Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2017 July 27

= July 27 =

And also
Sometimes when I come across "and also" I remove one of the words (depending on context) believing it to be a redundancy. I am not compulsive about this, but I am wondering if there are any rules or guidelines about it. The only internet advice I could find were regarding specific cases, and not in the general sense (e.g). — 2606:A000:4C0C:E200:E465:CA4F:4607:5398 (talk) 04:53, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * First, "and also" isn't a redundancy. "And" serves a grammatical function of combining two separate statement (or parts) into one, often allowing repeated wording to be eliminated. "He was tall.  He was fat." becomes "He was tall and fat".  "Also", or similar expressions like "in addition", serves the purpose of calling attention to the fact that two things are simultaneously applicable.  "I am decent.  I am also naked." would not work as well without the "also".  And therefore wordings like "She was intelligent and also sexy" work fine.  Second, redundancy in speech or writing is not always a bad thing.  See Pleonasm. --69.159.60.147 (talk) 06:28, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Hmmm. Isn't "She was intelligent and sexy" simpler? What extra shade of meaning does "also" bring to the sentence? Akld guy (talk) 07:46, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Akld_guy -- If some people assume that being intelligent and being sexy are incompatible, then "also" could signal the writer's intention to challenge such assumptions, or at least that the "she" being referred to is an exception to ordinary rules... AnonMoos (talk) 08:22, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Per AnonMoos, the inclusion of also implies juxtaposition of normally incompatible or at least uncommonly associated concepts. The also has meaning in that it changes the emphasis of the sentence.  -- Jayron 32 10:51, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * But IP 69.159 said that the "and also" works fine, in the basic sentence stated, without mentioning the contexts that you (AnonMoos and Jayron) have now introduced from nowhere. In the basic sentence "She was intelligent and also sexy", devoid of any other contextual shades, the "also" is redundant. Akld guy (talk) 20:47, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * If no shade of meaning beyond simple conjunction is intended, then "also" is redundant, but commonly when "also" is used, there is a desire to express something beyond simple conjunction, and readers/listeners will perceive it correspondingly... AnonMoos (talk) 21:10, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Well, the desire to express something beyond simple conjunction must be stated. One such context where "also" would be appropriate is the rhetorical question and answer: "Is she intelligent? She is intelligent and also sexy." Akld guy (talk) 23:48, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * No, the also is sufficient to alter the meaning of the sentence if that is intended. Also is only redundant if the speaker didn't intend to place any special emphasis.  There's no misunderstanding if the intent matches the expectation.  -- Jayron 32 14:39, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

Specifically, comments regarding this edit would be appreciated. And also, is "ATM machine" an example of pleonasm (just curious)? — 2606:A000:4C0C:E200:E465:CA4F:4607:5398 (talk) 06:47, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * See RAS syndrome. ←Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 09:12, 27 July 2017 (UTC)

Britons abroad
When an English guy goes to Scotland, NI or Wales, does he refer to this as being abroad? Do the other possible combinations refer as being abroad? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Hofhof (talk • contribs)
 * If he's a guy, he's not a broad. -- Jayron 32 10:48, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Badaboom! &mdash; fortuna  velut luna  11:02, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * No. --Viennese Waltz 11:09, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * No, except as a joke (which happens quite often). I think that "abroad" has strong connotations with crossing significant bodies of water. The Channel Islands would be an interesting test case. Matt's talk 13:08, 27 July 2017 (UTC)
 * No, except as mentioned above, abroad means out of the United Kingdom and its nearby Crown Dependencies. The Republic of Ireland would be a borderline case with some English people regarding it as "abroad" and some not, since Ireland has very close links with the UK and is the only country with which it has a land border.  Crossing the 21-mile-wide English Channel is definitely going abroad.   D b f i r s   13:20, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * The UK also has a land border with Spain.
 * Technically Gibraltar is a British Overseas Territory, not part of the UK. Iapetus (talk) 14:04, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * As an "English guy" I think that cultural difference is probably as important as the geography. I wouldn't think of Ireland or the Channel Islands as being "abroad" because if I go there it won't be particularly foreign to me: people will speak English, and live in a way I am quite familiar with. When I go into Europe I will encounter different languages and cultures - that is definitely abroad. Wymspen (talk) 15:03, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Cf the use of the word "overseas". Carbon Caryatid (talk) 15:33, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Technically, the UK is still in Europe, but maybe for not much longer. --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  23:31, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Perhaps not in the EU for much longer, but I hadn't heard that they were widening and deepening the English Channel to form a separate sub-continent!   D b f i r s   16:47, 28 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Some humour revolves round the phrase Norfolk Broads, for the reason outlined by Jayron. 80.4.70.229 (talk) 17:01, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

