Category: English

Mynd i’r afael

By Simon

Mynd i’r afael is a Welsh expression I’ve noticed quite a bit recently on Radio Cymru, and from the context in which it is used, I think it means something like “to try hard to deal with something”.

Here are some examples:

Angen i Brifysgol Cymru fynd i’r afael â dilysu canolfannau newydd, medd y Gweinidog Addysg, Leighton Andrews.
The University of Wales needs to address the validation of the new centres, said the Education Minister, Leighton Andrews.

[Source: BBC Newyddion]

Mae ‘na lawer o gymorth a chefnogaeth ar gael i bobl sy’n poeni am droseddu ac i’r rhai sydd am helpu i fynd i’r afael â throseddu.
Plenty of help and support is available to people who are worried about crime and those who want to help tackle crime.

[Source: www.direct.gov.uk]

NB. In both these examples mynd has mutated to fynd.

From these examples it seems that mynd i’r afael, which literally means “go to the grip/grasp/handle/hold”, means “tackle” “address” or perhaps “get a grip on”. Google translate gives “(to) address” for this term, as does the BBC Welsh dictionary. I got the impression from the context that quite a bit of effort was involved, but perhaps this is not always the case.

These days I tend to learn new words and expressions in Welsh, and in my other fluent languages, through extensive listening and reading. If I notice a word or phrase that crops up frequently, I’ll try and work out its meaning(s) from the context, and sometimes it takes a while to hone in on exact meaning(s). When I learn things in this way I tend to remember better than if I just look them up in a dictionary, though I do remember dictionary words if I use them quite a bit after looking them up.

How do you learn new vocabulary?

我们AA吧！

By Simon

The Mandarin Chinese expression, 我们AA吧！ (wǒmen AA ba), is the equivalent of “lets split the bill” or “let’s go Dutch”. I heard it for the first time from a Chinese friend the other day. My friend assures me that it’s a very common expression and is used when going out for a meal with friends (or on similar occasions) where instead of one person treating everybody (请客 qǐngkè), as happens at formal meals and banquets, each person pays for what they eat and drink.

Other ways to express the same idea include 我们分开付款 (wǒmen fēnkāi fùkuǎn) = we split the bill; 我们AA制吧 (wǒmen AA zhì ba) “let’s pay AA”; and 我们各付各的吧 (wǒmen gèfùgède ba) “let’s each pay our own”.

Apparently AA stands for “Algebraic Average” – the average share of the bill [source].

[Addendum] AA is also used in medical prescriptions as an abbreviation for the Late Latin word ana (in equal quantities) [source].

A few other Chinese expressions that use letters like this include 卡拉OK (kǎ lā OK) = karaoke and T恤 (T xù/xié): T-shirt.

Do you know any others?

The English phrase “to go Dutch”, meaning to pay separately, first appeared in writing in 1914 and is mainly used in the USA, according to the OED.

According to Wikipedia:

The phrase “going Dutch” originates from the concept of a Dutch door. Previously on farmhouses this consisted of two equal parts. Another school of thought is that it may be related to Dutch etiquette. In the Netherlands, it was not unusual to pay separately when going out as a group. When dating in a one-on-one situation, however, the man will most commonly pay for meals and drinks. English rivalry with the Netherlands especially during the period of the Anglo-Dutch Wars gave rise to several phrases including Dutch that promote certain negative stereotypes. Examples include Dutch oven, Dutch courage, Dutch uncle and Dutch wife.

New Finnish Grammar

By Simon

I’m currently reading New Finnish Grammar, an English translation of Diego Marani’s novel Nuova grammatica finlandese. It is the story of a man who is found unconscious with a serious head injury on a street in Trieste and who is cared for by a Finnish doctor, who believes he is Finnish as his jacket has a name tag with the Finnish name Sampo Karjalainen. When the mystery man regains conscious he has no memory or language so has no idea who he is, where he’s from or how he ended up in Trieste. The doctor does his best to teach Sampo, the name he adopts, to speak Finnish, then later arranges for him to continue his treatment in Helsinki.

