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 Language Learning Forum : Language Learning Log |  | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6696 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes  Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3225 of 3959 06 April 2013 at 12:50pm | IP Logged | ||
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Yesterday evening I basically did two things: I studied the Modern Greek morphology for substantives and adjectives, and lo and behold, at long last I opened my Irish Harry Potter II ("HP agus an Órchloch") and studied the first page.
Let's take Greek first. For some reason I haven't ever made a green sheet for this part of the morphology, so now I sat down with my truly essential Routledge grammar and tried to concentrate its informations into some kind of table. Ironically I have postponed this process because the system seemed fairly simple - for example the main endings of the substantives the adjectives are identical - but when you consider the exceptions then it becomes less trivial. My method is to look for 'minirules' which explain some part of a pattern. The most common pattern for the masculine (substantives as well as adjectives) is "ος (ε) ο ου / οι ους ων" *. But actually exactly the same form is also used for a few feminines and words which can be either gender, and there is a variation on it in the neuter "ος ο ους / η η ων". But there is a competing set of endings, which in the masculine is "ας α α / ες ες ων" or "ης η η / ες ες ων" (with a variant "εας εα εα / εις εις εων") - but in the feminine the ς'es er shuffled around in the singular: "α α ας / ες ες ων" or "η η ης / ες ες ων" (with a variant " η η ης / εις εις εων"). Now these patterns are parisyllable, but there are also imparisyllablic patterns: "ας α α / εδες εδες ων" etc. which basically are parallel to group two in both masculine and feminine with an inserted εδ in the plural - and actually there are adjectives, though not the most common ones, which also have this insertion. There is one funny detail: in the genitive singular of a few feminines on η you can choose between "ης" and "εως" .. and then I simply had to consult my only book on Ancient Greek ("40 Leçons pour découvrir le grec ancien") to get a confirmation of my hunch, that this weird and unmotivated "εως" really is a survival from days of yore - something like seeing an Archaeopteryx sitting on a branch in your back garden. The system in the neutrum is slightly different, partly because of the general rule that the accusative is identical to the nominative in both singular and plural, but the choice of insertions in the imparisyllabics is also different (τα for substantives), with the interesting feature that this insertion is used not only in the plural, but also in the genitive singular. OK, 'nuff Greek morphology - if you have reached this point you should have a medal. Let's switch to Irish. * singular nominative, (vocative), accusative, genitive / plural nominative, accusative, genitive (the vocative is only represented in this paradigm, otherwise the nominative form is used) IR: Thosaigh mé ag léamh "Harry Potter agus an Órchloch" .. agus an tús a bhí deacair. Mar shampla, an teideal ar chaibidil 1, "An Gasúr a Tháinig Slán", a fhreagraíonn don teanga "The boy who lived" i mBéarla. Tá "slán", ar ndóigh, ar eolas go maith as "slán agat" nó "slán leat" (Goodbye) . Ach "tháinig slán"?? "Tháinig" nach bhfuil i mo foclóir, ach tá a fhios agam ón am atá caite go bhfuil sé an fhoirm anuas "tar", "to come" i mBéarla. "Tar slán" níl i mo foclóir, ach a dhéanann sé an abairt "teacht slán", "to survive" i mBéarla. Tá "teacht" i mo foclóir ... na modhanna a líomhnaítear "to freeze" i mBéarla. Thug mé suas slabhra leanúint anseo - chun maireachtáil ("to survive") go maith go leor dom. Níl an t-aistriúchán Gaeilge go leor litheartha mar an t-aistriúchán Laidine de na imleabhar seo a leanas. Go hádhúil, tá pasáistí níos éasca. The Irish translation of the Potter stone book seems to be slightly less literal than the Latin one of the occult camera volume, and my troubles started already at the title of the first chapter, where I didn't find the expression "tháinig slán" in my dictionary - not even when I used my knowledge of Irish irregular verbs and checked the article about tar for *"tar slán" ("tháinig" is the past tense of "tar", to come"). However I found "teacht slán" 'to survive', which fits rather well the original title line "The boy who lived". For that segment of the reading community who hasn't yet read HP the toddler Harry was attacked by an evil sorcerer and miraculously survived, and somehow this monumental failure killed the sorcerer. I found out that the verb "teacht" means 'to freeze', but the homonymous noun means "approach, arrival" which isn't too far from the meaning of the verb "tar" ('to come'). So I decided to settle for something like 'the boy who survived' and proceed to the next line. At this speed it will of course take some time before I reach the end of the 262 pages, but by then I should be able to read Irish. Btw. the word "Órchloch" sounds much more ominous than the bland English "Philosopher's stone" . Which philosopher? Bahh. Edited by Iversen on 06 April 2013 at 1:12pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6696 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3226 of 3959 08 April 2013 at 10:53am | IP Logged | ||
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I'll pass through Slovenia soon, but so far I don't have any materials regarding the Slovenian language. So as a substitute I have put an old Berlitz language guide "Serbo-kroatisk til rejsebrug" in my bag to read in the bus-back-home. And yes, it is OOOOLD .. I bought it in the eighties, where I visited Herceg-Novi. And no, I wouldn't use it for serious study, but just to brush up my scanty memories of Kroatian from later travels it can't hurt.
