The Cunning Linguists....

[Katuschka]

This is totally not language stuff!

Well, I tried, haven't I......

[manderlyh]

I always appreciated English in school. I think it's a damn shame there are people in foreign countries who speak English better than some native English speakers. One of my co-workers is from Ethiopia, and she speaks better English than another one of my co-workers....who was born in Atlanta....to two parents who are also native English speakers.

Better English? As in Better Standard American English?

According to linguists, no one speaks a "better" version of a language than another. It's just their dialect.

Well, I tried, haven't I......

I'm trying too.

[SunChild]

I always think how cool it is that in a small country like ours that I can travel 30 miles down the road and people sound totally different to me !! Do they not say that the Bristol accent is derived from the West Indies ?? as there is a connection with the tone/sound as alot of people came over from the Carribean to Bristol many moons ago !

Trying to find out the origin of "cunning linguist" I came across this site, where they discuss COWS having regional accents, I kid you not:

http://timefortuckerman.com/forums/showthread.php?p=82473

Here's a bit o trivia from the bovine branch of blarney belching.

Cows also 'have regional accents'...

Cows have regional accents like humans, language specialists have suggested. They decided to examine the issue after dairy farmers noticed their cows had slightly different moos, depending on which herd they came from.

John Wells, Professor of Phonetics at the University of London, said regional twangs had been seen before in birds.

The farmers in Somerset who noticed the phenomenon said it may have been the result of the close bond between them and their animals.

Farmer Lloyd Green, from Glastonbury, said: "I spend a lot of time with my ones and they definitely moo with a Somerset drawl.

"I've spoken to the other farmers in the West Country group and they have noticed a similar development in their own herds. "It works the same as with dogs - the closer a farmer's bond is with his animals, the easier it is for them to pick up his accent."

Peer pressure

Prof Wells felt the accents could result from their contemporaries.

He said: "This phenomenon is well attested in birds. You find distinct chirping accents in the same species around the country.

"This could also be true of cows.

"In small populations such as herds you would encounter identifiable dialectical variations which are most affected by the immediate peer group."

Dr Jeanine Treffers-Daller, reader in linguistics at the University of the West of England in Bristol, agreed that the accent could be influenced by relatives.

She said: "When we are learning to speak, we adopt a local variety of language spoken by our parents, so the same could be said about the variation in the West Country cow moo."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/5277090.stm?ls

Go to this weblink and listen!

Yes, I do find wonderfully odd and potentially useful things on the net and am proud to share them with you all! Enjoy! Personally I like the Somerset Cow accent.

Ex-English major here - this is a great thread!

[SunChild]

Well, I tried, haven't I......

Indeed, quite lovely.

Is there a translation of the poem?

[SunChild]

I studied English Language and English Literature extensively for two years. I studied language acquisition as well as the evolution of the english language. I delved into the works of Chaucer and other old English texts. It was great fun. Also studied dialects and the effect the language has on people.

We should have a create a neologism competition.

Great idea. You start.

Can anyone explain the origins of "W00T" I just don't get it...

[Katuschka]

Indeed, quite lovely.

Is there a translation of the poem?

Yes, sure, I believe there are many, including Tennyson's 'translation,' which is rather a biased interpretation. I have one authentic translation, which was done by one of my professors, but as far as I know, she has used it only for academic purposes, so I'm not sure if I'm allowed to post it here.

[Electrophile]

Better English? As in Better Standard American English?

Yes.

[AllisonAdler]

Right! This ain't no place for childish pervs. Do you know what time is it now? It's...POETRY TIME!

The Battle of Brunnanburh

I've always loved this--such a fantastic poem!

[MS1]

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

"Beware the Jabberwock, my son!

The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

The frumious Bandersnatch!"

He took his vorpal sword in hand:

Long time the manxome foe he sought—

So rested he by the Tumtum tree,

And stood awhile in thought.

And, as in uffish thought he stood,

The Jabberwock, with eyes of flame,

Came whiffling through the tulgey wood,

And burbled as it came!

One, two! One, two! And through and through

The vorpal blade went snicker-snack!

He left it dead, and with its head

He went galumphing back.

"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?

Come to my arms, my beamish boy!

O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"

He chortled in his joy.

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

[SunChild]

Indeed, quite lovely.

Is there a translation of the poem?

Thanks, I found the Tennyson and another translation online, thanks be to Google... blech - it's all about manly men bloodily slaying each other with axes and hammers, not my favorite topic ("the pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"). Still, very interesting as language.

