka akiran
>Conveyant kiran sa ikiran
>Receptive kiran na nikiran
>
>Hence, _akiran_ and _kiran ka_ both mean the same thing: "young man"
>in the originative case. However, the former belongs to a relative
>clause, whereas the latter belongs to the main clause.
Hmm, interesting.
>The structure of an NP containing a relative clause is:
> <head_noun> <args ...> <relativised_verb> <case_clitic>
>
>The relativised verb is an inflected verb form which marks the case
>role of the head noun in the relative clause. For example:
>
> kiran ahuu tsanan sa
> young_man AUX_ORG-1sp speak-REL_RCP CVY
> The young man to whom I spoke.
>
> kiran nihuu tsanakan sa
> young_man AUX_RCP-1sp speak-REL_ORG CVY
> The young man who spoke to me.
>
> kiran ahuu itsana sa
> young_man AUX_ORG-1sp speak-REL_CVY CVY
> The young man about whom I spoke.
>
> kiran ihuu tsanan sa
> young_man AUX_CVY-1sp speak-REL_RCP CVY
> The young man to whom I was spoken about.
It took me two days to grasp what is going on here (I'm slow :) ). Marking
case on the verb...I like it! In my emindahken, if I ever get to verbs,
I plan on doing something vaguely similar by marking verbs for agent/patient,
etc.
My plan is to require the nouns of an utterance to appear in some kind of
animacy heirarchy, and to mark their syntactic roles on the verb. Not sure quite
how yet...
I'm still struggling with your cases, although I think they're a great
change from the IE types.
[snip sentences]
>Infinitive clauses are formed in much the same way, except that there
>is no head noun, and the verb is inflected for the infinitive. The
>infinitive is formed from the bare verb by suffixing -i (for
>consonant-final verbs) or -'i (for vowel-final verbs). The arguments
>to the infinitive are inflected using the auxilliary case forms.
>Here are examples of infinitive clauses:
>
> ihuu tsana'i.
> AUX_RCP-1sp speak-INF
> To speak about me.
How is this different from 'To speak TO me'? Wouldn't you need AUX_RCP-1sp
(the receptive case) in in that case ('scuse the pun) as well?
> nitse ahuu hamra'i.
> AUX_RCP-2sp AUX_ORG-1sp see-INF
> (For) you to see me.
>
>Infinitive clauses in Tatari Faran are actually nominalized clauses,
>since they inflect for case by having an appropriate case clitic
>appended. Here are some examples of full sentences containing an
>infinitive clause:
>
>1) huu na hamra nidiru abata' tsana'i so aram.
> 1sp RCP see AUX_RCP-girl AUX_ORG-chief speak-INF CVY COMPL
> I see the chief speaking to the girl.
Here you use receptive marking on the girl who is spoken TO, where in your
above example the receptive case marks the 'topic' of the speaking. I'm
confused...
[snip the rest]
I like your language, some of it doesn't make sense to me yet, though.
James W.
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________________________________________________________________________
Message: 6
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 21:40:04 -0800
From: "B. Garcia" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 22:06:04 +0000, Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: Constructed Languages List <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Poster: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
>
> Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Tristan Mc Leay wrote:
>
> > On 8 Dec 2004, at 8.49 am, Joe wrote:
> >
> >>> Most definitely! Turkish bread has obviously risen, but not much;
> >>> maybe
> >>> a centimetre or two thick, with lots of wholes. Pita bread though is
> >>> very flat and solid, apart from the fact that it's normally two
> >>> layers.
> >>> One of the best things about Turkish restaurants apart from everything
> >>> else is the Turkish bread! You _must_ try some if you haven't already,
> >>> certainly one of the nicest kinds of bread in existence.
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> Hmm. what you call a Pita bread, I'd call a Chapati, and what you'd
> >> call Turkish bread, I'd call Pita bread.
> >
> >
> > Chapatis are Indian and different again...
