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josht Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6452 days ago 635 posts - 857 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Spanish, Russian, Dutch
| Message 1889 of 3959 17 June 2010 at 11:32pm | IP Logged |
Iversen, GLOSS (http://gloss.dliflc.edu/) seems to be working fine for me. I just checked and it let me see Russian as well as French materials.
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| Hobbema Senior Member United States Joined 5747 days ago 541 posts - 575 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Portuguese, French, Dutch
| Message 1890 of 3959 18 June 2010 at 4:31am | IP Logged |
Fasulye wrote:
Iversen wrote:
Hobbema writes that he can't think in his foreign languages. I find this very strange, provided that he can do it in English and that he writes fluently in several languages including Portuguese. I do however remember a discussion where Cainntear emphasized that not all people think predominantly in words, so to do it freely in a foreign language would be even more unlikely - but fortunately I don't have that problem. I also think in music and pictures and other nonverbal systems, but most of the time me head is spinning with verbal thoughts - and in spite of the admonitions of most yogis I like it that way. |
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What a pity, Hobbema. But I'm sure that your thinking level of Portuguese and Dutch will come once in a while, you just have to continue studying and be patient!!!
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Many thanks for the encouragement, Iversen and Fasulye. I'm happy I can make myself understood, and I am content to be patient. Fortunately, I really enjoy language study, more so than I expected to when I started it, so it is not unpleasant for me, and I actually look forward to it. And it is true, especially for Dutch it is necessary for me to use a dictionary a lot. Some of my posts take work and preparation. But as I do it I learn vocabulary and am learning sentence structure and grammar at the same time. And when people are kind enough to make corrections, and when each of you write in my target languages it is a bonus for me, and another opportunity to learn.
Sibelius! I still have all of his symphonies and some of the tone poems on my Ipod. I have bcome especially interested in Sibelius' genius seen in context with the rest of the classical music tradition at that time. Until I myself recently decided to make an (informal) study of listening to his major orchestral works, I did not know how his music had it's own truly unique character. So much so that some believe (and I do too) that he is underrated as a composer and more of a genius than what he is given credit for. Thomas Dausgaard is a Danish conductor who has some good commentary on Sibelius.
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Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6709 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 1891 of 3959 18 June 2010 at 11:15am | IP Logged |
josht wrote:
Iversen, GLOSS (http://gloss.dliflc.edu/) seems to be working fine for me. I just checked and it let me see Russian as well as French materials. |
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It doesn't work here. However I can see that you live in the United States, so maybe it has been blocked outside the USA.
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| josht Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 6452 days ago 635 posts - 857 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Spanish, Russian, Dutch
| Message 1892 of 3959 18 June 2010 at 1:29pm | IP Logged |
Iversen wrote:
josht wrote:
Iversen, GLOSS (http://gloss.dliflc.edu/) seems to be working fine for me. I just checked and it let me see Russian as well as French materials. |
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It doesn't work here. However I can see that you live in the United States, so maybe it has been blocked outside the USA. |
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I just did a test by trying to access the site using a Danish proxy, and it timed out, so that may be the case. If you still want to access it, you can use a US-based proxy (like http://anon.me, which is free). It will be a bit slower, but it might let you at least get to the stuff.
Edit: Just to be clear, that's a web proxy, so there's no setup involved, such as adding proxy servers to your browser. You just go to the site and type in the URL you want to visit.
Edited by josht on 18 June 2010 at 2:20pm
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Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6709 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 1893 of 3959 19 June 2010 at 2:31am | IP Logged |
josht wrote:
Iversen wrote:
josht wrote:
Iversen, GLOSS (http://gloss.dliflc.edu/) seems to be working fine for me. I just checked and it let me see Russian as well as French materials. |
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It doesn't work here. However I can see that you live in the United States, so maybe it has been blocked outside the USA. |
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I just did a test by trying to access the site using a Danish proxy, and it timed out, so that may be the case. If you still want to access it, you can use a US-based proxy (like http://anon.me, which is free). It will be a bit slower, but it might let you at least get to the stuff.
Edit: Just to be clear, that's a web proxy, so there's no setup involved, such as adding proxy servers to your browser. You just go to the site and type in the URL you want to visit. |
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Sounds like a workable technique. But the site must have been deliberately restricted for some reason, and then the use through proxies is also in jeopardy.
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Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6709 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 1894 of 3959 20 June 2010 at 10:59pm | IP Logged |
I have spent the day doing irelevant things, but yesterday was reasonably productive - even though I didn't manage to write anyting here. OK, better late than never.
