False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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Shemtov
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Shemtov »

Lao Kou wrote: 13 Jan 2018 05:26
Iyionaku wrote: 12 Jan 2018 09:52 Speaking of Chinese, I'm still not very far with learning, but what already confused me

买 mǎi [maɪ̯˨˩˦] - to buy vs. 卖 mài [maɪ̯˥˩] - to sell

Not only are the characters similar (which is not so unusual for phono-semantic compounds, but still very confusing for me here), is the meaning so similar that I can think of myself being exposed to it in real life and terrible confuse it all the time...
I feel your pain, bra, and this is one of the more glaring moments of WTF. But tones are a real thing, not only devised as legerdemain to beguile conlangers and flummox second-language learners. As such, they are perceived as different words, and I have every faith that, if you were here (or in a Chinese-speaking community near you), you would not find it confusing at all (unless your foreigner tones really suck). And so it goes, with Mandarin, Cantonese, and Taiwanese (dialects with which I can profess a passing familiarity) -- different tones, different words. In the worst case scenario, you have context.

Now, you want to get a mind blow-out, go to Shanghainese, where 买 and 卖 are actual homophones (má). But even here, Shanghainese adds a word to help disambiguate 卖脱 for "sell". And of course, context; who's doing the talking on which side of the exchange (check out "borrow" and "lend" in conversational Chinese).
IIRC Thai (or proto-Thai) borrowed the Middle Chinese words that became mǎi and mài in Mandarin, with their own tone changes. And the :hkg: is even closer- [mai˧] vs. [mai˧˩}
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Znex »

Iyionaku wrote: 12 Jan 2018 09:52Speaking of Chinese, I'm still not very far with learning, but what already confusedme

买 mǎi [maɪ̯˨˩˦] - to buy vs. 卖 mài [maɪ̯˥˩] - to sell

Not only are the characters similar (which is not so unusual for phono-semantic compounds, but still very confusing for me here), is the meaning so similar that I can think of myself being exposed to it in real life and terrible confuse it all the time...
Historically, it seems to be because the word 卖 (賣) was originally derived from 买 (買):
買 /mreːʔ/ -> 賣 /mreːʔ-s/ > 賣 /mreːs/ > 賣 /mˠɛH/ > 卖 /mai4/
vs.
買 /mreːʔ/ > > 買 /mˠɛX/ > 买 /mai3/
:eng: : [tick] | :grc: : [:|] | :chn: :isr: :wls: : [:S] | :deu: :ell: :rus: : [:x]
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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I keep getting "buy" and "sell" confused in Swahili and they are -nunua and -uza respectively, so, like, things don't even need to be phonologically similar to be confused.
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Lao Kou »

Shemtov wrote: 14 Jan 2018 02:03 And the :hkg: is even closer- [mai˧] vs. [mai˧˩]
They are close, I'll grant you, but I believe in Cantonese 买 is fifth tone (阳上, low rising) (so, [mai˩˧]?) and 卖 is sixth tone (阳去, low level) ([mai˩]).
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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Imralu wrote: 14 Jan 2018 05:57 I keep getting "buy" and "sell" confused in Swahili and they are -nunua and -uza respectively, so, like, things don't even need to be phonologically similar to be confused.
Boy, do I hear that.

I used to be confused about the :grc: words

ὠνέομαι [o:.ne.o.maj] 'to buy', 'to purchase'
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/%E1%BD%A ... E%B1%CE%B9

which is Deponent, and having that faux-passive ending, would leave me to believe that it might mean 'to be bought'.

And there's also πρίαμαι which also means 'to buy' 'to purchase'
http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/tex ... pri%2Famai

It likewise is Deponent, and looks, waddles and quacks as if it were Passive & meant 'to be bought', somehow

[}:(] :mrred:


I kno, I kno: you just have to learn them as they come.


πιπράσκω [pi.pra.sko:] and πωλέω [po:.le.o:] {both mean 'to sell'} at least were not deponents.

And then there's the high-maintenance nest of vipers πέρνημι [per.nε:.mi] an Epic dialect, -MI verbal foodle-conjumblement. You know what? fuck U, πέρνημι. I'm not even getting into you right now. I have better things to do with my time. [>:(]
BTW: according to Wiktionary, πέρνημι is cognate with πόρνη [por.nε:] and :lat: pars and portio. Pimp that, Bembridge Scholars!


