There are 4 messages in this issue.
Topics in this digest:
1a. Re: Hebrew waw consecutive
From: Elliott Lash
2a. Re: USAGE: writing the date in Chinese
From: Eugene Oh
2b. Re: USAGE: writing the date in Chinese
From: Mark J. Reed
3.1. Re: Beijing, Zhongguo, etc.
From: Ollock Ackeop
Messages
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1a. Re: Hebrew waw consecutive
Posted by: "Elliott Lash" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Fri Aug 22, 2008 6:46 pm ((PDT))
I have a grammar of Biblical Hebrew which discusses some differences in
vocalism between the imperfect with waw-consecutive and the non-waw-marked
imperfect. I don't have it with me, but I will check when I get home.
-Elliott
--- On Thu, 8/21/08, David McCann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> From: David McCann <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> Subject: Re: Hebrew waw consecutive
> To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
> Date: Thursday, August 21, 2008, 4:17 PM
> On Wed, 2008-08-20 at 13:43 +0200, Veoler wrote:
>
>
> > Is there some hard evidence for this? As far as I have
> heard there was no
> > real foundation behind waw conversive, and I
> haven't ever seen any proof in
> > any direction. So I'm 67% non-believer in waw
> conversive and 33% agnostic,
> > until I see evidence. Do you have any references about
> the justification or
> > reason to assume the theory?
> >
> > I have'nt got very far in learning Hebrew and
> thought I should wait with
> > this question, but since it was brought up...
> >
> I'm no expert on Semitic languages: a quick check shows
> I read Gray's
> Introduction in 1973 and Gelb on Akkadian in 1982!
>
> I took the example from A. B. Davidson's Hebrew
> Grammar, but he offered
> no comment. I've just looked at Robert Hetzron's
> article in Major
> Languages of the World. He regards the perfective wa- form
> (which he
> rightly, I think, calls a past tense) as original and the
> non-past form
> as derived after wa- came to be seen as a "tense
> switcher". He suggests
> an etymology hawaya "was". I seem to remember
> that Akkadian forms a past
> in u-; but if that's so, Hetzron evidently thinks it
> unrelated. Of
> course, we can't tell what the original vocalisation
> was; it would be
> too good to be true if the prefix were the only tense
> marker.
Messages in this topic (2)
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2a. Re: USAGE: writing the date in Chinese
Posted by: "Eugene Oh" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat Aug 23, 2008 8:06 am ((PDT))
Nope, there is no straightforward way to combine all the different notations
for the year, though you will see those names on calendars separated by
spaces. However, "earth rat" or "fire rabbit" etc. are not written, because
they are indicated by the more elegant wùzǐ, dīngmǎo etc. Chinese are
expected to know the correspondences.
E.g.
2008 (in big font)
4705 wùzǐ
and any other information the calendar-maker feels inclined to inclkude.
Eugene
On Sat, Aug 23, 2008 at 3:18 AM, Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> (snip helpful reply from Eugene)
>
> Thank you for the very informative reply! A follow-on question: one
> thing I might do in English is include additional desgnations as a
> parenthetical: "4705 (wù-zǐ, yáng, earth rat)". Is there an
> analogous construct in written Chinese?
>
> --
> Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
>
Messages in this topic (9)
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2b. Re: USAGE: writing the date in Chinese
Posted by: "Mark J. Reed" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat Aug 23, 2008 8:58 am ((PDT))
On Sat, Aug 23, 2008 at 11:06 AM, Eugene Oh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Nope, there is no straightforward way to combine all the different notations
> for the year, though you will see those names on calendars separated by
> spaces.
Thanks.
> However, "earth rat" or "fire rabbit" etc. are not written, because
> they are indicated by the more elegant wùzǐ, dīngmǎo etc. Chinese are
> expected to know the correspondences.
Sure; I just did that as an example in the English. I imagine that
doing so in Chinese would be something like putting "Taurus" next to
"May" on a Western calendar.. although I gather that the terrestrial
branches are even more closely associated with the corresponding
animal totem than tha. Not sure about the stems and their elements
and yin/yang associations...
Thanks again!
--
Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Messages in this topic (9)
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3.1. Re: Beijing, Zhongguo, etc.
Posted by: "Ollock Ackeop" [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: Sat Aug 23, 2008 10:54 am ((PDT))
Eugene wrote (sorry, the "Quote original message" button returns garbage for
you)
>It isn't very accurate to use commercial names, as their nativisation
>involves harmonising commercial aims etc. as well. Coca Cola would have been
>kou3 ke3 kou3 le4 until someone spotted the opportunity.
