Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2006 August 10

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crossword help

can u help me with these clues

severe addict's practice (5-7)(*h*I*SELLING)

Shirt selling ? StuRat 07:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Chain smoking?--Shantavira 07:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Child selling.Thylacoleo 01:34, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

kind of cattle (10)B*G*a*o

Bighorn ? StuRat 07:04, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Bighorns are sheep. —Bkell (talk) 19:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's right, the cattle are called longhorns. StuRat 19:12, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Buffalo?--Shantavira 07:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Buggalo? :-D - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

everything possible -british film (**E*U***L*T*)

How many words? Closest I can come up with is Without Limits.--Shantavira 08:56, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Could be The Full Monty, assuming the L is wrong. Thylacoleo 01:39, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

corporal punishment (*I*O*T*E*E**)

Guillotine?--Shantavira 07:48, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think Madame Guillotine would be appropiate for corporal punishment... - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 07:53, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, that would be more like decapital punishment. =S 惑乱 分からん 09:53, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

HIT ON THE LEGS . JackofOz 10:49, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Very clever! By way of digression, corporal punishment is punishment to the body. My dictionaries don't suggest that it excludes capital punishment.--Shantavira 14:19, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

irregular (*I*F**)

Fitful?--Shantavira 07:39, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Sinful? JackofOz 10:06, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Misfit? —Bkell (talk) 19:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

thanks in advancMightright 04:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)e

french help

hi im learning french at school but i was wondering if there were any mnemonics or something like that to help me remember irregular french verbs that have to be conjugated with 'etre' in 'passe compose ' and aslo if there were any rules to conjugating the first group ,second group and third group verbsMightright 05:45, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I was taught DR. & MRS. P. VANDERTRAMP. It stands for the verbs: devenir, revenir, monter, rester, sortir, passer, venir, aller, naître, descendre, entrer, rentrer, tomber, retourner, arriver, mourir, and partir. --Chris S. 05:59, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

For 'etre' my class learnt "Mrs Van Der Tramp". I've found two links about this: and .

For verb conjugations, yes and no... that is, there are lots of rules: there are regularities but there are still things that you just need to memorise. Is there a specific tense or person you're having problems with? --Zeborah 06:06, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

There is, but I might not be as convenient for you as for me, a mnemonic for word order : veerfles =voir, envoyer, écouter, regarder, faire, laisser, envoyer, sentir Usually you say : Je veux le battre. Je vais le manger.

But when you use any of these as auxiliary verb: Je le laisse travailler. Evilbu 11:24, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's true. You just need to know the auxiliary verbs in English and their French equivalents. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T-C} 13:17, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Oh by the way, it's être, not etre. But maybe not having an AZERTY (like me!) might be the cause of that? Evilbu 14:38, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Ha! We learned MMT DRAPERS VAN. Which is a rubbish mnemonic. As opposed to other splendid mnemonics we learned in other subjects, such as "Many naughty rabbits eat green rhubarb roots" (characteristics of living organisms) and "Smiles of happiness come after having tankards of ale" (usually taught as SOH CAH TOA!) --Dweller 14:55, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Yeah, we had that. Someone in the class came up with TRAMP VENDS RAM. I'll chuck it at an anagram generator and see if it can come up with anything better... watch this space. ---- No, nothing much... at least within the output that I can be bothered to sift through. Arbitrary username 17:24, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Why bother learning the mnemonics? I just learnt that they're generally "verbs of motion." I suppose nager etc. could all be motion verbs too but je suis nagé doesn't really look right. I don't know. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:36, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

If you're not into mathematics you might not care, but you can also use French to make mnemonics : Tu aideras à rappeler ta quantité à beaucoup de docteurs amis. 2. 7 1 8 2 8 1 8 2 8 4 which are the first digits of e. Evilbu 20:49, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Under what circumstances would a month or day not be capitalized?

See title. (other than "may") --mboverload@ 07:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

In English, names of months and days are always capitalised. When it refers to the month, "May" is always capitalised; it's only "may" if it's being used as the verb. --Zeborah 08:43, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Thanks, I just wanted to brainstorm before I commit it to WP:RETF =D --mboverload@ 09:08, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

There's also the noun and verb march; june isn't necessarily capitalized in june bug; and there's the adjective august. User:Angr 09:20, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

What about April fool? (And is 'April's fool' proper English?) DirkvdM 09:31, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

April is always capitalised. The day is April Fool's Day, and the victim of such cruel and unusual punishment is called an April Fool. JackofOz 09:57, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Days and months are capitalized because they take their names from various ancient gods. A common error is to capitalize the names of the seasons as well, but these should be lower case.--Shantavira 15:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

