Wiktionary:Tea room/2011/June

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June 2011

cohesion and coherence

We are missing the linguistic meanings here. ---> Tooironic 07:14, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

stand

The book Sideways Stories From Wayside School has someone saying "Ron and I will stand everybody!" meaning play in opposition to them, or challenge them, or something, in a game. Does this exist (outside of that author's works)? Collocations I can think of offhand (without huge numbers of false positives) don't show up on Google with any frequency; e.g., there's but one relevant Web hit for "will stand everybody".​—msh210℠ (talk) 20:38, 1 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

All right. I've added it to [[stand]] with {{rfdef}}. Please improve it if you can.​—msh210℠ (talk) 15:47, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

number

As far as I know, "there are a number of people" is considered less awkward than "there is a number of people", but this is definitely not intuitive to non-native speakers because "number" is countable. Should this be reflected in the usage notes? ---> Tooironic 01:13, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This phenomenon is often called "semantic agreement". It's not specific to the word number; the same happens with many such nouns. It's so pervasive with lot that one could well argue that a lot of is now basically a plural determiner. (The phenomenon is also not unique to English; twenty seconds on Google will find you such things as « Durant cette période, une grande nombre de Chinois vivaient à Washington » (French) and "Un gran número de sistemas instalados trabajan por fíat" (Spanish) and "מספר גדול של ארגונים אימצו פתרונות תוכנת קוד פתוח" (Hebrew).) I don't know if individual affected words really need a usage note, but if you think it would be helpful, I don't see a problem with it. (If you're going to do that, you might want to create a template for it, so it's easy to add the same usage note to other affected words.) —RuakhTALK 01:37, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Usage examples illustrating the alternates are helpful, possibly even more than usage notes. DCDuring TALK 01:19, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No, I think semantic agreement is different. Here, we're looking a number transparency, discussed on p. 349 of the CGEL. They cite the main number transparent nouns as: lot, plenty, lots, bags, heaps, loads, oodles, stacks, remainder, rest, number, couple.--Brett 19:13, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

teodan

I find it hard to believe that Old English has misspellings, yet alone common ones. Surely Old English wasn't standardized enough to have anything close to a misspelling. --Mglovesfun (talk) 13:59, 2 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

誤字--Brett 19:16, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
      • The word is certainly attested in the following passage from Beowulf: Nalæs hí hine læssan lácum teódan ðonne ða dydon ðe hine æt frumsceafte forð onsendon. It's an alternative form. The usual spelling is tēodon. Leasnam 19:42, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

the phonology is a negligible difference, so I don't see it as a misspelling

{{onomatopoeia}}

This template is made to function as a context label and is categorized as a grammatical context label. I fail to see how onomatopoeia is grammatical rather than etymological and/or semantic. How do we categorize the etymological derivation from onomatopoeia? Do need (or already have) a different template for such derivation. DCDuring TALK 01:16, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

{{by ellipsis}}

Similar to above, except it seems to be purely etymological. DCDuring TALK 01:36, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

{{of a person}}

This seems not a grammatical context, but a semantic restriction. DCDuring TALK 01:36, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Yes, so what? Mglovesfun (talk) 10:08, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Missing grammatical context

We lack categorizing context-type grammatical templates and categories for senses of words that have restricted types of complements (eg, PPs headed by a specific preposition). DCDuring TALK 01:36, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

God

We now have a lot of senses like "A deity with bodily characteristics" and "An omniscient deity" and "A deity that can do anything, except contradicting his own laws..." and "A [deity that's a] moral judge of people". Et cetera. I really don't think that when the cited sources (for each of these has at least one citation, thanks to Daniel's hard work) included the word God, they meant — well, let me be specific. I really don't think that when Brenda Hicks-Wiggins wrote I thought if my life is hard not obeying God, then how sweet it could be if I obey him she meant by God "An authority or leader of people". I think she meant by God "{{non-gloss definition|A name}}" (specifically, "A deity's name"), and included in her mind was likely not only that that deity is an authority or leader of people but also that he's omniscient, perhaps, omnipotent, perhaps, etc.: so the cite is not really a good one for the sense it purports to support. But the point is that the word God means "A name" and not "A deity that's an authority", much as Robert means "A male given name" and not "That guy who lives down my street with the cats". I think we should collapse all the senses into one (except those currently at RFD for another reason). (Actually, I think supersense (as opposed to subsense) currently in the entry is worded very well: "A supreme deity, whose existence (or nonexistence) and other attributes are discussed and/or explained by various religions, doctrines, philosophical theories and beliefs of individuals, although with many disagreements amongst them.".) Thoughts?​—msh210℠ (talk) 04:12, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The entry seems to miss the point of having a dictionary. Most dictionaries serve their users humbly by economizing on readers' attention and conveying the core meanings of a word, not overlapping specialized meanings from various contexts and from throwaway lines. This entry does not, not do the citations support the senses for the most part. I would be inclined to challenge almost every sense at RfV, though I can also think of a much simpler approach to correcting it, which I would support. DCDuring TALK 05:06, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I, personally, would like to keep the subsenses as appropriate for a dictionary. There are ways to improve the entry, but I don't think deleting all the subsenses would be one of them. Here are a few thoughts:

