Bloavezh mat / 新年快樂 / Blydhen Nowydh Da / Šťastný nový rok / Gelukkig Nieuwjaar / Happy New Year / Bonne année / Einen guten Rutsch ins neue Jahr / Athbhliain faoi mhaise daoibh / Felice anno nuovo / 新年おめでとうございます / Blein Vie Noa / Feliz Ano Novo / С Новым Годом / Bliadhna mhath ùr / Срећна Нова Година / ¡Feliz Año Nuevo! / Gott nytt år / Blwyddyn newydd dda, and so on!
Category: French (français)
Language acquisition
I spent Christmas with my family at my brother’s house in Devon in the south west of England. His daughter is now 20 months old and it’s fascinating to see how she’s acquiring language.
The last time I saw her was at Easter this year when she was nearly a year old. At that time she was able to say a few words, but now she has a lot more words and little phrases, and understands more as well. Most of her words are in English, but she also uses some Russian ones (her mother is Russian) such as сок (juice), and even some BSL signs, such as thank you, picked up from baby signing classes.
As well as English and Russian, she’s picking up some French from the French nanny who looks after her a few days a week while her mother is working. So she is on the way to becoming a polyglot. Whether she’ll be as enthusiastic about languages as I am remains to be seen, but it will be very interesting to see how her language develops.
Do you have or know children who are being raised bilingually or multilingually? Do you have any tips and stories you’d like to share? Guest posts on this topic are very welcome.
Hedgehogs and Urchins
I discovered today that sea urchins (echinoidea) are known as zee-egels (sea hedgehogs) in Dutch, and that they used to be known as sea hedgehogs in English as well. They have similar names in other languages, for example, in German they are Seeigel (sea hedgehogs), in French they are oursins or hérissons de mer (sea hedgehogs) and in Spanish they are erizos de mar (sea hedgehogs).
The word urchin comes from the Middle English word yrichon (hedgehog), from the Old North French word *irechon, from the Old French herichun (hedgehog) – in Modern French hedgehog is hérisson – from the Vulgar Latin *hericionem, from the Latin ericius (hedgehog), from the Proto-Indo-European root *ghers- (to stiffen, bristle, stand out). From the same root we also get such English words as gorse, hirsute, horror and ordure.
The word urchin is apparently still used for hedgehog in some English dialects such as Cumbria, Yorkshire and Shropshire. It came to refer to people who looked or acted like hedgehogs from the early 16th century, and to poor, ragged youths from the mid 16th century, though this usage didn’t really take off until the late 18th century. Sea urchin was first used in the late 16th century.
Sources: Online Etymology Dictionary and Indo-European Lexicon
Les mots de le semaine
| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| instable | precarious (ladder) | simsan; sigledig; siglog |
| précarie | precarious (situation; existence) | ansicr |
| périlleuse | precarious | simsan; sigledig; siglog |
| le navet | turnip | meipen; erfinan |
| le rutabaga | swede | swedsen; rwden |
| le potiron; la citrouille | pumpkin | pwmpen; pompiwn |
| chirurgien | surgeon | llawfeddyg |
| la (veste à) capuche | hoodie | hwdî |
| bouder; faire la tête | to sulk | sorri; pwdu; mulo |
| la bouderie | sulks | pwd; soriant; sorri |
| elle boude; elle fait la tête | she’s sulking / she’s in the sulks | mae’r pwd arni; mae hi ‘di sorri; mae hi yn y pwd |
Polyglottery
Yesterday morning I met up with other conference participants and after a bit of a wander around the city, we had lunch then went to the opening ceremony a reception. In the after we had a little guided tour of Novi Sad seeing some interesting buildings, including the Catholic or Orthodox Cathedrals, and the fortress. There are some rather attractive buildings here, wide, pedestrianised café-lined streets, some nice parks and generally a relaxed kind of atmosphere.
In the evening we all went to a restaurant about 4 or 5km from the city centre for dinner. I walked there with a few others, and the rest went by bus or taxi. We had a nice dinner with lots of polyglot chat, then some people started dancing, and others carried on chatting.
Today there were lectures and talks on a variety of topics including sound symbolism, the magic of metaphors, language coaching, and acting and humour in a foreign language.
So far I’ve had conversations in about 10 languages and spoken bits and pieces of maybe 10 others. In some cases this was only a few words (all I know), in others it was a bit more. There are even two guys here who are learning Scottish Gaelic, one of whom also speaks a bit of Manx, and another who is learning Irish.
Novi Sad
There are various polyglot activities scheduled for this afternoon and evening, and talks and lectures start tomorrow, so I have this morning free. I plan to do a bit of work on Omniglot, and will try to meet up with other people who are here for the conference.
Unlike in Berlin, where most people stayed in a large hostel and the polyglot gathering was in the same place, here in Novi Sad things are a bit more spread out – we are staying in various hotels around the city and the conference is taking place in a cultural centre. My hotel doesn’t have a restaurant and breakfast is available at a café round the corner.