>
>
> Yes, I suppose. Okay, my names:
>
> A Pita Bread is about a centimetre risen, puffy, and generally white.
> You get things stuffed in it, and you can't wrap anything with it.
>
> Chapatis and Tortillas (Indian and Mexican, respectively - but they're
> pretty much the same, I think) are used to wrap things
>
> A Doner Kebab is a Pita bread stuffed with lamb, roasted on a spit.
> Generally with vegetables and chili sauce, served with chips.
>
> A Kebab (unqualified) can be either a Shish Kebab(skewer Kebab), or a
> doner Kebab, depending on the context.
>
You also have Naan bread :).
At festivals here in Monterey, the Indian restaurants here will set up
booths and sell naan bread with tandoori chicken or other things with
some basmati rice. Pretty good stuff. One of the restaurants bills it
as "Like an Indian Burrito!"
--
You can turn away from me
but there's nothing that'll keep me here you know
And you'll never be the city guy
Any more than I'll be hosting The Scooby Show
Scooby Show - Belle and Sebastian
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 7
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 23:01:58 -0500
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: CHAT: The Alex Charalabidis Guide to Souvlaki
The Alex Charalabidis Guide to Souvlaki
1. Asking for a "souvlaki" will normally result in a kebab - meat on a
skewer, especially outside Athens.
2. The classic "souvlaki" known throughout the world is purchased
by asking for "gyro pita" (YEE-roh PEE-tah) Note that the "pita" is
essential to denote the wrap, asking for "gyro" will likely get you the
full monty - a "merida" (portion) with the disappointing results Matt
mentions above. On the other hand, a "souvlaki (me) pita" would be a
classic souvlaki with meat from the skewer in it instead of meat sliced
off the big spit.
3. A "doner" is another name for "gyros" (the Turkish original, I
presume) and a term more widely used in the city centre rather than in
the neighbourhood "souvlatzidiko."
4. Fancier souvlakia (kebabs) may come with pieces of onion and green
bell pepper between the pieces of meat.
5. Chicken souvlakia are increasingly common and many shops now carry
them. Some shops have a separate spit for chicken but I'd go for the
souvlaki instead.
6. Any professional who calls it a "souvlaki sandwich" ought to be
condemned to a year of flipping burgers at McDonalds. I've never heard
of it, it's probably a strictly tourist shop term and would make any
Greek look at you funny.
7. Many places in the centre have blackboards with the menu written on
them outside the shop, usually in awful but recognizable transliterations.
8. Sitting down is an implied invitation to be served a full meal. Go
inside and stand in line.
9. Some places will lace the onion with parsley to draw out the bitter
flavour of onion that's been cut for a while. Others will combine it
with lettuce.
10. The meat in the gyros is commonly a blend of pork and lamb (or mystery
meat). Definitely not kosher. If you're Jewish or Muslim, you'll want
to avoid it and go for the souvlaki, which is usually lamb (see 2.).
11. Tzatziki is meant to have the consistency of yoghurt. The only thing
dripping out of the bottom of a wrap should be grease, not runny tzatziki.
12. Good tzatziki contains garlic - lots of it. Beware!
13. I had no idea I knew this much about souvlakia.
[BTW, the archive shows that we had a gyro/souvlaki conversation back
in September 2003. "The net loses its memory, if not its mind, every
six months."]
--
On the Semantic Web, it's too hard to prove John Cowan [EMAIL PROTECTED]
you're not a dog. --Bill de hOra http://www.ccil.org/~cowan
________________________________________________________________________
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Message: 8
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 20:25:34 -0700
From: Muke Tever <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 18:46:59 +0000, Ray Brown <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> which is itself a reanalysis of Greek _kudos_ [ku:dOs] 'glory',
>
> neuter singular. [ku:dOs] was Doric Greek, [ky:dOs] was Attic & Koine, and
> ['kiDOs] is Byzantine & modern.