  1. For hypothetical readers who believe that entries should be written with few words, without overlapping specialized senses, we already have the supersense.
  2. That belief is, however, technically incorrect in comparison with at least the entry of, which has 47 preposition senses, often overlapped.
  3. Deities are associated with a number of things. Hermes is defined as "(Greek mythology) The herald and messenger of the gods, and the god of roads, commerce, invention, cunning, and theft." These are important things. Failing to mention that "God" is the deity of Judaism is like failing to mention that Hermes is a deity of Greek mythology.
  4. With this argument in mind, a single but comprehensive definition would be this one, that may sound article-ish: "A supreme deity, whose existence (or nonexistence) and other attributes are discussed and/or explained by various religions, doctrines, philosophical theories and beliefs of individuals, although with many disagreements amongst them; those attributes include being the deity of Abrahamic religions, Hinduism, Sikhism, being a judge of people, being the creator of the universe, being the provider of things..."
  5. However, articles and entries are different in scope, wording and presentation. Compare w:God and God. In particular, the entry just mentioned once that God is a monotheistic deity, whereas the article has a whole huge section telling the "History of monotheism".
  6. In fact, if you have time, please see the revision of April 14 of the entry, which was the last one not edited by me. It has a strange choice of senses, which includes separating "An omnipotent being, creator of the universe (as in deism)." and "The single deity of various monotheistic religions." The current revision is certainly an improvement over it, at least by showing more clearly how the senses overlap.
  7. The senses do overlap, but they are used in different contexts by different people. God is the provider of things that come by chance. Therefore, the sentence "God gave her a pretty body." makes sense and implies that the speaker believes that the woman was born beautiful. The message is not that God is the deity of sex appeal, and not that God is a famous distributor of corpses. God is the provider. By contrast, "Poseidon gave her a pretty body." does not make sense at all.

--Daniel 09:03, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • I find this revision (14 April 2011) much better than current revision. Put differently, I support reverting the changes to "God" entry recently made by Daniel Carrero. What follows are various optional details that you can skip.

    The single most compelling definition seems to be this: "The single deity of various monotheistic religions"; this definition could be extended with ", often considered allmighty, all-knowing, and perfectly good", or the like. We can leave cataloguing of various properties that the single and only God is supposed to have to an encyclopedic work. Some more definitions can be justified by quotations, such as definition "An impersonal and universal spiritual presence or force", but I would like to see the reasoning that has lead from the quotations supporting the definition to the definition.

    However, I do not think that "God" means "A name". Neither do I think that "Peter" means "A name". This is likely to lead to a complex philosophical discussion, one that I do not have the energy to lead right now. The discussion would involve the following questions: What are the meanings of proper names, if anything? Are referents of proper names their meanings? Is "God" a description in disguise, or is it a term that designates its referent in such a way that not a single property of the referent follows necessarily from the designation? --Dan Polansky 10:06, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Agree the old revision is far better than the newer. Subsenses are not intended to cover every possible conversational context in which a word is used with essentially the same meaning. Senses like "A deity able to do something", "A deity that is somewhere" are no more useful than senses at purple for "A colour that can be used for paint", "A colour that can be the colour of a plum". Equinox ◑ 20:14, 2 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I have restored the pre-Daniel version. Edit summary: "restoring revision prior to Daniel's controversial changes. cf. "purple" not having 3 senses just because cars, plums, and flowers can all be purple". I do appreciate that Daniel did a lot of work finding citations but I think it was misdirected; see comments above. However, I may have reverted changes that followed Daniel's changes; I hope those editors can restore anything useful they may have added. Equinox ◑ 23:37, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
OK. I'm going to move the citations to Citations:God. --Daniel 23:41, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Equinox, reverting dozens of revisions was actually a bad idea. It would be better to just copy the definitions from the last "good" revision to the actual last revision, or else we lose translations, rhymes and whatnot. I'm going to do that too. --Daniel 23:44, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yeah, it wasn't very desirable. If you can sort it out, then thanks! Equinox ◑ 23:47, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

overlooked

On a TV program today I heard someone say, "Thank God this garden is not overlooked." - what do you suppose this means? The garden has not been neglected? The garden is not surrounded by tall buildings? Or something else? ---> Tooironic 11:26, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Could it mean "shaded", "in shade"? I'd be surprised if it was used of the shade of trees, though. DCDuring TALK 14:07, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I would guess that it has to do with the garden's level of privacy and/or seclusion: something like "Thank G-d no one can see us here". —RuakhTALK 15:38, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think so too. Sense 1 of (deprecated template usage) overlook seems to pertain. — Pingkudimmi 15:50, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
A web search for "garden is not overlooked" overwhelmingly favors the seclusion/privacy interpretation. I didn't find any support for my suggestion, though I didn't actively search for any. In my defense: I am more gardener/amateur botanist than sunbather. DCDuring TALK 16:17, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Note also that there is not necessarily an implication of human agency being involved. A hill may be said to overlook a valley: this just means it commands a higher position, not that anyone is actually looking. — Pingkudimmi 16:24, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
But the point seems to be that there us the potential for humans (or other primate?) to cast glances or projectiles at what can be overlooked from the overlooking place. DCDuring TALK 17:15, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
On a third hand, it doesn't seem part of the definition of the word, unless we adopt the approach taken in God. (See WT:TR#God.) DCDuring TALK 17:21, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Etymology vandalisms

Hello. I just edited big cheese and noticed it had a completely bogus "Chinook" etymology. (For an actual etym, just see http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-big1.htm and http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/64350.html for instance...)

The history page shows how this bogus etymology was added by User:Shii one year ago unsourced[1], quickly reverted[2], then forcibly added again[3] and has stayed since. The vandal's own history page Special:Contributions/Shii shows he's been adding more bogus Chinook etyms such as this one[4] for muckety muck...

There may be a lot of old undone vandalism to be found there for admins... 62.147.62.236 16:51, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. DCDuring TALK 17:25, 3 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

uneatable

There is a quote by Alistair Cooke that uses uneatable, and adds some context to how the word is used.

quotes.dictionary.com slash It_has_been_an_unchallengeable_American_doctrine_that

It would be worth noting on the page that inedible is the usual, and preferred form, and that uneatable is only used in the context that something looks or tastes so horrible that no one would want to eat it, even though it is, in fact, edible.

