Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2007 February 25

= February 25 =

Slovoj Zizek
Slavoj Žižek ---Can any one give an idea how one would pronoun this guys name? 02:09, 25 February 2007 (UTC)puzzled
 * You spelled the name in two different ways. Anyway, the name appears Slavic, so "j" is most likely pronounced as English "y", and ž as ("sh" as in "asia", not as in "she" or "ship"), making a rough approximation in English phonetic spelling "slah-VOY shee-SHEK, with the stress on the 2nd syllable (if I'm not mistaken). 惑乱 分からん 03:15, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * You're right, except that in Czech and Slovak, the first syllable is always emphasized: SLAH-voy ZHI-zhek. -- Mwalcoff 03:23, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * So this is a Czech/Slovak name? (Didn't know about "zh" phonetic spelling...) Short i sound, too. I thought about it, but somehow I'd gotten the impression it was incorrect... Oh, well, thanks... 惑乱 分からん 03:28, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Well, theoretically, the letter "i" in Czech is pronounced like IPA /i/, whereas "í" is pronounced the same way but for a two-count (/iː/). In practise, the letter "i" in Czech often sounds like a "short i" in english (/ɪ/). -- Mwalcoff 04:37, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Oh, and it turns out Slavoj Žižek is Slovenian, so forget everything I've written. -- Mwalcoff 04:38, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * So we're left with the question of how to pronounce it in Slovenian. It's probably, but we'd have to know what stress and tone marks are used on the name to be sure. —Angr 06:36, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I can't see IPA on the computer I'm on right now, but I checked this some time ago with a Slovenian friend and the ž-s are Voiced postalveolar fricatives. Stress on the first syllable of his first and his last name. 213.201.189.242 11:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Voiced postalveolar fricatives was what we said... Ž's are always, except for Turkmen, apparently... 惑乱 分からん 15:30, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Did you get the info on the supposed Turkmen anomaly from the article on Ž? I think that this is wrong: Turkmen is no exception, and ʤ in Turkmen is written as j. When Turkmen was still written with Cyrillic, both phonemes were indiscriminately represented by the same glyph ж. But I have no authoritative source for this. --Lambiam Talk  17:26, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * I've heard, in American academic settings, his name pronounced like Mwalcoff described in his first response; I think that's an acceptable American pronounciation. schi talk 00:02, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

I'm Slovenian; the IPA already posted by Angr is correct except for two points: a) the accent is on the first syllable in both the name and surname. The placement of accent is unpredictable in Slovenian, btw. b) The second vowel of surname Žižek is pronounced as a in about. This is debatable though, and a pronounciation as stated by Angr could be heard too.

tankini top vs shimmel
The term 'shimmel' has become popular with all major womens' sportswear makers for a supportive, non-chafing singlet covering the waist with interior encapsulated bra, made of fabrics that wick moisture away from the body during a workout.

Where does the term 'shimmel' come from? Is the term 'tankini top' (see Wikipedia) becoming obsolete? How does the term 'shimmel' relate to "Shimmel-length" as in Shimmel-length football jerseys (for men)?

No dictionary (online or offline), no manufacturer (we had long talks with Adidas and Brooks), no forum (see the thread "shimmel vs. tankini top" at the dictionary.com forum "Word Origins") knows anything about these two meanings of "shimmel".

Do you?

Freedwood 09:49, 25 February 2007 (UTC)


 * I would have thought that the German Schimmel might be useful. The English word shim does exist, and, in some senses, it follows the German usage (according to OED). — Gareth Hughes 14:08, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * It seems odd to give an article of clothing designed to keep the wearer dry a name that means "mold". —Angr 14:59, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes, my head was working backwards: it does seem like the opposite of what it's intended to do. Flicking through OED, I found that 'shimmy' is used as a dialect word for 'chemise'. Then, perhaps, a shimmel is a modern chemisette — "a bodice, more or less like the upper part of a chemise, worn by women, in some countries". On the other hand, 'shim' is a dialect version of 'skim', so it might have something to do with skimming away moisture from the body. — Gareth Hughes 15:09, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Latin usage question

 * scalaris - of or belonging to a flight of steps or a ladder


 * bellum -i n. (old form, duellum), [war, fighting]; 'in bello', or loc., 'belli', [in time of war].

