Elections

[HS Thomas]

While on the subject of Human rights:
(Both Britain and USA failed miserably on the Iraqi issue on human rigths.)
WE HAVE A NOBEL PEACE LAUREATE: Iranian human rights lawyer Shirin Ebadi has won the Peace Prize. (CNN)
And this link may be of interest:
Arnie's win a warning to Tony Blair
And this, reported with pride :
In my Name
As someone remarked in my newly adopted learn a langauge forum (About.com) which also has bi-lingual (I've yet to spot a tri-lingual conversation) topics on French Bashing which also combines remarks on American bashing (by the French) :
(Perhaps it is trilingual).
<<<< I used to say a good day for me is when I DON'T have to interact with the French because I used to say to myself "is there not one thing that these people can do correctly?" >>

Pas tr�s marqu�e par l'ouverture d'esprit, cette remarque...
translated - Not very marked for (keeping) an open mind, this remark.
I guess being objective is an acquired skill.
Necessary, to be adequately informed. Thanks herb.
regards

[Mapraputa Is]

I've yet to spot a tri-lingual conversation
Not quite a conversation, but thought you might enjoy it.
"The inside of my brain looks like this: "Diesem studentin son tottemo irritating, y tambien sus sensei. Nadie quiere use real, honto English. Solamente quieren usar katakana eigo. Nein, nein, chiquillos, this is warui, sehr schlect." Huge points to anyone else out there who can understand all of that. Sometimes I'm amazed I can express myself at all anymore."
While Surfing...

[HS Thomas]

αυτό хороший для перемещение δεν нет a вопрос вообще использование действовать похожий Вавилон. αλλά εσύ возможно περιμένω κάποιος знать эти многие язык.
I took a basic idea scripted in English and translated bits in Greek and Russian. I am not sure what the origins of the Russian language are but some of the letters look similar to Greek. What a friendly way to communicate in the Balkans while massacring two languages so neither speaker gets offended. I think the general gist is not lost in translation.
Of course this only works if good things are said.
Origin of the Russian language
regards
[ October 12, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[Jim Yingst]

I am not sure what the origins of the Russian language are but some of the letters look similar to Greek.
To expound upon the info in the link you found: Constantinus is also known as St. Cyril, as in "Cyrillic alphabet". Many of the letters were directly based off Greek. When they needed to represent a sound that was not present in Greek, they made up a new letter. The alphabet was later used among a wide range of slavic peoples, many of whom later adopted the Roman alphabet. I don't think Cyril & Methodius actually made it up to Russia (though I may be mistaken), but that's about the only country that still uses their alphabet. (Not sure about the various other former Soviet republics).
FWIW, Cyril and Methodius also appear in Milorad Pavić's Dictionary of the Khazars. Not that these entries will be much help in understanding their actual role in history, but they're kind of cool.
[ October 12, 2003: Message edited by: Jim Yingst ]

[Mapraputa Is]

HT: I am not sure what the origins of the Russian language are but some of the letters look similar to Greek.
There is a good picture of Greek and Russian alphabets:

(Stolen from http://www.plovdivcityguide.com/Cyrillic/)
JY: I don't think Cyril & Methodius actually made it up to Russia (though I may be mistaken), but that's about the only contry that still uses their alphabet. (Not sure about the various other former Soviet republics).

Cyrillics, as a character set is used for a writing on Russian, Byelorussian, Ukrainian, Bulgarian, Macedonian, Mongolian, Serbian, Kazakh, Kirghiz, Uzbek, Azerbaijani, Bosnian, Turkmen etc. languages.
http://www.cyrlinc.org/

I suspect most of the aforementioned languages use modified versions, though. You might want to look at Unicode Cyrillic Range:
http://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/U0400.pdf
[ October 12, 2003: Message edited by: Mapraputa Is ]

[HS Thomas]

Thanks for the links, Jim and Map.
Here's another link I found
International Phonetic Alphabet
regards

[Jim Yingst]

Thanks, Map. Looks like it's still used more than I realized. Also check out wwww.omniglot.com for additional info on all sorts of alphabets. They list a number of other languages which use Cyrillic as well, though some of those may be dead languages. And some of these can use Cyrillic or Roman - e.g. Turkmen. And Kurdish can be written in these two and also Arabic. All these are probably somewhat modified forms, as Map notes.