You could make a case that anything's edible in the sense you can physically ingest it, even if it ultimately proves fatal, it's still 'edible'. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:00, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I was taught the opposite, that edible substances are those that don't cause harm. Isn't that how the word is normally used? Dbfirs 20:17, 11 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

¶ Is this term actually comparable? I think that would only apply to substances that are figuratively “uneatable”. --Pilcrow 23:32, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

eatable

1. It says "edible is the usual term, and much more frequent in the US – eatable may be interpreted as an error – while comestible is relatively formal.".

This is ambiguous, and makes it look as though in other English-speaking countries, eatable is commonly used.

I cannot speak for England, but in Australia, eatable would also be considered an error, except in specific contexts, as the article goes on to mention. Unless the English object, I would remove "in the US", and just say "and much more frequent – ".

2. There should be a link to uneatable as the antonym.

Hi. Point 2: I have added the antonym. Point 1: as far as I know, eatable is perfectly common and valid in all English-speaking countries. The etymology is clear enough: eat + -able. Do you have evidence to the contrary? Equinox ◑ 23:36, 4 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

---I was simply asking to remove the phrase "in the US". The article makes it look as though it is only in the US that eatable is not regarded as the proper term.

I am Australian, and we were taught in school that the proper term is edible. "eatable" just sounds wrong. We might say something was uneatable, in the sense of being to horrible to eat (although edible), and even then, inedible is preferred.

"eatables" is sometimes used, and "eatery", but not "eatable" - it is "edible".

You asked for evidence: Google: eatable 1,280,000 results; edible 45,100,000 results Several of the results for eatable is for businesses marketing "eatable" clothing and other items that would not normally be expected to be eaten. Others are websites by people for whom English is a second language. For business/artistic license, one makes exceptions, but it certainly is not common practice.

I'd say edible is both more common and more standard. Some people consider eatable an error, which I don't. Mglovesfun (talk) 10:57, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Regarding the suggestion that "eatable" implies lower quality than does "edible," this US style guide disagrees. — Pingkudimmi 11:33, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I said UNeatable means horrible. My only point about 'eatable' is that it is not the common variant - google supports that 'edible' is by far the preferred option.

The article says that only "in the US" is eatable considered an error. It is also considered an error here. Please remove the phrase "in the US".

The word is perfectly acceptable in its own right, especially in the negative (e.g. Wilde's "The English country gentleman galloping after a fox - the unspeakable in full pursuit of the uneatable"), but "eatable" is often used when "edible" would be preferable in all English-speaking countries. I agree that we should remove the US restriction, and perhaps we could clarify the usage note at the same time. Dbfirs 20:08, 11 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

alight

Hi, collegues. Some months ago, RATP changed its message from

  • Terminus, please alight!

to

  • This is the last stop, please leave the train!

I am wondering why they did that. Was the verb alight a problem in this context (eg is it only for the cattle ? ;-) --ArséniureDeGallium 19:16, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Alight is completely correct here, but it's not a very common word. Many more people will understand "leave the train". ("Leave the train", by the way, does not strike me as very idiomatic — I would say "get off the train" — but its meaning is very clear, and I suspect that more non-native speakers will understand it. After all, their target audience is not just native English-speakers, but any English-speaker who isn't also a French-speaker.) —RuakhTALK 20:17, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I remember when I was in London the intercom on the Underground would say 'alight here' for certain destinations. I'm not sure if it is still that way. —CodeCat 20:19, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Ruakh, you really made the answer I was expecting for. Very interresting. Thanks. :)) --ArséniureDeGallium 20:29, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

enthousiastic and enthousiastically

I nominated both of these for deletion in French Wiktionary as misspellings, but was countered with a few hundred book uses of each. I was wondering, are these misspellings, or are they legitimate alternate spellings? bd2412 T 21:25, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Since they more closely mirror the French spellings than the modern English ones do, I wouldn't be surprised to find out they're obsolete spellings. Mglovesfun (talk) 21:33, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
68 of the 4500 bgc hits for "enthousiasm" and "anthousiastic" are followed by "sic". That seems to say that writers quoting the spelling think of it as a misspelling. If seems common among writers with Dutch and French surnames, though not so limited. DCDuring TALK 23:26, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Okay, I'm putting it down as a common misspelling for now. bd2412 T 00:08, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

-assed

This is currently defined as a suffix. Possibly the only word that can be described as having it may be half-assed, this seems a clear sum-of-part from -ass+-ed (compare "smart-assed"; though it's not clear what came first amongst the -ass words, some seem to date from the 60s at least), but most other words just use the noun as an appositive, e.g. "badass", "dumbass". Circeus 23:04, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

They are grammatically very different. -assed is clearly an adjective because of the -ed suffix. But -ass is a noun, specifically a so-called bahuvrihi compound, that denotes something that is not present in the compound. A badass isn't an ass that's bad, it's someone (perhaps originally) having an ass that's bad. It's similar to black belt. —CodeCat 23:14, 5 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Are you sure about that? I always assumed that these "ass" compounds are an extension of ass (“the self; a person”). The New Partridge Dictionary of Slang and Unconventional English (previewable on b.g.c.) gives that ass from 1945, bad-ass from 1955, and dumb-ass from 1958. (Though I suppose, when it comes down to it, there's not much difference between an exocentric compound and an endocentric one with a synecdochic head.) —RuakhTALK 00:37, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If I can say that someone is very badass, then I don't see how badass can be endocentric. It's clearly a descriptive word in that example. —CodeCat 00:42, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My point is actually that our single -assed example is clearly half+ass/-ass (i.e. half-ass)+-ed. Are there -assed compounds that cannot be -ass+-ed? Circeus 03:31, 6 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Request for a new addition

Häufigkeit German Noun - English 'Frequency" Gender f Plural die Häufigkeiten

It is used in a page in Wiktionary so should have an entry itself: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/frequency Bees77707 11:55, 7 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Häufigkeit, you could add it yourself, or use WT:RE:de (section H). Mglovesfun (talk) 20:31, 7 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I've started it. —Angr 15:07, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Lateral Area

I am a student at a school and i do not get this concept at all could someone please explain!!?— This comment was unsigned.