In latin if I want to say:


 * Belonging to a ladder in time of war

Would I write:

OR
 * Scalaris Belli
 * Belli Scalaris

Thank you Arcticdawg 15:40, 25 February 2007 (UTC) mundanum


 * The case-system should make both correct, is my impression, but I think there are probably some words missing (like temp(or)- time, etc.)... Anyway, my Latin is very bad... 惑乱 分からん 16:35, 25 February 2007 (UTC)


 * The word order makes no difference. In both versions the word belli would, however, almost certainly not have been interpreted by a native Latin speaker as being used adverbially, but as the genitive of bellum, giving a meaning like "the ladder thingy of (the) war". The English is ambiguous; does "in time of war" constrain the verb "belonging to" or the noun "ladder"? If the former, you could use scalaris in tempore belli or scalaris in bello. --Lambiam Talk  17:09, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

Would this be appropriate:

Arcticdawg 23:35, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * "Bellum Scalae" - War Ladder
 * "Scalae Belli" - Ladder of war


 * The 1st one seems wrong to me, isn't "bellum" here used in its basic form, while "war" is used as an attributive adjective to ladder or something... Hmm, I think I think correctly, but express it incorrectly... =S Please improve... Basically, in Latin case is a lot more important than word order, don't try translating something word by word without analysis, since you're bound to get wrong. 惑乱 分からん 23:52, 25 February 2007 (UTC)

What I am trying to find is the correct translation in latin for a wargaming game ladder. It has to be reasonably short as I was considering using it as a domain name for a website. I am having a hard time getting the correct wording.

How about this one:


 * De Bellis Scalae - Wargame ladder

Arcticdawg 00:02, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Scalae belli (or belli scalae) seems fine to me, and can be translated equally as "war ladder" and "ladder of war". It could also be interpreted as meaning "ladder used to wage war", just like English "war ladder", which is equally ambiguous. If you want to rule out this possible interpretation, scalae ad bellum would mean "(rings of) a ladder (leading) to war". Disclaimer: I'm not a native Latin speaker. --Lambiam Talk  00:23, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * What would "wargame", be, btw? Ludus belli? 惑乱 分からん 01:28, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * You could say that, but for denoting a genre of games instead of "a/the game of war" ludus bellicus may convey the intended meaning more clearly. This is used in the Latin Wikipedia in the article titles Dominus Anulorum: Ludus bellicus strategematicus (where it translates "battle game") and Ludus bellicus de statuis parvis. --Lambiam Talk  04:15, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Hello fellows, thank you for your input !! Here is an article that could use an English translation in it: DBM De Bellis Multitudinis Arcticdawg 10:32, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

Him / Her
I came across the list of Most common words in the English language and I noticed that 'her' comes in 29th on the list, but 'him' is at 58. Why the large difference between the two words? 68.231.151.161 23:00, 25 February 2007 (UTC)
 * One guess. Her is both accusative/dative (it's her) and genitive (her car). For "he", there are two words used "him" and "his", sure in the phrase "of hers" the feminine variant is different, while the masculine "of his" is the same, but the phrase is too rare to make much of a difference. 惑乱 分からん 23:48, 25 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Using this guess as a working hypothesis, + Zipf's law giving rank as the inverse of frequency, we can get a good fit with a numerical model in which the frequency of a personal noun form is explained as the product of a case-dependent value and a gender-dependent value. Setting Nom = 0.50620, Obj = 0.35769, Gen = 0.14383, M = 0.12268, and F = 0.06792, we have:
 * {| style="text-align:center"


 * word || role || value || inverse || rank
 * he || NomM || 0.06210 || 16.1 || 16
 * him || ObjM || 0.04388 || 22.8 || 23
 * his || GenM || 0.01764 || 56.7 || 58
 * she || NomF || 0.03406 || 29.4 || 30
 * her || (Obj+Gen)F || 0.03375 || 29.6 || 29
 * }
 * Here I've ignored the possible but rare interpretation of his as a possessive. Of course, it is not entirely surprising that we can get a good fit with five equations and five parameters. --Lambiam Talk  03:23, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * she || NomF || 0.03406 || 29.4 || 30
 * her || (Obj+Gen)F || 0.03375 || 29.6 || 29
 * }
 * Here I've ignored the possible but rare interpretation of his as a possessive. Of course, it is not entirely surprising that we can get a good fit with five equations and five parameters. --Lambiam Talk  03:23, 26 February 2007 (UTC)
 * }
 * Here I've ignored the possible but rare interpretation of his as a possessive. Of course, it is not entirely surprising that we can get a good fit with five equations and five parameters. --Lambiam Talk  03:23, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * You have mixed up "him" and "his", right? 惑乱 分からん 15:09, 26 February 2007 (UTC)


 * Thanks Lambian for Zipf's! I'll try to see in what domains ir applies best. Yes it appears that the case (Gen) is good, but the rank (58) is unlike the original question. -- DLL .. T 18:09, 26 February 2007 (UTC)

That explanation is much better than me thinking it was due to sailors talking about their ships: "Arrrrrrrgh, I knew da gale couldna harm her !". StuRat 23:25, 26 February 2007 (UTC)