RU: В моем медленно, но тщательное изучение книги русской истории, я прибыл вчера в разделе расцвета Грузия, и это вызвало некоторые туристические воспоминания. Страна была под арабским контролем за многие годы, но был восстановлен королем Давид IV 'Строитель'. Когда я был там в 2000 году я узнал с большим усилия, чтобы выразить свое грузинское название: აღმაშენებელი (Aghmashenebeli), и я также видел его могиле - он якобы похоронили под порога в церкви в Гелати недалеко от Кутаиси. Его преемником стал его дочь, красивая царица Тамара, которyю описал Балакирев в симфонической поэме. народного поэта Грузии Руставели жил во время своего царствования, и есть интересный отрывок о нем в книге: "Это был вискообразонанный человек, прекрасно знавший философию и поэсию, свободно владевший гречеким, персидским, арабским языками.". И, пожалуйста, помните: это было еще до интернета!
GR: Αντέγραψα επίσης μερικές σελίδες του βιβλίου μου στην Αθήνα, όπου το όνομα εξηγήθηκε ως ένας μύθος, όπου οι κάτοικοι είχαν να επιλέξουν μεταξύ του Ποσειδώνα και της Αθηνάς . Ποσειδώνας έδωσε μια πηγή, η Αθηνά έδωσε την ελιά, και έτσι την επέλεξε ως προστάτη τους. Αλλά για λόγους προνοίας έχτισαν επίσης πρόστιμο ναό του Ποσειδώνα στο χερσόνησο Σούνιο.
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I do of course my word lists and grammar studies, but there is not much to say about these activities. I could write about TV programs or podcasts, but instead I would like to mention that I spend a fair amount of time simply copying texts from books and magazines, looking up words and grammar and transferring the new words to wordlists. I still do it in greek and Greek, even though I can read extensively, because such intensive preoccupation with a few paragraphs forces me to learn the details of the languages instead of hoping that something will stick from my extensive reading.
For Russian I still use the good old history book with the accents, and after the passages about Kiev and Suzdalj/Vladimir and the plight of prince Igor of Novgorod (who was caught by the Polovetsians) I have reached the chapter about the golden age of Georgia under king David IV and his strongwilled daughter queen Tamara - known from a symphonic poem by Balakirev. Under the reign of queen Tamara lived the national poet of Georgia, Shota Rustaveli, who in addition to Kartuli spoke fluently Greek, Persian and Arabian.
My Greek book is a guide to Athens, and yesterday I read about the myth that explains the name of the town: the inhabitants were asked to choose between Poseidon and Pallas Athene. Poseidon made a source appear, but Athene created the first olive tree, and then they chose her as their patron deity. However to avoid the wrath of a rejected seagod they also built him a splendid temple, the one at the promontory of Cape Sounion which still stands.
Finally I did some work on my Irish, - a wordlist of some 70 words and a few sentences from a text with an interspersed Google translation. The message was that the town council of Galway has decided to continue its financial support of Gaeilge (see the following message). But I look a lot of words up even with the translation, because Irish has such a weird idiomatics ... and also because the quality of the Google translation is low.
Edited by Iversen on 21 June 2010 at 2:27pm
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Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6709 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 1895 of 3959 21 June 2010 at 1:25am | IP Logged |
To illustrate the entertaining side of the Irish language I'll give one sentence with its Google translation, and afterwards a commented word-by-word analysis:
D'fhógair Comhairle Cathrach na Gaillimhe le gairid go raibh sé chun leanúint ar aghaidh ag tabhairt tacaíocht airgid do Ghaillimh le Gaeilge, an t-easgraíocht atá freagrach as cur chun cinn na Gaeilge i gCathair na Gaillimhe.
The City Council announced recently that it was to continue providing financial support for Galway Irish, the foam easgraíocht responsible for promoting the Irish language in Galway City.
D'fhógair: the D' (from "do") marks a past tense, but it also entails lenition (aspiration). The word to look for in the dictionary* is therefore not *fhog(air), but "fóg(air)", 'announce'. Please note that "D'fhógair" isn't really a complete past tense form, but the particle "do" plus a 'common' verb form would in conjunction with an unstressed pronominal particle form a past tense form, - unless it is formed with an ending, in which case the added pronomen can be dropped. Though here it is just missing, which is somewhat confusing. Please also note that 'fh' is mute.