Isn't it generally taken that the Ancient Greek short omicron, unusually, was
[o] rather than [O]?
*Muke!
--
website: http://frath.net/
LiveJournal: http://kohath.livejournal.com/
deviantArt: http://kohath.deviantart.com/
FrathWiki, a conlang and conculture wiki:
http://wiki.frath.net/
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 9
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 18:54:25 -0800
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: German style orthography
--- "Pascal A. Kramm" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On Sat, 4 Dec 2004 19:15:53 -0800, bob thornton
> <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
> >I am making a language supposedly discovered in the
> >late 1800's by Germans on an island south of the
> >island Mafia on the coast of Tanzania. It includes
> >"whistlized" consonants, where labialization was
> taken
> >to such a degree that the w-sound is now a whistle,
> a
> >voiced whistle in the case of a voiced "whistlized"
> >consonant.
>
> A German style orthography would look like this:
>
> The phonemes are:
> (plosives)
> /p/ p
> /b/ b
> /t/ t
> /d/ d
> /k/ k
> /g/ g
> /q/ q
> (nasals)
> /m/ m
> /n/ n
> /N/ ng
> (fricatives)
> /P/ f
> /B/ w
> /T/ th
> /D/ dh
> /s/ s
> /s_m/ �
> /z/ s (no distinction from /s/ made in spelling)
> /z_m/ �
> /C/ ch
> /j\/ jh
> /x/ ch (no distinction from /C/ made in spelling)
> /X/ qh
> /h/ h
> (laterals)
> /l/ l
> /L/ ll
> (approximate)
> /j/ j
> (rhotic)
> /rR\)/ r (This is a simultaneous r and R\... it is
> fun to pronounce.)
>
> (affricatives)
> /tT)/ tth
> /dD)/ tdh
> /ts)/ z
> /dz)/ ds
> /tC)/ tch
> /dj\)/ djh
> /kx)/ kch
> /qX)/ qqh
>
> ("whistlized")
> /s_m_W/ �� (_W represents "whistlization")
> /z_m_W/ ��
> /C_W/ ch�
> /j\_W/ jh�
> /x_W/ ch�
> /t_W/ t�
> /d_W/ d�
> /k_W/ k�
> /g_W/ g�
>
> Vowels are:
>
> /i/ i
> /I/ i (before double consonant or end of word)
> /e/ e
> /&/ �
> /@/ e (before double consonant or end of word)
> /u/ u
> /O/ o
> /A/ a
>
> --
> Pascal A. Kramm, author of Choton
> official Choton homepage:
> http://www.choton.org
>
Thanking you, and I ask would this be historical for
the period?
=====
-The Sock
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
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Message: 10
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 18:15:37 -0700
From: Muke Tever <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Looking for reference material on old Hindu legends.
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 20:20:00 +0100, Steven Williams <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> --- Muke Tever <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> skrev:
>> If that wasn't a typo, you may be able to find
>> better information with the spelling "Vimana".
>> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vimana
>>
>> Don't know of any reliable resources, though dubious
>> ones are in no short supply.
>
> Actually, it was the Wikipedia article that sparked my
> interest.
Doh!
> I'm thinking of writing an alternate history, and it'llfeature very heavily
> such things as vimanas (vimaanaa?vimaani? what's the Sanskrit plural?) and
> such.
It's neuter, so... the singular would be "vima:nam" and the plural
probably "vima:na:ni".
*Muke!
--
website: http://frath.net/
LiveJournal: http://kohath.livejournal.com/
deviantArt: http://kohath.deviantart.com/
FrathWiki, a conlang and conculture wiki:
http://wiki.frath.net/
________________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________________
Message: 11
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 18:42:09 +0300
From: Dan Sulani <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
On 7 Dec, Steg Belsky wrote:
> That's... that's... that's SHAWARMA!
> Well, mostly.
> Weirdly-staying-together cylinder of meat, roasted on a slowly-spinning
> rotisserie-like spit, but vertical, served by slicing off cooked bits
> vertically, and put in a pita.
