Omniglot - the blog

A while ago I discussed a theory that Germanic languages were spoken in Britain long before the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons.

Today I came across an article by Stephen Oppenheimer, author of The Origins of the British: A Genetic Detective Story, in which he argues that many people in what is now England spoke Germanic languages quite a long time before the Anglo-Saxons showed up.

Julius Caesar mentioned that a tribe called the Belgae had settled in parts of soutern Britain before he invaded the country, and that they spoke essentially the same language as their continental cousins. The Belgae are thought to have spoken either a Celtic language or a Germanic one. Oppenheimer thinks they probably spoke a Germanic language, and Caesar implies as much.

Among the evidence for a pre-Roman Germanic-speaking population in Britain, Oppenheimer mentions the near absence of place names of Celtic origin and Celtic inscriptions in most of England, the handful of Celtic words in English. He also uses genetic evidence to demonstrate that there is are significant Scandinavian elements in the genes of people from the east coast of Britain from the Shetlands to East Anglia, and that these elements dates back to Neolithic times. He also cites lexical evidence that suggests that the split between English and the Germanic languages spoken on the continent of Europe goes back a lot further than conventionally thought.

On the news this morning they mentioned that China is suffering from a chronic shortage of names, which leads to many cases of mistaken identity. They gave an example of one man who was arrested by mistake - it was one of his neighbours with the same name who the police were after.

The ordinary people of China are traditional known as 老百姓 (lǎobǎixìng), which means ‘old 100 surnames’. This comes from the ancient tradition that citizens adopt one of a hundred single character surnames. Today there are up to 450 surnames in use in some areas of China, such as Beijing - though fewer in other areas. Here is a list of the current top 100 Chinese surnames.

According to an article on this topic in the Telegraph, the most popular surname in China is 王 (wáng), closely followed by 李 (lǐ), which between them account for 14% of the population or some 185 million people.

One solution being considered is to allow children to take the surnames of both parents. The Chinese government is also considering allowing a greater range of characters to be used as surnames, and also for the use of ethnic minority surnames, which are usually replaced with Chinese surname with a similar sound.

Today I found an interesting piece about the differences between speaking your own language and speaking a second or foreign language by Dragan Todorovic, a Serbian writer and artist who lives in Canada. He tells us that:

…my biggest problem was the sound of my English. Language is acquired with its sound, and the sounds I had picked from records and movies were harsh, aggressive, and presented me in a very different light from who I was and am. Suddenly I realized that somewhere in the process of acquiring the tone of modern English I had lost my identity. It was painful to realize that in my language I was smart, but I sounded stupid in English.

Have you had similar experiences? Do you think you’re a different person when you speak a foreign language?

I came across an interesting website that tells you how many people there are in the USA who share the same name as you. I looked up my name and discovered that there are 38,996 Simons, but only 1,800 Agers. The number of people in the States called Simon Ager is zero.

According to another site that does the same thing for the UK, there 10 other people who share my name. The site says that “There are probably more people killed in yoghurt, cream, marshmallow and fluffy thing accidents each year then there are of you.” - isn’t that nice to know! You can also leave messages for people who share your name that they’ll see if they search for themselves.

There’s probably a Greek or Latin-derived term for the practise of searching for yourself and/or your name online, but can’t think what it is. Any suggestions?

When you go to a language class, quite often the teacher will give you a name in the language you’re learning, which might be the equivalent of your name in that language, or a name with a similar sound.

The French and German versions of my name are spelt the same but pronounced differently, while in Spanish my name is written Simón. The Irish equivalent of my name is Sím, while in Scottish Gaelic it’s Sìm. One of my Chinese teachers gave me the Chinese name 安斯韦 (Ān Sīwěi), which I later changed to 革賽門 (Gé Sàimén) - 不確定那一個名字比較華式的，但是我猜第一個是比較好的．有沒有什麼意見？

Most of my friends from Taiwan and China have ‘English’ names. Some of them were given these names by their teachers, others chose their own names. In some cases they went for quite unusual names, including Dual, Van (from Van Gogh), Rainbow, Stone and Pencil.

