Focus

By Simon

This month I’ll mainly be focusing on improving my Irish (Gaelic). This is mainly because I’m going to a summer school in Irish language and culture at Oideas Gael in Donegal at the end of this month, as I’ve done every year for the past six years, plus two years going there in June. I plan to write something in Irish every day on my other blog, Multilingual Musings, which I set up as a place to practise using my languages, and will make recordings of the posts. I will also listen to Raidió na Gaeltachta (Irish language radio) every day and maybe find things in Irish to read as well.

I think the writing practice will be most useful – I’ve been doing the listening and reading fairly regularly anyway, but rarely write in Irish and often have to check my spelling and grammar. Doing the recordings will be a good exercise as well.

At the end of August I’ll be going to Sabhal Mòr Ostaig, the Gaelic college on Skye, to do a course in Skye Gaelic Songs and Traditions with Mary Ann Kennedy, so will be focusing on improving my Scottish Gaelic in August.

I will also be keeping my other languages ticking over and learning a bit more Breton and Russian every day.

Do you have any particular language projects or goals for this summer?

Gaeilge

By Simon

An mhí seo tá mé ag díríu ar Ghaeilge go príomha. Beidh mé ag dul chun an Scoil Samhraidh ag Oideas Gael i nGleann Cholm Cille ag deireadh an mhí, agus ba mhaith liom mo chuid Gaeilge a fheabhsú roimhe sin. Beidh mé ag éisteacht le Raidió na Gaeltachta agus ag triail rud éigin a scríobh anseo gach lá. Ba mhaith liom níos mó amhráin as Gaeilge a chuir de ghlanmheabhair chomh maith.

This month I am focusing mainly on Irish. I will be going to the summer school at Oideas Gael in Glencolmbcille at the end of this month, and would like to improve my Irish before then. I will listen to Raidió na Gaeltachta and try to write something here every day. I would like to memorize more songs in Irish as well.

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg Brezhoneg
prendre des libertés to take liberties bod yn hy[f]; beiddio gwneud rhth monet / mont re frank ouzh ub
le devis quotation (estimate) pris rakpriz
la citation quotation (from book) dyfynnu arroudenn
les guillemets (m) quotation marks dyfynodau klochedigoù
les arrhes (m) deposit (refundable) blaendal (ad-daladwy) arrez
l’acompte (m) deposit (non refundable) blaendal (di-ad-daladwy) rannbae
hors taxes; exempté de douane duty-free di-doll; tollrydd pep taos er-maez
le chargement load (things carried) llwyth fard
il pleuviote it’s spitting (with rain) mae hi’n pigo bwrw / taflu dafnau pleuvasser a ra
la bruine; le crachin drizzle glaw mân; gwlithlaw; manlaw; brithlaw ailhenn
éthique; moral ethical ethic buhezegezh; divezel

Archerien

By Simon

An interesting word that came up in my Breton lesson today is archerien, which means police. It caught my attention because it has no obvious connection to the word police, and because it is completely different to the equivalent words in other Celtic languages:

– Welsh: heddlu (“peace force”)
– Cornish: kreslu (“peace host”)
– Irish: gardaí (síochána) (“guards of peace”); póilíní
– Manx: meoiryn shee (“peace keepers/stewards”); poleenyn
– Scottish Gaelic: poileas

The English word police comes from the French police (public order, administration, government), from the Latin polītīa (state, government), from the Greek πολιτεία (politeia – citizenship, government, administration, constitution). It is shares the same root as policy, politics, politician and various other words [source].

Many languages use variants on the word police, e.g. Politsei (Estonian), პოლიცია (polits’ia – Georgian), Polizei (German), पुलिस (pulis – Hindi), پلیس (pulis – Persian), Booliis (Somalia), Policía (Spanish), Pulis (Tagalog), but some do their own thing:

– Bavarian: Kibara
– Chinese: 警察 (jǐngchá); 公安 (gōng’ān)
– Faroese: Løgregla
– Greek: Αστυνομία (Astynomía)
– Hungarian: Rendőrség
– Icelandic: Lögregla
– Japanese: 警察 (keisatsu)
– Korean: 警察 (gyeongchal)
– Thai: ตำรวจ (tảrwc)

Are there other examples of languages with a word unrelated to police for police?

Hop on a call

By Simon

Photo of a phone

An email I received yesterday contained the sentence “Would be happy to hop on a call to discuss should you change your mind.” The expression to hop on a call particularly caught my attention as it’s not one I’ve come across before. In this context I would have said “to give you a call”.

Have you come across this expression before? Do you use it yourself? If not, how do you refer to telephonic communication?

I’ve heard/used:
– to phone/call/ring sb
– to call sb up
– to give sb a call/bell/ring/buzz

There are a few slang words for phone, including dog (and bone) – rhyming slang; and blower. Do you have any others?

