English Language & Usage: Multi-Layered Discourse Room

Mitch

16:08

The Traitors: Is a Welsh accent really more trustworthy?

Robusto

@Mitch If it is, then how did "to welsh on a bet" gain popularity?

jlliagre

Wordle 1,297 4/6

🟨⬛🟨⬛⬛
⬛🟨⬛⬛⬛
⬛⬛⬛⬛⬛
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

Vikas

@Mitch There should be option to mute all bots.

Mitch

@Vikas On Xitter and bsky, you only see bots if you 'follow' them (plus random ads thrown in which you can never avoid). So if you don't like a bot's content, don't follow it.

@Robusto I didn't think of that, but I'm sure the usual BBC readers/listeners had that in the back of their heads. Every region in England must have preconceived notions of them... notice in the article they waffled around the concept of...

> "They genuinely appreciated it, they find it funny, attractive and friendly, but they didn't take it seriously or associate it with intelligence"

OK they didn't waffle at all...they're basically saying the Welsh are trustworthy but stupid.

(that's not what statistical association means but that's how the article comes across.)

Vikas

16:29

@Mitch I don't follow but in comment threads you see them.

Mitch

@Vikas Oh...ok...maybe I just don't follow people that have replies that attract bots. I just don't think I've seen them much.

Cerberus

@GratefulDisciple Exactly!

Robusto

17:00

@tchrist Do you perceive a difference between gray and grey, or are they interchangeable for you?

jlliagre

17:16

@Robusto Color-blindness?

Robusto

@Mitch I think they ought to bring back poodle skirts. Or something poodle. Shorts? Brassieres? Hmm.

@jlliagre No, I'm talking about the words themselves. There are two spellings of the same color, but for me "grey" seems harder and more negative, as in "cold and grey" or "battleship grey"; whereas "old and gray" or "wispy gray dandelions" and so on are more positive. Or at least less pejorative.

Except the idiom "grey eminence" is always spelled with an "e" whereas "the Gray Lady" is the nickname of The New York Times.

Robusto

17:37

> In the UK we huddle around a single candle to keep warm. And when it gets really cold, we light it.

tchrist

18:16

@Robusto Absolutely no difference whatsoever.

I more often write grey myself except for Dicks like Grayson, but that's likely from reading too much English lit, and D&D. The Sindarin Elves are the Grey Elves, the Ered Mithrim are the grey mountains, and Mithrandir the grey wanderer.

Grey seems a bit more real to me therefore, as a spelling. But that's just silly hallucination. Plus I understand that "grey/gray" happens whenever R=G=B under the RBG color model and thus is by definition achromatic.

tchrist

18:38

> grey, gray: The adjective denoting the color
intermediate between black and white, or composed of a
mixture of black and white with little or no positive
hue; ash-colored, lead-colored. (Many correspondents
said that they used the two forms with a difference of
meaning or application: the distinction most generally
recognized being that grey denotes a more delicate or a
lighter tint than gray. Others considered the
difference to be that gray is a `warmer' color, or that
it has a mixture of red or brown (cf. also the quot.

@Robusto ^^^^^

Robusto

@tchrist The idiolectical (ortholectical?) preferences (prejudicews?) are mine, of course, but I wondered if you or anyone might experience something similar.

tchrist

> Cognate with Old Frisian grē, Middle Dutch grau, graeu, grou (in Old Dutch only in the place name Grawenvene (1132); Dutch grauw), Old Saxon ‑grē (only in appulgrē dapple grey, perhaps showing formal influence from Old Frisian; Middle Low German grā, grāwe), Old High German grāo (inflected grāw-; Middle High German grā, German grau), Old Icelandic grár, Old Swedish grar (Swedish grå), Old Danish gra, graa (Danish grå); further etymology uncertain and disputed.
Notes
Further etymology
Perhaps related to classical Latin rāvus (see note at roan adj.), although this form presents a number of…

Robusto

> Professional, if not primitive English usage has made a distinction between gray and grey. The spelling gray may with propriety be employed to designate admixtures in which simple black and white are employed. The form grey may indicate those admixtures which have the same general hue, but into which blue and its compounds more or less slightly enter.