> Shawarma is chicken, turkey, and/or lamb, though; never beef as far as
> i know. Generally served with a wider variety of choices for add-ons,
> though - chopped tomatos & cucumbers ("israeli salad"), cabbage,
> _hharif_ (hot sauce/paste), _amba_ (spicy mango-based sauce), _hhumus_
> (chickpea paste), _tehhina_ (sesame dressing), pickles, and /tS)ips/
> (British-style french fries) are relatively common ones. Oh, and
> _matbuhha_ and "Turkish salad", which are mashed-tomato-based and
> mashed-pepper-based additions. and eggplant. You won't find all those
> things at every neighborhood shawarma/felafel joint, but they all seem
> to be pretty common add-ins for roasted meat fast food like shawarma,
> kebab, shishlik, etc.; also for felafel. All these add-ins are known
> categorically as _salatim_ "salads" but except for israeli salad,
> they're mostly only 'salad' in the sense that tuna salad is a salad.
>
> Shaul and/or Dan can correct me if my glazed international-student eyes
> are missing some important distinctions :) .
Are you kidding, Steg??! Felafel is _food_! (I often have one for lunch!)
Shawarma, OTOH, is what put the "junk" into "junk-food"! ;-)
Seriously! IME, the "meat" that they press together into a cylinder
is odds and ends that the meat producers couldn't get rid of any other way.
It is usually somewhat tough and totally tasteless! To remedy that,
on top of the rotating cylinder of "meat", the schawarma vendors usually
put a huge glob of fat (presumably beef or lamb). While the "meat"
turns beside the vertical grill, the fat melts bit by bit and makes its way
onto the stuff below, thus imparting any flavor one might taste!
(Sometimes they add an onion to the fat on top so that it too can
dribble down some flavor!)
In the past, I used to eat schawarma on occasion. I can't anymore! :-P
Regarding the other types of meat: my family doesn't usually eat
kebabs. If we cook chopped meat, it's usually patties
done American style rather than Middle-Eastern kebabs.
Personally, I'm a bit ambivalent about how I eat shishlik
(which I understand as skewered meat/vegetables). Sometimes
I eat them apart from the accompanying pita and sometimes I
stuff them into the pita and eat them that way.
I agree with Joe's definition of a pita. You can't wrap anything
in the local pitas because they are too thick (but I like them that way!).
Here in Israel, we also get a "Georgean" bread (I forget what its
Georgean name is), which is about 25 centimeters (10 inches) long
and about 10 centimeters (4 inches) wide as I recall,
sort of low (maybe about the height of a hotdog bun or a little
higher). Very tasty! I once ordered a tuna-salad sandwich at a
restaurant and asked for it to be on that bread. I was expecting
a couple of slices and a filling. They brought me
a whole loaf, cut down the side like a hotdog bun, and filled to
overflowing with tuna-salad. :-) It was delicious!
Regarding the "salad" add-ons, Steg, IMHO you pretty much covered it.
By "hharif" do you include the Yemmenite "sxug" (spelling?).
If so, it's worth noting that there are two types: red and green.
Contrary to what one might expect, the red one is only hot.
The green stuff will kill you! ;-)
You also left out pickled hot peppers (the pale green ones).
I love them in my felafels.
Dan Sulani
--------------------------------------------------------------
likehsna rtem zuv tikuhnuh auag inuvuz vaka'a.
A word is an awesome thing.
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Message: 12
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 10:54:58 -0500
From: Roger Mills <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
Steg Belsky inter alii wrote:
(snip my description of gyros meat/d�ner etc etc.)
> That's... that's... that's SHAWARMA!
I'll remember that if I ever visit Israel.
>> It may be
> > that [souvlaki] too can be served in a pita with condiments; I don't
> > recall.