Pibeqɛdæ – new con-script

By Simon

Here’s a script, called Pibeqɛdæ, that I constructed this afternoon based on the letter p, mainly. It has most of the phonemes used in English, and could be further extended. I put it together just to demonstate to a visitor to Omniglot how you might make a con-script. It turned out quite well, I think.

Pideqedae alphabet

I was just going to float the vowels over the consonants, like in Tengwar, then I thought I’d try putting them in the consonants, and am quite pleased with the results. It isn’t a very practical script as it quite be hard to make a font with vowels that fit inside the consonants.

Bassa Vah puts tone marks inside the vowels, but I haven’t come across any other scripts that put the vowels inside the consonants. Have you?

Les mots de la semaine

By Simon
français English Cymraeg Brezhoneg
imperméable waterproof diddosi didreuz
barboter; faire trempette to paddle (in water) slotian; padlo; ffritian bourbouilhañ
pagayer to paddle (a kayak/canoe) rhwyfo; padlo roeñvat
la pataugeoire paddling pool pwll padlo poullig patouilhañ
patauger to wade/splash about; flounder sblasio; fflatsio; slotian; ymdrochi papouilhat
décrocher to go cold turkey gwneud triniaeth croen gwydd diskregiñ
tailler to sharpen (pencil) rhoi/gwneud blaen (ar bensel); hogi, miniogi krennañ
le taille-crayon pencil sharpener peth gwneud min/awch ar bensel beger-kreionoù
aiguiser to sharpen (blade/appetite) hogi; rhoi min ar lemmañ
le coquelicot poppy (wild) llygad y cythraul; llygad y bwgan; bochgoch roz-aer
le pavot poppy (cultivated) pabi roz-moc’h
les soins intensifs (m) intensive care gofal arbennig; gofal dwys prederioù askoridik
les menottes (f) handcuffs gefynnau (llaw) kefioù-dorn; grizilhonoù
menotter to handcuff gefynnu; rhoi gefynnau (ar) grizilhonañ
avoir les menottes aux poignets to be handcuffed bod mewn gefynnau

Tag questions, innit!

By Simon

Tag questions or question tags are interrogative fragments (tags) added to statements making them into sort of questions. They tend to be used more in colloquial speech and informal writing than in formal writing, and can indicate politeness, emphasis, irony, confidence or lack of it, and uncertainty. Some are rhetorical and an answer is not expected, others invite a response.

In English they come in various forms, for example:

– I like coconut, don’t I?
– You’re tall, aren’t you?
– He’s handsome, isn’t he?
– She said she’d be here, didn’t she?
– It’ll rain tomorrow, won’t it?
– We were away, weren’t we?
– You’d gone, hadn’t you?
– They’ll be there, won’t they?

A simpler tag question used is some varieties of English in innit, a contraction of isn’t it, which could be used for all the examples above. Other English tags include right? and eh? – do you use any others?

Tag questions in Celtic languages can also have quite complex forms which depend on the verb and the subject in the main clause, particularly in Welsh.

Manx
– T’eh braew jiu, nagh vel? (It’s fine today, isn’t it?)
– Hie ad dys y thie oast riyr, nagh jagh? (They went to the pub last night, didn’t they?)
– Bee oo goll magh mairagh, nagh bee? (You’ll go out tomorrow, won’t you?)

Irish
– Tá sé go breá inniu, nach bhfuil? (It’s fine today, isn’t it?)
– Chuaigh siad go dtí an teach tábhairne aréir, nagh ndeachaigh? (They went to the pub last night, didn’t they?)
– Beidh tú ag dul amach amárach, nach bheidh? (You’ll go out tomorrow, won’t you?)

Scottish Gaelic
– Tha i brèagha an diugh, nach eil? (It’s fine today, isn’t it?)
– Chaidh iad dhan taigh-òsta an-raoir, nagh deach? (They went to the pub last night, didn’t they?)
– Bidh thu a’ dol a-mach a-màireach, nach bi? (You’ll go out tomorrow, won’t you?)

Welsh
– Mae’n braf heddiw, on’d ydy? (It’s fine today, isn’t it?)
– Mi aethon nhw nhw’n mynd i’r dafarn neithiwr, on’d wnaethon? (They went to the pub last night, didn’t they?)
– Fyddet ti’n mynd allan yfory, on’ fyddet? (You’ll go out tomorrow, won’t you?)

I’m not sure about how tag questions work in Breton and Cornish.

In other languages things can be simpler:

– Czech: že?
– French: n’est-ce pas? non?
– German: nicht wahr? nicht? oder?
– Italian: no? vero? (positive), non è vero? (negative)
– Polish: prawda? (positive), nieprawdaż? (negative)
– Russian: да? (da?)
– Spanish: ¿no? ¿verdad?

Can you provide other examples?