English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

I had a book years ago called something like 'Sound Changes in Romance from Latin' that had on each of two facing pages a different phoneme in Latin and a table of what it became in all the (major) Romance varieties.

tchrist

Yes, I have that book.

Mitch

sort of like what is done on the wiki pages for the lexical sets for English vowels.

tchrist

1:31 AM

That would be interesting.

Mitch

I feel like it wouldn't be terribly hard (for someone else!) to do, even for accents.

lexical sets for Romance, Germanic, Slavic.

Polynesian

tchrist

By the way, in that last video, they presented Galician as Portuguese right after the East Timor president. Which, compared with how widely all the others vary, it pretty much is.

Mitch

Semitic (they're all so close!)

tchrist

Semitic??

Also, Polynesian would be cheap. :)

Mitch

@tchrist all the maps and charts I see label them separately, but then the details seem to show them as almost identical

@tchrist Hebrew and the Arabic varieties are very similar s->sh, things like that.

tchrist

1:33 AM

Sibbolets!

Færd

@Mitch So if I'm getting it right, you're saying that since different species have different sensual apparatus, their mental images or perceptions of things are different. OK, that's a given. Even between humans, you stand there and I stand here, and we see this thing differently.

Mitch

@tchrist polynesian seems to mostly vary only between r and l and maybe syllabification (and vowels)

@tchrist exactly!

@Færd yes. maybe not as trivially as your 'standing' example, but yes.

Færd

But so what? Does that mean that the chain of POVs and facts ends in opinion and not fact? That there's an opinion behind any fact?

How so? Is that conclusion itself an opinion or a fact?

Ah, you haven't defined opinion yet to answer that, have you.

Mitch

as to mental images, yes, some birds can perceive patterns on flowers that we can't because they have different frequencies of light that are in the petals.

Færd

Good for them.

BTW, science is far from being the farthest domain from doubt. I could go on about this.

Mitch

1:37 AM

@Færd so this is ELU and we can appeal to the fluidities (or soft edges) in meanings of 'opinion' and 'fact'. We could say that even if what both you and I see are different, they are both (contextualized) facts. And that literally supplies a situation for 'facts come with a point of view' of the observer.

@Færd definitions aren't necessarily facts but not necessarily opinion either.

so meta!

tchrist

@Cerberus Wait, are you sure? Are you hearing that in sexto or in sétimo? I even heard one Portuguese fellow say séptimo in the old way.

Cerberus

The latter.

Mitch

@Færd you haven't defined definition. so hah!

tchrist

I just relistened looking for the affricated sétimo from someone from Portugal. Trying to find that.

Cerberus

In the former I would not expect it, for it has no ti/te.

Mitch

1:39 AM

@Færd um by definition it sorta is.

unless you're just wanna say math, I wouldn't disagree

Cerberus

It's in the link posted above.

Færd

@Mitch That statement is not a definition you're referring to.

tchrist

@Cerberus Thanks, and you're still right. :)

Cerberus

A, sim.

Mitch

@Færd I don't think I'm trying to present it as one

Cerberus

1:41 AM

The woman in your link sounds like Portuguese.

The two men in Galicia sound like Spanish.

But what do I know?

tchrist

I had the identical sentiment.

Færd

@Mitch So we need some things that don't need definition, right?

Cerberus

But I think it said Galicia, not Galego?

tchrist

But if you listen to the men's words, they're using Portuguese versions, so like suposta not supuesta. The first man has a theta that he was trying to suppress.

Cerberus

And I'm sure they have speakers Spanish there?

tchrist

1:42 AM

Yes, they do.

Cerberus

OK.

Mitch

@Færd if we're being mathematical, axioms are in some sense definitions, in the way that symbols are introduced and the axioms implicitly allow behavior akin to a definition.

Cerberus

I really wouldn't be able to tell without slow and close examination.

Færd

@Mitch I'm asking you "is this statement a fact or an opinion?", and you say "definitions are neither this nor that". If my statement is not a definition, your answer is irrelevant.

tchrist

But the idea seemed to be that they were all three speaking "Portuguese" there in Galicia, which means they were speaking Galego really. I'm pretty sure.

Mitch

1:43 AM

when did Portuguese and Spanish 'split'?

Cerberus

@tchrist That was what I expected.

But I the woman sounded very different from the men.

tchrist

@Mitch That's probably not a good way to think about it, as it may have been before the Empire fell. Certainly with the Visigoths it had begun to differentiate.

@Cerberus agree

Færd

@Mitch Axioms are in your mind. There may or may not be definitions there.

You put them down based on our mutual understanding of how to use symbols, which is definition, sorta.

Cerberus

But perhaps Galician can be spoken with a Spanish accent and with a Portuguese accent, I've no idea.

tchrist

The real thing though is that the "origin point" for "Portuguese" was in Galicia and the origin point for "Spanish" was in neighboring Asturias due east of there. They were not very far apart.

@Cerberus It felt that way to me, too.

Cerberus

1:46 AM

OK.

Robusto

Why was there a Galicia in Spain and one in (or near) Poland? Were they related?

Mitch

@tchrist was Spanish more Arabic influenced than Portuguese was?

tchrist

@Mitch Yes.

Cerberus

@Robusto I've always wondered about that too, but I would expect them to be unrelated.

tchrist

Spanish has about 4,000 words of Arabic extraction, something like five times that of Portuguese, which is still appreciable.

Cerberus

1:47 AM

And then there are Galatia and Cilicia...

Robusto

@Cerberus Maybe Anglicization is the commonality.

Cerberus

Well, they're both Galicië in Dutch,

Mitch

@Cerberus Isn't there a weird theory that Galatia was of Celtic origin?