But it was clearly written by people who drive cars and hate trains. There are eighteen pages about what to do when your car breaks down plus two with street signs, while train travel has been limited to five pages in the section about 'Rundrejse' (travelling around). And here I found the following utterly foolish passage (my translation): You will probably not be spending most of your holiday travelling by train or waiting on a railway station, so here we'll limit ourselves to certain situations (..). If you have trouble regarding tickets or train times, you can contact a travel agency, where the [employees] probably speak English or another main language, or to the receptionist at your hotel. Erh, what's the purpose of a language guide? To tell people to contact the receptionist at your hotel if you need a train ticket? Btw. the night train from Serbia to Greece which I used a couple of years ago was definitely older than the Berlitz guide. I had booked an expensive 1 class single compartment, so at least I didn't have to share it. However even at 1. class the toilets didn't work and there was no water at all in the whole wagon, and therefore the faeces piled up in the toilet bowls and my personal sink stank of urine so I had to cover it up. Luckily I'll only visit a couple of places in Slovenia the next time, and Lonely Planet claims that the trains there have been updated since the war. Edited by Iversen on 08 April 2013 at 12:44pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6696 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3227 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 12:31am | IP Logged | ||
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POR: Ontem eu li no Berlitz croata no autobús, e isto foi estranho - a última vez que eu olhei alguma coisa numa língua eslava do sul foi o sérvio, e em parecia muito estranho ver as mesmas palavras escritas num alfabeto latino. Especialmente porque eu tambem reconheço muitos deles de língua russa. Hoje eu falhou a guía Berlitz e leia em vez algumas textos em Português. Havia um artigo sobre Cristina Branco, que teimosamente nega que ela seja fadista, embora ser ela provavelmente uma dos mais importantes da espècie (quando ela não está perdendo o seu tempo com jazz). Outro artigo tratava do Banco de Gringotts, terceiro de J.K. Rawlings e o seu dinheiro, e ao final eu leí uma longa explicação do conceito 'Horcrux' no universo mágico.
I read my Berlitz yesterday - and it was a weird feeling because I mostly read Serbian and Macedonian texts in Cyrillic last time I was in that part of the world. And then it feels almost unnatural to see the same words in Croatian with Latin letters - especially because I recognize many words from Russian. Of course I have been to Croatia several times, but that was before my interest in language really resurfaced. Time will tell whether a few days in Slovenia can change that. Actually I prefer reading Slavic languages in Cyrillic, because there is so much else I can read in Latin writing. Today I betrayed poor old Berlitz for some printouts in Portuguese: one article about the fadista Cristina Branco (who doesn't actually use the word about herself) and a series of articles connected to the world of Harry Potter: one about Gringott's Bank, one about J.K. Rawlings (with a keen interest in her personal money tank) and finally a longer article about the seven Horcruxes. IR: Agus lean se Harry Potter chuig ag gnáthú ar mo cónaí umhala. Rinne mé staidéar ar leathanach eile ar imleabhar I, agus cé go bhfuil focal anaithnid go leor, táim slán sábháilte agam toisc go bhfuil mé an leagan Béarla (agus mo foclóir) ag mo thaobh. Is cuimhin liom ó físeán le Krashen agus Steve Kaufmann, gur bhféadfadh Steve glacadh le 40% focail anaithnid mar go bhfaigheann sé na focail ar fad mar bhronntanasas ona chóras lingq. CAT: Mentre jo lluitava amb las fosques paraulas irlandesas, vaig guardar la televisió, incloent el programa "Gent" en espanyol de TVE. Vam visitar llocs en Barcelona i València que jo mateix he visitat, com por eixemple la Rambla. No obstant això, jo no estava tan boig brolla per jugar als jocs amb el quals els estafadors es diverteixen en aquest carrer. Jo no don diners als músics de carrer ni als estàtues vivents, però hi havia en realitat un senyor en la emissió que va ser molt impressionant en el seu vestit del diable - i talment bó tan bo que talvez valgui un cèntim . Em va sorprendre que cada estatua té el seu propi lloc oficial i certificat, amb una placa per marcar el lloc i un horari regular. També vam visitar la Sagrada Famil-- de Gaudí i l'Aquari de València, que ara compta amb una morsa de més d'una tona de pes. While I battled valiantly with the murky Irish world of linguistic magick I did actually also watch TV, including a program in Spanish from TVE about people in Barcelona and Valencia. I have never been so totally braindead as to play in the games offered by sneaky dexterous and smoothtalking scammers, and I never give money to street musicians - well, not even to 'human statues, although I find them less nauseating than