[Mapraputa Is]

Also check out www.omniglot.com for additional info on all sorts of alphabets. They list a number of other languages which use Cyrillic as well, though some of those may be dead languages.
www.omniglot.com has been on my list for long time, but I totally missed the fact they list the languages that use a given script - I was too absorbed with various beautiful alphabets. As for languages which use Cyrillic, I can recognize about a half, they mostly belong to former USSR nationalities. I checked several random -- they aren't dead, albeit many of them "endangered" or "seriously endangered", like this one:
"Shor is a Turkic language spoken by less than 10,000 people in the Kemerovo Oblast of the Russian Federation."
[ October 13, 2003: Message edited by: Mapraputa Is ]

[Mapraputa Is]

FWIW, Cyril and Methodius also appear in Milorad Pavić's Dictionary of the Khazars. Not that these entries will be much help in understanding their actual role in history, but they're kind of cool.
I just read this entry in Russian translation and now wonder what parts are true, and what not. That his teacher was Leo the Mathematician is not Pavić invention. And there is a brief mentioning of "... those first Glagolitic signs" (my translation). "Glagolica" was the first alphabet created by Cyril, before "Cyrillic". There is a theory that Glagolitic letters were made out of three Christian symbols: cross, triangle (symbol of Trinity) and circle (a symbol of eternity). Here is a good article about it, it's in Russian but the first table has Glagolitic letters and the last picture shows them even better (the big letters are Glagolitic).
P.S. I have been interested in Khazars since my school years, because their state was situated right where I am from, or at least very close.
[ October 13, 2003: Message edited by: Mapraputa Is ]

[HS Thomas]

The IPA crops up in monoglot.com again useful to learn how words sound but still, practise is required to recognise letters in the original form.
Factfile :The Greek alphabet is a writing system that was developed in Greece between 1000 BC and 800 BC. It is the direct or indirect ancestor of all modern European alphabets. Derived from the North Semitic alphabet via that of the Phoenicians, the Greek alphabet was modified to make it more efficient and accurate for writing a non-Semitic language by the addition of more letters.
The Ionic alphabet developed around 400BC around Anatolia (region in modern day Turkey).
regards

[Mapraputa Is]

For those who loves surrealistic twists:
Other Suppressed Info You Should Know About
Modern Jews are overwhelmingly Khazars -- NOT Hebrews

Some of you may have to prepare for brain meltdown here -- unless you are seeking the truth, then you will be liberated by this knowledge.
Somewhere between 70% and 85% of those who constitute modern "Jewry" are NOT, repeat not, descended from the Hebrews of the Old Testament. That means they cannot possibly have any claim on the Holy Land, even by the tortured and false reasoning of Khazar hirelings such as Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. So if modern day "Jews" are not descended from the ancient Hebrews, who are they? They are descended from a once-fierce tribe which used to form a nation called Khazaria which was located in Russia (you will find Khazaria on good medieval maps). The combination of their language and Hebrew became known as "yiddish."

Oh my.

[Jim Yingst]

Well it's good that we can get such unbiased information from a source which clearly has no other agenda. :roll:

[HS Thomas]

Zundelsite - site of Mr Zundel who doesn't like Germany being accused of the libel of the 'Holocaust'.
from Wikipaedia:
Hebrew (I'vrit, עברית ; ) is a Semitic language. For two-and-a-half-thousand years Hebrew was used only for study of the Bible and Mishnah, ceremony, and prayer, but it was reborn as a spoken language during the 20th century, replacing Arabic, Ladino, Yiddish and other languages of the Jewish diaspora as the spoken language of the majority of the Jewish people living in Israel.
Hebrew is the official language of the state of Israel. Modern Hebrew is referred to in Hebrew, as "I'vrit", while ancient biblical Hebrew is known in Hebrew as "L'shon HaKodesh", or the Holy Tongue, i.e. G-d's language.
Yiddish is a Germanic language spoken by about four million Jews throughout the world. The name Yiddish itself means 'Jewish' and is originally short for yidish daytsh, or 'Jewish German'; an older term in English is Judaeo-German. The language arose in central Europe between the 9th and 12th centuries as an amalgam of Middle High German dialects, incorporating also many Hebrew words.
Yiddish eventually split into West and East Yiddish. The latter in turn split into Northeast and Southeast Yiddish. Modern Yiddish, and especially East Yiddish, contains a great many words derived from Slavic languages.