Ahaa!

jlliagre

@Robusto I know that. Color-blindness was obviously a joke when referring to colorless colors ;-)

Connections
Puzzle #575
🟦🟨🟨🟨
🟪🟨🟨🟨
🟩🟨🟨🟨
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟩🟦🟩🟦

Jan 2 at 16:00, by jlliagre

Robusto

18:54

@jlliagre Sometimes it's hard for me to know when you're joking. A flat statement by you is not the same as a flat statement by @Mitch, for example. I know when he's joking (like, whenever he's typing, more or less). But you seem mostly to put in the smiley wink (;-) so when it's missing I either get confused or assume you're serious.

@jlliagre Now, now, let's not let a little game cast a pall on your whole year.

jlliagre

@Robusto Okay.

;-)

Robusto

That's better.

^_^

Mitch

19:11

@Robusto opens mouth to object

closes mouth

tchrist

@Robusto 1867

Not even 1967, even.

Mitch

Speaking of flat, what is a flat white?

tchrist

18

Robusto

@Mitch It's a white that isn't shiny, or a stupid espresso drink.

Mitch

It sounds like a coffee that white ladies in Lululemon get at Starbucks.

But it turns out it's basically a caffe latte.

Robusto

19:13

@tchrist Oh, come on. You mean you don't cleave to certain artifacts from bygone days? I think you do.

@Mitch I don't go for the trendy drinks. Coffee in a cup or mug, usually with a dash of cream, THVM.

tchrist

@Robusto I think as a kid I may have thought of grey as being a little bluish. But ever since I learned color theory and needed a word that means neutral, that's been long gone.

Jun 11, 2017 at 18:10, by tchrist

Sep 19 '12 at 13:44, by tchrist

@Robusto “At first, when they were highest, they seemed merely grey; but as we watched they dropped toward us, and I saw they were of a hue for which I can find no name but that stands to achroma as gold to yellow, or silver to white.”

Robusto

For me, the e in "gr_y" feels more dismal somehow than the brighter a.

tchrist

@Robusto Is it more dismal when they (the fey) prey than when the fay pray and play? And how do you feel about the sidhe? :)

> bay bey blay bray cay chay clay cray day dey dray fay fey flay fley fray gay gey gley gray grey Hay hay hey jay kay key kray lay ley May may nay ney pay play pray prey Ray ray say scray sey Shay shay skey skyey slay smay spay splay spray stay stey stray sway they tray trey tway way wey whey yay.

That isn't even counting obsolete versions.

Also: blae brae hae kae mae myae scrae spae tae thae vae yae.

> bay bey blae blay brae bray cay chay clay cray day dey dray fay feigh fey flay fley fray gay gey gley gray grey hae hay Hay heigh hey jay kae kay key kray lay ley mae may May myae nay neigh ney pay play pray prey ray Ray say scrae scray sey shay Shay skeigh skey skreigh skyey slay sleigh smay spae spay splay spray stay stey stray sway tae thae they tray trey tway vae way weigh wey whey yae yay.

GratefulDisciple

19:35

@tchrist FWIW, this Wikipedia article on Grayscale says "... a greyscale (more common in Commonwealth English) or grayscale (more common in American English) image ...", so maybe the difference is more to do where the word "gray" and "grey" is used? The famous novel "Fifty Shades of Grey" is by a British author.

tchrist

@GratefulDisciple Same thing with greylisting. Just use whichever you please.

I very much do know people who get very uncomfortable that words have more than one spelling.

Of course the answer is to use just one at a time. :)

But it becomes an invitation of colorful/colourful invective if every such adknowledgment/acknowledgemnt of greylisting/graylisting need be spelled/spelt out so explicitly that it makes people question your judgment/judgement.

GratefulDisciple

@Mitch I rarely go to Starbucks, but one day I was intrigued to try what Starbucks Blonde® Roast Coffee taste like (I usually get Pike Place® Roast. Turns out it's so bland, maybe targeted for the same "white ladies in Lululemon".

tchrist

The furore/furor would be neverending.

Wikipedia:List of spelling variants

This is a list of British English words that have different American English spellings, for example, colour (British English) and color (American English). Word pairs are listed with the British English version first, in italics, followed by the American English version: spelt, spelled Derived words often, but not always, follow their root. Thus "neighbour/neighbor" give "neighbourly/neighborly", "neighbouring/neighboring" etc. (but "licensing" is used everywhere, in spite of "licence/license"). Plurals and verb forms almost always follow even though not listed here: "analyses/analyzes", "...