Some combination of lateral and area I guess; without the context I can't tell you. --Mglovesfun (talk) 08:31, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
IME it refers to the surface area of the sides of an object (i.e., excluding the respective areas of the top and the bottom surfaces). HTH.​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:51, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

cobweb

"A spiderweb, or the remains of one, especially an asymmetrical one that is woven with an irregular pattern of threads." Neither Chambers nor Webster says that a cobweb is usually asymmetrical or irregular. Can we source this, or should we just reduce the definition to cover all spider-webs? Equinox ◑ 01:47, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm not sure about asymmetry and irregularity, but for me cobweb is definitely more specific than spider web. [[w:Spider web#Types of spider webs]] lists a bunch of types of spider web, with cobweb being treated as apparently synonymous with tangle web; Wikipedia doesn't explain what they are, but the term "tangle web" certainly evokes the right image for me. —RuakhTALK 02:17, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I always thought cobwebs were broken remnants of spiderwebs or even of air-blown individual filaments + dust, in line with MWOnline's def: "tangles of the silken threads of a spiderweb usually covered with accumulated dirt and dust".
I would disagree mostly with the "woven" part of the definition. BTW, is high dusting includable? DCDuring TALK 04:09, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
My sense is that cobwebs are strictly an indoor phenomenon while spiderwebs can be in or out. A search for nouns collocating with the lemma cobweb supports this. Nouns such as ceiling, corner, house, windows, and room turn up, but you don't find nouns like grass, tree, branch, and earth.--Brett 10:48, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It can also be found with "porch", "barn", and "cave". Any place that lowers wind speed enough for the structure to survive for a while seems to suffice. DCDuring TALK 13:24, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
  • 1892, The Overland monthly, volume 20, page 291:
    Occasionally, tufts of dried grass or moss will be blown by the winds and lodge across a limb of one of these trees, or perhaps in a cobweb spun in the crotch of a branch.
-- DCDuring TALK 13:27, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

dagnab(b)it

dagnabit

The one example on dagnabit spells the word "dagnabbit". Seems a bit inconsistent. Google suggests that both spellings are common. There may be more, using hyphens or blanks as separators (e.g. "dag nabbit") and then there is also dagnammit. Is all that worth adding to the article? Rl 06:35, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The spelling with 2 "b"s is more common on Google books. The 2-"b" spelling is also a better fit with the nearly "p" sound I recall from TV westerns. I have edited the entry a bit, but not yet moved it to the more common spelling.
dagnamit is more common than dagnammit, but both are much less common than dagnabit. I'd be happiest if all of the entries were alternate forms of or hard redirects to dagnabbit. DCDuring TALK 12:56, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
FWIW, dagnabit appears in the title of a Deputy Dawg episode, Dagnabit, Rabbit. — Pingkudimmi 13:31, 9 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Moved to dagnabbit. dagnabit is an alt form. DCDuring TALK 19:27, 1 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

fishmonger, warmonger, et al

Fishmonger's etymology is defined as a "compound word"; warmonger's is defined as a "word suffixed with -monger". Should we be consistent with these? Could they be both compound and suffixed words, I wonder? Oh, and to add salt to the wounds, what should we do about fishmonger's? :) ---> Tooironic 13:15, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Consistency is always good, but the line between these two is blurred. It's hard to tell whether something is a compound or a suffixed word sometimes. At what point does a word that is consistently compounded with other words become a suffix? Is it when it is no longer identical to its origin? —CodeCat 13:25, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I wouldn't call monger a suffix, personally, I'd say these are all compound words. Ƿidsiþ 13:50, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
We could say it becomes a suffix when it is no longer used as a separate word, but still is added to stems. Does this fit the fact pattern for "monger"/"-monger"?
There is no reason for consistency in presentation as there is no consistency in the nature of word formation over time. I hypothesize that borrowing and Anglicizing Latin words ending in "itas" and Old/Middle/Modern French ending in "ite" led to the existence of a population of words ending in "ity" from which the productive English suffix "-ity" was inferred. Thus a few presentations (inconsistent with each other) of etymology would be appropriate for words ending in "ity", IMHO. DCDuring TALK 16:09, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I suspect that "compound word" would be best. We don't normally invent new words with "-monger" (Second-hand carmonger, anyone?) -- ALGRIF talk 16:53, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Serbo-Croatian persirati

Does anyone know the translation in English? Would the etymology of the word be too much to ask? Regards, --Biblbroks дискашн 20:10, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't speak that language but there's a page on Wikipedia suggesting it means "address with the polite V-form". In English addressing with the impolite T-form is to thou, tutoy, or tutoyer, but I don't know a verb for the other one. Equinox ◑ 20:25, 10 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, it means to address with the polite V-form. Actually, since I am a native Serbo-Croatian speaker, my question should have been thus: does anyone know the equivalent in English for persirati? But since I am not a native English speaker, my question asked was as above. :-/. Thanks for the info, though. Actually, as I was skimming through that Wikipedia page, I've come to think of the etymology. Perhaps it comes from the German Sie, but the prefix per- is what puzzles me in that case. Also if German is the source for the word, pronounciation might be with z not s. Regards, --Biblbroks дискашн 21:30, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
No real equivalent; use {{non-gloss definition}}. --Mglovesfun (talk) 09:59, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Should we create a non-idiomatic translation target page for this? A lot of languages have such words, it would be a shame if we had no way to link them together. —RuakhTALK 15:49, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps an appendix, then?​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:23, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Why non-gloss definition? "To address with the polite (deprecated template usage) v form" is a gloss.​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:23, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Wouldn't thus appear somewhat cumbersome? I haven't found an entry for V-form in wiktionary, so it might be better if it were created first in order not to create any potential confusion. Just MHO. --BiblbroX дискашн 21:56, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
non-idiomatic translation target sounds good, but what? Mglovesfun (talk) 22:11, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Created the entry. Dunno 'bout the {{non-gloss definition}}, tho. --BiblbroX дискашн 09:29, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