regards
[ October 15, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[Anonymous]

Originally posted by HS Thomas:
I am not sure what the origins of the Russian language are but some of the letters look similar to Greek.

This might help you.

[HS Thomas]

Have you been inspired to learning Russian then ? Or Sanskrit ?
regards
[ October 15, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[HS Thomas]

It's odd but the link that Ravish posted shows both German and Russian being a derivative of Greek , but they have different Alphabets.
That's odd.
regards

[R K Singh]

Originally posted by HS Thomas:
It's odd but the link that Ravish posted shows both German and Russian being a derivative of Greek , but they have different Alphabets.
That's odd.
regards

Even I was thinking the same ..
All European languages are suppose to be derived fron Sanskrit but all have different alphabets and vowels .. [atleast Sanskrit and English/latin]
I think something is missing in the philosphy of language ...

[Mapraputa Is]

All European languages are suppose to be derived fron Sanskrit
It would be more accurate to say that European languages and Sanskrit are derived from the same common root - so called "Proto Indo European Language" (PIE)
http://hinduwebsite.com/general/sanskrit.htm

[Mapraputa Is]

HST: International Phonetic Alphabet
... sucks.

Adyge and Kabardian have a set of lateral fricatives. Adyge has fortis or geminate stops pp tt kk qq qqw tts ttsw and more. Adyge even has pharyngeal stops, which I have never heard of in a language: there is no phonetic symbol for them in the IPA and I certainly couldn't produce them myself.
Ubykh was formerly listed in the Guinness Book of Records as the language with the most consonants (81 by some counts), until displaced by an even more obscure Khoisan language from southern Africa. The last native speaker of Ubykh, Tevfik Esenc, died on 7 October 1992. Esenc fully cooperated with linguists to record his precious legacy, and was x-rayed to try to understand how he was making his sounds. http://www.everything2.com/index.pl?node=North-West%20Caucasian

[ October 19, 2003: Message edited by: Mapraputa Is ]

[HS Thomas]

Ubykh, has just become extinct. An alternative name for the family is Abkhazo-Adygean.

Hardly surprising. The language was so difficult no one could learn it.
I am sure the Ubykh people live on speaking an easier language.
The IPA isn't International ? Perhaps it is International in the sense of currently spoken languages.

Unfortunately, since Ubykh is so consonantally complex, a satisfactory ASCII transcription for it is not yet in place. A phonemic transcription that can be used is as follows:

See Wikipaedia -
Ubykh language
Phonemic transcription to the rescue. There seems to be still some interest and the Ubykh people who had adopted Turkish and Circassian as their language are now learning their difficult language.
Perhaps the IPA will include these kinds of phonemes eventually.
regards

[HS Thomas]

The Psetloqoa tradition - isn't that cute ?
Readers articles "From the Memory".

And the English-Ubykh dictionary seems under construction and requires a little knowledge of the International Phonetic Alphabet and fonts for it, which can be downloaded at:
English-Ubykh" target="_blank" rel="nofollow">www.sil.org/computing/fonts/encore-ipa.htmlEnglish-Ubykh
regards
[ October 19, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[Jim Yingst]

