LL-L "Idiomatica" 2008.04.13 (07) [E]

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From: Diederik Masure <didimasure at hotmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2008.04.13 (03) [E]

I always heard that West-Flemish (+East Flemish?) does the same, while the
east of the country uses the 'normal' system, i.e. saying "no" to affirm a
negative question. But I have never really noticed this myself (since I
don't know many persons from these tracts) so maybe our Westflemish members
could shine some light on this?

Diederik

From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
Subject: Culture related language use

I noticed something interesting, the different way of replying to some
questions by speakers of many non-European languages. I know a lot of
people with African (Guinea, Sierra Leone, Congo, Angola etc), Middle East
(Arab, Irani, Afghani etc) and Far East (Chinese, Vietnamese) backgrounds.
If they are asked e.g. "Didn't you go to work today?" and they
answer "Yes", this means "No, I didn't go to work". This often leads to
confusion, because a Dutchman or other European would say "No",
meaning "No, I didn't go to work". So they just confirm the
question, "yes" means "you're right, it's true what you asked", whereas
Europeans would say "no" i.e. "the action you're asking about is negative".
On the other hand, when asked "did you go to work today" and they did not,
both will answer "No."
I'm curious if there are European languages too with the confirming
system, and whether there is a difference between Indo-European languages
and other, how languages like Hindi etc. handle this which are I E but
from outside Europe.

Ingmar

----------

From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2008.04.13 (03) [E]

Oh, what a coincidence! I should have rather sent it with subject "fun with
words" because it is a case of When No means Yes, as in Tom's message
about Slovak (a)no...

From: Ingmar Roerdinkholder <ingmar.roerdinkholder at WORLDONLINE.NL>
Subject: Culture related language use

I noticed something interesting, the different way of replying to some
questions by speakers of many non-European languages. I know a lot of
people with African (Guinea, Sierra Leone, Congo, Angola etc), Middle East
(Arab, Irani, Afghani etc) and Far East (Chinese, Vietnamese) backgrounds.
If they are asked e.g. "Didn't you go to work today?" and they
answer "Yes", this means "No, I didn't go to work". This often leads to
confusion, because a Dutchman or other European would say "No",
meaning "No, I didn't go to work". So they just confirm the
question, "yes" means "you're right, it's true what you asked", whereas
Europeans would say "no" i.e. "the action you're asking about is negative".
On the other hand, when asked "did you go to work today" and they did not,
both will answer "No."
I'm curious if there are European languages too with the confirming
system, and whether there is a difference between Indo-European languages
and other, how languages like Hindi etc. handle this which are I E but
from outside Europe.

Ingmar

•

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