Yes, of course. I should have thought of that.
>Also, many names are Sinicised not by using the modern Mandarin
>pronunciation. There is no fixed way of Sinicisation: different names will
>be Sinicised differently in China, in Hong Kong, in Taiwan and in Singapore
>(though the official press in Singapore likes to use the PRC version if
>known). How the name turns out depends on a few factors, such as
>
>1. when the name was borrowed
>2. who first borrowed the name
>3. that person's familiarity with methods of Sinicisation, past examples and
>Middle Chinese/an alternative Chinese lect to Mandarin.
>
>(tones make no difference.)
>
>For example, the name Jiānádà [tɕanata] for Canada is only so pronounced in
>modern Mandarin. When it was borrowed the characters were pronounced
>[kænata] in the . America was borrowed as [amilikæ], subsequently formalised
>to [jamilikæ] and sound-shifted to [jamejlitɕa]. Unwieldiness in Mandarin
>aside, potential confusion also (as always in Chinese) leads to abbreviation
>with clarification: hence Měiguó, literally "jamejlitɕa (country)" and
>Měizhōu, literally "jamejlitɕa (continent)".
>
>The name "Washington" is now Huáshèngdùn [hwaɕəŋtwən], but when borrowed it
>used to be [waɕiŋtun], and still is in Cantonese. "Sweden" is Ruìdiǎn
>[ɻweitjæn] but used to be [switjɛn] and still is in Hokkien (Min-nan) and
>Teochew.
And that
>Zhōnghuá Rénmín Gònghéguó tends to be used in official situations, like
>summits, or where a distinction is favourable against Taiwan. The name
>Yǎměilìjiā is archaic except very rarely in Hong Kong or unless the
>publisher has a predilection for it.
That's not what I was looking for, though. I said that I had never seen the
translation for "The United States of America" in the wild. Now after
looking it up on Wikipedia (I often find Chinese names of things by
searching Wiki and then clicking "zhongwen"), it is
me3li4jian1he2zhong4guo2. I now realize that I actually *have* heard this
in the wild -- at the Olympics, during medal ceremonies, when they announce
the names of the atheletes and the countries they represent, they use the
full name (but not when they say "and now, the national anthem of the United
States" -- there they just say mei3guo2. I wasn't sure at the time, as I
did not know at the time that he2zhong4 meant "united" -- and I also had
expected the word zhou1 "state, province" to be in there.
>One curiosity that I have never figured out (not that I thought much about
>it) was where the extra syllable in the Chinese name for Russia (Éluósī
>[ɤlwɔs̩]) came from.
I have no idea what you're talking about as I don't know where the Chinese
name for Russia even came from. Is it actually supposed to be from "rus"?
Russia borders Mongolia -- maybe the name comes from somewhere in the
eastern regions. I dunno -- as much as I'm not a Sinologist I know a
hundred times less about Russia and Russian.
On Fri, 22 Aug 2008 13:10:49 -0400, Jim Henry <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>On Fri, Aug 22, 2008 at 8:09 AM, Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>
>> I tend to the more authentic of the available Anglicizations:
>> [halapEnjo] rather than [halapinjo], for example, and yeah, that
>
>In what dialect is [halapEnjo] an anglicization? In my 'lect and some
>other 'lects I'm familiar with /E/ does not occur before /n/,
>it's realized as /Ej@/ in my 'lect and /&/ in some other 'lects.
>But foreign words with /e/ or /E/ plus a nasal are more apt to
>get borrowed with /in/ than /&n/, maybe, as in [h&[EMAIL PROTECTED]@].
>
>--
>Jim Henry
>http://www.pobox.com/~jimhenry/
I think it's more often [h{l@'pejnjo]. It's common for English speakers to
take Spanish [E] to [ej], since it occurs in places where [E] just doesn't
work for many English speakers.
On Fri, 22 Aug 2008 08:09:54 -0400, Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>> *my real name = George Corley
>
>So where does "Ollock Ackeop" come from, out of curiosity?
>--
>Mark J. Reed <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Old Star Wars Galaxies character that for a short time spun off as an
independent (and completely non- Star Wars related) RP character and
eventually evolved into the Kesatan race -- which probably only share with
the Mon Calimari the fact that they are intelligent amphibians -- and, not
having a complex speech mechanism, cannot produce linguistic sounds much
less pronounce the name.
To summarize (before I get too much off topic garbage in here), my pseudonym
is from a character in a game I no longer play who has evolved in my head to
the point that he can't really exist as an individual anymore as the race he
inspired cannot pronounce his name!
Messages in this topic (160)
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