GratefulDisciple

@tchrist I used to be uncomfortable with aluminium/aluminum, so just give up and go with the flow. (When I learned English in Indonesia, we used British spelling; the influence of British Council was more palpable than the American counterpart as well.)

tchrist

@GratefulDisciple For the most part, nobody used to know about these before mass media and the internet came along.

I remember having to go out of my name to purchase UK editions of novels written by English authbors so they didn't screw with the text.

GratefulDisciple

19:49

@tchrist Or when people immigrate.

tchrist

This is being done less often now. But it still happens. Pisses me off.

@GratefulDisciple Indeed.

Living in England you cannot help but notice things nobody ever tells you about otherwise.

Or here, vice versa.

It's the things that aren't just spelt differently but worded differently that are the hardest.

Alternate vocabularies.

No matter what list of these you find, reality is more divergent still.

Plus you have all these crazy internal regionalisms anywhere that's big enough. So you end up misgeneralizing by accident.

GratefulDisciple

@tchrist Just came across an off-topic article for this chatroom, but started with an anecdote of the peculiarity of British word usage for an American audience. (The section on a sign: "No football coaches")

tchrist

@GratefulDisciple It somewhat annoys me that it's considered ok to make the English read things written by Americans but not the other way around.

People need to learn how pluricentric languages work.

Especially English.

@GratefulDisciple "Ancient Near East" is another of those terms that the language police don't like. So exhausting.

GratefulDisciple

@tchrist Yes; that's annoying. Learn new word today.

tchrist

> Pluricentric languages (PLCLs) are a common type among the languages of the world. Presently 43 languages have been identified as belonging to this category, for instance, English, Spanish, Portuguese, Bengali, Hindi, Urdu (Crystal, 2003).

GratefulDisciple

19:56

@tchrist Yes, I have come across several introductory books / textbooks on ANE that are prefaced with a sort of apology of why the field is named that way.

tchrist

> Near East: This article is about the geographical term. For the geopolitical region that it applies to, see Middle East. For another region that it roughly applies to, see West Asia. For the ancient history of the region, see Ancient Near East.

Makes you half want to give up talking to anybody.

Near ≠ Middle.

> Near East and Middle East are both Eurocentric terms.

Yes, and so is English itself inherently Eurocentric.

Notice how you don't hear people getting scolded for mentioned western democracies.

There are also northern biases.

In our tongue.

Because our tongue originated in a particular place.

Like telling people they can't sing Christmas carols involving snow because it's offensive to the southern hemisphere, or even that shepherds are not in their fields during wintertime.

> Across the world, the consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages is responsible for about 340,000 deaths each year from Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, according to a study published Monday that is one of the largest attempts to assess how the spread of Western eating habits is affecting global health.

See, it's everywhere!

Remember what 中國 (pinyin: Zhōngguó) really means. :)

Chung Kuo in Wade–Giles.

It's the center or middle ~~kingdom~~ country, what China calls themselves. See also the Mediterranean Sea.

Deictics happen. Cope.

GratefulDisciple

20:20

@tchrist I don't speak Chinese, but my dad didn't fail to let me know what the word means. It can be dangerous if the current Chinese government inculcate through their propaganda to its 1.5 billion population (I really don't know what's going on there) to realize (make real) the word's meaning in Reality. They did cultural revolution before (I shudder to see how Western instruments were treated in the movie The Red Violin).

jlliagre

20:57

> too, to, two

What variants are those?

handan_toddler

homonyms

(I guess)

🙊🤐🤥

homophones

jlliagre

@handan_toddler It is supposed to be a list of spelling variants. Homonyms/homophones are not spelling variants of a single word.

handan_toddler

Right, pardon moi.

MetaEd

Wordle 1,297 3/6

⬛🟨⬛🟨⬛
⬛🟨🟩⬛🟨
🟩🟩🟩🟩🟩

handan_toddler

Pronounced "mwa."

As in mwahahaha :-)

@MetaEd nice avatar.