>
> Hey, it's not in the pita unless it's actually *inside* the pita! :-P
> ;-)
>
That may depend on the quality of the pita; some are more easily
split-openable than others-- speaking only of the pita one can buy in the
average US supermarket (the ones I buy purport to be made by a Lebanese
bakery).
General comment/speculation: the confusion gyros/d�ner vs. souvlaki seems to
have arisen in Europe, perhaps even in Greece. Perhaps, if the d�ner idea is
originally Turkish (I note that the word was glossed "drehen" = turn =
gyros??), there is a certain European Greek reluctance to admit that, or to
use their term for it. I don't know. However, suffice to say there are a lot
more Turks in Western Europe than in the US, plus many Greeks in W.Europe
(and Australia, I suspect)are of much more recent vintage than those in the
US; conceivably therefore Greek/Turkish tensions are more vividly felt.
Most Greek-Americans by now are 1st generation or later; their immigrant
forebears are long gone. (My friend's father died at �100 in the l980s.)
They certainly have no fondness for the Turks, but few have ever actually
encountered one..........
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Message: 13
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 11:57:51 +0100
From: Benct Philip Jonsson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Proto-Germanic
Estel Telcontar wrote:
> Benct Philip Jonsson ha tera a:
>
>>Estel Telcontar wrote:
>>
>>>Hello everyone,
>>>How do the Germanic conlangers out there find proto-Germanic
>>>paradigms to develop their languages from? I'm having a hard
>>>time tracking them down.
>
>
>>Author Prokosch, Eduard
>>Title A comparative Germanic grammar.
>
> [...]
>
> Does Prokosch actually give Proto-Germanic paradigms? I've looked at
> it several times, and all I could find was comparisons of the
> descendant forms without reconstructions.
OOPS, I'm mis-remempering then....
>>Are you Norwegian?
>
>
> No, I'm Canadian. I don't know exactly why it's sticking Norwegian ads
> at the bottom of my email... it must have something to do with the fact
> that at one point I switched my language to Norwegian because I heard
> that it then doesn't stick any ads at the bottom of your emails at all.
> It worked, at least when I first tried it, and I didn't check since.
It must have something to do with Norwegian legislation
against unsolicited advertisements.
--
/BP 8^)>
--
Benct Philip Jonsson -- melroch at melroch dot se
Solitudinem faciunt pacem appellant!
(Tacitus)
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Message: 14
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 00:01:50 -0500
From: Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
----- Original Message -----
From: "Philip Newton" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: "Sally Caves" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Sent: Tuesday, December 07, 2004 11:59 AM
Subject: Re: Looking at the Cratylus; was: nomothete
> On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 10:42:04 -0500, Sally Caves <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> wrote:
>> Philip... can you go back to my original question? These corrections are
>> helpful, but they don't address my major concerns.
>
> I don't feel competent to answer your original question.
That's okay, Philip... I can use ANY knowledge about Greek. You were very
helpful, actually. I wanted to thank all of you for your thoughtful
responses to this. And curse my exuberant attention deficit. Eco actually
does go on in this chapter of his ("From Adam to Confusio Linguarum") to
discuss the Cratylus. But I was glad for the on-line discussion.
See you all tomorrow...
Sally
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Message: 15
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 22:44:33 -0500
From: John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
And Rosta scripsit:
> I was embracing American English, which, as others have pointed out,
> has become /'kudouz/, an apparent plural, in contrast to the older
> (& still BrE) mass noun /'kju:dQs/ (hence presumably the name of the
> OS Bill Gates bought, QDOS, "quick & dirty operating system", and
> renamed in the characteristically banal way one would expect from
> that stronzaccione).
I very much doubt this etymology of QDOS; AFAIK the current American
pronunciation is older than 1980. But I make no claim for the etymology
of Sinclair QDOS, which is at least British and may well be a pun on "kudos".