[Map]: It would be more accurate to say that European languages and Sanskrit are derived from the same common root - so called "Proto Indo European Language"
Similarly, in response to HST:
[HST]: It's odd but the link that Ravish posted shows both German and Russian being a derivative of Greek , but they have different Alphabets.
Hmmm, Ravish's link isn't working for me right now, but as I recall it didn't show that. Russian and German aren't really derivative of Greek; they're all three derivative of Proto-Indo-European. (Which was once known as Indo-Aryan, but that name has lost popularity for some reason.) :roll: Proto-Indo-European didn't have an alphabet of its own, so it's not surprising that its descendants evolved different alphabets. There are still other links between various languages - e.g. German did take some words from Greek, like the names of sciences such as Physics, Biology, Psychhlogy, etc. I'm too lazy to look up just what the German versions of these are, but the point is it's much like the English, which is to say in this case it's Greek words with a Roman alphabet. But despite some borrowings, German is not primarily descended from Greek, or Sanskrit either. Russian inherited about half its alphabet from Greek, but otherwise is largely separate from it.
English is a bt more confusing in this respect, because it's regarded as primarily from German, but also imported a whole lot of words from French and sometimes Latin, Greek, or other languages.

[Mapraputa Is]

HST: The Psetloqoa tradition - isn't that cute ?

I now wish to recall one traditional practice which I witnessed in my childhood and which remains a vivid memory. This tradition took place in a Cherke village in Syria, in the fifties …
The name is Psetloqoa, which is a combination of two words Pse for mind, and Tloqoa meaning the search for a companion for life through community of thought. This tradition served to initiate contacts between young men and young women.

More...

[HS Thomas]

JY:English is a bt more confusing in this respect, because it's regarded as primarily from German, but also imported a whole lot of words from French and sometimes Latin, Greek, or other languages.

Old English had a Germanic base.
Words were adopted from conquering nations notably the French largely from which Middle English was derived.

The Lord's Prayer in Germanic Languages shows how Old English looked like. (I didn't know Alsation was a language). The closest living relative of the English language is Frisian,apparently. Though you won't guess that by listening to the speakers.
Pennsylvania Dutch gets a mention and I can recognise those words and not in Old English or in Frisian.
This seems to be a good link to English Language History Resources
THE CHAUCER METAPAGE AUDIO FILES shows how Middle English was pronounced and
at least the words become recognisable.
The influence of Greek on the English language must have been through the German language.I suspect English has adopted more French words (which was the language of the court) than has survived German words in English.
regards
[ October 20, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[Jeroen Wenting]

Frisian is of course not a language (at least not legally ).
The EU list of recognised languages does not include Frisian, instead listing it as a dialect (something that the people in the area dislike a lot, as it means they have no legal basis for their practice of forcing the dialect on others through official documents and roadsigns and getting compensated for it by increased government funding).
Frisian itself is again split into Frisian and Ost Frisian, spoken respectively in parts of the Netherlands and parts of northern Germany.

[Mapraputa Is]

"A language is a dialect with an army and a navy"

There is a much-cited aphorism in linguistics that "a language is a dialect with an army"; I think I had seen it attributed to Max Weinreich, but I did not know that he originally wrote it in Yiddish as "A shprakh iz a diyalekt mit an armey un a flot" ['A language is a dialect with an army and a navy'] in the article "Der yivo un di problemen fun undzer tsayt" ("Yivo" and the problems of our time) in the periodical Yivo-bleter 25.1 [1945].
http://www.languagehat.com/archives/000633.php

[HS Thomas]

I've been wrestling with the above saying and have come to the conclusion they weren't talking about the English language.
It's too full of paradoxes. It's not a commanding language, it's petty and modest. But we get by very well with it. And that's part of it's popularity as it casts it's magic spell far and wide.
Paradoxes
Do any other languages show such lunacy ? What do they speak in the English army and navy ? They must have a special English rule book.

regards
[ October 20, 2003: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[HS Thomas]

From Wikipaedia:
"In a way, "dialect" is not a linguistic term: there is no linguistic means by which one is able to distinguish a "dialect" from a "language" - it is rather a kind of sociolinguistic evaluation (or historical evaluation in the case of linguists) that makes people talk about languages and dialects.
Often, dialects are called dialects
solely because they are not (or not recognized as) literary languages,
because they are not standardized,
because the speakers of the given language do not have a state of their own,
or because their language lacks prestige."
Now I understand the saying and is consistent with what Joeren wrote about Frisian. There's some deep soul-searching in the preservation of dialects.
regards