What is the difference between 'April fool' and 'june bug', then? DirkvdM 03:50, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

"April fool" actually refers to the month of April, whereas (as far as I know) the name "june bug" doesn't derive from the name of the month. -Elmer Clark 09:21, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I suppose if some poet, like ee cummings, refuses to capitalize them, then that case should be preserved in any quotations of that poet, as well. StuRat 16:05, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Apparently Cummings himself did not approve of this rendering. --Lambiam^Talk 03:39, 13 August 2006 (UTC)

All august men may march. --Lambiam^Talk 19:20, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

this is probably what the answerer wanted?--K.C. Tang 09:17, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

One is assuming that Septem, Octo, Novem and Decem were gods. Then why not Unus, Duo, Tres (?) and the others ? I'm not sure that Caesar was divinised either (but he was). -- DLL ^{.. T} 17:40, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

No. As far as I know, the first few were either just names of months, July and August were after the emperors, and September-December were originally the 7-10th months. Look it up (here). —Daniel (‽) 20:52, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Septem, Octo, Novem, Decem are the actual names of the numbers (if I remember my Latin from ten years ago!) Nyttend 18:37, 14 August 2006 (UTC)

Possession in Japanese.

I need someone to check my Japanese symbol choices and grammar for me, thanks in advance!

魚 - this is ("Sakana") fish?

雄 - this is the name "Tetsuo"?

Put like this: 魚雄 would mean "Tetsuo's Fish", right? Or is it done differently? -- 69.138.61.168 07:41, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

you have to add a "no" between the possessor and the possessed: 雄の魚--K.C. Tang 07:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think 雄 is the name "Tetsuo", actually. There's several dozen ways of writing names, depending on the individual, but I don't think that's one of them. --Ptcamn 19:19, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Here are some common ways of writing the name "Tetsuo": 铁男 (as in the SciFi horror flic) • 鉄雄 (as in Tetsuo Shima) • 哲男 • 哲徃 • 哲応 • 哲暢 • 天津夫. --Lambiam^Talk 20:26, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

If you're intending "Tetsuo's fish", then "Tetsuoの魚" is it. 雄 alone does not mean any specific thing. The possible kanji options for Tetsuo are: for "Tetsu" = 哲, 徹 or 鉄; for "o" = 雄, 夫, 男, 郎, or 生; choose a kanji from each, then put them together. These are quite common kanjis -- for more, google (and you'll get something like this).

If you would like to know the meaning of 魚雄, I don't know such a word... Google says there's a sushi restaurant of the name. --marsian 03:57, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

雄 is the rarely used kanji for osu, male. Sometimes の can be hidden when part of a name, like as in Yamanote Line, but a combination like this would almost certainly be coupled with furigana to explain how they intend people to interpret/read it.  freshofftheufoΓΛĿЌ  17:36, 12 August 2006 (UTC)

cree word for

loaf and relax

meanings

213.165.161.214I came across a word 'imminant' i can't seem to find a meaning for it anywhere in british english .. does it mean exactly the same as imminent? is it american? or does it have a different meaning altogether?

I'd say it's just a typo for imminent. Or maybe eminent. User:Angr 17:50, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Or a really bad typo for "immigrant". What context is it used in? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 18:30, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Or "immanent"? · rodii · 19:01, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Was it in a Wikipedia article? Because anyone can edit them, spellings in Wikipedia articles are not reliable. I've just found and corrected three instances of that word.--Shantavira 18:38, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

That's probably it then. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:46, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

Wikipedia isn't the only one. Googling 'imminant' on English sites gives 18400 hits, 4 of which in Wikipedia. 3 of which were old versions, already corrected, and 1 in a talk page archive. DirkvdM 04:03, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Anglophone countries

what countries speak English as a homelanguage

"Home" language? Take a jouk at Image:Anglospeak.png - it might be what you're looking for. - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 19:44, 10 August 2006 (UTC)

"jouk"? JackofOz 00:19, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Yes, imminantly. DirkvdM 04:04, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Imminantly and haistily. It is emportant that it you see it! :-D "Jouk"'s a...errrr...Northern Ireland word, sort of, meaning "look". I thought it'd be clear from the context. Does it mean something offensive in Australia? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 07:20, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

I don't think it's even phonotactically acceptable in Australia. The "ou" diphthong only occurs before coronals. --Ptcamn 09:09, 11 August 2006 (UTC)

Actually, it just represents the /ʉ/ sound. Badly spelt, I know, but who spells slang words? - THE GREAT GAVINI {T|C|#} 17:32, 11 August 2006 (UTC)