--
John Cowan www.ccil.org/~cowan www.reutershealth.com [EMAIL PROTECTED]
SAXParserFactory [is] a hideous, evil monstrosity of a class that should
be hung, shot, beheaded, drawn and quartered, burned at the stake,
buried in unconsecrated ground, dug up, cremated, and the ashes tossed
in the Tiber while the complete cast of Wicked sings "Ding dong, the
witch is dead." --Elliotte Rusty Harold on xml-dev
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Message: 16
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 09:19:35 -0600
From: "Thomas R. Wier" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: The Need for Debate
From: And Rosta <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Tom Wier:
> > As Ray has already noted, this spawned
> > great debates, so great in fact that a papal bull was issued in 1272
> > and again in 1277 banning certain topics of debate in the University
> > of Paris (not, notably, banning them in general), not so much to
> > suppress dissent (the Pope himself had taught there and was a moderate
> > theologically IIRC), but to keep tempers to a manageable level.
>
> By analogy, then, this would make John Cowan the (of course, very
> liberal) pope of Conlang. Pope John II, to be exact -- successor to
> Pope John I, Pope Lars, and Pope David.
Incidentally, the Pope who promulgated the latter bull of 1277 was
also a John -- John XXI this time -- who was the first and so far
only Lusitanian to sit on the throne of St. Peter. Also interestingly,
there never was a Pope John XX; people lost track sometime in the
11th century and misnumbered this one and the next (d. 1334). I suppose
this may have been a factor in people waiting over 600 years before
naming another one (John XXIII, who died in 1963). It would appear
our own list's Pontiff has an illustrious nomenclature behind him.
==========================================================================
Thomas Wier "I find it useful to meet my subjects personally,
Dept. of Linguistics because our secret police don't get it right
University of Chicago half the time." -- octogenarian Sheikh Zayed of
1010 E. 59th Street Abu Dhabi, to a French reporter.
Chicago, IL 60637
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Message: 17
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 09:50:38 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: most looked-up words
Quoting Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Hi!
>
> Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> > Quoting Henrik Theiling <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> >...
> > > Hmm, I never heard that pronunciation. It's usally /'gy:rOs/ or
> /'gi:rOs/.
> >
> > Might been just students, or a local thing. There's plenty of Greeks in
> Aachen,
> > afterall.
>
> Hmm, Aachen? There are some German dialect that regularly do /g/ ->
> [j] in certain contexts that I fail to remember now. I'm also not
> sure, but probably '�cher' dialect is one of these. Maybe that's the
> profane reason?
I don't know if this is a feature of �cher Platt, but in any case, I got it from
people who had few or none (other) dialectal features in their speech. In fact,
�cher seems to be practically dead among younger people. It would seem odd that
they'd have a dialectal pronunciation of this one word, which just happens to
coincide with the pronunciation in the language it's borrowed from.
Andreas
PS Berliner dialect, or at least some varieties thereof, seem to do [g]>[j]
everywhere, at least initiallly; I heard 'jut' for 'gut' and similar when I was
there.
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Message: 18
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 01:58:38 -0800
From: Arthaey Angosii <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Asha'ille site update
Mostly I would appreciate more feedback on my dictionary format(s). My
personal favorite is the verbose all-on-one-page version at
http://arthaey.mine.nu:8080/~arthaey/conlang/lexicon/dictionary.html
Other, shorter, formats (by popular demand ;) ) are linked from
http://arthaey.mine.nu:8080/~arthaey/conlang/lexicon/
I've also finally started on putting a grammar up online, though as of
now it's still limited. I'll be putting up the rest of it during
winter break. The phonology is already there and can be found via
http://arthaey.mine.nu:8080/~arthaey/conlang/grammar/
Comments appreciated!
--
AA
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Message: 19
Date: Tue, 7 Dec 2004 17:58:31 -0800
From: bob thornton <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: German style orthography
Thanks muchly! I'd, however, like to ask how realistic
this scheme is based upon the times.
