Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2013 March 25

= March 25 =

Humanities -> Societies ?
Would it make sense to rename "Arts & Humanities" (and possibly the Humanities section of the Reference Desk) into "Arts and Societies"? Does it make much difference, is it correct or acceptable or not, does it sound more formal or more informal to some, does it even sound uneducated to others? Some may say that it may be better to be more generalised, others could be overly proud of being a member of the internationally-varied homo sapiens clan and will tend to assert the use of such words? I myself prefer "Arts and Societies" better but that's just my own individial preference. I'm assuming that since elves, extra-terrestrials, and the like do not exist, it shouldn't really matter in the first place. 72.235.221.120 (talk) 00:05, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Read Humanities. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 00:09, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Not necessarily what I asked. I am wondering if there would really be any difference made if "humanities" and "societies" were to swap places. 72.235.221.120 (talk) 09:46, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Yes there would be a difference. Like "arts", "humanities" is commonly used as a collective term for various academic disciplines or subjects, "societies" is not. I would suggest looking up those words in a dictionary. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 10:09, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
 * "Society" (not "societies") can be used in that way, but has a narrower meaning than "humanities". --ColinFine (talk) 12:41, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
 * "There is no such thing as society. There are individual men and women, and there are families." (Guess who).  --   Jack of Oz   [Talk]  17:32, 26 March 2013 (UTC)

Feminae ad ludos semper veniunt
I remembered reading part of Ovid's Ars Amatoria and really enjoying the line that basically said "Women go to the games to see and that they themselves might be seen." I though the Latin was something like "feminae ad ludos semper veniunt ut videant — et ipsae videantur." And I found many instances of that specific wording on the Internet. But I couldn't seem to find what part of Ovid it was from (I thought it was the AA but didn't remember for sure). I was baffled to be unable to find the Ovid source from Google. I thought to look at the Wikiquote article for Ovid, and lo and behold, there it was, but with different wording. The wording is actually "spectatum veniunt, veniunt spectentur ut ipsae," line 99 liber primus.

So context established, I wonder where the former wording came about—and how it seemed to take such a hold. It's so established my edition of Wheelock even has it. Does anyone know? 67.164.156.42 (talk) 09:07, 25 March 2013 (UTC)


 * My first thought was that it might be a variant manuscript reading - texts that are passed down in manuscript often develop such variants. But the Ars Amatoria is a poem, so any variant would need to fit the same meter, and in this case it doesn't. I wonder if perhaps this is a gloss (a note made by the copyist to explain a difficult bit of Latin) from a manuscript? --Nicknack009 (talk) 11:19, 25 March 2013 (UTC)


 * Our article on Wheelock's Latin says that his Sententiae Antiquae "may be either direct quotations or may be paraphrased from the original document." I bet Wheelock is the author of this altered phrasing.--Cam (talk) 19:45, 25 March 2013 (UTC)

