Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2007 July 31

= July 31 =

so long
Where does the term "so long", used as a synonym for goodbye come from? -- JAXHERE | Talk 14:15, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Here is the entry from the Online Etymology Dictionary. Perhaps German or Scandinavian or even Hebrew in origin.  -- LarryMac  | Talk  14:26, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

antonym for greeting
I can't seem to find a single English word which expresses the opposite of greeting, to descibe what we do when we say goodbye. Any ideas? -- JAXHERE | Talk 14:15, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
 * Farewell. --Mayfare 14:19, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The OED entry I just linked in the question above has a quoted reference to "so long" being "[a] salutation of parting", which is, I suppose, a rather wordy antonym for "greeting". -- LarryMac  | Talk  14:29, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Of course, not every concept has a single English word to express it, and many things don't strictly speaking have an opposite. Xn4 11:03, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm with Mayfare on this one: Farewell is a good example, and can be used in a similar way: "I gave him my farewell." I think that the word "goodbye" works also: "We said our goodbyes."  --Cromwellt|talk|contribs 07:06, 2 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Valediction is probably the closest (literally "Goodbye-saying"). AndrewWTaylor 13:48, 2 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I agree, valediction is the correct word, although this may be one of those occassions where using a single, rarely used word will produce more confusion than using a phrase of several more common words. --M @ r ē ino 14:56, 7 August 2007 (UTC)

Punctuation
Which is correct: (a) Hi, Mary:  Hello, Mary: or (b) Hi Mary:   Hello, Mary:


 * Your examples are not clear. Is this a conversation between two people both called Mary?  Or a variety of different salutations, like at the start of an email? Trying to give an answer, if you're asking about the correctness of the comma between the words "Hi" or "Hello" and the person's name, I would say it doesn't much matter.  To have the comma in would be rather more formal, and as such would fit with "hello" rather better than it would with "hi". --Richardrj talkemail 14:56, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * The comma is normal, but I don't understand the purpose of the colon, which would be better replaced with a full stop. But why the repetition? More context would help.--Shantavira|feed me 15:31, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * Perhaps he means the second part ("Hello, Mary") as a translation of what he is trying to say (ie he wants to know the difference between "Hi, Mary" and "Hi Mary", both of which should mean the same as "Hello, Mary"). D  aniel  (‽) 17:09, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * To the original poster -- if Daniel's interpretation of your question is correct -- and that is how I myself also interpreted it -- then (a) is correct and (b) is incorrect. The comma from (a) is necessary because of the concept of "direct address".  That is, the comma separates the statement (hello) from the person to whom the statement is directly addressing (Mary).  Thanks.  (Joseph A. Spadaro 02:52, 4 August 2007 (UTC))

Kosovo/Kosovar/Kosovan
There's a discussion ongoing at Talk:Kosovo as to what's the correct and most common adjective in use for Kosovo; opinions from people interested in linguistics would be highly welcome. Thanks! — Nightstallion 16:46, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
 * I'm not an expert on either Serbian or Albanian, but this is what I understand. 'Kosovo' (Косово) is a Serbian name, meaning 'of the blackbird(s)'. It is shortened form of 'Kosovo polje' (Косово поље), meaning 'plain of the blackbird(s)'. Morphologically, 'Kosovo' is a possessive adjective. However, it has come to be used as a proper noun referring to the plain. From the view of Serbian grammar, 'Kosovo' is an adjective. The Albanian name is 'Kosovë' (feminine singular indefinate noun), but the definite noun 'Kosova' is more common. It derives from the Serbian. In the definite genitive, it is 'e Kosovës'. The proper adjective formed from 'Kosovë' is 'kosovar'. The form 'Kosovan' seems like a hybrid to me: the '-an' ending looks like that in 'American', from the Latin ending '-ānus'. Thus, using 'Kosovo' as an adjective looks more Serbian, but could reflect the English usage of 'the England football team'. Using 'Kosovar' as an adjective looks more Albanian. 'Kosovan' seems to have come about as an attempt to make a new adjective by those who either didn't know of the adjectival property of the previous two. — Gareth Hughes 15:48, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Minor clarification re "From the view of Serbian grammar, 'Kosovo' is an adjective." It's not, at least not anymore, although it started as such: it has proper adjective "Kosovski", and 'Kosovo' behaves like any other (neuter) noun. Compare a similar situation with e.g. surname "Markov", which also originates as a possessive: however, since it's a noun, its adjective is "Markovljev proces". Duja ► 12:47, 2 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Yes. If even it's an adjective, then with nominal endings; we say na Kosovu, and not na Kosovom.  The same story is with Russian names, though there the adjectivity has borne out a little better.  Not to mention: find me anyone in Russia who understands that Chelyabinsk used to be an adjetive!  :)  --VKokielov 14:13, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

rhetorical question
Above page claims "Some rhetorical questions become idiomatic English expressions" including "I am Harry Potter" - is this a mistake - it's new to me, otherwise can someone please explain. Thank you.83.100.252.241 19:23, 31 July 2007 (UTC)
 * It was just vandalism; I've reverted it. Thanks for pointing it out. —Angr 19:37, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Use of non Gender terms rather than man/he and woman/she
Is it the policy of Wikipedia to use gender neutral terms in articles? In particular, in articles about partner dances, the terms noun "man" or the pronoun "he", and the noun "woman" or the pronoun "she", traditionally, the man leads, the woman follows. This is particularly true in the conservative country western dance community. Is there a policy on this usage, and if so, what is it? I have just spent 15 munites trying to find an answer to this. Steve Pastor 23:41, 31 July 2007 (UTC)