Not Zep related but I'm moved to post this in honor of Tatiana. Too bad the young men from San Jose apparently never studied it:

TIGER, tiger, burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

In what distant deeps or skies

Burnt the fire of thine eyes?

On what wings dare he aspire?

What the hand dare seize the fire?

And what shoulder and what art

Could twist the sinews of thy heart?

And when thy heart began to beat,

What dread hand and what dread feet?

What the hammer? what the chain?

In what furnace was thy brain?

What the anvil? What dread grasp

Dare its deadly terrors clasp?

When the stars threw down their spears,

And water'd heaven with their tears,

Did He smile His work to see?

Did He who made the lamb make thee?

Tiger, tiger, burning bright

In the forests of the night,

What immortal hand or eye

Dare frame thy fearful symmetry?

[SunChild]

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

Thank you Sam, an all-time favorite!

[manderlyh]

'Twas brillig, and the slithy toves

Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:

All mimsy were the borogoves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

Okay Sam...now I'll pass my linguistics homework over to you so you can tell my teacher what part of speach "gyre," "borogoves," "mome," "outgrabe" and "raths" are.

I LOVE William Blake!

The Red Cross Telegram

The Red Cross telegram

Read when it came

Those five and twenty words;

The terror, fear,

Was there; I did not date

To grasp the cruelty

That now I know

It did contain:

'We have to move,

Our residence will not

Remain this town,

Farewell, beloved child.'

How can I ever sing

A requiem

In silent, dark despair,

Transfiguring

Your calvary of nails

And gas and graves.

Lotte Kramer

[Katuschka]

Thanks, I found the Tennyson and another translation online, thanks be to Google... blech - it's all about manly men bloodily slaying each other with axes and hammers, not my favorite topic ("the pain of war cannot exceed the woe of aftermath"). Still, very interesting as language.

I think it's mostly about finding a place in the world, but yes...axes, hammers....they were Anglo-Saxons after all.

[manderlyh]

The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock

T.S. Eliot

LET us go then, you and I, 1

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherised upon a table;

Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats 5

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question … 10

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”

Let us go and make our visit.

In the room the women come and go

Talking of Michelangelo.

The yellow fog that rubs its back upon the window-panes, 15

The yellow smoke that rubs its muzzle on the window-panes

Licked its tongue into the corners of the evening,

Lingered upon the pools that stand in drains,

Let fall upon its back the soot that falls from chimneys,

Slipped by the terrace, made a sudden leap, 20

And seeing that it was a soft October night,

Curled once about the house, and fell asleep.

And indeed there will be time

For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,

Rubbing its back upon the window-panes; 25

There will be time, there will be time

To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;

There will be time to murder and create,

And time for all the works and days of hands

That lift and drop a question on your plate; 30

Time for you and time for me,

And time yet for a hundred indecisions,

And for a hundred visions and revisions,

Before the taking of a toast and tea.

In the room the women come and go 35

Talking of Michelangelo.

And indeed there will be time

To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?”

Time to turn back and descend the stair,

With a bald spot in the middle of my hair— 40

[They will say: “How his hair is growing thin!”]

My morning coat, my collar mounting firmly to the chin,

My necktie rich and modest, but asserted by a simple pin—

[They will say: “But how his arms and legs are thin!”]

Do I dare 45

Disturb the universe?

In a minute there is time

For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse.

For I have known them all already, known them all:—

Have known the evenings, mornings, afternoons, 50

I have measured out my life with coffee spoons;

I know the voices dying with a dying fall

Beneath the music from a farther room.

So how should I presume?

And I have known the eyes already, known them all— 55

The eyes that fix you in a formulated phrase,

And when I am formulated, sprawling on a pin,

When I am pinned and wriggling on the wall,

Then how should I begin

To spit out all the butt-ends of my days and ways? 60

And how should I presume?

And I have known the arms already, known them all—

Arms that are braceleted and white and bare

[but in the lamplight, downed with light brown hair!]

It is perfume from a dress 65

That makes me so digress?

Arms that lie along a table, or wrap about a shawl.

And should I then presume?

And how should I begin?

. . . . .

Shall I say, I have gone at dusk through narrow streets 70

And watched the smoke that rises from the pipes

Of lonely men in shirt-sleeves, leaning out of windows?…

I should have been a pair of ragged claws

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas.