on acid, on steroids

I don't understand how these are adjectives. Can someone give an non-adverb example? Equinox ◑ 16:27, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How about As you'd expect, the rules for these sudoku on steroids are slightly different. — Pingkudimmi 16:45, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
We have the heading "Prepositional phrases" and an associated category (at least in English) for these, um, prepositional phrases. DCDuring TALK 17:09, 12 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

dad

In mostly emptying Category:English familiar terms, I came across this entry with a single sense. I split the definition into three, differing basically by register and usage and, therefore, synonyms and translations. Is my split of the definition an improvement? Is it adequate for checking and dividing the translations? Can this entry be fixed by, say, Sunday, June 19th? Would it be a good WOTD? DCDuring TALK 22:10, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Surely #1 and #2 are the same, #2 is just the vocative use of #1, right? Mglovesfun (talk) 22:35, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If you don't like this, what do you think of cleaning up lady? When I looked at various terms of address, like guy, fella, Mack, buddy, Jack, deary, I found it difficult to match the ordinary noun senses with the uses of the vocative. For example, deary had only the obsolete sense, though it was not uncommon in my youth and remains in use. As a term of address, it does not necessarily have the meaning "dear one". Generally I don't think that the register information that we should have would be the same for vocative and other uses. DCDuring TALK 23:00, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
[after e/c] Yes, I think so. Or, more precisely, I think #2 is a vocative use of the proper noun Dad, which is a proper-noun use of #1. But it may be worth keeping all three, anyway, since a non-native speaker might have difficulty guessing which words for "father" are used vocatively, which as common nouns, and which as proper nouns, in which registers and contexts. —RuakhTALK 23:14, 13 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

SO mom comes from MOther, why where does DAD come from? Why don't British people say DUD like they say MUM? --24.94.251.19 08:35, 24 August 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Secretary of State

Why is this so often capitalised, even when being used as a common (and countable) noun? Seems strange to me. ---> Tooironic 12:11, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

See also [[User:Msh210/Sandbox#name prependages]].​—msh210℠ (talk) 15:25, 14 June 2011 (UTC) Actually, that's not so relevant.​—msh210℠ (talk) 18:27, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
In the U.S. it's pretty common to capitalize this sort of official designation, especially nouns, but also a few adjectives (such as "Federal"). I think it leaks from a sort of legalistic or bureaucratic usage that seeks to make clear that the designation is invested with an official meaning. Anyone can declare themself a "secretary of state", but it takes a Constitution to make them a "Secretary of State". :-P   Which designations are capitalized depends on how much officialese has pervaded the document; I would be very surprised to find "States" capitalized, for example, in a normal newspaper article, but conversely, I'd be very surprised to find "vice-president for academic affairs" written in lowercase there (provided it's a U.S. paper). In full-on legal contracts, you'll often even see all-caps; an initial paragraph might specify the definition of "EBAY" or "LESSEE", and thenceforth eBay or the lessee is consistently referred to thus. —RuakhTALK 15:45, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Perhaps also relevant is that (deprecated template usage) Secretary of State serves as both the name of the position and the title of the incumbent (e.g., Secretary of State Clinton). In Australia, the equivalent is currently Foreign Minister Rudd, who is the Minister for Foreign Affairs. We have had quite a few foreign ministers over the years, just as the US has had secretaries of state. — Pingkudimmi 16:45, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Sorry, but that's not quite right. In U.S. usage the title "Secretary of State" and the common-noun "Secretary of State" are both regularly capitalized. This is what Tooironic found strange; and I suppose that you will find it strange as well, now that you know of it. :-)   (But to be sure: the title is nearly always capitalized, whereas the common-noun can go either way. Google suggests that Time typically capitalizes it, but that U.S. News and Newsweek typically do not.) —RuakhTALK 23:24, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

corner

Are we missing the sense as in, "to put someone in the corner"? ---> Tooironic 12:23, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Te only to put someone in the corner I'm familiar with is literal (SOP) and corner in it is the corner of a room. We have that as noun sense 2 ("The space in the angle between converging lines or walls which meet in a point", which is perhaps not worded as well as it could be).​—msh210℠ (talk) 18:29, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm talking about the idiomatic usage, not a literal corner. ---> Tooironic 23:40, 14 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
What is it supposed to mean? I'm unfamiliar with it. The first twenty results of a Google Web search for "put him in the corner" are all literal.​—msh210℠ (talk) 15:07, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think it is a figurative corner, a consequence of having been figuratively boxed in. We seem to lack the (sub)sense that MWOnline has: "a difficult or embarrassing situation: a position from which escape or retreat is difficult or impossible", which they show after the "secret place" sense. DCDuring TALK 16:28, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
To be "in a bit of a corner" (metaphorically, i.e. in trouble) is quite common: [5]. Equinox ◑ 16:30, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

temperamental

is there any evidence of this sense (this sense) of temperamental? I can't think of good search terms. (The ones I've tried were no good.)​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:51, 15 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