 * These days, almost all writers of English try to write in a gender neutral way. It's almost de rigeur, which is why it is not specifically mentioned as Wikipedia policy. I can see why articles about partner dances could be problematic. I've been to lots of dances in which women have been obliged to dance with female partners, but the caller will still describe the leader as "the man", and I don't think anyone takes offence at this. If you can provide the titles of specific articles as examples I will take a look at them.--Shantavira|feed me 07:57, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * This applies in particluar to the country western two step page, where man/woman was recently replaced with the gender neutral language. My own experience is the same as yours when it comes to country western dance, ust one of the places where use of the term "de riguer" would probably elicit blank stares. I accept the use of "neutered" pronouns in other dances, but believe that the use of man/woman in describing the dance of such a conservative segment of the population is more appropriate. I ask the policy question to access the strength of my argument. Thanks for any further comments. Steve Pastor 15:33, 1 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I don't think you can assume that "country western two step" and "conservative" go hand in hand. There's quite a large gay subculture involved in various types of country western dancing.  -- LarryMac  | Talk  15:44, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * It's not every day I see two different misspellings of de rigueur in adjacent paragraphs. &mdash;Tamfang 01:18, 3 August 2007 (UTC)

While I don't question the existence of a gay contry western dancing subculture, I have never unknowingly walked into a gay country western dance scene. The use of the term subculture, "large" or not indicates that it is not mainstream. No doubt I could find one if I wanted to.but, the cw 2 step article is not about the gay country western scene. Use of gender neutral terms in an article on that topic would be appropriate. Steve Pastor 17:54, 1 August 2007 (UTC)


 * I presuming that you are joking but just in case...conservative in language and conservative in sexual-liberty/preference are pretty different. You could prefer traditional terminology and still have open views on sexuality, or you could have "common usage = acceptable" style views on language and be rabidly anti-gay/lesbian. Regarding trying to make dance-articles gender neutral - I have had a fascinating debate with a somewhat strong minded femminist about this, they took the view that taking man to mean 'lead' and woman to mean 'the person being led' was perpetuating stereotypes that continue to promote the idea that men are more powerful/important/worthy than women. I personally think that whilst perhaps historically this is why language showed he/she I think the majority of modern usage is merely a consequence of history rather than trying to perpetuate such a situation - we had to agree to disagree unfortunatley. Anyway sorry this isn't really all that useful an answer - oh well. ny156uk 17:58, 1 August 2007 (UTC)


 * Interesting. Your comments seem to suggest you think that for a term to be perpetuating a stereotype, the person using the term would have to be trying to perpetuate the stereotype, rather than using the term as a consequence of history. I assume that's just an accident of typing, since it would enable the strawman of 'Are you saying [such and such] is deliberately perpetuating sexist attitudes?', which would be silly. Modern usage is almost entirely a consequence of history, but that doesn't mean it doesn't perpetuate a stereotype. Calling all firefighters 'firemen' is a consequence of history for most people who do so, and doesn't indicate that the person is sexist, but using such terms perpetuate the stereotype that (for example) all firefighters are men. It is the same for dancing. However, this being Wikipedia, I would recommend using the terms used in the sources for the article. Skittle 21:51, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * Maybe the words we use should reflect the reality that is, rather than the reality that some proportion of the population wants to exist. In other words, if the vast majority of leaders are men, as they are in country western two step, then using the words men, man, and he, would be appropriate. And, no, I haven't been kidding about anything I've written here. If anyone would like clarification, we can do it here, or on my talk page if it is too off topic. Please be specific. Steve Pastor 22:08, 1 August 2007 (UTC)
 * I would say that the terms "leader" and "follower" should always be preferred to "man" and "woman" in dance articles, both because they are more accurate (they better "reflect the reality that is") and because gender-neutral language should be preferred wherever it is not exceedingly clunky. Because there are men who follow and women who lead (even if there are not many), leader/follower is always accurate, even where man/woman is not.  (And why specify sex unnecessarily where it's not an integral part to the dance?)  That being said, I think using "he or she" after every instance of "leader" or "follower" is probably needless, because it is true that most leaders are men and most followers are women, and it seems burdensome to specify both where one is normally accurate.  (In my opinion, this is one of the cases where the gender-neutral alternative is so clunky that it justifies using gendered speech.)  Calliopejen1 12:13, 6 August 2007 (UTC)