English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Cerberus

12:00 AM

@Chappo Hmm that's odd.

I would expect a moderator to accept the flag even if he feels it's not the right category.

Chappo

@Cerberus This one maybe deleted by the OP?

Cerberus

@Chappo No, it was 'deleted from review' by eight people including you.

Chappo

@Cerberus It comes up in my flagging history as declined. It says: "not an answer – Chappo 2 days ago declined - a moderator reviewed your flag, but found no evidence to support it"

Cerberus

It gives no reason.

Chappo

@Cerberus I don't doubt that deletion was appropriate, and I suspect I might have flagged it as NAA first and subsequently found it in the LQP queue where I then voted to delete (but without giving a comment, as I'd already added a personal one). So the question is, why's it showing up as "declined"?

Chappo

12:23 AM

Similarly, this one, which has since been closed as POB. My flagging history says "off-topic – Chappo Sep 3 at 2:02 declined." My recollection is that I thought it was seeking literary analysis, which is off-topic.

Cerberus

12:39 AM

@Chappo Yes, I have no idea.

Perhaps a system error?

Jasper Loy

Hiii

Chappo

@Cerberus Well, the declined ones are a tiny fraction of my total (7 out of 435 post flags) so I'm not going to lose any sleep over it. But I was concerned that maybe when I flag a question as off-topic for not showing enough research, it's being rejected for the other half of the flag (i.e. consider ELL instead).

Jasper Loy

@RegDwigнt I just saw your latest video. It is very strange that every time you upload a new video, within an hour there is already one like. I wonder if that is from Robusto or someone else... It must be a very big fan of yours. I have a big fan too, in the living room.

Chappo

Hi @JasperLoy. Nice to meet you :-)

Jasper Loy

@Chappo Hiii. Nice to meet you too. You can check out my youtube channel if you are bored. The link is in my profile.

Chappo

12:53 AM

@JasperLoy Great voice!!!

Jasper Loy

@Cerberus It could be a human error too. Sometimes, people just click on the wrong button, especially when they are using a touchpad and not a mouse, or worse, when they are using a mobile phone.

I remember there was once I edited a post on SE. After it was done, some tags were changed, but I did not change them, and the edit history didn't show anyone else doing edits, so I had no idea how it happened.

That edit removed a relevant tag and added an irrelevant tag, and I had to explain that I had no idea what happened, especially when I was using a mouse on a big computer.

Chappo

@JasperLoy I'm in a youtube video too, for a catch I took at an international cricket match as a spectator. Interview is at about 1:20.

Jasper Loy

@Mitch The lyrics of that song A Flower's All You Need made me cry. Some of it means a lot to me.

@Chappo I just saw it. I have never worn a hat myself.

@Chappo Oh, I would like to ask you since you seem to be Australian. Is the Macquarie Dictionary the most popular dictionary there? Also it seems that there is no way to buy the dictionary except from Australian stores and websites. For example, Amazon doesn't even carry it!

Chappo

@JasperLoy Sadly most people (probably globally) consult an online dictionary nowadays, and the Macquarie is paywalled. So my answer would be no, very few Australians would own one. Most homes probably have a dusty old Pocket Collins, or Concise Oxford.

I've been thinking of buying one though, both for professional purposes and for fun.

Jasper Loy

@Chappo I see. Well, Oxford does publish a two-volume Australian National Dictionary, but it is a rather old edition. I have the 2007 two-volume Shorter Oxford English Dictionary and also the 2010 Oxford Dictionary of English.

Chappo

1:09 AM

The great value of the Macquarie is in all the uniquely Australian (or Aust/NZ) words and expressions. When I get the time, I'm planning on asking a well-researched question here about the etymology of "blowing a foofoo valve" ;-)

I have the Australian Concise Oxford but it's a 1989 edition :(

Jasper Loy

Well, if you are interested in Scottish expressions, you should see the Chambers Dictionary.

And a new edition of Collins English Dictionary will be published next month.

Chappo

I dinnae ken that.

Jasper Loy

Some history about the Concise Oxford English Dictionary.

At first it was based on the Oxford English Dictionary, but the last few editions have been based on the Oxford Dictionary of English, which represents current English only and not historical English.

So OED is a different dictionary from ODE.

And the website oxforddictionaries.com where you can check words for free is actually the ODE, while oed.com is actually the OED of course.

I am very interested in all kinds of dictionaries, which is why I read up on them.

Chappo

I've been planning to see whether there's a way for me to access the OED via a subscribing library's online portal.

Jasper Loy

The personal subscription is very expensive for individuals.

Chappo

1:17 AM

Otherwise I could spend more time physically in my local library - there's a thought.

