Category: Language

Gender-neutral German

By Simon

According to an interesting article I found today in The Guardian, moves are afoot in Germany to try to introduce gender-neutral language. The German Justice Ministry has apparently issued an edict which requires state institutions to use gender-neutral language, which is quite challenging, especially when it comes to job titles and words referring to groups of people.

Usually the masculine forms of nouns and articles are used to refer to mixed male and female groups, as is the case in other European languages with noun genders, however the feminine form is now used in some cases even when referring to men. For example, der Professorin is used for male and female lecturers, rather than der Professor (m) or die Professorin (f).

Are similar moves being made in other languages?

Peelie-wersh & Fankle

By Simon

Peelie-wersh & Fankle – they could be a crime fighting duo, the name of a shop of some kind, or even the name of a band, but are in fact a couple of Scots expressions I came across recently in one of Alexander McCall-Smith’s books. He sprinkles such words in his novels based in Scotland and often doesn’t explain their meaning, saying that it’s obvious. Maybe to someone more familar with Scots, but not always to me. If you didn’t know, what would you think these words meant?

Peelie-wersh [‘pilɪwɛrʃ] means ‘sickly, delicate in constitution, colourless, insipid, nondescript. An example of use: “A peely-wersh young man in braw clothes a wee thing the waur for wear.” from Free Fishers by J. Buchan.

Peelie means ‘thin, emaciated, stunted’, and also appears in the expression, peelie-wally, which means ‘sickly, feeble, pallid, wan, thin and ill-looking; dull, insipid, colourless; a tall, thin, ill-looking person.

Wersh, which is also written wars(c)h(e), wairsche, warish or werch, means sickly, feeble (person); tasteless, insipid (food & drink); dull, uninteresting; lacking vigour, character or passion.

Fankle [faŋkl/faŋl] means to catch in a snare, to trap; to captivate; to tangle, ravel, mix up; to become ravelled or tangled, to catch (on); to move the feet (or hands) uncertainly; to stumble, to fumble. An example of use: “They fankle me try hoo I will, These twa wee bonnie flooers.”

Related words include:

– fankled, fanglet = confused, tangled, uncertain
– fanklin = stumbling, faltering

Sources: Dictionary of the Scots Language and Online Scots Dictionary

Mountains and molehills

By Simon

Making a mountain out of a molehill

I discovered yesterday that the French word for mole is taupe /top/, and I wondered if this might be related to the English word taupe, which, according to the OED, means ‘A brownish shade of grey resembling the colour of moleskin’ or in others words, mole-coloured.

The English word taupe comes from the French, which comes from the Latin talpa (mole), which is of unknown origin, according to Wiktionnary.

Mole-related words and expressions in French include:

– taupinière = molehill
– taupier = mole catcher
– être myope comme une taupe = to be blind as a bat
– noir comme une taupe = pitch-black

The French equivalent of to make a mountain out of a molehill is se faire une montagne d’un rien or faire une montagne d’une taupinière. What is the equivalent of this phrase in other languages?

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg
la taupinière molehill prid y wadd; priddwal; twmpath gwadd
le taupin click beetle; maths student chwilen clic (?); myfyriwr mathemateg
noir comme une taupe pitch-black pygddy; purddu
myopes comme une taupe blind as a bat yn ddall bost; mor ddall â’r nos/garreg/thwrch daear
le tableau (d’affichage) scoreboard bwrdd sgorio; bwrdd cadw sgôr
la cible (de jeu de fléchettes) dartboard bwrdd darts
le centre (de la cible) bullseye llygad (tarw); canol y nod; bwl
mettre dans le mille; faire mouche to hit the bull’s-eye ei tharo hi yn y canol; sgorio/cael bwl
faire un carton to hit the mark bwrw’r nod, taro’r nod

‘Academic’ style language teaching

By Simon

I’ve noticed that when some people write about language learning, particularly those who encourage you to learn languages on your own, they often make disparaging remarks about the ‘academic’ style of teaching found in language classes. Apparently this style of teaching is boring, dry, focused on grammar and learning vocabulary, and/or has too few opportunities to speak the language you’re learning. I suspect these ideas are based on personal experiences which are generalised to include all languages classes.

My own experiences of language classes are quite different, especially the ones I’ve done in Wales and Ireland for Welsh and Irish, where speaking and listening are the main focus. The classes I took in Chinese and Japanese at university were more focused on reading and writing than speaking and listening, however there were some conversation oppportunities. At secondary school my French and German classes included some speaking practise, especially when I was studying for my A Levels.

What are your own experiences? Are you involved in teaching languages, or studying them? What methods and approaches are used?

Breadcrumbs & Scotch Eggs

By Simon

Scotch Egg / œuf dur enrobé de chair à saucisse et pané

Yesterday I discovered an interesting French word: paner, which means to coat with breadcrumbs or to bread.

So a Scotch Egg, which is a hard boiled egg wrapped in sausage meat, breaded and deep fried, can be described as a œuf dur enrobé de chair à saucisse et pané in French – it sounds better in French, although it’s not something you’d find in France or other French-speaking regions, as far as I know.

Restaurants in the UK often use French names and descriptions for dishes as they sound better and more sophisticated than their English equivalents. Do restaurants in other countries do this?

Would you rather have toad-in-the-hole or saucisses cuites au four dans de la pâte à crêpes?

Or how about pudding aux raisins instead of spotted dick?

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg
l’anneau (m) ring modrwy
le rond de serviette napkin ring cylch napcyn; modrwy napcyn
la bague de fiançailles engagement ring modrwy ddyweddïo
une vague de froid (de courte durée) cold snap pwl/sbel o dywydd oer
le craquement snap (sound of something breaking) clec
céder to snap (break) torri (‘n glec/gratsh)
(sorte de jeu de) bataille snap (game)
la brume mist niwl; niwliach; tarth; tawch
la bruine Scotish mist smwc; smwcan; smwclaw; ffwgen
le brouillard; la brime fog niwl; twach; niwlen; tarth
des nappes de brouillard patchy fog niwl ysbeidiol/bylchog (?)
brouillard à couper au couteau thick fog niwl trwchus
la miette crumb briwsionyn
la miette/mie de pain breadcrumb briwsionyn bara
les chapelure (fpl) (dried) breadcrumbs briwsion bara
œuf dur enrobé de chair
à saucisse et pané		 Scotch egg ŵy selsig; ŵy mewn sosej
paner to coat with breadcrumbs taenu briwsion
pané (coated) in breadcrumbs; breaded wedi ei daenu briwsion

Beringia

By Simon

I found an interesting article today about the origins of Native American and Siberian languages. Researchers have found links between the Yeniseian languages of Siberia and the Na-Dene languages of North America, and believe that these two groups share a common ancestor. Their findings also suggested that these languages might have developed in Beringia, the land between Siberia and Alsaka that was above water during the last ice age from about 35,000 years. Genetic studies suggest that the ancestors of Na-Dene speakers left Siberia some 25,000 years ago, but the first traces of people in the Americas date to 15,000 years ago, so it is thought that they lived in Beringia in the meantime, until the ice retreated sufficiently to allow them into Alaska. Some of the people of Beringia are thought to have migrated back to Siberia as well.

I just came across a programme about Beringia on the BBC World Service.