Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2008 October 1

= October 1 =

Bach title
I've tripped over an arrangement of a Bach composition, subtitled in German "Wenn Meine Trubsal als mit Ketten". While I can translate each individual word adequately, I can't put them together into a coherent phrase. Trubsal should be Trübsal, distress; Ketten are chains, but how would you render than into, say, a cantata title in English?

(If my distress was all in chains? Were my distress like chains?)

--DaHorsesMouth (talk) 03:57, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * This gives the following translation of the Aria:


 * Wenn meine Trübsal als mit Ketten
 * When my sorrow as if with chains
 * Ein Unglück an dem andern hält,
 * joins one misfortune to another,
 * So wird mich doch mein Heil erretten,
 * then will my saviour rescue me,
 * Daß alles plötzlich von mir fällt.
 * so that everything suddenly falls away from me.
 * Wie bald erscheint des Trostes Morgen
 * How soon appears a morning of consolation
 * Auf diese Nacht der Not und Sorgen!
 * after the affliction and worry of this night! --  JackofOz (talk) 04:06, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Ah, Jack beat me to it. I was just going to say you need the next phrase too.  Grsz  talk  04:08, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * The translation has a couple of (relatively minor) issues, namely:
 * So wird mich doch mein Heil erretten: "Heil" is not the saviour but that which the saviour (German "Heiland") brings; I'd probably translate it with "salvation" or "grace".
 * Wie bald erscheint des Trostes Morgen: there's a genitive that's not correctly rendered in the English sentence; "Trostes Morgen" should be "consolation's morning".
 * Auf diese Nacht der Not und Sorgen: this is also not quite correctly translated, it should be "this night of affliction and worry".
 * And the first word is open for interpretation as it's a bit ambiguous in German; a (temporal) "when" certainly works and makes sense in the context of the cantata, but a case could also be made for a (conditional) "if" which would change the tone of the passage slightly -- Ferkelparade &pi; 08:16, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Exposition to alcohol causes...
Is it appropriate to use the word "exposition" in place of "exposure"? --Seans Potato Business 09:50, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * No. Why would it be? Algebraist 09:55, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It would be if the definition of 'exposition' aligned with the intended concept, obviously. I have a lecturer who insisted that it was appropriate and that the word is used in this way in scientific literature on the subject of epidemiology. Seans Potato Business 11:12, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Google scholar seems to agree with him, unfortunately. What a horrible usage. Algebraist 09:32, 3 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Only if you tell your troubles to the bottle. —Tamfang (talk) 17:11, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

even more probable to be true
How can you express the idea that if A is true, B is even more probable to be true. (i.e. there is even more evidence to B). Mr.K. (talk) 10:38, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * "A makes B more likely/probable."? Zain Ebrahim (talk) 10:47, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Maybe correlation? Not quite a perfect match to the described scenario but sort of similar. 194.221.133.226 (talk) 11:06, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Bayes' theorem is perhaps a more closely related concept than correlation, in my opinion (though as you're asking on the Language ref. desk page you're probably not after mathematical concepts anyway).--85.158.137.195 (talk) 12:03, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I am not sure if this is a general question or if you have a specific example in mind. In general, one might say: "A implies B". In particular cases, there are many ways to express the idea depending on how strongly A and B are linked. Wanderer57 (talk) 12:27, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