terrible with a capital T

I noticed there are only three citations in Google Books. Anyway, you can do this "Blah with a capital B" for any adjective (try searching for "bad", "evil", "fun"). Thoughts on desirability? Equinox ◑ 20:08, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Seems like yet another snowclone ("yasc"?). DCDuring TALK 21:12, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It might make sense for Wiktionary to capture snowclones, since they are a particular case of language usage with a particular meaning. But it would seem to represent a broadening in scope. Dcoetzee (talk) 23:17, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
There is Appendix:Snowclones. Equinox ◑ 11:30, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I don't object to this entry; I have never heard of it, ever, and as you say it's rare or very rare. The formula is something with a capital something, as you point out. Mglovesfun (talk) 11:41, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
And it is now added to Appendix:Snowclones and cross-linked. Dcoetzee (talk) 15:36, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

yes man

Is this word used to refer only to males, or can it be used to refer to women as well? I've never heard it being used to refer to a woman, but that may be because people would rather not offend. I could imagine a lot of people would use yes woman in that case, but I've never heard anyone say that either. A friend of mine did refer to herself as "yes man" once though. —CodeCat 23:11, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

big phat

Discussion moved from WT:RFD.

Well, last month I completed big fat (diff) plus some related edits. I also created a basic sourced entry for its alt spelling big phat; nothing too fancy: 

==English==

===Adjective===
{{en-adj|pos=[[big]] [[phat]]|-}}

# {{alternative form of|big fat}}

===References===
* {{w|Gordon Goodwin's Big Phat Band}}
* [http://www.thesmokinggun.com/documents/crime/big-phat-liar "Big Phat Liar"] at {{w|The Smoking Gun}}
* [http://www.bigphatindianweddings.com/ "Big Phat Indian Weddings" website]

But now I find out this was summarily deleted a few hours later, even though:

  • This had regular formatting and couldn't be called a joke
  • This had basic sourcing and couldn't be called made-up
  • This had a link to phat also showing it's not nonsense
  • This had plenty of hits with a cursory search on Google Books or Google News (even using [ "big phat" -Goodwin ] so as to exclude references to the band) if one was still in doubt

And yet this was just shot in the back of the neck without even some discussion or review. I want to report this as a completely out-of-process, rogue deletion. And to add insult to injury, when I click the red link to big phat, it shows how this User:SemperBlotto added the inflamatory edit summary "nah!" -- there's not even a link to a policy or some pretense of justification: it just looks like a power-mad, in-your-face, because-I-can, plain eff-you to contributors.

So there are four things I'd like to know:

  1. Why shouldn't this article be restored or at least properly discussed?
  2. Why did this guy wipe himself with a good-faith and legitimate page?
  3. Why does such an unwiki cowboy has been given the right to be prosecutor-judge-jury-executioner of other people's work when he can't even click phat, or use Google Books, or propose for deletion, and is allowed to lord over decent contributors in edit summaries?
  4. Why shouldn't he be removed the possibility of more blatant abuse? (And how many similar ones did he commit that went unreported?)

Is that too much to ask? 62.147.27.248 19:02, 16 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Moved here by Mglovesfun (talk) 11:32, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Blatant abuse, no. Bad decision yes. The small amount of dedicated administrator face dozens if not a 100+ decisions a day, and sometimes we get it wrong. That's not abuse, it's being wrong. --Mglovesfun (talk) 11:34, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
(see google books:"big phat"). Mglovesfun (talk) 18:02, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

house

Noun sense:

(uncountable) A children's game in which the players pretend to be members of a household.
As the babysitter, Emma always acted as the mother whenever the kids demanded to play house.