It’s a really good translation that reads as if it was originally written in English, the language used very expressive and interesting, and there are lots of interesting bits about language acquisition and about the Finnish language. Here is a selection:

“In the Finnish language the noun is hard to lay hands on, hidden as it is behind the endless declensions of its fifteen cases and only rarely caught unawares in the nominative.

Is this true?

In the Finnish sentence the words are grouped around the verb like moons around a planet, and whichever one is nearest the verb becomes the subject. In European languages the sentence is a straight line, in Finnish it is a circle, within which something happens.

Is this a good description of Finnish sentences?

I was beginning to be able to express myself, even if somewhat stiltedly. I would learn the words already declined, a different one for each case, and when I did not know how to put them together I made do with saying them at random, hoping that intonation and gesture would go some way towards making up for lack of syntax. And yet, while still lacking firm banks, the Finnish language was gradually carving itself out a bed in the quicksands of my mind, with the words that I had tamed coursing down it and gradually informing me of the meaning of others. Branching out and joining up, they sent the thousand drops of sound which make up a language into circulation, watering and strengthening my awareness, my ability to sense the boundaries of meaning.

I haven’t finished the book yet, but am enjoying it so far and would certainly recommend it.

Rundfunk

By Simon

I came across the German word Rundfunk the other day and it just appealed to me, so I thought I’d find out more about it.

Rundfunk /ˈʀʊntfʊŋk/ means broadcasting, radio, wireless or broadcasting company/corporation, though would probably also be a good name for a band.

It also appears in such expressions as:

– Rundfunkansager – radio announcer
– Rundfunkgesellschaft – broadcasting company
– Rundfunksendung – radio programme
– Rundfunksender – radio transmitter

Rund /ʀʊnt/ means round, rounded, circular, spherical, plump, about, roughly, flatly, and comes the Middle Low German runt, from the Old French ront, from the Latin rotundus (round), from rota (wheel, disk), from the Proto-Indo-European *Hroth₂-o- (wheel) [source] – the same root as the English word round.

Some words and expressions featuring rund include:

– Rundbank – circular bench
– Rundbau – rotunda
– Rundblick – panorama
– Rundung – curve
– eine Runde machen – to go for a walk / ride – similar to the Welsh expression, mynd am dro (to go for a turn)
– eine Runde schlafen – to have a kip (sleep)
– rund um die Uhr – right (a)round the clock
– jetzt geht’s rund – this is where the fun starts
– es geht rund im Büro – there’s a lot on at the office

Funk /ˈfʊŋk/ appears in radio-related compounds, like Rundfunk, and is possibly related to Funke (spark, scrap, gleam, ray, glimmer), from the Proto-Germanic *funkô/*fankô (spark), from the Proto-Indo-European *(s)peng-/*(s)pheng- (to shine).

Some words featuring Funk include:

– Funkerzählung – story written for radio
– Funkgerät – radio equipment, walkie-talkie
– Funkmeßgerät – radar
– Funkkolleg – educational radio broadcast
– Funkwagen – radio car

The verb funken (to radio, to emit sparks) also exists.

One thing I like about German is words link Rundfunk, which seem to me to be somehow more earthy and straightforward they their more flowery Latin or Greek-derived equivalents. I like the Latin and Greek-derived words as well, but the words with Germanic roots just appeal to me in a different way.

Hedges and thistles

By Simon

During a conversation with a Chinese friend yesterday neither of us could think of the Mandarin word for hedge or thistle, among others, so I thought I’d look it up.

There appear to be a number of words for hedge in Mandarin:

– 栵 (lì) – hedge
– 藩籬 [藩篱] (fān​lí) – hedge / fence; line of defence / barrier
– 樹籬 [树篱] (shù​lí) – quickset hedge*
– 籬垣 [篱垣] (lí​yuán) – fence / hedge
– 柵籬 [栅篱] (zhà​lí) – hedgerow

If you want to talk about hedge funds though, there’s 私募基金 (sī​mù​jī​jīn) or 對衝基金 (duì​chōng​jī​jīn), and a hedgehog is 猬 (wei).

