Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2011 March 14

= March 14 =

French stress
I have always been told that in French there is no concept of stress as it is thought of by English speakers, and when we (as Anglophones) hear the French "stress" the last syllable of every word we are actually hearing the "prosody". Is this true? If so, why is it that on many pages on this Wikipedia French pronunciation is given with the IPA stress notation « ' »? 72.128.95.0 (talk) 01:21, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * In our stress (linguistics) article, it has a nice explanation: "French words are sometimes said to be stressed on the final syllable, but actually French has no word stress at all. Rather, it has a prosody whereby the final or next-to-final syllable of a string of words is stressed. This string may be equivalent to a clause or a phrase. However, when a word is said alone, it receives the full prosody and therefore the stress as well." I'm not sure if that's linguistically exactly accurate; how can there be prosody with only one word? But anyway, a word in isolation has stress just like English words. Adam Bishop (talk) 07:47, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * I guess the reason why some people say French has no stress is because they equate "stress" with "word stress" (i.e. with emphasis always being placed on a certain syllable of a certain word); however, if we define stress phonetically, as emphasis through loudness, length, and intonation, then both English and French have stress; it's just that English stress placement is determined at the level of the word (say, "next-to-the-last syllable of the word with some exceptions", although it's really a lot more complex than that), whereas French stress placement is determined at the level of the phrase ("last syllable of the phrase"). Both are stress, and certainly both are "prosody". The word "prosody", which covers all kinds of stress and much more besides, is not really needed here, I think (and sure, there can be "prosody" - tone, length, stress - within one word, or within one syllable for that matter).--91.148.159.4 (talk) 23:52, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * In connected conversational speech, French stress generally occurs on the last non-schwa vowel of an "intonational group" of several words pronounced closely together as a unit. As has been explained, it has much more to do with determining where and how the overall intonation of a sentence/phrase will be expressed than with pronouncing one syllable of a word more strongly than other syllables in the word... AnonMoos (talk) 02:23, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Hindi help
What is the Hindi name for the Vancouver School Board?

The Hindi name is in this document http://nootka.vsb.bc.ca/March2010_Parents_budget_multi.pdf - On page 10.

Thanks, WhisperToMe (talk) 01:56, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It's not Hindi, it's Punjabi. ਵੈਨਕੂਵਰ ਸਕੂਲ ਬੋਰਡ, 'vainkūvar s(a)kūl borḍ'.  ʙʌsʌwʌʟʌ   spik ʌp!  02:49, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Ah, I see. Thank you very much! BTW for the Toronto School Board stuff at Reference_desk/Language, that's Hindi, right? WhisperToMe (talk) 03:46, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Yes, that is Hindi. ʙʌsʌwʌʟʌ   spik ʌp!  08:04, 14 March 2011 (UTC)

You talkin' to me?
Is there some nefarious difference between taxi drivers and cab drivers that the British are hiding from the rest of the English-speaking world? The Office for National Statistics states "one in seven Pakistani men in employment was a taxi driver, cab driver or chauffeur". Clarityfiend (talk) 04:10, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * See Hackney carriage - a 'Taxi', as opposed to Private_hire - a 'minicab'. Only Taxis are legally allowed to ply for hire in the street - though the law is often flouted. AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:18, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * To clarify further. A 'minicab driver' will be booked over the phone - "I want a cab from number 10 Some Street, Somewhere to...." and the driver can presumably look up the start and destination on a map, whereas a 'taxi driver' will (at least in London) have 'the knowledge' and if you get in, and say "drive me to number 10 Some Street, Somewhere" he/she is supposed to know where it is - in addition, minicab fares are negotiable, whereas taxis have fixed rates (at least in theory). A chauffeur would theoretically be a driver employed by an individual for their own use. In practical terms, this means that if I want to get my grandmother to the railway station, I'd phone for a minicab (I'm unlikely to see a taxi for hire in my street), but if she wants to go from the station to my house, she will probably take a taxi (they are waiting outside the station for trade, and should be able to find my house). If my grandmother can afford a chauffeur, he can find his own way here... AndyTheGrump (talk) 04:42, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Taxis also have minimum standards. You will never see one for hire with a scrape on it. Kittybrewster  &#9742;  08:26, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * It should be noted that, to increase the confusion, nearly everyone in london calls a taxi a "black cab". --85.119.27.27 (talk) 10:12, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The original full name is taximeter cabriolet, so "taxi" and "cab" are both contractions of this that have specialised in various directions. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 11:07, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This is sort of a side question, but are London taxi drivers allowed to use GPS? I have been in taxis in three different countries in the past year and all of them had GPS devices...but I suppose The Knowledge is still a point of pride. Adam Bishop (talk) 13:27, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Satnav would be preferable to some alternatives - I was recently nearly knocked off a Boris bike by a taxi whose driver was reading the A to Z. AndrewWTaylor (talk) 14:01, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * In NYC, you can call "gypsy cabs" to pick you up, but only officially medallioned taxicabs are legally allowed to be hailed in the street... AnonMoos (talk) 15:11, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Q: What's worse than raining cata and dogs? A: Hailing taxis. :) ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 19:33, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * So, if you hail something other than an official taxicab, you're breaking the law? Or, are you saying that only official cabs are allowed to respond to a hailing?  --   Jack of Oz   [your turn]  19:55, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * The second. See Taxicabs_of_New_York_City for an explanation; basically the medallion taxis are the yellow cars with the medallions on them (little metal badges with serial numbers) which grants the driver the right to pick up passengers from the street corner.  Other cars-for-hire, called "livery cabs" are other colors (i.e. NOT yellow), respond to specific calls for specific trips (usually a contracted trip with specific start and end points, like "from your house to the airport") and may not pick up passengers on the street.  In NYC, you wouldn't think to hail a car that wasn't yellow so it would be unusual to hail a livery cab from the street.  The article Illegal taxicab operation covers more as well.  -- Jayron  32  20:10, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Sounds like it's basically a monopoly granted by the city government, under the reasonable justification of traffic control. I would assume that picking up friends in your car is immune from these rules, presuming they are not paying the driver. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:15, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Though there is an element of traffic control and revenue collection (licences aren't cheap), I am sure the primary justification (at least in the UK) is the protection of passengers from thieves and rapists masquerading as bona fide drivers: licenced drivers undergo a degree of scrutiny by the licencing authority before being licenced and can have their licences withdrawn for various misdemeanors and improper behaviours, and the taxicabs' display of official driver IDs inside, and cab licence numbers inside and outside the vehicle, allows traceability. The public is periodically warned to either flag down only properly marked taxicabs, or ensure that the supposed minicab they get into is really the one they've ordered. Rapes and murders, etc, have occasionally been carried out by fake minicab drivers picking up people outside nightclubs, for example. Private arrangements are not subject to such regulations, though technically someone taking 'petrol money' for transporting a fellow commuter as a regular arrangement is supposed to declare it for income tax purposes. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.201.110.135 (talk) 19:04, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * "licences aren't cheap". Understatement as a NY taxi medallion goes for over $640,000. 75.41.110.200 (talk) 20:30, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Makes total sense. They're granted a monopoly, but with that comes scrutiny and responsibility... and an expectation by someone hailing an approved cab that they'll be transported safely. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 20:15, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * While the distinction between taxis and "private hire cars" seems to be made in most British municipalities, I have not met the word "minicab" outside London (in fact I thought for many years that the term was obsolete, apparently because I hadn't heard it since I moved out of Greater London in 1980). --ColinFine (talk) 00:46, 16 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Very interesting. Thanks, all. Clarityfiend (talk) 05:50, 17 March 2011 (UTC)

