Cat got your tongue?

By Simon

Cat, Chat

The English idiom “Has the cat got your tongue?” is used when someone remains silent in situations where they are expected to say something. It could be glossed as, “Why don’t you say anything? Your silence is suspicious.” Possible origins of this phrase are discussed on this page. The French equivalent of this idiom is “Tu as perdu ta langue ?” (Have you lost your tongue?”).

In French there is a similar idiom involving cats and tongues: donner sa langue au chat (to give one’s tongue to the cat), but this means to give up or stop guessing when you don’t know the answer to something, or don’t know what someone is asking of you.

Apparently this idiom developed from the phrase jeter sa langue au chien (to throw one’s tongue to the dog), which originated in an era when leftover food was thrown to the dogs, and meant that you no longer felt like finding an answer to a question, so you might as well throw it to the dogs. Over time the phrase became donner sa langue au chat, as cats were considered secret keepers, and you gave your tongue to the cat in the hope that it would be able to answer the question [source]. An equivalent idiom in English is “to throw in the towel” or “to throw in the sponge”, expressions which come from boxing.

Are there any similar idioms in other languages?

Learning a New Language – How Easy (or Difficult) is It?

By Simon

Today with have a guest post by Abby Nelson

I have a friend who can speak four different languages; and he’s not the kind who gets by with a few strategic words and sentences, he’s fluent in them too. If at all I envy anything in him, it is this multilingual ability which I know I can never emulate. Now while eternal optimists would tell me to never say never, and offer additional advice that anything is possible if you set your mind to it, those who are more realistic understand that learning a new language involves many different variables. For example:

– Popular belief has it that children pick up a new tongue faster than adults; but that’s not really true. What’s true is that kids who learn a new language before they reach puberty speak the tongue without the accent that makes it easy to identify non-native speakers. Adults and children are equally good at picking up new languages when exposed to it on a prolonged basis.

– Learning a new language is fastest when you try your hand at the spoken lingo, and the easiest way to do this is to spend time around native speakers who don’t speak any other language. This is why most of us pick up a new tongue within a few months of settling down in a foreign country where the local language is different from the one you speak. Necessity is the biggest motivator when it comes to picking up a new language – your survival instincts kick in and you initially pick up the basics necessary for communication; and with the passage of time, you learn more of the tongue and become more fluent in the language.

– When you learn a new language by listening to and speaking it, you pick up the vernacular slang and not the grammatical version of the tongue. So while you may be a proficient speaker after a while, you may not understand other aspects of the language.

– It takes effort to learn how to read and write the native script of a language. Some languages are easier than others if you already have the foundation laid to facilitate learning the script. For example, if you know how to read and write English, it’s easier to learn how to read and write languages that use the same script. You may have some difficulty with the pronunciation, but with a fair amount of practice, you can soon pick up this aspect of the language as well. Languages with complex scripts are the hardest to master to read and write.

So in conclusion, I think it’s safe to say that the ease or difficulty with which you master a language depends on personal necessity and motivation to learn the new tongue; so what’s a breeze for you may end up becoming an uphill climb for me and vice versa.

About the writer
Abby Nelson writes on the topic of Masters in Counseling. She welcomes your comments at her email id: abby.85nelson< @>gmail< .>com

Pelf

By Simon

Pelf noun, money or wealth, especially if dishonestly acquired; lucre. Also a slang term for money.

Etymology: from the Old French pelfre (booty); related to the Latin pilāre (to despoil).

[Source]

I came across this word today in The Times in an article about a British supermarket starting a pawn broking service, or more specifically a gold exchange service. I hadn’t encountered it before and thought at first that it was a typo. The context is:

Most of the other alchemists promising to turn gold into cupro-nickel are doing so at a rate so miserly that even a richly embossed heirloom would barely provide a widow’s pelf.
From: The Times, 3rd January 2011

On the grow

By Simon

A somewhat unusual turn of phrase I heard today on BBC Radio 4 was “on the grow“. The programme was called Where England Meets Wales, and they were taking about the increase in the number of speakers of Welsh in north east Wales. The context was:

I’m not entirely sure why, if compared to Scots Gaelic or Cornish, it’s thrived, but I think it’s something that really symbolises the Welsh nation, and as a nation we’re incredibly passionate about having the language and keeping alive. What’s really encouraging is that there’s a high number of Welsh learners in every county, so it is on the grow, and it’s growing very quickly.

Have you heard this construction before?

Segues and sequels

By Simon

Segue [ˈseɪgweɪ; ˈsɛgweɪ]

– verb

  1. to continue at once with the next musical section or composition (often used as a musical direction).
  2. to perform in the manner of the preceding section (used as a musical direction).
  3. to make a transition from one thing to another smoothly and without interruption: The conversation segued from travel anecdotes to food.

– noun

  1. an uninterrupted transition made between one musical section or composition and another.
  2. any smooth, uninterrupted transition from one thing to another.

Etymology: from 1740 it was used as a musical instruction to play into the following movement without a break, literally “now follows”. It is a third person singular of the Italian verb seguire (to follow), and comes from the Latin sequī (to follow), from the Proto-Indo-European *sekw- (to follow)

*sekw- is also the root of the English word sequel, via the Old French sequelle, from the Late Latin sequela (that which follows, result, consequence), from the Latin sequī (to follow).

[Source]

This word came up in a crossword I did yesterday and though I’d heard it before, I haven’t seen it written down and thought it was spelt something like segway.

Puzzle

By Simon

I don’t have a quiz for you today, but do have a question from a correspondent:

Can any of you provide a good English version of the following?

Recht haben und Recht bekommen sind zwei verschiedene Dinge.

This would be used in a context of somebody who loses or fears losing in a court of justice in spite of having a very strong legal case. Typically your lawyer could say this to you, when discussing the case.

Christmas

By Simon

Nadolig Llawen
Joyeux Noël
聖誕快樂
Nollaig shona doibh
¡Feliz Navidad!
Nollick Ghennal
Bo Nadal
Nollaig chridheil
メリークリスマス
Buon Natale
Frohe Weihnachten
Bon Nadal
Veselé vánoce
and Merry Christmas!