Isn't this a proper noun?​—msh210℠ (talk) 16:36, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Not unless bridge, marbles, hopscotch et al are also, and none of them are currently listed as such. — lexicógrafa | háblame — 17:09, 17 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Not to mention baseball. Mglovesfun (talk) 09:47, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It does seem to have a sort of implied "(the game of) house" though. Like "let's play (at being a) doctor" — no game name entry there yet, I see. Equinox ◑ 11:31, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Does "house" have this sense without "play" or something else in the context that makes it clear that there is a game involved. Of course, we don't have the appropriate sense of "play". One could "play fireman", "play firehouse", or "play war". Should, then, "fireman", "firehouse", and "war" be defined as games? I realize that this reliance on context is against the grand lexicographical project of including every meaning of a term only as an explicit definition. But are we improving [[play]] by omitting the appropriate verb sense and [[house]] (and [[fireman]], [[firehouse]], and [[war]] by including a sense that only exists in frames that make it obvious what it intended? DCDuring TALK 15:05, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
It is quite a curious construct to me. Of course, with the indefinite article, play can mean "portray" (as on stage), and the child who "plays doctor" is in fact playing a doctor (but the second child is also "playing doctor", perhaps, who only acts as a patient). We also have that sense of "pretend to be" with an adjective, e.g. "play coy", "play dumb", "play dead", "play hard to get". Equinox ◑ 15:10, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
And "play truant," where it means "be." — Pingkudimmi 16:29, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I think it's mainly a common noun; think of something like "She dreamed that she might someday babysit kids who did not play so much house". (This is not to disagree with DCDuring. The only relevant hits at google books:"house is a game" all have "playing house is a game", though one of them does mention "the American game 'house'". But if we do list it at [[house]], then I think it should be as a common noun.) —RuakhTALK 15:31, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
@ Equinox: I was trying to avoid exclusive reliance on the "play-a-role" sense of "play" by including "firehouse" and "war". But, the pretend patient is also playing "doctor". MWOnline has a sense.
@ Ruakh: I can't think of how to conveniently search for the game sense of "house" without using words like "game" and "play". Maybe in coordination with names of other children's games?
I found this usage: "Playing work," said he, "is just as much and as purely play as any play that ever was." There are many others involving words "X" that we are unlikely to wish to assign a sense of "a game involving playing roles typically involved in X". DCDuring TALK 16:34, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I guess I don't see a problem with the word "game" being nearby. This sense of "house" is largely restricted to the phrase "play house", where the special meaning is in "play" rather than in "house", but when it has different collocates, I think "house" itself has taken on the meaning. I dunno. —RuakhTALK 17:59, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
The problem is that the presence of such words as "play" and "game" is a clear indicator that the context is determining how to read "house" (or "war" or "fireman" or "firehouse" or "work"). If "house" is a "game" it is one without rules, only roles. No OneLook reference has "house" in this sense, just as they don't have special senses for "playing war" (not war game) or the others.
I guess my claim is that, not only is there a meaning of "play" that frames the interpretation of "house" when "house" is object of "play", but, more generally, that other words are indicators of a context that frames the interpretation. DCDuring TALK 18:57, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
But doesn't context always frame the interpretation of a word? I mean, no one hears the word baby, shorn of context, and thinks of its vegetable sense; does this mean that [[baby]] shouldn't mention that sense? For that matter, the whole concept of rfv-sense is that we can look through b.g.c. and determine, based on context, what sense was meant of a given word. —RuakhTALK 20:12, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yes. I guess I am trying to make a distinction between a productive context into which many, many words would fit and those that select among senses in the lexicon. "To play" something where something is a situation ("racetrack", "geography", "farm", "luxury", "mercy", all from COCA} seems to create a frame with turns any following noun (actually we should include nominal phrases like "find the chicken", "remember when") into one meaning a game of some kind. I think this is why other dictionaries don't see fit to include this sense of "house". DCDuring TALK 20:56, 18 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I see. I think we largely agree; we both feel that "play ____" is a special property of "play", rather than of "____". The difference is in a detail: you feel that the special property of "play" is that it makes "____" a game, so any other context that makes "____" a game will have the same effect, whereas I feel that the special property of "play" is that it makes "____" a hyponym of "pretend" ("play house" being one type of "play pretend"), so other contexts that merely make "____" a game, and not necessarily a form of pretend, will not have the same effect unless "____" has become lexicalized. —RuakhTALK 00:12, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I'm glad I was able to successfully say what I meant. But I think that there is clearly no special lexical sense of "racetrack", "geography", "farm", "luxury", "mercy", "find the chicken", "remember when", "firehouse", or "Mommy and Daddy". I see "house" as no different, except for being more common. DCDuring TALK 00:26, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Parolled

Hi from Paris ;-)

It took me some time to understand this word, in the following sentence coming from Charles Manson discography [[6]] (Other recordings section) :

An unofficial CD of a prison concert from the 1970s is available in collectors' circles and since being parolled several years ago, (…)

After some research… and thinking ;-) as both parolled and (to) paroll are not quoted either in Wiktionary or in my Harper Collins senior, I came to the point it should come from the verb to parole, as a research for paroled led me to the article parole. However, in wk, only paroled is quoted as the Simple past tense and past participle of parole, where the spelling parolled… is not !?

1. What is the rule for past forms coming from such verbs ending w/ an “e”

2. What could (should) be done as I found out 13 other occurrences for parolled in your whole WP:en, apparently w/ a similar meaning/usage ?

Thanks a lot in advance.

--Bibliorock 02:35, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

At Google News (archives) "paroled" is about 2000 times more common than "parolled". In the last month it is about 1000 time more common, perhaps reflecting the lesser quality editing in what News now includes. At that relative frequency I personally would be comfortable calling "parolled" an error. I would correct the various WP entries. I think the source of the error is that writers may be modelling the spelling of the -ing form and past/past participle of parole on the spelling of the same forms of patrol (patrolling, patrolled), with which "parole" rhymes. I find I need to check (or heed the spell-check warnings of) my spelling of these term with doubled consonants for the past/past participle and -ing form. HTH. DCDuring TALK 03:31, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
I agree; but in addition to "parolled" being an uncommon misspelling today, google books:"paroll" and "parolled" give me the impression that "paroll(ed)" was once a standard alternative spelling. ("Paroll" seems to have disappeared completely, and "parolled" seems to survive only as a "patrolled"-influenced misspelling, perhaps essentially unrelated to its former standard use.) —RuakhTALK 03:55, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Google N-gram search makes it seem that the two-"l" spelling was the more common before 1800. DCDuring TALK 05:26, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
If it helps, Old French parole became Middle French parolle by hypercorrection. That is to say, only one l in the Latin parabola. Mglovesfun (talk) 18:04, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

waive

The verb section contains a sense "To turn aside; to recede.", citing Chaucer.

Webster 1913 shows this as a separate entry, ie, etymology, but does not provide any etymology. I would certainly not want to show it as the same etymologically as the other senses of waive#Verb. It seems more related to (deprecated template usage) waver. Thoughts? OED? DCDuring TALK 21:45, 19 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

  • I've split them up, although I did change that definition from ‘turn aside’ to ‘stray, wander’, which seems to be what is meant. Ƿidsiþ 16:38, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
    Interesting that there is apparently a Medieval Latin waivium (“thing thrown away by a thief in flight”) per (Online Ety Dict). I wonder where that came from. "Unknown Germanic source"? "Waive" and "waif" clearly have influenced each other, whatever their distinct origins may have been. DCDuring TALK 17:17, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

cornhole

¶ The sense “(From the old fashioned practice of using dried corncobs instead of toilet paper in outdoor privies)” sounds quite bizarre. Is that verifiable? --Pilcrow 18:12, 20 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

-tor

Most of the purported usage examples seem wrong to me. For example I thought that (deprecated template usage) cantor = stem of (deprecated template usage) cantus, past participle of (deprecated template usage) cano, rather than stem of (deprecated template usage) cano + (deprecated template usage) -tor as the usage notes imply. Only the (deprecated template usage) gladiator derivation seems right, as there was no corresponding classical Latin verb *gladio. Almost all the inhabitants of the category of derivations have the same characteristics.