=====
-The Sock
"My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:
Look upon my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"
__________________________________
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Message: 20
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 10:11:10 +0100
From: Andreas Johansson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: CHAT Re: Souvlaki (was most looked-up words)
Quoting John Cowan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>:
> Finally, there is the term "Dagwood sandwich", referring to Blondie's husband
> in the long-running comic strip _Blondie_. I don't know if this is live
> usage or just a kind of in-joke.
Oversized sandwiches are sometimes called _dagobertmackor_ in Swedish, from
_Dagobert_, the name of said character in the Swedish translation of the comic,
and _macka_, an informal word for a sandwich (or simply a piece of bread with
cheese or whatever on).
Is there an English word for a "half" sandwich, which lacks the upper bread?
Andreas
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Message: 21
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 12:29:04 -0500
From: Paul Roser <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
On Tue, 7 Dec 2004 18:25:19 -0500, # 1 <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I would like to know, </FONT></P>
> When a consonant is fricative or trilled, it can be continued as long we
> want. Is there any languages that has some words that are only consonants
> without vowels? A little word that is only a rolled [r], a [s], a [v],
> without the vowel releasing. It would be conceivable.
A couple of languages that have been noted in the linguistic literature for
their voweless words include the Berber languages, Tashilhayt & Tamazight
(as elsewhere noted), Nez Perce, Bella Coola (AKA Nuxalk). The African
language Lendu (AKA Balendru) also has words with syllable trills and
sibilants, and there are numerous other examples of languages with syllabic
consonants.
Most widespread seem to be syllabic nasals, laterals and trills, followed
by syllabic sibilants /s, z/, followed by other syllabic fricatives.
I've read that Tamazight even has syllabic stops, but I've never heard the
examples given, so I am suspicious at to whether they are released, in
which case I suspect that there might be an ultra-short vowel or, if
voiceless, an ultra-short voiceless vowel (similar to Shoshoni - or is it
Comanche? I forget...)
Bfowol
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Message: 22
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 12:23:46 -0500
From: Geoff Horswood <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: USAGE: Speak-Say-Tell
Hi,
I was thinking about the English words "speak", "say", "tell" (and "talk"),
and trying to quantify the exact difference between them.
Specifically, I was wondering whether all the words were strictly necessary
in a language, or whether you could postulate a language with only one word
meaning speak, say, tell or talk, depending on context. How realistic is
this?
(Kazakh has 3 words: /ajtu/ to speak or tell, /deu/ to say, and /s2jleu/ to
talk, plus the compound /djep ajtu/.)
What about other natlangs?
Geoff
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Message: 23
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 17:38:15 +0000
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: USAGE: Speak-Say-Tell
Geoff Horswood wrote:
>Hi,
>
>I was thinking about the English words "speak", "say", "tell" (and "talk"),
>and trying to quantify the exact difference between them.
>
>Specifically, I was wondering whether all the words were strictly necessary
>in a language, or whether you could postulate a language with only one word
>meaning speak, say, tell or talk, depending on context. How realistic is
>this?
>
>(Kazakh has 3 words: /ajtu/ to speak or tell, /deu/ to say, and /s2jleu/ to
>talk, plus the compound /djep ajtu/.)
>What about other natlangs?
>
>
'speak' and 'talk' can have two meanings, depending on their transitivity.
a) (intransitive) to say something
b) (transitive) To say something in manner X
In my idiolect, only 'speak' can take a language as its direct object.
Neither of them expect elaboration.
eg.. I speak French, I speak to him, I talk nonsense
'say' and 'tell' are intransitive and transitive respectively. However,
these expect you to explain exactly *what* you said.
I think they would be the best way to quantify it. I think generally
most languages collapse one or two of them into the other. Collapsing
them all would be fairly simple, and I don't think it would cause too
much of a catastrophe.
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Message: 24
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 09:43:09 -0800
From: "H. S. Teoh" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: Tatari Faran Update
On Wed, Dec 08, 2004 at 09:09:39AM -0600, James W wrote:
> >>>> H. S. Teoh<[EMAIL PROTECTED]> 12/6/2004 12:56:28 PM >>>
[...]
