Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2019 April 1

= April 1 =

in different social terms
What may "social terms" mean in the following context:"The environmental risks considered in this subdomain are widespread, concerning both developed and developing countries, and cause harm to people who have not voluntarily chosen to suffer their consequences, requiring public authority regulation. In most cases, these risks cannot be assessed precisely, and can be evaluated differently in different contexts and social terms." Thank you! — Preceding unsigned comment added by 222.128.181.103 (talk) 02:29, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * It means "one's social situation", i.e. one's place in society. If I parse the passage, it means something like "Environmental risks are dependent on one's place in society" in much less obfuscatory language.  I.E., one's socioeconomic status determines how much you are affected by environmental risks.  The rest of the sentence also provides that context; the people who suffer from environmental risks are often not the ones who have caused the environmental risks, and how much you suffer depends on your social status.  -- Jayron 32 12:06, 1 April 2019 (UTC)

Japanese Pitch Accent
How is it supposed to have arisen? déhanchements (talk) 16:49, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * [I've wikilinked your Title for the benefit of other interested users] I can't answer the question (and am not sure if it can be answered) but in case you're interested there is a more general treatment of the phenomenon at Pitch-accent language. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.200.138.194 (talk) 10:02, 2 April 2019 (UTC)

Steinway / Stainway?
In Green Book, Don Shirley tells Tony Lip to make sure every piano he plays on is a Steinway. Tony Lip can be seen writing "Stainway" (sic) on a map. But why?

I understand both English and German. Steinway is a German-related name and is pronounced with an /ai/ diphthong. However, under English pronunciation rules, "Stainway" would instead be pronounced with an /ei/ diphthong. It's kind of funny how the written and pronounced sounds are switched vice-versa.

Is this because Tony Lip comes from an Italian background? Or is he dyslexic? Or why did he spell "Steinway" that way? J I P &#124; Talk 18:21, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think the diphthong interchange is purely coincidental. The misspelling is not surprising (the correct one might have been), although many would have expected "Stineway". Jmar67 (talk) 18:58, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * The diphthong interchange is just an aside. What I was asking here is why Tony Lip misspelled it specifically as "Stainway" and not "Stineway" as you say, or some other way. J I P  &#124; Talk 19:13, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * Could be that it was just how the actor portraying him thought it was spelled. No idea whether that was discussed during production. It may have been a spur-of-the-moment decision. It's an interesting observation. You might ask at Talk:Green Book (film). I also wonder how often Lip was able to fulfill the request. Jmar67 (talk) 19:38, 1 April 2019 (UTC)
 * I think it's because Tony comes from an Italian background.They have Italian names which are written and pronounced that way, like Pais (historian) and Paisiello (composer). And German also has many names which are written with an /ai/ diphthong and pronounced like that: Daimler, Gaimar, Hainisch, Kaiser, Maimon, Waitz, etc. Omidinist (talk) 05:17, 2 April 2019 (UTC)


 * In fact, "Steinway" is not a German word. It's an English word derived from the founder's German name Steinweg.   It was deliberately designed NOT to sound German.  Given that, it's a wonder that most people still give it the /stine/ pronunciation.  Americans do often change -stein to /steen/ (e.g. Bernstein), so there's no reason why Steinway couldn't have become /stain/ way in some mouths.  --   Jack of Oz   [pleasantries]  21:42, 2 April 2019 (UTC)