Decipher Japanese writing
Hi, please see the image at

http://img547.imageshack.us/img547/7290/kanji2.png

毎回カード（他大学のカードを？う）

Can anyone identify the "?" character, and also correct if I have anything else wrong? 86.160.222.15 (talk) 12:56, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * 使 as in 使う Siuenti (talk) 13:13, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Oh. That's definitely right, is it? I'm puzzled because there seems to be no continuous vertical stroke. If the character is written in the standard way (e.g. as shown here), I have difficulty visualising how it could end up looking like the thing in the picture. 86.160.222.15 (talk) 14:04, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * No continuous vertical stroke? You mean besides the one on the left of the character? That, and the diagonal line above it, together make up the radical for 'man'. It's there. I guess you mean the one to the right. This is handwriting, and looks like it has been written by a high school or university age girl (or somebody older who still writes like that). Very often personal style comes into play, and despite what you may be told in Japanese language courses, people do not always follow the stroke order.  KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  15:21, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks, yes, I mean the vertical stroke on the right. I am interested to know how someone could write that character so as to arrive at the thing in the picture. At the moment I don't see how it's possible using the standard number of strokes, whatever one's personal style. This is because the vertical stroke appears to be split in two, with one part above the rectangle and the other part below, rather than passing through the rectangle in one continuous stroke as it should. To me it appears to be a fundamentally different configuration of strokes. Am I missing something? 86.160.222.15 (talk) 18:29, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * As KageTora says, it is the difference between handwriting and what you might see printed. For example, my handwriting in English has different letter forms than what is commonly printed.  Perhaps because I write quite small and fast, many letters are incomplete or misshapen from the "standard" to such an extent that other people can struggle to read it, especially is a sample is taken out of the context of the surrounding words.  Unfortunately, part of my job requires that I write legible notes for others to read, so when doing that I write much slower, larger and take care to form my letters correctly.
 * Now I see that Japanese handwriting can use almost a circle to represent three strokes of a rectangle and can leave some strokes incomplete, and sill be recognised, I feel much better about tackling writing Japanese characters again. Astronaut (talk) 19:26, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * I have drawn two more characters at:
 * http://img845.imageshack.us/img845/1689/kanji4.png
 * The upper version is how I would normally write this character. The lower version is a more careful rendition of my interpretation of the earlier scanned image, taking into account the fact that it ought to read 使. Are we really saying that the lower version falls within acceptable bounds of stylistic variation? Sorry, I don't mean to disbelieve people who obviously know more about this than I do, but I just find it quite surprising. I do wonder if I am looking at the original scanned image somehow in the "wrong way". 86.160.222.15 (talk) 20:35, 25 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Any comments? Is my lower version acceptable? If not, what is the fundamental/essential difference between my rendition and the original scanned character? 86.146.109.82 (talk) 23:53, 26 March 2013 (UTC)
 * The lower version is decipherable/understandable for native speakers, but some of them would tell you it's wrong. Think it as a terrible case of typo/misspelling in en. It's only acceptable for your hastily scribbled personal notes. Don't use it. Oda Mari (talk) 06:48, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Thanks, for clarity at this point I have labelled the three characters at http://img716.imageshack.us/img716/3808/kanji5.png. In your opinion, is A written in fundamentally the same way as C (i.e. with the right-hand vertical stroke split into two), or is there some way (that I can't currently visualise) that B could end up looking like A if written quickly/carelessly? 86.179.6.219 (talk) 18:17, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
 * No. If you write the character with correct strokes, I don't think 使 would be A no matter how quickly/carelessly you write it. A seems to be written in fewer strokes. It looks modified す + the last stroke to me. I have no idea why the original writer wrote the strange incorrect valiant. It might be because of the limited space. But it's a mystery to me. Oda Mari (talk) 08:23, 28 March 2013 (UTC)
 * As said above, Japanese handwriting can differ immensely from the way people are taught to write at school, or the way foreigners are taught to write in learners' textbooks and websites. Some people will replace the boxes with love hearts or even smileys, for example - in informal situations, of course (people sometimes do the same with the dot over the letter 'i' in English). As Mari says, if you write 'incorrectly' - and especially if you write slowly and carefully (and still incorrectly), you will be told again and again by people that what you have written is incorrect, until you start to write it properly (I cannot stress this enough - you will get sick of it after a while, believe me). When something is merely scribbled, it will not matter so much. If you were Japanese, people would think you were uneducated, but as you are a foreigner, they will be far more ready to forgive you, thinking you just plain don't know. The word in the original message you showed us (Picture A in the new link) is essentially scribbled without much thought - evidenced by the fact that there was not enough room for the う, which was then written underneath the kanji (rather than at the beginning of the next line, where it should be). Only this word was written like that, and the rest are pretty clear. Remember, in manga, everything in a picture is drawn like it is for a specific reason, and if this is taken from manga, as I suspect it is, it is meant to give you an idea of the kind of person who wrote it (in the story). In any case, it is best not to use such variations, although it is OK to be able to recognize them. Sorry for the long reply, but I hope it helps clarify a few things.  KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  20:01, 27 March 2013 (UTC)
 * Mari, your indent implies that reply was intended for me, whereas I was agreeing with you.   KägeTorä - (影虎)  ( TALK )  10:20, 28 March 2013 (UTC)