English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

12:56 AM

24

Because it was not a French word, but a Scottish one. And we did lose a u — just not the u you were expecting. Per the OED, it was a corruption of grammar, which during the 18th century was variously spelled glamer, glamor, glammar, and then in Scotland, as glaumour. That was one u too many, ...

24

A: How are 'marry', 'merry', and 'Mary' pronounced differently?

If you wish to try to simulate the distinction for people who do not normally make it, I have found that it is best to illustrate it this way: Marry has the same vowel as Matt or mat, so IPA /æ/. Merry has the same vowel as met, so IPA /ɛ/. Mary has the same vowel as mate or may, so IPA /eɪ/ or...

I think either of those would give me a hat.

24

A: What's with the 'heigth' pandemic?

Heighth is no error It is a misunderstanding that the spelling or pronunciation of heighth is an illiterate and uneducated error. Although many wrongly consider it such, history is not on their side, nor are the better dictionaries. Despite how in particular over the last century the heighth s...

But old ones only go so far. You have to post new stuff to get most of the new hats.

Feeds

1:36 AM

0

Q: Database user adjectives

This is a multi-faceted question (if that's allowed). I am running a web application with a database that is used by westerners and asians, so cultural sensitivity is important. I am implementing some "fun" statistics. They will be used in the following manner: Today's <word> is <username>. Where <...

tchrist

1:59 AM

I don't understand how his suggested busybody could possibly be an adjective. I’m thinking he doesn't know what an adjective is.

tchrist

2:09 AM

Ayup. Doesn't know what an adjective is.

Feeds

5:44 AM

0

Q: Can you suggest a word for something considered suburban and unsophisticated?

Something like "provincial" comes to mind but hit the mark work because 1) it is related to small towns and 2) it has a romanticized connotation, whereas the word I am looking for would have a critical tone and denote things that are suburban and unexceptional.

single-word-requests

Feeds

6:51 AM

0

Q: turn the following sentences into passive

they took me to school when i was a child she brought me a special gift they are transmitting the news by the radio they are construct the highest building in the city they where holding a meeting all last night the student has cleaned the blackboard they paint their house every year they are di...

single-word-requests meaning phrases verbs translation

Educ

7:05 AM

Hello, folks!

hope you doing well

:41728065 I would like to thank you @ :41728065 but Instead of focusing on my feelings, i would like to say something nice about your act you did great job, How can i thank you

Feeds

7:23 AM

0

Q: Is there an adjective that means "under development"? I need one for a document title

The title of a template document I'm translating is quite long and goes like this: Comparison of the formulations of the drug under development Trade name (INN), dosage form, strength, manufacturer, country and the reference drug product Trade name (INN), dosage form, strength, manufacturer, ...

single-word-requests phrase-requests translation

Feeds

11:19 AM

1

Q: What's the adjective for the spoon when some one uses the spoon, scoops and licks it and then gives the same spoon to other

What's the word when some one uses a spoon to scoop a jam and lick it and then gives the same spoon to you. I would like to know another word apart from "used" or "spoiled" as in my culture there is a specific word for it because it should be differentiated from a new spoon purchase become used s...

single-word-requests phrase-requests

Færd

1:16 PM

@Mitch :41726579 I mean superfluidity is as much of a macro quantum effect as transistors and ferromagnetism and colors etc are. (I think what you describe may be closer to BEC where in some diluted gases many particles go into the same quantum state and collectively exhibit the phenomena that are usually related to one particle)

@MattE.Эллен Godspeed! Take a selfie while up there. Maybe update the old avatar? :)

@Cerberus True.

Well it'd been a monarchy for decades before the 70s' events but I don't know much about their social structure yet. It's not recorded to have been a feudal hierarchy. And I guess people were happier than they've been in the recent decades.

@Cerberus I see. Actually I'm agonizing my way through this one too.

Very dark.

MetaEd

2:07 PM

Mornin, campers.

tchrist

For width, I can say /ˈwɪtθ/ and I can say /ˈwɪdð/ but I don't know that I can say /ˈwɪdθ/.

Mitch

@Færd huh? Colors? How does... do you have a quick reference (I don't want to bother you for a full explanation)?

tchrist

Seems like both parts of the affricate have to either be voiced or else both parts need to be unvoiced. Strange to have those be unpaired. Cheech, judge.

And frankly, /ˈwɪdð/ is tough to say.

Mitch

@tchrist /ˈwɪdð/ is hard too

tchrist

@Mitch I just said that.

Mitch

2:13 PM

but /'beyðd/ for 'bathed' is easier, but not particularly easy

tchrist

Metathetically.

dint axe me

Mitch

how about the new pronunciation 'heighth' /haytθ/?

well that's easiy

tchrist

"new"?

What's the new part?

Mitch

non-standard?

you choose, you're the stickler

tchrist

> In ME. the forms in -t were predominant in the north, and since 1500 have increasingly prevailed in the literary language; though heighth, highth were abundant in southern writers till the 18th c., and are still affected by some.

That doesn't look especially new to me; does it to you?

Rustic?

It's a holdover from long ago.

Once it was length and width, breadth and heighth.

The -t version "prevailed in the literary language".

Apparently the -th version still happens in the south of England at times. I tend to think imagine it has often been "rediscovered" many times since its demise, enough that we don't need to posit some isolated pocket of 18th century speakers hiding in some secluded Appalachian enclave or Outer Banks colony.

Cats. Christmas decorations.

There's a vowel changing pattern in long > length, broad > breadth.

And in wide > width.

Twelfth and hundredth.

Are tricky to say.

OMG THERE’S A sidth.

OED marks it with both dialect and rare.

> A gown should be ... walking width and striding sidth.

Another quote has length, width, and sidth.

The only other surprise I found was myriadth.