Clearly, Greek verbs of economic transaction where somehow influenced by the Hutts and Ferenghi.
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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:jpn: だめ dame “no good; useless; not allowed” (implies that the thing referenced is undesirable to the speaker)
:esp: dame “give me (command)” (implies that the thing referenced is desirable to the speaker)
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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This is a stem, so it rarely shows up in this form, but if it did, given the situations it would come up in, and Anti-Japanese feelings in Korea, I could see that if it did come up, an English speaker thinking his/her Korean interlocutor was code-switching into racist English.

:kor: 잡수시- [t͡ɕa̠ps͈uɕʰi] "Eat (hon.)" :Eng: "Jap Sushi"
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Iyionaku »

:eng: outing - a trip to the countryside
:deu: Outing - (homosexual) coming-out
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by shimobaatar »

Iyionaku wrote: 04 Feb 2018 15:01 :eng: outing - a trip to the countryside
:deu: Outing - (homosexual) coming-out
Interesting.

First, I'd like to point out that the English usage you're referencing is even more specific than that, and carries no connotations, at least for me, regarding the destination. An "outing", for me, is any short trip taken for pleasure.

Second, "outing" has another meaning in English that's related to the German meaning. To paraphrase Wiktionary, "outing" can refer to "the [act] of publicly revealing that a person is [LGBT] without that person's consent".
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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shimobaatar wrote: 04 Feb 2018 16:45
Iyionaku wrote: 04 Feb 2018 15:01 :eng: outing - a trip to the countryside
:deu: Outing - (homosexual) coming-out
Interesting.

First, I'd like to point out that the English usage you're referencing is even more specific than that, and carries no connotations, at least for me, regarding the destination. An "outing", for me, is any short trip taken for pleasure.
Agreed. In "Mary Poppins", I seem to remember them referring to the trips they take as outings, but only one of those is to the country. (They also call the country trip a holiday, but that's another general word.)
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by sangi39 »

GrandPiano wrote: 08 Feb 2018 05:31
Creyeditor wrote: 08 Feb 2018 01:50 To me German Weide willow and English willow, look like they should be related, but I guess they aren't? *d>l is so frequent in Papua but it seems to be non-existant in Europe, IINM.
I don’t know if any European languages have had it as a consistent sound change, but Latin had d > l as an irregular change for at least one word: *dingua > lingua “tongue”. (Though this apparently occurred due to influence from lingere “to lick”)
Well, now that that's been said:

English: lingerie
Latin: lingere (to lick)
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Shemtov »

Orthographically similar:
:eng: N*gger; Niger.
I mean, the latter is a country inhabited by Black People, the former is the worst slur one can use for that ethnic group, and they're one letter off? That's messed up.
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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Shemtov wrote: 09 Feb 2018 16:52 Orthographically similar:
:eng: N*gger; Niger.
that's a good one.....
It fooled me for a long time because it seems obvious and there are a cluster of other nations named after the dark skin of their inhabitants... see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_the_blacks .

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Re: d>l, note also L _solium_"throne", from a pie base cognate to _sedeo_"sit".
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Shemtov »

Pabappa wrote: 09 Feb 2018 17:22
Shemtov wrote: 09 Feb 2018 16:52 Orthographically similar:
:eng: N*gger; Niger.
that's a good one.....
It fooled me for a long time because it seems obvious and there are a cluster of other nations named after the dark skin of their inhabitants... see https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_of_the_blacks .
That Wiki article says that "Niger" does not come from :lat: <Niger> but from the Niger river, whose name is from :ber: ger-n-ger "River of Rivers".
Interestingly, Hebrew did the opposite, as the Hebrew equivalent of the N-word is "Kushi" Literally "Cushite", as Cush was the region spanning the Horn of Africa (Including Ethiopia) and Sudan and South Sudan, and its people were the ethnic group of Black people most known to Jews in Biblical times, and most Black people in Israel come from Ethiopia (Falashas). In Biblical and Rabbinic writings, it is used as a neutral (and the latter interprets some of the former's usages as positive) term for Black people. In fact, in his latter years, the late Sephardic Chief Rabbi of Israel, Chacham ʿovadia Yosef Z"TL got into trouble for using the word in its Biblical/Rabbinic sense. So we find that :heb: takes the name for the skin-color from the land they had most contact with whose inhabitants had that skin-color (see also Mishnah Negaʿim 2:1 that uses "Germanic" for all Caucasians).
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Imralu »

Dormouse559 wrote: 05 Feb 2018 04:27
shimobaatar wrote: 04 Feb 2018 16:45
Iyionaku wrote: 04 Feb 2018 15:01 :eng: outing - a trip to the countryside
:deu: Outing - (homosexual) coming-out
Interesting.

