Bwriadau da

By Simon

Bron pob penwythnos, bydda i’n meddwl bod rhaid i mi ddysgu yr eirfa a’r gramadeg fy ieithoedd mewn ffordd mwy systematig, neu ymarfer y chwiban yn amlach, neu ddysgu mwy am seineg, a bydda i’n dechrau ei wneud yr wythnos nesa. Mae llawer o fwriadau da ‘da fi, efallai gormond ohonyn nhw, ond dw i’n arfer heb wneud dim llawer neu ddim byd amdanyn nhw.

Beagnach gach deireadh seachtaine, bím ag smaoineamh gur cheart dom an foclóir agus an ghramadach mo theangacha a fhoghlaim níos córasacha, nó an fheadóg a chleachtadh níos minice, nó níos mó foghraíocht a fhoghlaim, agus tosóidh mé na rudaí seo a dhéanamh an seachtain seo chugainn. Bíonn go leor rudaí, b’fhéidir barraíocht acu, ar m’intinn agam, ach de gnách, ní déanaim mórán nó faic fúthu.

Word of the day – typography

By Simon

Typography is:
1. the art or process of printing from type;
2. the art or process of setting and arranging type for printing;
3. the arrangement, style, or general appearance of printed matter
(from yourdictionary).

It comes via French and Latin from the Greek τύπος (typos), to strike + γραφία (graphia), to write.

I chose this word today because I found an interesting blog about typhography called I Love Typography. As well as discussing typography, the author also gives advice on creating your own fonts, something that quite a few people ask me about. There are also some slightly less-than-serious posts, such as this one about Typoholism, “A disorder characterized by the excessive consumption of and dependence on type…”.

I think I ‘suffer’ from typoholism, and a related condition for which I can’t think of a word at the moment. Can you think of a word for my love of languages and writing systems? Perhaps ‘panglotophilia’.

Language change

By Simon

According to a New Scientist article I came across the other day, frequently-used words tend to be more resistant to change then words that are used less often.

A team at the University of Reading lead by Mark Pagel, an Evolutionary Biologist, compared the words used to express 200 different meanings in 87 different Indo-European languages. They found that the more frequently a word is used in speech, the less likely it is to change over time. They also found the conjunctions and prepositions tend to change more readily than numbers, pronouns and question words like who, what, where, etc. The team calculated a ‘mutation rate’ for each of the words the studied and predicted that frequently-used words are likely to resist change for over 10,000 years.

Another study at Harvard University demonstrated that the most frequently-used English irregular verbs have tended to remain stable over time, while most of the least frequently-used ones have become regular.

Tâi-ôan-ōe / Taiwanese

By Simon

I found an interesting website today called Tailingua, which provides a good, clear introduction to the Taiwanese language (Tâi-ôan-ōe). It includes information about the language, the numerous methods used to write it, and explains how to set up your computer to write Taiwanese using Peh8-oe7-ji7 (POJ), the most popular system for writing Taiwanese with the Latin alphabet. There is also a list of books for learning Taiwanese, links, and a blog.

Other sites with information (in English) about Taiwanese include Talking Taiwanese, Intermediate Taiwanese Grammar, and Glossika.

Word of the day – Lloegr

By Simon

The Welsh name for England is Lloegr (/ɬɔigr/). The etymology of this name is a mystery. According to this site, it first appeared as Lloegyr in an early 10th century prophetic poem called Armes Prydain. A variant of the name, Lloegrwys, or “men of Lloegr”, was in use before then and more common. In early poetry, the names used for the English included Eingl (Angles) and Iwys (Wessex-men) – they are called Saeson (Saxons) in modern Welsh. Some scholars believe that Lloegr originally referred to the kingdom of Mercia, and eventually came to mean the whole of England.

There’s a thread on this forum in which a number of possible etymologies of Lloegr are discussed. Here are some of them:

  • it comes from the Middle English name for England, Loegres
  • it comes from Legorencis Civitas, the Roman name for Leicester, which was probably derived from a local Celtic name
  • it means the “lost land(s)”
  • it’s named after Locrinus, the son of Brutus (from Geoffrey of Monmouth)

More details: http://www.old-north.co.uk/Holding/celt_lloegr.html

Llifeiriant o Gerddoriaeth

By Simon

Yr wythnos hon, dw i wedi bod yn canu, a chwarae’r gitâr a’r chwiban yn amlach nag arfer. Er enghraifft, bydda i’n dechrau chwarae’r gitâr gyda’r bwriad ymarfer am bum neu ddeng munud, a cyn i mi wybod, dw i wedi chwarae am hanner awr neu fwy. Dw i’n teimlo bod y gerddoriaeth wedi bod yn casglu yna i ers blynyddoedd, ac yn ddiwethar mae hi wedi dechrau gollwng neu lifeirio allan ohona i.

Tuile ceoil

An seachtaine seo, tá mé ag canadh, agus ag seinn ar an giotár agus an fheadóg níos minice ná is gnách. Mar shampla, bím ag tosú ag seinn ar an giotár agus tá sé ar intinn agam ag cleachtadh le cúig nó deich bomaite, ach roimh a bhfuil fios agam, bím i ndiaidh ag seinn air le leath uair nó níos faide. Tá mé ag mothaigh go raibh an ceol ag carnigh ionam le blianta anuas, agus le déanaí tá sé i ndiaidh tosú ag sceith amach uaim.

Japanese more difficult than Chinese?

By Simon

An article I came across today, via Keith’s blog, argues that it’s a lot more difficult to learn Japanese than Chinese.

The author of the article studied both Chinese and Japanese at the Defense Language Institute (DLI), and lived in Japan for over seven years. He feels confident about communicating in Chinese (Mandarin) and found it much easier than Japanese, or Spanish and German, which he studied in high school. He didn’t find learning Japanese at the DLI too hard, but had difficulty communicating with Japanese people in Japan. He believes the main difficulties are the sheer amount of Japanese syntax, only a small proportion of which is covered in most Japanese courses, and Japanese culture, in which people tend to avoid saying things in a straightforward way.

My own experiences are somewhat similar – I found Chinese easier to learn than Japanese, though I’ve only been to Japan once and was there for four months, whereas I spent over five years in Taiwan, plus a couple of months in China. Had I spent longer in Japan, I’m sure my Japanese would be a lot better now. Would it be as good as my Chinese? I don’t know.

Word of the day – Samhain

By Simon

Today’s word, Samhain (/ˈsˠaunʲ/) is the Irish word for November, and also refers to the ancient Celtic festival which was traditional celebrated at this time of year to mark the end of the harvest and the start of the ‘Celtic New Year’. The word samhain comes from the Old Irish samain, which possibly means ‘summer’s end’, though that etymology is uncertain.

The last day of October is known as Oíche Shamhna in Irish and Oidhche Shamhna in Scottish Gaelic, both of which mean the ‘night of Samhain’. It was a time for feasting and to for taking stock of livestock and stores of crops, a custom still observed in some areas.