> >The structure of an NP containing a relative clause is:
> > <head_noun> <args ...> <relativised_verb> <case_clitic>
> >
> >The relativised verb is an inflected verb form which marks the case
> >role of the head noun in the relative clause. For example:
> >
> > kiran ahuu tsanan sa
> > young_man AUX_ORG-1sp speak-REL_RCP CVY
> > The young man to whom I spoke.
> >
> > kiran nihuu tsanakan sa
> > young_man AUX_RCP-1sp speak-REL_ORG CVY
> > The young man who spoke to me.
> >
> > kiran ahuu itsana sa
> > young_man AUX_ORG-1sp speak-REL_CVY CVY
> > The young man about whom I spoke.
> >
> > kiran ihuu tsanan sa
> > young_man AUX_CVY-1sp speak-REL_RCP CVY
> > The young man to whom I was spoken about.
>
> It took me two days to grasp what is going on here (I'm slow :) ).
> Marking case on the verb...I like it!
Yeah, this way there's no need for a relative pronoun. :-)
> In my emindahken, if I ever get to verbs, I plan on doing something
> vaguely similar by marking verbs for agent/patient, etc. My plan is
> to require the nouns of an utterance to appear in some kind of
> animacy heirarchy, and to mark their syntactic roles on the verb.
> Not sure quite how yet...
Hmm. That sounds almost like a "trigger lang", where the role of the
"subject" is marked on the verb.
> I'm still struggling with your cases, although I think they're a great
> change from the IE types.
If you need more info, the case system is described in greater detail
here:
http://conlang.eusebeia.dyndns.org/fara/cases.html
And yes, it's *very* non-IE. :-) But, so claim people who've learned
Ebis�dian (which uses an analogous system), it's really not that
strange once you understand how it works.
[...]
> > ihuu tsana'i.
> > AUX_RCP-1sp speak-INF
> > To speak about me.
>
> How is this different from 'To speak TO me'? Wouldn't you need AUX_RCP-1sp
> (the receptive case) in in that case ('scuse the pun) as well?
OOPS!!!! Sorry!! That's an incorrect gloss. _ihuu_ is AUX_CVY-1sp, not
AUX_RCP-1sp. The receptive form is _nihuu_. And yes, if it were the
receptive here, it'd be "to speak to me" rather than "to speak about
me".
[...]
> >Infinitive clauses in Tatari Faran are actually nominalized clauses,
> >since they inflect for case by having an appropriate case clitic
> >appended. Here are some examples of full sentences containing an
> >infinitive clause:
> >
> >1) huu na hamra nidiru abata' tsana'i so aram.
> > 1sp RCP see AUX_RCP-girl AUX_ORG-chief speak-INF CVY COMPL
> > I see the chief speaking to the girl.
>
> Here you use receptive marking on the girl who is spoken TO, where in your
> above example the receptive case marks the 'topic' of the speaking. I'm
> confused...
[...]
Sorry, it was a wrong gloss on the previous example. The receptive
always marks the person being spoken to; it is the conveyant which is
used to mark the person being spoken about (or the thing being
spoken).
T
--
Exaggerate?! I have never, *ever* exaggerated in my whole entire life, not
even 0.000001 times!
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Message: 25
Date: Wed, 8 Dec 2004 17:41:29 +0000
From: Joe <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: vowels: are they necessary?
Paul Roser wrote:
>
>
>I've read that Tamazight even has syllabic stops, but I've never heard the
>examples given, so I am suspicious at to whether they are released, in
>which case I suspect that there might be an ultra-short vowel or, if
>voiceless, an ultra-short voiceless vowel (similar to Shoshoni - or is it
>Comanche? I forget...)
>
>
I can articulate a syllabic *voiced* stop quite easily. Voiceless
syllabic stops seem impossible to me.
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