MetaEd

21:19

Strands #309
“In neutral”
🔵🔵🔵🟡
🔵🔵🔵

@handan_toddler Thank you! The date is coming right up

handan_toddler

👍👍

MetaEd

Connections
Puzzle #575
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟪🟪🟪🟪

I really, really wanted the purple category to have to do with homonyms

GratefulDisciple

21:47

@Cerberus I keep thinking of items related to a (food-related) PICNIC before I saw another meaning. The purple I didn't know until it was revealed.

Connections
Puzzle #575
🟨🟨🟨🟨
🟩🟦🟩🟦
🟩🟪🟦🟩
🟩🟩🟩🟩
🟪🟦🟦🟦
🟦🟦🟦🟦
🟪🟪🟪🟪

Robusto

22:05

You folks are LATE to the party. Did you miss your connection?

jlliagre

Tightrope, a daily trivia game | Britannica

Jan. 6, 2025

T I G H T R O P E
💔 💔 💔 ⎵ ⎵ ⎵ ⎵ ⎵ ⎵ 🤕

My Score: 0
Could be worse, couldn't it?

Daily Octordle #1078
5️⃣8️⃣
9️⃣🕛
🕚6️⃣
🔟7️⃣
Score: 68

Robusto

@jlliagre I think you reached the limit of worse there. All the way to worst, in fact.

jlliagre

@Robusto No. Should I have been allowed to play three more steps, I would have had six failures in a row.

Robusto

@jlliagre You already precipitated the coup de grace. Or, as many people pronounce it, coup de gras ... ;-)

jlliagre

22:20

@Robusto I prefer the second one. A coup de gras is softer :-)

Robusto

True. But it probably doesn't have the effect desired by the administer.

jlliagre

Executioners can't spell? What a shame!

Daily Sequence Octordle #1078
4️⃣5️⃣
6️⃣7️⃣
8️⃣9️⃣
🔟🕚
Score: 60

handan_toddler

@Robusto well, let's get this party started

Mitch

22:37

The Executioner (1963 film)

The Executioner (Spanish: El verdugo) is a 1963 Spanish satirical dark comedy film directed by Luis García Berlanga. It was filmed in black and white, and is widely considered a classic of Spanish cinema. The film won several awards, both in Spain and internationally. == Plot == Amadeo, an executioner in Madrid, meets José Luis, a funeral parlour employee who is going to pick up the prisoner that Amadeo has just executed. José Luis cannot find a girlfriend, since all girls leave him when they find out that he works in a funeral parlour. Amadeo's daughter, Carmen, cannot find a boyfriend, because...

I think they can spell but it's hard to get a match.

Araucaria - Him

@alphabet Hey there. Was thinking about this here Q:

1

Q: Who or Whom? Which is correct?

That's who we know about. Whom doesn't sound right. Predicate copulative?

I don't think anyone's picked up on the issue, which is that the string concerned is neither a relative clause nor an interrogative, but a 'fused relative construction' aka 'a free relative'.

jlliagre

@Mitch Aaargh, the garrota. Frankly, I'd prefer the guillotine should I have to chose. I hope not though.

Araucaria - Him

@alphabet The word who there aguably has two functions: It's the Head of the NP functioning as Object of about, but it's also the Pronucleus for the free relative and thus as a prenucleus would normally be able to reflect the case of the gap that follows.

@alphabet I thought you might like to answer with in a proper professional kind of way? I am marking essays and exams and stuff so no can do ... But someone needs to give the OP and wider audience a proper answer. One of yours would be great!

Mitch

@jlliagre argh, c'est le case de le diré.

jlliagre

*to choose

Mitch

22:48

@jlliagre my method to be executed? ...

Old age.

jlliagre

Expeditious method!

Araucaria - Him

23:02

@alphabet Aargh, that's what happens if you multi-task (or rather if I do).

The two functions are head of the NP functioning as PC of BE and then clause internally the object of about.

handan_toddler

yeah, multi-tasking erodes attention focus

handan_toddler

23:25

but maybe, that's why we get addicted to it

Araucaria - Him

@alphabet I'm getting there slowly: prenucleus co-indexed with the gap functioning as the object of about [And that's another reason why you should write the answer]

@handan_toddler Yep

Transcript for

English Language & Usage: Multi-Layer…