From: MDBG Chinese-English Dictionary

*a quickset hedge is a type of hedge created by planting live hazel or whitethorn (common hawthorn) cuttings directly into the earth. Once planted, these cuttings root and form new plants, creating a dense barrier [source].

So I’m still not sure which word to use for the hedge in my garden (a privet hedge), probably 栵 or 藩籬. This is the kind of thing you often have to deal with when translating.

The English word hedge comes from the Old English *hęcg, hęgg from the Germanic *hagjâ.

The Mandarin for thistle is 荼 (tú), which also means common sowthistle (Sonchus oleraceus) / bitter (taste) / cruel / flowering grass in profusion [source]. The English word thistle comes from the Old English þistil, from the Old Germanic *þīstil.

Summer chicks and glowing coals

By Simon

Butterfly

Last night we were talking about the Pili Palas on Anglesey, a butterfly centre, which also has birds, snakes and other exotic creatures. The name is a pun combining pili-pala (butterfly) and palas (palace) – it took me ages to realise this. We were trying to think of the words for butterfly in various other languages and came up with the French, papillon, and the Spanish mariposa, but got stuck after that. This got me wondering why these words are so different in different languages.

The English word butterfly comes from the Old English buttorfleoge, perhaps from bēatan (to beat) and flēoge (fly), or perhaps it was the name just for yellow butterflies, and/or because butterflies were thought to eat butter and milk.

In Middle High German butterflies were known as molkendiep (“milk-thief”) and in Low German a butterfly is a Botterlicker (“butter-licker”) [source]. In Modern German Schmetterling /ˈʃmɛtɐlɪŋ/ is the word for butterfly – from Schmetten (cream) – from the Czech smetana (cream). This is based on the folk belief that witches transformed themselves into butterflies to steal cream and milk [source].

Welsh words for butterfly include iâr fach yr haf (“summer chick”), glöyn byw (“living coal”), pila-pala and bili-balo.

Like iâr fach yr haf in Welsh, butterflies are known as “summer birds” in Norwegian, sommerfugl, and in Yiddish, zomerfeygele.

In Irish the word for butterfly is féileacán, possible from the Old Irish etelachán (little flying creature / butterfly), from etelach (flying) [source]. The Manx butterfly, foillycan, comes from the same root, but in Scottish Gaelic butterflies are seilleann-dé (“God’s bee”) and dealan-dè (“God’s lightening”).

The French word for butterfly, papillon, comes from the Latin pāpiliō (butterfly, moth) – of unknown origin, and also the root of the English word pavilion (via Old French) [source]. The Italian farfalla (butterfly) comes from the same source.

The Spanish word for butterfly, mariposa, apparently comes from the expression Mari, posa(te (Mary, alight!), which features in children’s songs and games, or from la Santa Maria posa (the Virgin Mary alights/rests). Other theories about the etymology of this word.

There is more discussion of words for butterfly in various languages on AllExperts, and there are words for butterfly in many more languages here.

Crusts, hogwash and turnspits

By Simon

On the BBC Four programme If Walls Could Talk: The History of the Home, that I watched last night, they discussed the possible origins of a number of expressions, including by hook and by crook, upper crust, hog wash, turnspit and so on.

By hook and by crook – by whatever means necessary.
In medieval times peasants were only allowed to take wood from the trees – any wood on the ground belonged to the lord of the manor – and they gathered the wood with reapers’ billhooks or shepherds’ crooks. According to The Phrase Finder, this is the most likely origin of this phrase, though there are other suggestions: that it comes from Hook Head and Crooke, villages on opposite sides of the Waterford channel in Ireland, and Cromwell apparently said that Waterford would fall ‘by Hook or by Crooke’, i.e. by a landing of his army at one of those two places. Another possibility is that the phrase comes from two judges from the early 17th century, called Hooke and Crooke, who were called on to solve difficult legal cases.