. . . . .

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully! 75

Smoothed by long fingers,

Asleep … tired … or it malingers,

Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me.

Should I, after tea and cakes and ices,

Have the strength to force the moment to its crisis? 80

But though I have wept and fasted, wept and prayed,

Though I have seen my head [grown slightly bald] brought in upon a platter,

I am no prophet—and here’s no great matter;

I have seen the moment of my greatness flicker,

And I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker, 85

And in short, I was afraid.

And would it have been worth it, after all,

After the cups, the marmalade, the tea,

Among the porcelain, among some talk of you and me,

Would it have been worth while, 90

To have bitten off the matter with a smile,

To have squeezed the universe into a ball

To roll it toward some overwhelming question,

To say: “I am Lazarus, come from the dead,

Come back to tell you all, I shall tell you all”— 95

If one, settling a pillow by her head,

Should say: “That is not what I meant at all.

That is not it, at all.”

And would it have been worth it, after all,

Would it have been worth while, 100

After the sunsets and the dooryards and the sprinkled streets,

After the novels, after the teacups, after the skirts that trail along the floor—

And this, and so much more?—

It is impossible to say just what I mean!

But as if a magic lantern threw the nerves in patterns on a screen: 105

Would it have been worth while

If one, settling a pillow or throwing off a shawl,

And turning toward the window, should say:

“That is not it at all, That is not what I meant, at all.” 110

. . . . .

No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Am an attendant lord, one that will do

To swell a progress, start a scene or two,

Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,

Deferential, glad to be of use, 115

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;

Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;

At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—

Almost, at times, the Fool.

I grow old … I grow old … 120

I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.

Shall I part my hair behind?

Do I dare to eat a peach?

I shall wear white flannel trousers, and walk upon the beach.

I have heard the mermaids singing, each to each.

I do not think that they will sing to me. 125

I have seen them riding seaward on the waves

Combing the white hair of the waves blown back

When the wind blows the water white and black.

We have lingered in the chambers of the sea

By sea-girls wreathed with seaweed red and brown 130

Till human voices wake us, and we drown.

[MS1]

Okay Sam...now I'll pass my linguistics homework over to you so you can tell my teacher what part of speach "gyre," "borogoves," "mome," "outgrabe" and "raths" are.

And it will take all my cunning to do so.

Which is a bad thing, since I am no longer a cunning linguist, only a master debater.

Are we posting poetry? If you know me, you know what's coming next:

Ode to a Naked Beauty

With chaste heart, and pure

eyes

I celebrate you, my beauty,

restraining my blood

so that the line

surges and follows

your contour,

and you bed yourself in my verse,

as in woodland, or wave-spume:

earth's perfume,

sea's music.

Nakedly beautiful,

whether it is your feet, arching

at a primal touch

of sound or breeze,

or your ears,

tiny spiral shells

from the splendour of America's oceans.

Your breasts also,

of equal fullness, overflowing

with the living light

and, yes,

winged

your eyelids of silken corn

that disclose

or enclose

the deep twin landscapes of your eyes.

The line of your back

separating you

falls away into paler regions

then surges

to the smooth hemispheres

of an apple,

and goes splitting

your loveliness

into two pillars

of burnt gold, pure alabaster,

to be lost in the twin clusters of your feet,

from which, once more, lifts and takes fire

the double tree of your symmetry:

flower of fire, open circle of candles,

swollen fruit raised

over the meeting of earth and ocean.

Your body - from what substances

agate, quartz, ears of wheat,

did it flow, was it gathered,

rising like bread

in the warmth,

and signalling hills

silvered,

valleys of a single petal, sweetnesses

of velvet depth,

until the pure, fine, form of woman

thickened

and rested there?

It is not so much light that falls

over the world

extended by your body

its suffocating snow,

as brightness, pouring itself out of you,

as if you were

burning inside.

by Pablo Neruda.

BTW, cunning linguists, this was translated from Spanish.

[Katuschka]

The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock

T.S. Eliot

Oh...bad memories, bad memories....

[manderlyh]

And it will take all my cunning to do so.

Which is a bad thing, since I am no longer a cunning linguist, only a master debater.

Are we posting poetry? If you know me, you know what's coming next:

BTW, cunning linguists, this was translated from Spanish.

I think WE DO know you!

Oh...bad memories, bad memories....

Why?

[SunChild]

I think it's mostly about finding a place in the world, but yes...axes, hammers....they were Anglo-Saxons after all.