Yiddish abbreviations?
Hi. Having a look at the cover of https://ia902706.us.archive.org/25/items/nybc200539/nybc200539.pdf (i.e. page 5 in the pdf), I found the way the acronym for AUCP(B) was written in Yiddish a bit odd: (.ב).אל.ק.פּ‎ , i.e. "al.k.p.(b.)". For the first word, "Alfarbandisher" ('All Union') the letters "al" are used instead of just "a". Why? --Soman (talk) 19:36, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * How wonderful — it's a Yiddish version of Stalin's sleazy concentrated mass of lying and deception (see The History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks) and my past comments on the corresponding article talk page Talk:The History of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks)), and I bet most of the translators were purged in one way or another by the time Stalin died... I'm not sure I can exactly answer your question, but I do know that the letters aleph-lamed were sometimes ligatured together in Eastern European printing practices, and there's a Unicode "compatibility" character UFB4F HEBREW LIGATURE ALEF LAMED, which may or may not display in your browser: &#64335; -- AnonMoos (talk) 21:33, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * letters aleph-lamed were sometimes ligatured together in Eastern European printing practices -- wikt:ﭏ claims just the opposite: mostly used in writing or typesetting Judeo-Arabic and Ladino (i.e. in Southwestern / Southern Europe, and Middle East). For example, I've seen this ligature in a poster from Mandatory Palestine. --82.24.249.51 (talk) 22:11, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * Hmm, that's interesting... I wouldn't have thought to look up UFB4F on Wiktionary. I've mainly encountered it in connection with Mandelkern's Concordance, but I know very little about Sephardi practices. AnonMoos (talk) 00:46, 28 July 2017 (UTC)

German to English translations
German to English please.


 * FUNKAUFKLAERUNGS FUHRER REICH
 * General Nachrichten FUHRER
 * Hoeherer kommandeur der funk aufklaerung
 * Funkmessbeobaghtung und stoerdienst
 * Luftnachrichten Abteilung
 * Luftnachrichten Regiment (Radio intelligence regiment?)
 * Oberbefehlshaber der luftwaffe
 * Oberkommando der luftwaffe  (High command of the Liuftwaffe)
 * Zentraler gefecchtsstand fuer funkauswertung

It is for a org chart in the Luftwaffe Luftnachrichten Abteiling 350. scope_creep (talk) 22:10, 27 July 2017 (UTC)