Upper crust – the aristocracy.
The folk etymology of this phrase is that only the nobility were given the upper, unburnt part of the bread, while the peasants got the bottoms of the loaves that had sat on the oven floor and got burnt. According to The Phrase Finder though, there is no evidence for this explanation. They cite one reference from The boke of nurture, folowyng Englondis gise by John Russell (circa 146): “Kutt ye vpper crust for youre souerayne.” (iCut the upper crust [of the loaf] for your sovereign). The term upper crust wasn’t used to refer to the aristocracy, at least in writing, until the early 19th century and previously referred to the outer crust of the Earth’s surface and, more frequently, a person’s head or hat.

Hogwash – nonsene.
In Victorian times, and probably before, any food waste that couldn’t be made into soup or otherwise reused was called ‘wash’ and was sold to farmers to feed their pigs or hogs, hence ‘hogwash’, which is also known as pigswill. By the later 19th century and mainly in the USA hogwash came to mean nonsense, especially ridiculous, worthless or nonsensical ideas.

Turnspit – a person whose job it was to keep a roasting-spit turning, or a dog that kept the spit turning by running in a wooden tread-wheel to which it was attached. Such dogs were also known as turnspit dogs or turn curs and a breed (now extinct) was developed specifically for such work. Such a dog first appears in writing in Of English Dogs in 1576 with the name Turnespete. Other names for them include the Kitchen Dog, the Cooking Dog, the Underdog and the Vernepator.

Peu profond

By Simon

Last night I discovered that there doesn’t appear to be a separate French word for shallow, at least when you’re talking about shallow water, dishes or graves – the term peu profond (‘not very deep’) is used in these cases. If you’re talking about a shallow person, mind, writing, novel, film or conversation though, the word to use is superficiel(le), or you can say that they manque de profondeur (lack depth).

This got me wondering whether there is a Latin word for shallow, when referring to water, etc, which didn’t end up in French. According to my Latin dictionary, shallow is brevis, vadōsus or levis. Another Latin dictionary I checked defines brevis as short, vadōsus as “full of shallows, shallow, shoal” and levis as “light, not heavy” or “smooth, not rough”.

The English word shallow first appeared in writing in the early 15th century schalowe, and is possibly related to schald (Old English sceald) – shoal.

Ingrown languages

By Simon

In an interesting book I read recently, What Language Is by John McWhorter, the author discusses why some languages appear a lot more complicated or ‘ingrown’ than others. He gives the example of Persian and Pashto, two Iranian languages spoken in a number of countries in western and central Asia. Whereas Persian has more or less regular and simple verb conjugations, in Pashto the verb endings and other aspects of the language are much less regular. This is because Persian was the language of a large empire in which many people learned Persian as adults, and few did so perfectly, so many of the irregularities and other complex aspects of Old Persian were regularised and simplified. This process didn’t happen with Pashto, so the language is still ingrown.

Other languages that are or have been used as colonial languages or lingua francas with many adults learning them imperfectly have undergone a similar process of simplification. These include English, Mandarin Chinese, colloquial spoken varieties of Arabic, Indonesian and Swahili. According to McWhorter, these languages could be considered abnormal as many of their irregularities and eccentricities have been levelled out. As a result they are relatively easy to learn, or at least somewhat less difficult than more ingrown languages.

One example a particularly ingrown language is Navajo, which even linguists find superlatively forbidding. Some even claim that it’s not possible to learn it after childhood. Apparently none of the Navajo verbs follow a regular pattern, and regularity is notably absent in other parts of the language.

So if you’re struggling to get to grips with Spanish or Mandarin, it might be of comfort to you to remember that you’re not learning Navajo or a similarly ingrown language.

Oideas Gael

By Simon

I’ve been having a wonderful time this week at Oideas Gael in Gleann Cholm Cille in Donegal in the north west of Ireland. I can understand most of the Irish I hear here, and my own spoken Irish is definitely improving, as is my ability to sing in Irish (I’ve been doing the sean-nóis class in the afternoons).

As well as hearing and speaking a lot of Irish, I’ve also had opportunities to speak French, German, Czech and Japanese this week with other people on the course – wonderful 🙂

I’ll be heading back to Bangor tomorrow and more regular blog posts will start to appear here again after I get home.