A forteriori? Provided A does not imply B, but there are stronger reasons to believe B is true.80.58.205.37 (talk) 15:42, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * There's no such word, AFAIK. Did you mean a fortiori? — Emil J. 15:50, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * yes, I meant a fortiori. 80.58.205.37 (talk) 17:43, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Scottish
Why is there a Scots wikipedia? Surely the language has to be the first language of a group of people to be at all useful; and seeing as in Scotland the first language is Scottish English; which all business education and broadcasts etc. are conducted in; who does this benefit? Te only people that can read it can read the English (probably better, as they probably only learnt the semi-archaic Scots for a bit of fun) and the English one has far more content. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.16.62.154 (talk) 12:28, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * There is no "first language" criterion for a Wikipedia to exist; indeed there is an Esperanto Wikipedia. A Wikipedia in a given language exists purely when there is enough interest (and then enough activity) for one to exist. -- Finlay McWalter | Talk 12:32, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * My personal opinion on this has long been that one of the things Wikipedia isn't is Asterix; therefore Wikipedias should exist only in languages used as the medium of instruction somewhere, rather than every language and dialect someone thinks it would be neato to have a Wikipedia in. I don't know whether Scots fulfills that criterion though, and anyway it's only my personal opinion, not Wikimedia policy. —Angr 12:46, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, Scots and Esperanto both have native speakers. And seeing as Scots is a recognized language with a fair number of speakers, a Wikipedia has been created in it, and has done fairly well.  One of the reasons to have Wikipedias in native languages is because people sometimes prefer to use their own language over a more common one.  For example, though there are no monolingual speakers of Welsh or Norman that I'm aware of, individuals often feel that their own language is just as valuable or useful as the dominant language.  Additionally, different cultures give different priorities.  Articles which have been deleted here for being non-notbale on the English Wikipedia (such as Diex aie) have been decidedly kept on other language Wikipedias where they are considered notable to that culture.  The Jade Knight (talk) 04:10, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Actually, the people over at Meta.Wikimedia.org have pretty much adopted a "no new dead-language Wikipedias" policy, which means that there will probably be no further Wikis like Latin, Classical Chinese, and Old English. The Klingon Wikipedia and the Tokipona Wikipedia were shut down 2-3 years ago... AnonMoos (talk) 13:01, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Sweet suffering succotash, this notion is enough to make me wish I knew enough Latin to start a online encyclopedia. How does the GNU general public license restrain me from doing so? (Answer: it doesn't.)  The policy listed above deals with new language subdomains of existing projects on Wikimedia (who, fortunately, don't seem to view themselves as the Galactic Emperor).  The esteemed Finlay, above, shows good sense: if a bunch of people want to have an online encyclopedia in Scots or Latin on Klingon, so what?  If they succeed, they succeed; if they fail, they fail.  Some folks need more important things to worry about, like whether Andy Murray is a British tennis player or a Scottish one. The world wonders.  --- OtherDave (talk) 15:13, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * There's a Klingon Wikia, but there isn't a Klingon Wikipedia anymore. There is, however, an established Latin Wikipedia (just like I already said above). AnonMoos (talk) 15:21, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Right you are; my misreading. The point's the same, though: whatcha gonna do if someone starts an online encyclopedia in, say, Elvish?  Send Jimbo Wales to beat them up? --- OtherDave (talk) 19:37, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * They're welcome to do so, but not under a subdomain of wikipedia.org... AnonMoos (talk) 21:01, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I remember they tested out Quenya in the Incubator but I don't think it took off.  bibliomaniac 1  5  21:33, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * OtherDave, I have no issue with someone starting a website of any form, in whatever language they like, but I just thought the cost incurred by dead language wikipedias may be wasted funds, as no-one benefits from it. If they do it in their own domain they can do what they want. But this is an organization that depends on charity to make ends meet. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.16.62.154 (talk) 00:38, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * For Latin, at least, it is fun, and good practise, and we get to communicate with other Latinists from all over the world in a common language. The English Wikipedia doesn't really benefit anyone in any meaningful way either; what could be more of a waste of time than contributing to a encyclopedia that is essentially unusable, since by its own definition it can never be complete, and welcomes all sorts of meaningless crap from anyone with spare time and a computer? But here we are anyway. Adam Bishop (talk) 04:53, 2 October 2008 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.210.170.49 (talk)
 * Oh, what a naughty thing to say, Adam. You speak as if WP were here solely for the benefit of the editors.  What about our primary clients, the readers?  That's who I always keep in mind when I'm writing or editing articles.  There's a reason why WP has become one of the top 5 most visited sites in the world, and only a small percentage of visits are from editors.  --  JackofOz (talk) 05:03, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * The real problem with many (if not most) Wikipedias in dead or constructed languages is that they don't attract a "bunch of people want to have an online encyclopedia" in that language, or at least not enough of them to actually produce a reasonable approximation of one. The Latin and Esperanto Wikipedias are the positive exceptions, with about 22,919 and 104,591 articles respectively — that's not bad at all.  Welsh is doing fine at 18,892 articles, and even Norman has 3,125 articles.  On the other hand, the Klingon Wikipedia had a grand total of 67 articles when it closed, while the Toki Pona Wikia currently has 372 "legitimate content pages".  —Ilmari Karonen (talk) 01:18, 4 October 2008 (UTC)