 * scope_creep, I (and I'm sure others) are happy to help, but there's a load of mistakes/typos in that list, and even the title of the article is wrong: Most glaringly, it should be "Abteilung", and then the compound word should be either Luftnachrichtenabteilung or Luftnachrichten-Abteilung (probably the latter), but you can't just put a space between the words like in English. "Luftwaffe Luftnachrichten-Abteilung 350" still wouldn't satisfy me as a lemma though. I'd leave out "Luftwaffe". The NSA link didn't lead anywhere useful, and I didn't find the typos I was looking for in the Seabourne report. Were all these words spelled that way in the sources you used? ---Sluzzelin talk  15:51, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Hi Sluzzelin, it was the TICOM guys spelling that way. A kind of simplified American military spelling. If the title of the article wrong, lol, I will fix that as well, while your here. You seem to have come at a timely manner. The chart is in the TICOM doc, for lufftwaffe, which is at . It is document 5, page 125 in the doc, 127 in the pdf. It is a large org chart I have completed, in Visio. The stuff above is the legend. Just needs the proper naming, then I'll post it up. So you reckon I should rename the article just Luftnachrichten-Abteilung 350 ? Tell me, and I'll do it. scope_creep (talk) 16:12, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
 * Oh, thank you for that explanation. I'd use whatever the Luftwaffe used at the time, but I'm not sure which it is. I was hasty above, as usual, and it might be one word, "Luftnachrichtenabteilung", after all (that's what the Uni Potsdam uses here e.g.) Hmm ..., pinging Pp.paul.4, KnightMove, Future Perfect at Sunrise. If it were ambiguous I guess one could write the title "Luftnachrichtenabteilung 350, Luftwaffe" or "Luftnachrichtenabteilung 350 (Luftwaffe)". ---Sluzzelin  talk  16:38, 28 July 2017 (UTC)
 * I agree with Sluzzelin's first answer: The link to the TICOM document in the article is dead. Your other link posted in this thread leads to the document, so you should replace it in the article's "bibliography" section (or use https://www.nsa.gov/news-features/declassified-documents/european-axis-sigint/ (vol. 5), for not everybody has enabled or wants to download PDF documents immediately without seeing where they come from). Having found and read the TICOM document finally, it deals on pp. 21 sqq with the subject of the article. It has:


 * "This Chapter concerns the organization and development of the Signal Intelligence Agency of the Commander in Chief of the Air Force (Chiffrier Stelle, Oberbefehlshaber der Luftwaffe, abbreviated Chi-Stelle/OBdL, as of November 1944 Air Force High Command, Air Signal Battalion 350, Oberkommando der Luftwaffe, Luftnachrichten Abteilung 350, abbreviated OKL/LN ABT 350 and referred to throughout this volume as Chi-Stelle)."


 * You could extract an article lemma Luftnachrichten Abteilung 350 from that, which would make sense, or the more cumbersome Oberkommando der Luftwaffe, Luftnachrichten Abteilung 350. For the TICOM report and the Seaborne report both use Chi-Stelle, it would make sense to create a redirect Chi-Stelle OB.d.L which you already did (from your page move). --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 09:53, 30 July 2017 (UTC)
 * The present article lemma "Luftwaffe Luftnachrichten Abteiling 350" is misspelled and should be deleted leaving no trace. --Pp.paul.4 (talk) 09:59, 30 July 2017 (UTC)


 * What about the translations above. I have done a couple, but it would be nice to get proper ones, including a translation of Reichspostgebäude, Südstollen (which I think is south tunnel). I will fix the link. Fixed! It seem to need moved every three to four months. Thank you for work done so far. I will change the title too: Luftnachrichten Abteilung 350 I bet you half to three quarters or more of the German to English translations I have completed using auto software are wrong, slightly, a wee bit wrong but not right.  scope_creep (talk) 16:43, 30 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I have put up the org chart to Luftnachrichten Abteilung 350, which has the offending mis-translations in it. I guess it is a first cut. It was a very large org. The legend is the place to look. Thanks. The Chi-Stelle OB.d.L is the older org, in late 1944, still going strong, although not something to admire. They mid 1944 to the LN/350 name. scope_creep (talk) 16:55, 30 July 2017 (UTC)


 * I can give you some rough translations of the terms, but I’m not sure they’d be suitable for an article, particularly since I’m not familiar with the translation conventions. That said, here’s my first try:


 * Rgds ✦  hugarheimur 08:12, 1 August 2017 (UTC)


 * Thanks. ✦  Excellent work as usual. I'll update my chart tonight. scope_creep (talk) 11:47, 1 August 2017 (UTC)