Cerberus

Yes, sort of.

Mitch

the Galatia in modern day Turkey?

Robusto

1:47 AM

@tchrist It might interest you to know that there are some very common Portuguese words in Japanese.

Cerberus

There were Celts in Galatia, I believe.

In Antiquity, I think.

tchrist

@Robusto I don't think so. Galicia in Spain I think has something to with the land of the Gaels, who were Celtic immigrants.

jinx

@Robusto So I have heard.

Mitch

or vestiges of the Celtic hegemony?

tchrist

There are bagpipes in Galicia.

gaitas

Mitch

(before the romans and germans pushed them towards the edges)

Cerberus

1:49 AM

Galatians (people)

The Galatians were a Celtic people that dwelt mainly in the north central regions of Asia Minor or Anatolia, in what was known as Galatia, in today's Turkey. In their origin they were a part of the great Celtic migration which invaded Macedon, led by Brennus. The original Celts who settled in Galatia came through Thrace under the leadership of Leotarios and Leonnorios c. 278 BC. These Celts consisted mainly of three tribes, the Tectosages, the Trocmii, and the Tolistobogii, but they were also other minor tribes. They spoke a Celtic language, the Galatian language, which is sparsely attested. In...

Robusto

For example, tempura is obviously associated with Japan, yet it is from a Portuguese word.

tchrist

Here I thought we were in the New Testament.

Cerberus

@Robusto Really!

Robusto

Yup.

The Japanese also use the word pan for bread, but they got it from the Portuguese.

Cerberus

I wonder how it came to be associate with the Japanese food, then.

Do the Japanese use tempura as well?

@Robusto Interesting! Is that really their common word for bread?

Mitch

1:51 AM

@Færd Euclid considers them very distinct. But I don't. Or rather definitions are axioms defined with '=' and a single function application on one side -or- a meta-replacement doing the same thing.

Cerberus

Even for traditional Japanese bread, which is probably nothing like ours?

Robusto

@Cerberus Yup.

Cerberus

Cool.

Robusto

@Cerberus They didn't make bread before the Portuguese showed up, I'm pretty sure. Thought I could be wrong.

Mitch

@Cerberus what would induce such a group to migrate so far, especially against the usual tide of east to west away from the mongols.

Cerberus

1:52 AM

@Robusto In the sense that e.g. tortillas are also called bread.

And naan.

Robusto

@Cerberus And ... wait for it ... guess what the word oranda means in Japanese (also from Portuguese).

@Cerberus Naan is Indian bread, no?

Cerberus

@Mitch At which time, do you mean? In the 3rd century BC?

Mitch

@Robusto Dutch?

Cerberus

The Mongols attacked 1500 years later.

Robusto

@Mitch Close, but no cigar.

Cerberus

1:53 AM

@Robusto Holland?

Robusto

@Cerberus ding ding ding

Winnah winnah chicken dinnah!

Mitch

@Robusto Oh come on!

Cerberus

@Robusto Yes, but it's quite different from ours! Children would probably not call it bread here unless so instructed.

Robusto

@Mitch Dutch is not the same as Holland, sorry. The prize goes to the doggy.

Mitch

it's all the same (outside of the lowlands)

Cerberus

1:54 AM

I wish to donate 2/3 of my prize to the green square.

Mitch

I demand a recount!

@Cerberus How gallant!

Cerberus

I did get that it must be the country and not the adjective, though.

Robusto

@Cerberus I see no purely green square, so the prize remains undivided.

Durr.

Cerberus

@Mitch You mean Galate, surely?

Mitch

It would be churlish of me to refuse. But let us drink together!

Cerberus

1:55 AM

Can the prize be gelato?

tchrist

Galician gaita

The Galician gaita (Gaita galega in galician, and Gaita gallega in Spanish) is the traditional instrument of Galicia. It is also used in some parts of Portugal. The word gaita is used across northern Spain as a generic term for "bagpipe", although in the south of Spain and Portugal it denotes a variety of horn, flute or oboe like instruments according to region. Suggestions as to the origin of the name gaita are many. It has been compared to the names of eastern European bagpipes, such as gaida, gajda, and gajdy. The linguist Joan Coromines has suggested that the word gaita most likely derived...

@Cerberus +1

Ita est.

Good, let's eat!

Done. Dessert?

1:56 AM

> For most of modern history, the Japanese failed to understand the point of the baguette — known locally as furansu pan (French bread) — and shunned the globally coveted Gallic specialty, thinking it was hard and tasteless.

tchrist

Projection.

Mitch

@Cerberus There was always pressure from that direction. If they're not directly to blame, they're suspicious, even if they didn't exist yet.

Robusto

@Cerberus Well, they don't eat cheese and they don't really butter bread, so I can understand why they might be befuddled by a baguette.

Cerberus

@Mitch Heh.

Mitch

@Robusto what do they do with all the female cows?

Cerberus

1:58 AM

I think there were only Persians and Greeks there to pressure them.

Robusto

BTW, I prefer the ficelle to the baguette.

Cerberus

@Robusto Si.

> ...the all-important katsu sandwich (a deep-fried breaded pork cutlet served between two thick slices of bread), which to overseas visitors must come off as overkill, an incomprehensible lump of grease and carbs.

Mitch

@Cerberus Reason enough!

Robusto

@Mitch What ordinary farmboys do the world over.

Ba-dump dump.

Mitch

@Robusto the crust is the best part, and the ficelle is all crust

Robusto

1:59 AM

Ayup.

Cerberus

@Mitch Perhaps they experienced more pressure from whence they came, be it from Romans or climate?

Robusto

Damn, now I wish I had a ficelle and some butter.

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…