the usual fare of tonedeaf Dylanites .. but in this program they showed one man in a devil's costume which actually deserved a cent or two for his performance. Besides I actually learned something: apparently the guys and gals playing statues on the Rambla have each their own certified spot with a little plaque in the street, and they have a timetable telling them when they are supposed to be there. So it is not pure chaos, as I always have thought. PS: * "gnatach" is not in my dictionary, but the verb has a weird duplicity. I looked the verb "to haunt" up in my dictionary and got two alternatives: "gnátaigh" and "taithigh", with a substantival form gnáthóg - a haunted house is given as "teach siúil". "Taithigh" is however translated as "frequent, practice, experience" in the other half of the dictionary, whereas "gnátaigh" still might be a candidate with translations like "haunt, frequent". But "gnáthóg" means "den, lari", and "siúil" means something like "walk, thread, wander, travel" - not exactly what I expected from a haunted house. So "gnáthog" is out, but the regular verbal substantive of "gnátaigh" would probably be "gnáthach" so I first tried to write that. But alas, according to Wiktionary it means something like "customary" and "common". Actually "gnath-" as a prefix normally means that something is common, which doesn't exactly make matters more supernatural and sinister. I suppose that the book itself will solve the problem for me at some point - there are a number of haunted places in the magical world. Edited by Iversen on 10 April 2013 at 10:53am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| liammcg Senior Member Ireland Joined 4597 days ago 269 posts - 397 votes Speaks: English* | Message 3228 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 1:26am | IP Logged | ||
Táim ag leanúint ar aghaidh le Harry Potter mar is gnáth (I'm continuing on with Harry Potter as is usual?). Rinne mé staidéar ar leathanach eile ar imleabhar , agus cé go bhfuil focail anaithide ann, táim slán (sábhailte) toisc go bhfuil an leagan Béarla (agus mo fhoclóir) agam (I studied another page on Imleabhar, and though there are a lot of unknown words, I'm safe because I've the English version (and mo dictionary)) Is cuimhin liom ó fhíseán le Krashen agus Steve Kaufmann, go bhféadfadh Steve glacadh le 40% focal anaithnide mar fhaigheann sé na focail go léir le bronntanas as a chóras lingg (can you give me the English for this phrase?) Scoth na hoibre uait ar an iomlán! Maith thú agus coinnigh ort! Edited by liammcg on 10 April 2013 at 1:27am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6696 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3229 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 1:33am | IP Logged | ||
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I am still battling with those few lines in Irish. The meaning of the last sentence there should be something like "I remember from the video with Krashen and Steve Kaufmann, that (gur) Steve could accept 40% unknown words, because (mar gheall ar) he gets all the words as a gift from his system lingq.
Besides I would like to keep something like "táim slán" because it is a wordplay on the title line of the first chapter - cfr. my earlier post above. How do you really say that something or somebody is haunting a place in IRish, like for instance Harry Potter is doing to my humble abode? Edited by Iversen on 10 April 2013 at 1:51am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| liammcg Senior Member Ireland Joined 4597 days ago 269 posts - 397 votes Speaks: English* | Message 3230 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 1:45am | IP Logged | ||
because he gets all the words as a gift from his system lingq: mar go bhfaigheann sé na focail ar fad mar bhronntanas óna chóras lingq. Haunting? Ah, now I understand, my apologies. The way of saying haunting is the same as "frequenting", hence my translation of "mar is gnáth", as usual. I think the verbal noun is "ag gnáthú", let me check it in the dictionary. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| liammcg Senior Member Ireland Joined 4597 days ago 269 posts - 397 votes Speaks: English* | Message 3231 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 1:54am | IP Logged | ||
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Yep, "ag gnáthú". Type it into google and you'll see instances of both uses as mentioned
above. "Táim slán" is perfectly fine. Sábháilte is often added to the phrase to convey a deeper meaning, something the equivalent of "safe and sound" I suppose. So "táim slán sábháilte". 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6696 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 3232 of 3959 10 April 2013 at 1:58am | IP Logged | ||
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Thank you. I'll follow your advice in both respects, and then it is goodnight from me - it is almost 2 o'clock in the night here. Edited by Iversen on 10 April 2013 at 2:03am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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