I suppose if call yourself by a different name when you speak a foreign language, you are, to some extent at least, adopting a different persona. This gives you opportunities to say things and perhaps to do things you wouldn’t normally do when speaking your mother tongue.

Do you behave differently when speaking in foreign tongues?

In my class at school I was one of seven Simons, hence the title of this post. The name Simon seems to have been particularly popular in the UK in the sixties and seventies - not sure why - any suggestions? I was born in 1970 and often meet other Simons, quite a few of whom are roughly the same age as me. In fact I know at least five other Simons in Brighton.

There are fashions in names, as there are in many things. Lists of the most popular names are published in newspapers annuallly and prospective parents peruse them with interest. You can see some examples here. In 2005, for example, many parents in the USA gave their sons biblical names, with Jacob, Michael, Joshua, Matthew, Daniel and Joseph were among the top ten.

Opinions about names seem to be based, at least to some extent, on the people you know with those names. If you like and respect the people you know with a particular name, then you may well think of it as a pleasant and respectable name. Although if you meet somebody you don’t like with that name, your opinion might change. When considering names for your offspring, you may be inclined towards names of people you respect and/or admire.

Which names are popular in your country or region at the moment?

I heard that in some countries (Spain and France I think) there are lists of approved names you can choose for your children. If you want to call them something else, the authorities will refuse to register them. Is this true?

Continuing yesterday’s theme of identity, describing what you do for a living can be tricky if you don’t work in a well-known profession. If someone tells you they’re a doctor, teacher, lawyer or police officer, you have a pretty good idea what their job entails. However, if you work in such professions as web development, computer programing, management consultancy, etc, many people don’t really understand what you do.

Many of us define ourselves by our jobs. We say “I am an X” or “I work as a Y”. We also define ourselves in other ways, including by sex, race, age, nationality, language(s) spoken, interests, and/or in terms of our families and our position/roles therein.

In my case, my current job title is “Web Developer”, but few people understand what that entails. There are in fact many different specialisms under the umbrella of web development - my particular specialism is building multilingual websites. So I usually just tell people that I build and translate websites. This often prompts questions like “Do you design the sites as well?”, and “Are you a translator then?” - in answer to which I explain that someone else usually does the design and translation. My role is to turn the designs into websites, and to add the translations to them, which involves a lot of copying and pasting. I think my parents just tell people that I work with computers and/or do something with websites.

The company I work for (Study Group) is even more difficult to describe, so usually I just say that I work for a college.

Sometimes I tell people I’m a circus performer or translator. I could also claim to be a musician or teacher. I do occasionally do translations and act as an interpreter, and used to do these things more often. I did work as a teacher (of English) for a while in Taiwan, and sometimes help friends with various languages. I also teach juggling and other circus skills to anybody who wants to learn them, on an informal basis, and occasionally perform in public. I play, or used to play, the clarient, saxaphone, tin whistles, and a few other instruments. I used to play with wind bands, big bands and an orchestra, and have performed with these groups in parts of England and France.

The answer to this question may depend on who’s asking it, where you are at the time, and what and how much you want to reveal about yourself. In many countries it’s rare to meet people who have lived all their lives in one place. Most of us move, at least a few times, to different parts of our countries and possibly to other countries.

We might choose to identify ourselves with our place or country of birth, the place or country where we grew up, or our current place or country of residence, or even the place or country from where our anscestors originated.

I myself currently live in Brighton in the southeast of England, was born and grew up in Lancashire in the northwest of England - specifically I was born in Morecambe and grew up in Silverdale. I’ve lived in various parts of the UK, and also in France, the Channel Islands (Jersey), Taiwan and Japan. So when asked “Where are you from?”, my answer might be Silverdale, Lancashire, the northwest of England, England, the UK, Britain, Brighton, the southeast of England, or somewhere near London. It all depends. Sometimes I mention the Welsh origins of my mother’s side of the family if I want to emphasise my Welshness and/or to establish my Celtic credentials.

If we ever colonise other planets, we will a new layer of identity as citzens of the Earth.