The Chat Thread

[North Star]

Well, rev is ultimately an abbreviation of revolution.

Or reverend...

Spiv my dictionary gives as a slangy variant of spiff (itself, dialectish . . . and derived from the slangy spiffy).

Chav, I know not . . . .

Romani čhavo unmarried Romani male, male Romani child
Brit. slang (derogatory).

  In the United Kingdom (originally the south of England): a young person of a type characterized by brash and loutish behaviour and the wearing of designer-style clothes (esp. sportswear); usually with connotations of a low social status.

But in any case, there are lots of words in English that end in w or ve/vy, but are loan words from Scandinavian languages, and are there spelled with a v. Since the authorities in spelling got rid of the v at the end of words, naturally all of the ones used these days are abbreviations, loan words or new inventions.

[Karl Henning]

Thanks!

Yes, just an accident of orthography.  No idea why I suddenly wondered today, whether there was invariably a silent -e after any v which is the final consonant of an English word. Give Dave a shave, Olive!

[Karl Henning]

And following your borroved jest, I wondered if by chav you meant chaw, which is US slang, a variant of chew.

[North Star]

And following your borroved jest, I wondered if by chav you meant chaw, which is US slang, a variant of chew.

Oh, chaw is a new one to me.

[Karl Henning]

Particularly used of chewing tobacca (a chaw).

[Szykneij]

I lost my shiv while eating schav on the moshav.

[kishnevi]

I lost my shiv while eating schav on the moshav.

schav and moshav being  loan words.  (Tangential note:  you would be more usually at or in a moshav than on it.)

I wonder if any language has more loan words than English does, especially American English.  The great debtor language of the world.


Another side note:  given the development of orthography,  there are more than a few words in English which end in the "v" sound but are spelled with an "f"--'of' being the first one that springs to mind.

[DavidW]

English words ending in -v? (Which are not either borrowed from another language, nor abbreviations . . . .)

I asked one of the English profs about that, he pointed out that "not borrowed from another language" is problematic given the nature of the English language.  It is built from several languages.  He went on about the history of the language for awhile as I slowly backed away...

[ibanezmonster]

I wonder if any language has more loan words than English does, especially American English.  The great debtor language of the world.

Not sure, but English probably has more words in general than any/almost any other language, if such a thing could be counted.

As for loan words percentage-wise, I wonder how it would compare to Japanese, a language whose vocabulary I'd estimate to be ~20% English.

[torut]

Not sure, but English probably has more words in general than any/almost any other language, if such a thing could be counted.

As for loan words percentage-wise, I wonder how it would compare to Japanese, a language whose vocabulary I'd estimate to be ~20% English.

If you count words using Kanji as loan words in Japanese, it should be very large. I did a quick search, and according to the statistics of a Japanese dictionary, the ratio of loan words is about 2/3. (pure Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~48%, other loan words ~15%)

[Karl Henning]

I asked one of the English profs about that, he pointed out that "not borrowed from another language" is problematic given the nature of the English language.  It is built from several languages.  He went on about the history of the language for awhile as I slowly backed away...

Sorry that I opened that can of worms for you

[North Star]

I asked one of the English profs about that, he pointed out that "not borrowed from another language" is problematic given the nature of the English language.  It is built from several languages.  He went on about the history of the language for awhile as I slowly backed away...

Same with just about any other written language really.

[mn dave]

What are you listening to now?
What are you? A glistening cow?

[ibanezmonster]

If you count words using Kanji as loan words in Japanese, it should be very large. I did a quick search, and according to the statistics of a Japanese dictionary, the ratio of loan words is about 2/3. (pure Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~48%, other loan words ~15%)

Hmm, so my 20% was close... but in actual usage, it would probably be a higher percentage if Japanese particles aren't counted. I would guess that there are probably way more obscure words using Kanji than native Japanese or Western words.

Same with just about any other written language really.