Unidentified symbol
This question comes by way of Ryan North, of Dinosaur Comics: Does anyone know if there are any languages that have a symbol that resembles this? -- MacAddct1984 (talk &#149; contribs) 15:58, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * I've never seen it, but if there were a language spoken only by cricketers, it might in a cryptic sort of way represent the word for a sticky wicket (see sticky wicket for what I'm talking about). --  JackofOz (talk) 16:17, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * You could ask over at omniglot.com. The Jade Knight (talk) 04:17, 2 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It looks rather like a UK road sign you might see on a three lane motorway, meaning that the left hand lane is blocked somewhere ahead. 163.1.148.158 (talk) 13:29, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

Journalist with foreign accent?
Is it my impression or the CNN journalist here does have a foreign accent? Is it possible to be a journalist not being a native speaker?80.58.205.37 (talk) 17:42, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

What? Is there some sort of requirement that people only take jobs in the country they were raised in or something? 70.90.171.153 (talk) 17:55, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * The journalist in question is named as Felipe Barral; according to this page, he is "assignment editor/producer for CNN en Español". I guess he can occasionally be called upon to do reports for CNN in English if it's simpler than sending a native speaker to a place where he already is.  In general, broadcast journalists will be native speakers; historically, even those with regional accents were rarely allowed on the air (hence "BBC English" and General American).  However, if a reporter has a particular unusual speciality, that may outweigh the disadvantage of an accent.  In particular, foreign correspondents for a news organ are often natives of the country reported on rather than of the news organ's home market.  CNN International, being global, has lots of nonnative English speakers. jnestorius(talk) 19:31, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Utterly unthinkable. What do those foureen mutts imagine, appearing on CNN like that?

Dear IP Adress, you, sir, have some serious issues that need to be dealt with. Or maybe you just have some growing up to do, that's possible, too. TomorrowTime (talk) 22:56, 1 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Naughty naughty; feeding the trolls. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.16.62.154 (talk) 01:11, 2 October 2008 (UTC)

I am not a troll and not all edits from my IP are my edits. It was a serious question and it was answered seriously. Consider that where I am, there are only native speakers in journalism. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.58.205.37 (talk) 07:58, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * If you are in Spain, as me and as your IP indicates, I must say that many journalists here have foreign accents. It depends on what you call foreign of course. They are clearly native speakers of the Latin-American Spanish. However, I suppose that in professions deeply dependable from language skills, like journalism, non-native speakers will be only a minority of the working force. Mr.K. (talk) 08:14, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Although she was born in London, Christiane Amanpour was raised in Iran, and has a slight accent. She is a well-respected reporter.  And are you saying that there are no native-Basque speakers on Spanish television?   Little Red Riding Hood  talk  21:14, 2 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I was not saying there are no native Basque speakers. I just said non-natives are a small minority, even smaller when compared with the general population. I suppose there are some native-Basque speakers and native-Catalan speakers, however I would also call them native-Spanish speakers since they are bilingual.Mr.K. (talk) 08:13, 3 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Also, Sylvia Poggioli, though American, is NPR's Rome-based European correspondant, and she has a distinctivly Italian accent. Interesting, since she was raised New England.  I have always admired her reporting, but her accent seems a bit of an affectation.  Likewise, their China correspondant Rob Gifford is distinctly British.  While still fairly entrenched in most media, it seems the general attitudes towards the accents of our news presenters is changing slightly... --Jayron32. talk . contribs  04:34, 3 October 2008 (UTC)


 * Foreign correspondents in Spanish TV also have sometimes a slight accent. Although I believe they are native speakers who lived overseas for a long time. Mr.K. (talk) 08:13, 3 October 2008 (UTC)


 * I've never noticed Syliva Poggioli's accent except when she pronounces Italian words, then she pronounces them as an Italian would, rather than as an American would.  Little Red Riding Hood  talk  22:40, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Let's start with an assumption of good will. In some countries, journalism is not a profession open to non-citizens. DOR (HK) (talk) 04:03, 6 October 2008 (UTC)

Please translate the following?
The words SVAZ PRAEL USA JIHOZAPADNI ALLIANCE  appear on a lapel pin showing the Statue of Liberty. What does it mean and what language is it? ForgetergalForgetergal (talk) 20:45, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * Perhaps Czech.  Grsz  talk  21:26, 1 October 2008 (UTC)

Svaz=Association Jihozápadní=Southwest  Grsz  talk  21:29, 1 October 2008 (UTC)
 * It's Czech. It should read "Svaz přátel USA, jihozápadní aliance", which means "The Union of Friends of the USA, Southwest Alliance". It is a name of an NGO. — Emil J. 13:05, 2 October 2008 (UTC)