First, I'd like to point out that the English usage you're referencing is even more specific than that, and carries no connotations, at least for me, regarding the destination. An "outing", for me, is any short trip taken for pleasure.
Agreed. In "Mary Poppins", I seem to remember them referring to the trips they take as outings, but only one of those is to the country. (They also call the country trip a holiday, but that's another general word.)
I've never heard das Outing in German, only sich outen and das Coming-Out. The bit that is likely to trip me up is whether it is a synonym of das Coming-Out or whether it's an equivalent of outing in English.

(A)
Since his coming out = seitdem er sich geoutet hat = since he came out

(B)
Since his outing = seitdem er (von einer anderen Partei) geoutet wurde = since he was outed (by another party)

Does German use Coming-Out only for (A) and Outing only for (B), like English, or do they have another distribution?
Glossing Abbreviations: COMP = comparative, C = complementiser, ACS / ICS = accessible / inaccessible, GDV = gerundive, SPEC / NSPC = specific / non-specific, AG = agent, E = entity (person, animal, thing)
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

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I have definitely heard 'das Outing' and 'das Coming-Out' in the sense A. 'Seit seinem Outing durch X' sounds better than 'seit seinem Coming-Out durch X' though. On the other hand verbal uses 'sich outen', 'jemanden outen' and 'sein Coming-Out haben' are much more frequent.
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by All4Ɇn »

Creyeditor wrote: 09 Feb 2018 22:47 I have definitely heard 'das Outing' and 'das Coming-Out' in the sense A. 'Seit seinem Outing durch X' sounds better than 'seit seinem Coming-Out durch X' though. On the other hand verbal uses 'sich outen', 'jemanden outen' and 'sein Coming-Out haben' are much more frequent.
Does German also use 'das Outing' to refer to an occasion of someone being outed like it can in English?
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by ixals »

All4Ɇn wrote: 10 Feb 2018 05:23Does German also use 'das Outing' to refer to an occasion of someone being outed like it can in English?
Wiktionary translates German's Outing with both coming out and outing. It looks like Duden treats Outing as a synonym for das Outen and they define outen as to come out and to out someone.
Imralu wrote: 09 Feb 2018 22:14 I've never heard das Outing in German, only sich outen and das Coming-Out. The bit that is likely to trip me up is whether it is a synonym of das Coming-Out or whether it's an equivalent of outing in English.

(A)
Since his coming out = seitdem er sich geoutet hat = since he came out

(B)
Since his outing = seitdem er (von einer anderen Partei) geoutet wurde = since he was outed (by another party)

Does German use Coming-Out only for (A) and Outing only for (B), like English, or do they have another distribution?
I've heard das Outing sometimes but using a verbal construction sounds way better in my eyes and I've also heard it being used a lot more than das Outing. Personally, I'd say Outing can refer to both (A) and (B) and Coming-Out only to (A). I'd also say that people more familiar with LGBT+ rights would prefer Outing over Coming-Out for (A) because most new ideas, sources and media are English. On the other hand, I could also see people not familiar with those topics using Coming-Out to refer to (B) as well.
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by Imralu »

Thanks for the answers!
ixals wrote:I'd also say that people more familiar with LGBT+ rights would prefer Outing over Coming-Out for (A) because most new ideas, sources and media are English.
Häh? That makes no sense to me. Both of those words are from English and in English, Outing is definitely (B) and Coming-Out is definitely (A).
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Re: False friends and other unfortunate coincidences

Post by sangi39 »

Imralu wrote: 10 Feb 2018 18:48 Thanks for the answers!
ixals wrote:I'd also say that people more familiar with LGBT+ rights would prefer Outing over Coming-Out for (A) because most new ideas, sources and media are English.
Häh? That makes no sense to me. Both of those words are from English and in English, Outing is definitely (B) and Coming-Out is definitely (A).
I was going to say, at least as far as I've ever used it and heard it used "coming out" is the process of a person explicitly and publicly telling people that they're lesbian, gay, bisexual, etc. (A), while "outing" is where that announcement is made by someone else, most often without permission (B).

It's interesting, though, that German (at least the standard in Germany) has borrowing the term "outing" to refer to both. Is there a distinct native German term for each event or are both referred to natively in German by a single term as well?
You can tell the same lie a thousand times,
But it never gets any more true,
So close your eyes once more and once more believe
That they all still believe in you.
Just one time.
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