Comhairle Cathrach: literally "council town- "
na Gaillimhe: "of-the Galway" (feminine, 2.declension, genitive)
le gairid : "le" means something like 'at', and it is often used in a construction that ressembles the Russian one with "y" (I have got X --> X is 'with me'). But "le gairid" is a fixed expression that means 'recently' ("gairid" is actually an adjective that means "short, near")
go raibh sé is actually a subjunctive with a dummy-subject (actually a sort of freestanding ending), preceded by a conjunction meaning "so that". WHich means that we are now in a subordinate phrase, and its verb is as usual placed at the beginning of the sentence (with a conjunction to mark the boundary).The word "raibh" (from to be "bi") is just one of an immense number of verbal forms that all mean 'to be', but the Irish like to have special forms for each construction: positive, negative, interrogative, negative interrogative, habitual, dependent .... you name it.
chun leanúint ar aghaidh: literally something like "towards theFollowing [..] head/aspect". But here "aghaidh" obviously doesn't mean 'head' or 'aspect'. The dictionary has three headwords 'ar' (and three 'ár'), but they don't easily fit in here. However there is also an expression "ar aghaidh libh" = 'go on!' (i.e. go 'in the face of'). So roughly "chun leanúint ar aghaidh" must be cover a thought roughly similar to "towards the-things-that-come be heading".
ag tabhairt: "at" + "yield, grant" (noun)
tacaíocht.. do: "give support ... to"
airgid: money
Ghaillimh le Gaeilge: Galway .. with Gaelic.
an t-easgraíocht atá freagrach: "easgraíocht" is simply the word for 'institution'. The "t-" is used in front of vowels in situations where lenition would occur with consonant, - and the article "an" in nominative/accusative feminine singular is such a case - but "an" before a masculine noun isn't. "atá" is a contracted verbal form, based on another copula form "tá" (English 'is', here roughly "to whom is"), and "freagrach" is simply 'responsability'
as cur : 'as' ="out of". The word "cur" has misled Google to introduce some spurious foam - but 'foam' is "cúr" (with an accent). The meaning of 'cur' is difficult to define - the dictionary just gives 'sowing, burial, mound' plus a lot of expressions. The common denominator seems to be something about a 'foundation' or 'basis' for something. Maybe "as cur" just means 'basically' or 'in essence' - however this is just a loose guess.
chun cinn "chun" something like "towards", "cinn" = 'decide' (actually the imperative singular - though here used as a verbal noun)
na Gaeilge "ofthe Gaelic" (about Gaelic)
i gCathair na Gaillimhe "in town ofthe Galway". The 'g' is a result of 'eclipse', which is provoked by the preceding preposition "i". The written "c" indicated the original consonant, the 'g' the one that is actually spoken.
so...
D'fhógair Comhairle Cathrach na Gaillimhe le gairid go raibh sé chun leanúint ar aghaidh ag tabhairt tacaíocht airgid do Ghaillimh le Gaeilge, an t-easgraíocht atá freagrach as cur chun cinn na Gaeilge i gCathair na Gaillimhe.
becomes ..
{PAST}Announce! Council City- ofthe Galway at-close (=recently) (that) be! it for-thingstocome-in-face (=forthwith) provide support money for Galway with Irish, the institution (here=the council) towhom-is responsability for foundation towards what-follows ofthe Gaelic in City ofthe Galway.
which becomes ..
The City Council of Galway has recently announced that it will continue to provide financial support for the Gaelic language in Galway, the institution being responsable for the furthering of Gaelic in the City of Galway.
* My dictionary is "Collins Pocket Irish dictionary", and for its size it is quite comprehensive - most words I need are there.. the problem is putting them together.
Edited by Iversen on 22 June 2010 at 12:31pm
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| mick33 Senior Member United States Joined 5930 days ago 1335 posts - 1632 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Finnish Studies: Thai, Polish, Afrikaans, Hindi, Hungarian, Italian, Spanish, Swedish
| Message 1896 of 3959 21 June 2010 at 10:21am | IP Logged |
AF: Ek dink soms ek sal eendag gaelies wil leer, maar nie nou-nou nie, maar miskien kan ek dit volgende jaar leer. Vier tale is genoeg. Ek saamstem met jou dat gaelies inderdaad vermaak is. Jou vertaling en verduideliking is baie interessant want my voorouers was kelties, alhoeveel ek weet amper niks oor die gaelies taal of kultuur nie. Ek dink enige taal dat so 'n ingewikkeld spelling hê, (en dit is meer ingewikkeld as engels of sweeds) sal beslis diè moeite werd om te leer.
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