Yeah. I will read it more carefully, thanks.

Okay Sam...now I'll pass my linguistics homework over to you so you can tell my teacher what part of speach "gyre," "borogoves," "mome," "outgrabe" and "raths" are.

Ok, here's my shot at it, keeping in mind I haven't been in school for quite some time:

gyre = verb

borogoves = noun

mome = noun

outgrabe = wtf?

raths = adverb

The Red Cross Telegram

The Red Cross telegram

Read when it came

Those five and twenty words;

The terror, fear,

Was there; I did not date

To grasp the cruelty

That now I know

It did contain:

'We have to move,

Our residence will not

Remain this town,

Farewell, beloved child.'

How can I ever sing

A requiem

In silent, dark despair,

Transfiguring

Your calvary of nails

And gas and graves.

Lotte Kramer

[MS1]

Ok, here's my shot at it, keeping in mind I haven't been in school for quite some time:

gyre = verb

borogoves = noun

mome = noun

outgrabe = wtf?

raths = adverb

I'd put it this way:

gyre = verb

borogoves = noun

mome = adjective

raths = noun

outgrabe = verb

Well, how bout it Miss Manders? Who's right?

*remembers he hasn't taken an english class in a decade*

eep.

[Katuschka]

Why?

I had to write an essay on this poem. It was for my literary studies seminar. The final essay. My observations regarding the poem itself were quite good, the problem was that I sufficiently answer the main queston - which was about discussing the poem in its historical context. I got C....which was a pass, and that was important, so I still consider myself lucky.

But...you know...

[SunChild]

And it will take all my cunning to do so.

Which is a bad thing, since I am no longer a cunning linguist, only a master debater.

Are we posting poetry? If you know me, you know what's coming next:

Ode to a Naked Beauty

With chaste heart, and pure

eyes

Yeah, right...

[SunChild]

And it will take all my cunning to do so.

Which is a bad thing, since I am no longer a cunning linguist, only a master debater.

Oh, behave!

Have to share. I work in information systems at a hospital and probably our most important file is the Master Patient Index. masterpatientindex. Say that ten times real fast. Excuse me?? The WHAT?

Some of us are incapable of keeping a straight face in meetings anymore.

[manderlyh]

gyre = verb

borogoves = noun

mome = noun

outgrabe = wtf?

raths = adverb

gyre = verb

borogoves = noun

mome = adjective

raths = noun

outgrabe = verb

Well, how bout it Miss Manders? Who's right?

I had to consult the answer book.

gyre= verb

borogoves=noun

mome=adjective

raths=noun

outgrabe=verb

Looks like you did! (as in you got the MOST right)

I literally did have to look in my linguistics workbook to see what the answers were. I was just being a smartass.

[MS1]

The Revenant

by Billy Collins

I am the dog you put to sleep,

as you like to call the needle of oblivion,

come back to tell you this simple thing:

I never liked you—not one bit.

When I licked your face,

I thought of biting off your nose.

When I watched you toweling yourself dry,

I wanted to leap and unman you with a snap.

I resented the way you moved,

your lack of animal grace,

the way you would sit in a chair to eat,

a napkin on your lap, knife in your hand.

I would have run away,

but I was too weak, a trick you taught me

while I was learning to sit and heel,

and—greatest of insults—shake hands without a hand.

I admit the sight of the leash

would excite me

but only because it meant I was about

to smell things you had never touched.

You do not want to believe this,

but I have no reason to lie.

I hated the car, the rubber toys,

disliked your friends and, worse, your relatives.

The jingling of my tags drove me mad.

You always scratched me in the wrong place.

All I ever wanted from you

was food and fresh water in my metal bowls.

While you slept, I watched you breathe

as the moon rose in the sky.

It took all of my strength

not to raise my head and howl.

Now I am free of the collar,

the yellow raincoat, monogrammed sweater,

the absurdity of your lawn,

and that is all you need to know about this place

except what you already supposed

and are glad it did not happen sooner—

that everyone here can read and write,

the dogs in poetry, the cats and the others in prose.

[SunChild]

I had to consult the answer book.

gyre= verb

borogoves=noun

mome=adjective

raths=noun

outgrabe=verb

Looks like you did!

I literally did have to look in my linguistics workbook to see what the answers were. I was just being a smartass.

Congrats Sam! Happy New Year to the Cunning Linguists!