LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.04 (02) [D/E]

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From: Mike Morgan <mwmosaka at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (02) [E]

> It would have been clearer simply to say
> "We will have a meeting on tuesday." (This would mean *this* tuesday, of
> course.)

the solution used in Japanese Deaf culture (and I am sure a solution
used in other cultures as well) is to refer to events ALWAYS by their
date. I was forever, even after 15 years being in the midst of it
daily, translating when people asked me "Will you be there on 14 Feb"
that they mean "Tuesday 3 weeks from now"!

Mike || マイク || माईक || Мика || માઈક || მაიქ || ਮਾਈਕ
מייק || மாஇக் || Miqueu || U C > || ما یک || Mihangel
================
Dr Michael W Morgan
Managing Director Ishara Foundation Mumbai (Bombay), India
++++++++++++++++
माईकल मोर्गन (पी.एच.डी.) मेनेजिंग डॉयरेक्टर ईशारा फॉउंडेशन (मुंबई )
++++++++++++++++
茂流岸マイク(言語学博士) イシャラ基金の務理事・事務局
長 ムンバイ(ボンベイ)、インド

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From: Mark Dreyer <mrdreyer at lantic.net>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (02) [E]

Beste Marlou



Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica"



Mark said:

Well, in the same place we Afrikaners also say 'volgende', & logic argues
for retention. Nowww, which is nearest - to the present year: The year past
or the year to come? Now you may argue context gives that information, which
is true, but you need it.



Marlou, you say:

I beg your pardon, this is Tüdelkram. The noste, naaste, next, nächste etc.
year is always the year to follow. The year past is out of reach by the laws
of physics, unless you are able to surpass the speed of light. If I say
today: "Next year I will do this", I mean 2010. Basta. Even though 2010 is
al long way and 2008 is only just gone.



Mark:

Thanks for that, Marlou. Incidentally, does this apply to all dialects
across the board? Messinch?



Just by the way this isn't so in Afrikaans I wonder if it can be so in
Dutch? The way we use 'naaste' it *has* to be more open. For example,
"Maaandag naaste aan die eerste van die maand." = (Monday nearest the first
of the month) for a date as prescribed through every month of the year, like
my wife's dancing classes. It may be that the Monday in question comes two
days before the first, or in another case a day later. 'Volgende' leaves no
room for doubt.



A propos of your next observation, one can have the same problem between
English- & Afrikaans- speakers. Under the circumstances we prefer to say
"...Dinsdag." for that day this week, or "...hierdiee Dinsdag." to make
sure, & "...aankomende Dinsdag" for the Tuesday a week over" (Dinsdag oor 'n
week, as in 'môre oormôre').



Marlou:

Much more amusing is the northern german custom of saying "This tuesday we
will have a meeting" in contrast to "Next tuesday we will have a
meeting." (I think this has been discussed already here, hasn't it?) Now
what is "this" tuesday? It is in fact the next tuesday to come. The nearest
tuesday. In Hamburg at least it is so. The people of this extraordinary town
are some time ahead of time, quite without the help of relativity and speed
greater than that of light. "Next tuesday" is the tuesday after. I have seen
people miss meetings on these grounds. A Hamburg man said "Next tuesday", an
Austrian man came -- this tuesday! It would have been clearer simply to say
"We will have a meeting on tuesday." (This would mean *this* tuesday, of
course.

The height of confusion would be to say "this tuesday" on a tuesday in
Hamburg! :-))



Yrs,

Mark



P.S. By the way, what exactly is Tudelkram? (pardon - I can't find the
diacritic).


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From: Diederik Masure <didimasure at hotmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (04) [D/E]

Luc: the other way arround it happened to "a nadder" or in Dutch "een
nadder" which then lost its n and became adder, but Latin natrix still has
the n.
It can also happen with an l- from romance languages, as in "lommer(te)"
meaning shade, from French l'ombre.

I never heard people say "drie een half" in any Dutch dialect for half past
three... but my Irish friend here used to confuse us all by saying "lets
meet at half three" or "I'll see you guys at half nine" all the time. He
means "half past three", "half past nine" but by omitting "past" all the
Dutch and Norwegian people here automatically make it into their own "half
drie" and "half negen".