Couple
The couple has no children or the couple have no children? Kittybrewster  &#9742;  08:21, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I would go with "have". --Viennese Waltz 08:32, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This is an American-Commonwealth difference, and also subject to personal preference, context, and other things. See this thread. L ANTZY T ALK 12:12, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * See collective noun. Roger (talk) 12:52, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Could you not say "They have no children"? DuncanHill (talk) 01:30, 16 March 2011 (UTC)

Looking for semantic labels
I'm a policy writer, and I'm trying to label some key attributes of policy statements. I've been looking through the references from the linguistics portal, but I don't know the language of linguistics well enough to formulate a search. Specifically:

- What is an appropriate and simple label of that attirbute of a statement that shows where it lies along the spectrum from mandatory to discretionary? This will be what I use to determine whether a statement is either a guideline or a requirement. I've come up with some absurd labels, like "optionality", "mandatoriness", or just "force", but I'm lost.

- Similar to the above, but slightly different, what would be a good label to capture whether a statement is normative/prescriptive versus informative/descriptive? From the sources I've consulted, both requirements and recommendations can be classified as normative/prescriptive, with varying degrees of the previous "mandatoriness" attribute. This might be similar to mood, (imperative vs. declarative), but I'm looking for a word that's a little more user-friendly.

Sorry if this is too vague a question, or if this is the improper forum for it. I appreciate any input anyone can offer. Glenn R. Marshall, Eagan, MN (talk) 20:09, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * For the first one, how about "degree of discretion permitted" ? You could then use a percentage scale, say from 0% meaning you will be arrested and charged for failure to comply to 100% meaning you can do as you please. StuRat (talk) 22:27, 14 March 2011 (UTC)


 * (Not a native English speaker), but for 1) "optionality" sounds OK to me, and Wiktionary agrees: "Quality or state in which choice or discretion is allowed. ". For 2), there is "wikt:normativity", under which title also exist books. Wiktionary gives "prescriptivity" as a synonym. No such user (talk) 08:02, 15 March 2011 (UTC)

Rating quality of content
Is anyone aware of a process for making a step-by-step analysis of the content quality of a print or online article? I have noticed that some sites/magazines have content which I value and others leave me unimpressed (Wikipedia articles are almost always what I would rate as high quality and hopefully the content on my own website, , would also rate high.). I am wondering if there exists a procedure for assigning a content value to articles of all kinds. I'm not sure of what the proper procedure is for asking/answering this question... can someone with ideas about this concept of a step-by-step process to assign a value rating to articles e-mail me?  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.143.120.143 (talk) 23:31, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * Per reference desk policy, all of your personally identifying info has been redacted. I'll leave it to others to answer your question. -- Jayron  32  23:43, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
 * This shouldn't be on the Language Desk. --  KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  05:13, 15 March 2011 (UTC)
 * I dunno: the subject involves, though extends beyond, evaluation of written language. Although Humanities might have been a better choice, I think of the RefDesk subject areas not so much as rules, more guidelines (ah-harr). We can't expect possibly WP-naïve OPs always to evalute subjects in the same way that we might. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.201.110.135 (talk) 16:46, 15 March 2011 (UTC)