It seems that smoking is permitted inside in some places here – ugh! Since the smoking ban came into force in the UK I’ve tried to avoid visiting places where indoor smoking is still allowed. I didn’t check before coming here and might not have come if I’d known. At least the weather is warm and sunny so I can sit outside and avoid most of the smoke.
I’ve spoken a bit of Serbian so far, and found that some people in hotels and restaurants speak English as well. Last night I shared a taxi from Belgrade to Novi Sad with one of the other conference participants – a Polish guy with Vietnamese roots. We talked mainly in French, with a bit of Spanish, English and Russian thrown in for good measure. The taxi driver spoke only Serbian, plus a bit of Russian and German, and I struggled to explain to him that one of the people who was supposed to be with us had missed his connection in Zurich, due to a delayed flight from London, and would be arriving later.
Can’t do it for toffee
There’s an interesting idiom in British English that means that you are bad at doing something – you can’t do it for toffee. Apparently a US equivalent is can’t do something for beans.
The equivalent of this phrase in French is il n’est pas fichu de faire qch and in Welsh it’s nid yw’n medru gwneud rhywbeth am ffortiwn.
Are the similar idioms in other varieties of English, and in other languages?
Les mots de la semaine
| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| le caramel | toffee | cyflaith; taffi; toffi |
| il n’est pas fichu de faire qch | he can’t do sth for toffee | nid yw’n medru gwneud rhywbeth am ffortiwn |
| la pomme d’amour | toffee apple | afal taffi |
| bêcheur | toffee-nosed | ffroenuchel; trwynsur |
| la cigogne | stork | storc; ciconia |
| de suite; d’affilié | on the trot; in a row | yn olynol; ar ôl ei gilydd |
| l’ankylostome | hookworm | llynghyren fachog; bachlyngyr |
| le ver | worm; maggot | pryf |
| (en)levé | upbeat (music) | curiad i fyny |
Language matters
| français | English | Cymraeg |
|---|---|---|
| se débrouiller | to manage (get by) | dod trwyddi; ymdaro; dod i ben; ymdopi |
| gérer | to manage (a business) | rheoli; llywio |
| l’émeute (f) | riot | terfysg |
| le service | good turn | cymwynas; tro da |
| un service rendu en appelle un autre | one good turn deserves another | a wnêl mad, mad a ddyly |
| la donation, le don | donation | rhodd; anrheg |
Neo-eisimeileachd / Unthirldom / Independence
As there’s an independence referendum in Scotland today I thought I’d look at a few relevant words in Scottish Gaelic and Scots:
| Gàidhlig (Scottish Gaelic) | Scots | English |
|---|---|---|
| reifreann [rʲɛfərʲɛn̪ˠ] | referendum | referendum |
| rneo-eisimeileachd [n̪ˠʲɔ eʃɪmələxg] | unthirldom | independence |
| neo-eisimeileach [n̪ˠʲɔ eʃɪmələx] | unthirlit | independent |
| bhòt [voʰt̪] | vote | vote |
Etymologies
– neo-eisimeileachd: from neo- (un-), from Irish neamh-/neimh-, from Middle Irish nem, from Old Irish neb-, neph-; and eisimeil (dependence, obligation), from Middle Irish esimol [source]
– referendum: from the Latin referendum (“that which must be referred” or lit. “thing brought back”), from referre (to bring or take back), from re- (back) and ferre (carry) [source].
– independent: from in- (not, opposite of) and dependent, from French indépendant, from dépendant, the present participle of dépendre (to hang down; to depend), from Latin dependentem, from dēpendēo (to hang down/from; to depend on) from pēndēre (to droop, to hang (from), to slope, to slant) [source]
– vote: from Latin vōtum (promise, dedication, vow; determination, will, desire; prayer), a form of voveō (I vow/promise; dedicate/devote to a deity; I wish/desire.), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁wogʷʰ-. [source]
Independence in Scots is either independence or unthirldom, a word I found on Spawk. It also appears on Wikipedia, along with unthirlt (independent) in the sentence:
“Scots unthirldom is the poleetical muivement that thinks Scotland shoud poleetical sinder itsel frae the Unitit Kinrick, an become an unthirlt kintra wi ane govrenment an a sovereign pairlament.”
(Scottish independence is the political movement that thinks Scotland should politically separate itself from the United Kingdom, and become an independent country with its own government and a sovereign parliament.)
– unthirldom and unthirlit come from unthirl = land outside the Sucken* or Thirl** of a particular mill; the dues paid to a mill for the grinding of corn grown on land not restricted to it [source]
– unthirlit also means not enslaved or subjugated (to another)
* Sucken [′sʌkən] = the lands of an estate on which there was an obligation to grind corn at a certain mill, or the totality of the tenants of such lands [source]
** Thirl [θɪrl] = To lay under a certain obligation or restriction, specifically in Scots Law: to bind the lands of an estate or their tenants by the terms of lease to have the grain produced on the lands ground at a certain mill, to astrict the grinding of corn [source].