0

Q: Storing field terms

Need help in translation several terms of storing documents: When some goods are reaching store/stock(this is another unclear moment for me), we have to generate act(at least that's how it's called in my native language(russian)), which contains all details of receivement, e.g. all the goods de...

meaning translation derived-terms

I'm having trouble understanding that question.

MetaEd

3:24 PM

@tchrist It really looked to me like the asker wants the names of fields you would find on typical shipping and receiving documents. I commented asking if this was so.

tchrist

@MetaEd Thanks!

MetaEd

@tchrist I happen to be perpetually buried under such fields.

tchrist

poppies poppies everywhere

MetaEd

4:16 PM

Existential Blues

►

user325499

5:17 PM

@Educ Sure, no problem.

user325499

Also, try to join proofreading sites if you like.

user325499

Oh, and if you really want to be good in English try these steps:

user325499

1) Read, read read. Read everything even crap on the internet.

user325499

2) Engage with people in English online.

user325499

3) Pick fights with native speakers of English. Not here, in other places if you feel like it. That is one tried and tested way to improve English. But use your own discretion with this one.

user325499

5:23 PM

4) Make friends online with people (who are good at English).

user325499

5) Join Lang 8 (not sure about their current status though)

user325499

6) Join Grammarly

user325499

7) Troll people in English.

user325499

You will be Proofreading your own text in months

Feeds

5:45 PM

0

Q: Is there a verb form for how an effigy relates to its target or referent?

So an inanimate object in a story is representative of a person in the story. Anything that happens to the object represents something that happens to the person. So what’s the word for “The object ____ the person”. Sort of like symbolizes, represents, but not exactly it.

single-word-requests

Cerberus

@Ivan Excellent advice! Except that I would advise people to make sure they're reading proper English.

As opposed to 'street' etc. English.

Educ

@Ivan Thank you so much i really appreciated by the way i always listening to the Fox radio

Could someone point me to free proofreading site please

Davo

6:05 PM

Wow, hats really help clear out the review queues.

user325499

6:47 PM

@Cerberus ♪♪ I'm bigger and bolder and rougher and tougher, in other words sucker there is no other... ♪♪

user325499

More seriously though, you are right.

user325499

@Educ Lang 8, Grammarly etc. Or google "Good proofreading sites".

MetaEd

“Where can I ask for free proofreading? – Meta”

Educ

Thanks both of you

Feeds

-2

Q: A term that can be used to describe a person in this situation?

Suppose a person performs daily tasks for the benefit of others, without payment or compensation. These others assume that these tasks will always be carried out and do very little to make the person's burden easier. The others regularly undermine that person's worth by adding to that person's ...

single-word-requests adjectives

sumelic

6:58 PM

@tchrist "lakhth" looks even weirder to me, but I guess its pronunciation is fairly straightforward.

MetaEd

@sumelic The doorman locketh and the doorman taketh the key away.

Mari-Lou A

8:47 PM

Hello all. Sorry to interupt but where is @RaceYouAnytime? Does he come here often? if he does.... please can you ask him to undelete his answer on the "in a jiffy" question? Unless, which can happen to anyone, he got the date wrong. I tried myself but came up empty-handed, maybe he is subscribed to Green's Slang Dictionary and he got the date from them. I dunno... I was so thrilled yesterday by the citation. Oh well...ta ta.

Mitch

9:14 PM

@Mari-LouA I've never seen him here

@Mari-LouA do you have a link to that question?

Found it.

Færd

@Mitch You see, your color is determined, among other things, by which photons the electrons on your surface (skin!) can absorb and release while they're jumping from this energy level to that, and the energy levels are decided by the Schrödinger equation.

Mitch

note that he says in a comment to his own question that it is a work in progress, which presumably means that he will undelete it when he's edited it enough.

@Færd oh. I thought you were going the other direction about how the receptors in your eyes somethety something blah blah because of discrete energy levels.

Færd

That too :)

Mitch

but color then by your explanation is simply any electro-magnetic radiation

Færd

I didn't define it. I simply introduce one of the factors involved.

Mitch

9:24 PM

I hold you responsible not just for your words but for the phenomenon itself

Why is the sky blue? I want it red...now!

To match my socks

it's kind of the trend now

Mari-Lou A

9:53 PM

@Mitch thanks anyway, I was hoping maybe for an explanation without me having to post "off topic" comments. RYA posted and immediately deleted their answer which made me think that it was work in progress but nothing's happened since then. Oh well, pity. Bye, thanks for replying :)

Mitch

@Mari-LouA Well, maybe he's just taking his time

you could always just choose to vote to undelete yourself, and then maybe I would do the same and then maybe one more would do it. But then I think he can always delete his own stuff

Also, relevantly, Josh (the one who 'resigned voluntarily' a couple months ago) had asked about a post/delete/undelete strategy along with some bounty thing (I didn't understand it) in order to get more rep. And I think he successfully did it a few times.

But posting crap quickly, deleting and then working on it, seems a reasonable, allowable strategy, in case a question gets closed or in this case so as not to show a crap answer but expecting to fix it up.

Færd

11:27 PM

@Mitch It's red if you hard enough.

*look hard enough

Tonepoet

@Mari-LouA Hi Mari-Lou. It's nice to see you poke your head into the main chat-room for once, even if it is just a temporary state of affairs. Unfortunately, to answer your question, RaceYouAnyTime does not visit this chatroom frequently, or at least not when I'm here anyway. I'm sorry that I can't be of much further help.

Feeds

11:56 PM

0

Q: antonym for "thimble"

What word can be used to describe a large quantity or amount in a way that it would sound as an antonym for "thimble". Preferably a word that rhymes with it or start with "t". As in: I had a thimble of patience and the task required "?antonym?".

single-word-requests antonyms metaphors

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…