Except... language isolates, like Japanese. We just don't know what language native Japanese words descended from, though people have made guesses, some wild ones including Finnish or some southern Indian language (might have been Tamil), and I think some language in the Pacific islands. Don't remember about Ainu, though...

If you set your standards for a definition of a loan word to be something traceable from another language, I guess basically all languages from Europe have 100% loan words, with the exception of languages like Basque.

[torut]

Hmm, so my 20% was close... but in actual usage, it would probably be a higher percentage if Japanese particles aren't counted. I would guess that there are probably way more obscure words using Kanji than native Japanese or Western words.

Sorry, actually that is statistics of 90 actual periodicals in 1956 (a little old data.) The statistics of a Japanese dictionary is different. A word using Kanji + Hiragana was counted as Kanji words.

Japanese dictionary (1956)
native Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~54%, other loan words ~10%

90 periodicals published in 1956
native Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~48%, other loan words ~15%
(This is the count of different words. If the numbers of usage is counted (if a word is used twice, the number is 2), the ratio of native Japanese words increase.

More recent study: 70 periodicals published in 1994
native Japanese words ~24%, words using Kanji ~31%, other loan words ~42%, unknown 3%
I guess loan words from English had increased a lot.

[North Star]

Except... language isolates, like Japanese. We just don't know what language native Japanese words descended from, though people have made guesses, some wild ones including Finnish or some southern Indian language (might have been Tamil), and I think some language in the Pacific islands. Don't remember about Ainu, though...

If you set your standards for a definition of a loan word to be something traceable from another language, I guess basically all languages from Europe have 100% loan words, with the exception of languages like Basque.

True, hence the 'just about'
Some Japanese shops/restaurants are using random or not-so-random Finnish words as their names, btw. (kurkku, cucumber; ehkä söpö, perhaps cute).

[ibanezmonster]

True, hence the 'just about'
Some Japanese shops/restaurants are using random or not-so-random Finnish words as their names, btw. (kurkku, cucumber; ehkä söpö, perhaps cute).

That's pretty neat... as long as you get over the hurdle of reading the katakana for the first time and realizing it isn't English. 

Sorry, actually that is statistics of 90 actual periodicals in 1956 (a little old data.) The statistics of a Japanese dictionary is different. A word using Kanji + Hiragana was counted as Kanji words.

Japanese dictionary (1956)
native Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~54%, other loan words ~10%

90 periodicals published in 1956
native Japanese words ~37%, words using Kanji ~48%, other loan words ~15%
(This is the count of different words. If the numbers of usage is counted (if a word is used twice, the number is 2), the ratio of native Japanese words increase.

More recent study: 70 periodicals published in 1994
native Japanese words ~24%, words using Kanji ~31%, other loan words ~42%, unknown 3%
I guess loan words from English had increased a lot.

That's why if you wanna learn Japanese, you basically have to know English first nowadays.

[ibanezmonster]

Snyprrr bait...
http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/young-men-giving-up-on-marriage-women-arent-women-anymore

[Karl Henning]

Saw one in action last night.

[ibanezmonster]

Holy...

lol, I've been reading the best, most insane facebook drama ever.

This girl who is on facebook ("Finger Uke") runs a business selling ukelele transcriptions of composers like Bach, Paganini, Mozart, etc. Suddenly she goes on this rampage, posting about how someone sexually harassed her via a private message, soliciting prostitution. She slanders other people who won't help her punish this guy; completely full of righteous, Christian anger and about "man's highest honor is protecting the women and children," just multiple long rants, etc.

So one of the guys whose name she slanders has turned it into a some sort of game. He just released some evidence that seems to point out that she was a porn star and was trying to quit the business. It looks pretty solid to me; not to go into detail, but if you read through the posts carefully and thought about it logically, there is no doubt. I even tried to help her out, but now I regret it. And the guy who sent her the "sexual harassment" message was actually polite and asked her how much she charged for a live webcam. Seriously messed up, hypocritical person.