Jasper Loy

And the 20 volume 1989 edition costs a lot.

Chappo

I think Mary-Lou recently posted (on Meta?) about a special discount subscription offer?

Vague recollection it closes end of October??

Jasper Loy

I find the SOED a good abridgement of the full OED. It is also affordable.

However, it omits all words obsolete before 1700, and contains only 85,000 quotations intead of a few million, but it is good enough.

And it is more updated, being published in 2007.

Chappo

"S" stands for shorter?

Jasper Loy

Yes, so you might want to look at the SOED and the ODE too.

The ODE is excellent for examples of current English. I find that more important than historical quotations.

Feeds

1:22 AM

2

Q: Is there any synonymous word in English to describe an inoffensive girl?

In Asian countries, such as China and Korea, populace's aesthetic is quite different from the US. We prefer a girl who is more sweet, pure, and inoffensive, (my translation is not authentic in English, since sweet can be used to describe any kind of attractive females). And in Asian countries, i...

single-word-requests

Chappo

I was a dictionary geek in my teenage years, loved reading it for new words. I was a champion user of little-known two-letter words in scrabble!

Jasper Loy

@Chappo Collins English Dictionary is now the official dictionary of Scrabble. It used to be Chambers though.

Chappo

I'm glad - I never liked Chambers!

Jasper Loy

Chambers has humorous definitions for several words, but its fans like them.

Its definitions are too short to be comprehensible sometimes.

Collins has slightly better defintions, but the ODE has the best among the British dictionaries.

Chappo

Been a pleasure chatting. GTG. :-)

Jasper Loy

1:31 AM

Bye!

JBis

2:06 AM

When injecting a quote into a sentence how do you handle case change? For example:

> While he was in home...

The man claimed that the event occurred "While in his home..."

vs

The man claimed that the event occurred "while in his home..."

The man claimed that the event occurred "[w]hile in his home..."

Cerberus

Unless it is something extremely precise, just do "while...".

JBis

@Cerberus I don't have to use []?

Cerberus

Not unless it is something like quoting from some document as part of a lawsuit.

Or unless it is a linguistic research paper about spelling.

It's language, not computer language!

JBis

@Cerberus Sorry, I am a programmer XD

@Cerberus Thanks again!

Cerberus

Heh.

You will often see people use [w]hile in texts where there is really no reason to.

Under a false impression that such things are necessary in a normal text.

Just because they have seen it somewhere.

JBis

2:15 AM

@Cerberus Yes, thats where I got it from. Although I do use it if I need to explain something, within the quote, for context.

Cerberus

For example, newspapers habitually (and by convention) correct spelling and grammar errors when quoting people, unless there is some special reason to keep errors intact in that particular situation.

@JBis You mean the square brackets for comments? Yes, but that is something else entirely.

JBis

@Cerberus Yes. Content vs grammatical/spelling change.

@Cerberus I didn't know that. Figured they quoted exactly.

Cerberus

Nope.

JBis

(Besides, umms)

Cerberus

At least not good, traditional newspapers. Unless there is a special reason.

So if there is any doubt at all as to whether the correction might change the meaning of what was written or said, then they won't correct it.

Then they can use (sic) if necessary.

JBis

2:22 AM

sic, learned a new word!

Cerberus

Yay.

But don't overuse it!

Normally, when you quote someone's text that contains an error, fix it to save him from embarrassment, rather than emphasising the error by sicking it.

JBis

Probably why its not used super often (or at least I have never seen it)

Cerberus

Yes.

It is a bit like [w]hile: only used in contexts where you really need to be 100% exact, to indicate that something odd in the text is not your error/addition, but the original author's.

"He really write/said it like this!"

Sic is Latin for "so, like this".

JBis

@Cerberus Do you know Latin or just some stuff?

Cerberus

3:00 AM

@JBis I have read classics at university, so yes.

JBis

@Cerberus Nice. Would be interested, but I am bad at language :(

Cerberus

3:31 AM

@JBis I'm sure you could learn it fast!

Latin is very exact, in a way a bit like a computer language...

If you ever want to start learning some Latin, some recommend Ørberg's Lingua Latina per se Illustrata.

See whether you can read this...

SmokeDetector

4:11 AM

[ SmokeDetector | MS ] Offensive answer detected (80): What is proverbial town pump? by Merrill C on english.SE

Feeds

4:33 AM

0

Q: What's the hand stacking gesture called?

What is it called, the gesture whereby a team stack their hands on top of each other's with their palms face-down, then swing their arms quickly backwards, and go "Yeah!" or something, before they enthusiastically engage in some sort of teamwork activity?

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English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…