I can't see this in the archive, so it may not have made
it to the unicode list (as Petra isn't a member?).
Misha
----- Forwarded by Misha Wolf/LON/GB/Reuters on 29/05/2002 14:15 -----
Petra Cerne Oven
<petracerneoven@btint To: Misha
Wolf/LON/GB/Reuters@Reuters
ernet.com> cc: john hudson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>,
[EMAIL PROTECTED], pco --
btinternet
<[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
28/05/2002 12:37 Subject: Re: Language name
questions
Please respond to Header: Internal Use Only
Petra Cerne Oven
Misha wrote:
[...]
> This is not the case with many other languages. I'm not a linguist, so I can't give
>language categories, but I guess
> at least Slav languages do things very differently from English.
This is very true. I can add some examples:
Apart from dual, Slovene grammar also has six cases [German has 4], which depend on
gender (3 possibilities), number (singular, dual, plural) and declination. There is
plenty of exceptions as well (just to make it more interesting :-).
1. nominative case
2. genitive
3. dative
4. accusative
5. locative
6. instrumental case
They change everything. Here are your examples translated into Slovene.
> "Say it to me in English"
"Povej mi to v angleščini." (5th case, if I am right)
But "English is beautiful language" would be "Angleščina je lep jezik." (nominativ)
Depending on declination, words also change the form: angleščina, angleščine,
angleščini, angleščino, (pri) angleščini, (z) angleščino.
> "This is an English shirt"
"To je angleška srajca." (nominativ, femininum)
> I think the Slovak replacement for "English" would be "slovenský",
> "slovenská" or "slovenské", depending on the gender of "shirt".
You are right. It is the same in Slovene:
"This is an English car." would be "To je angleški avto."
Declinations change nouns, adjectives and everything else. "Petra is very busy" would
be "Petra je zelo zaposlena" but "Petra is not at home" is "Petre ni doma".
It is very funny when I translate things from English to Slovene and English speaking
people complain that there were spelling mistakes in names in the article....
> Then comes the interesting question: What do we mean when we write
> "English" in a language selection menu on a Web page. The possible
> meanings include:
> - "English language" -- "slovenský jazyk" / "sloven?tina"
> - "in English" -- "slovensky"
> - "English Web page" - "slovenský", "slovenská" or "slovenské",
> depending on the gender of "Web page".
On Slovene web pages you can usually see "slovenščina" (Slovene), or "slovenski jezik"
(Slovene language) or "v slovenščini" (in Slovene). Since there are no issues of
non-understanding there (nobody would assume that "Slovene" would mean that only
Slovene people may read it or something like that) I think everybody tries to make it
as short as possible (and they pin on Slovene flag, which is anyway recognizable only
to Slovene :-/
best wishes,
Petra
........................................................................................................................
| Petra Cerne Oven | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | [EMAIL PROTECTED] |
|Department of Typography & Graphic Communication | 2 Earley Gate, Whiteknights |
|Reading RG6 6AU | United Kingdom |
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