Greetings, Diederik

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From: M.-L. Lessing <marless at gmx.de>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (02) [E]

Dear Luc,



what do your people say when it is 15:15 h? In northern germany we say
"Viertel nach drei", in some southern and eastern areas they say "Es ist ein
Viertel vier". So from the first minute past 15:00, they look ahead to the
completion of 16:00. This is a strange way of thinking to me. They never
look back in time. We here look back to the 15:00 at least an half hour;
when it is 15:20 we say "20 nach drei". Only 15:30 is "halb vier", and from
then also the northern german people look ahead to 16:00 saying "20 vor
vier" and "Viertel vor vier". By the way, "Viertel vor vier" is "dreiviertel
vier" in some southern regions. The full hour is alyways considered as the
main actor, even if time is a fraction of this full hour. I can't help
thinking this way of expressing time has to do with the feeling for time and
thus with character. How we express things must influence what we think of
them. -- Another such (private) suspicion of mine is that France has
produced so many glorious mathematicians because of their odd way of
counting. Counting in French is, you know, half calculating already, much
more so than in other languages. A french child that can count to 100 can do
multiplications and sums and all that automatically and immediately can
start into Legendre-polynomes, Lagrange-functions, Fourier-transformations,
Cauchy-criteria etc. :-) No wonder every second name in the history of maths
is french. Complication can be useful in posing challenges and training to
human mind! At least I suspect it is so; it would be much trouble to prove
scientifically the influence of french counting on the production rate of
maths geniuses over, say, 5 generations. -- Well, germans have produced Gauß
and Euler, that must do for us. Gauß surely does, good old Gauß! :-)



Hartlich!



Marlou

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*Sent:* Sunday, January 04, 2009 2:57 AM

*Subject:* LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (04) [D/E]

From: Luc Hellinckx <luc.hellinckx at gmail.com>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica"

Beste Marlou,

On a same note, roughly speaking, half of the people here say "half vier"
when the time is 15:30, and the other say "drie en half"...*s*

Kind greetings,

Luc Hellinckx

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From: Sandy Fleming <sandy at scotstext.org>
Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (03) [E]

> From: KarlRein at aol.com
> Subject: LL-L "Idiomatica" 2009.01.03 (02) [E]
>
> It is amusing to me to read about this "Northern German custom"; it is
> also a generalized custom in the United States (and, I suspect, in
> many other countries).  I have tested this in language classes, and
> loud arguments come forth over what "next Thursday" means if it is
> said, let us say, on Monday.  I once phoned a business person I had
> been expecting for an hour, and he told me, not at all confused, that
> according to his schedule, he was due to call on me in a week.  I
> suspect that this confusion is quite universal.

> Karl Reinhardt

In Scotland, this is treated in a quite specific way.

The week is from Sunday to Saturday.

So on a Friday, say, "next Sunday" means two days hence, "this
Wednesday" was two days ago, while "last Wednesday" is Wednesday of last
week. "Next Saturday" is eight days hence, and you would say "tomorrow"
rather than "this Saturday".

If the day referred to is yesterday or tomorrow, then "yesterday" or
"tomorrow" is used rather than using the this/next terminology.

So "this" is used for the Sunday to Saturday we're in, "next" for the
Sunday to Saturday coming up, and "last" for the previous Sunday to
Saturday. This can be extended to cover five weeks by saying "next
again" to indicate two weeks hence (the Sunday to Saturday), or eg "the
Saturday before last" for two weeks ago (the Sunday to Saturday, as
always).

In England and Wales, by contrast, people seem to be vague about which
day is the first day of the week, and tend to just say "next" for the
next day of that name and so on, although this can become vague if we
say "next Saturday" when this Saturday is tomorrow or very close.

Sandy Fleming (Time Lord :)
http://scotstext.org/



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 From: R. F. Hahn <sassisch at yahoo.com>
Subject: Idiomatica

Folks,

For what it's worth, the Scottish system as described by oor Sandy abuin is
the only one that really makes sense to me, because it is based only on week
divisions irrespective of past and future within a given week. *Voilà* the
no-Tüdelkram Scottish approach. No wonder I have an escotophile streak.

About *Tüdelkram*, please check out the next "Etymology" edition, Mark *et
al*.

Regards,
Reinhard/Ron
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