I think something analogous applies at -sor#Latin.

To me it seems more economical to select the past participle stem as the stem of the agent nouns than then the first person present indicative stem. DCDuring TALK 14:58, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It only seems that way as an artifact of the participle and suffix endings merging in Classical Latin. The older forms of the words demonstrate that etymologically it is the principal stem from which the word is formed, and not the participle. There just aren't meny cases where the participial and agent suffix consonants demonstrate this. You can read more in works like Allen & Greenough's New Latin Grammar (revised by Anne Mahoney). I've been (mostly) following Allen's interpretation of Latin suffixes.
That said, Allen has not always been right. His Latin vowel sounds have been overturned by more modern scholarship, and if there is more modern scholarship on the origin and implementation of Latin suffixes, I've love to see it. However, Allen makes a pretty convincing case, and as far as I know his scholarship in this matter is not contested by Classicists. --EncycloPetey 21:11, 17 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

hit

Quite a few of the derived terms of hit, especially those beginning "hit the", seem to share informal and/or figurative senses of "hit" (verb) , whether or not they are idiomatic. The senses seem to be missing in [[hit#Verb]].

I am especially interested in:

-- DCDuring TALK 20:00, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I always imagined hit the hay and hit the sack to use (as you and I both think hit the deck and hit the ground use) a "hit with one's body; land on" sense of hit. Hit the books and hit the bottle seem to use a "use heavily" sense of hit, or something like that. Hit the jackpot I always imagined as using a "manage to arrive at" (or something like that) sense of hit also found in hit the target and hit the bull's-eye. We do have a "To manage to touch in the right place" sense with hit the jackpot as a usex. Imagination is a wonderful thing.​—msh210℠ (talk) 20:24, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

shakescreen

I've see iPhone aps with what I call shakescreen or tiltscreen technology - it works where if you shake or wobble or tilt the phone, the screen appears as if it too is shaking/tilting (mostly used for games, I guess). Is there a more in-use word than shakescreen or tiltscreen to denote this, or other -screen words akin to touchscreen? If not, can these be promoted? BTW, iPhones are a good source of new language. --Murray Right 23:14, 21 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

lhe

The content in this page is very confusing. In the definition part it says that lhe is the dative of ele and ela but in the table that follows, lhe is listed in the accusative section. I don't speak Portuguese so I can't make a correction, but could somebody please fix this inconsistency? Wyverald 01:25, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I believe the problem is with the column labels in the table; its "Direct object (accusative case)" column seems to contain both direct and indirect object pronouns (accusative and dative cases), and its "Indirect object (dative case)" column contains what I believe are the object-of-preposition pronouns (prepositional case). —RuakhTALK 02:29, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
That’s right. lhe is the dative case, but it is an objective pronoun (object of a verb) rather than a prepositional pronoun. I changed the column headings. —Stephen (Talk) 02:47, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

-algia

We have treated this and many similar affixes used scientific and professional (law, medicine) fields as English. But most of them are rarely used with non-Latin stems (including Ancient-Greek ones derived as the Romans did). Many of the etymologies of these terms reference New Latin, but we have few of such suffixes. It may well be that most of the medical and legal words (less likely terms of more than one word) so derived are translingual, appearing in multiple European languages.

Should we not create Latin sections for such suffixes and move most or all of the derived terms to the Latin entries? That would also mean that {{suffix}} should not be used in the English section as the suffixation takes place in Latin. This is more or less the way it works of is supposed to work for taxons. Medical and legal Latin terms are similar to the taxons, though there is no official standards body, AFAIK, and the derivations sometimes seem barbaric or in the manner of Vulgar or Late Latin. DCDuring TALK 01:30, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Miranda warning

Miranda warning is a member of Category:American English. Is that categorization accurate? --Daniel 01:56, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A Google news search for the past month shows 186 uses in US publications, 1 in a UK publication, a law-firm press release discussing their US capabilities. DCDuring TALK 02:13, 23 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Thanks. --Daniel 20:24, 8 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Short form for STEWARD

Please advise me of the short form alphabets for the word STEWARD.

May be it is 'stwd'

Thank you

Randy Loo

marenge

Hi everybody. I found the word marenge in the english translation of a menu in Reykjavik. Any idea of what it could be? (the icelandic word was marens, but that doesn't help me) Thanks. --ArséniureDeGallium 23:33, 24 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe a creative spelling of meringue? Nadando 00:25, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Yes, that is also my best guess. I was just surprised because Icelanders generally speak a better English than mine. Thanks for the answer. --ArséniureDeGallium 09:29, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

willingness

If this is uncountable, why can we say "a willingness to do something"? On second inspection, there appears to be hits on Google Books for "willingnesses" anyway... ---> Tooironic 00:00, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Many nouns are both, often in virtually the same sense. It is a little tedious to determine which is the more prevalent for a specific sense. "show" and synonyms + "a willingness" is about 4 times as common as "show" and synonyms + "willingness" at COCA. "Willingnesses" does not appear there. OTOH "our willingness" (112) and "their willingness" (541) are fairly common. I'm not really sure that "a" is a 100% reliable indicator on countability, though I have used it as such. The semantics of "a willingness" vs "willingness" seem a bit different to me. To me "a willingness" seems possibly situationally or otherwise qualified in a way that "willingness" does not. DCDuring TALK 02:48, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

History

Why is it that the word historic is preceeded with an, while history is preceeded with a?

See [7]. Equinox ◑ 21:46, 25 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

central business district / downtown

The inner city is referred to as the central business district in Australia and downtown in the United States. What do Britons call it? ---> Tooironic 05:43, 28 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

town centre/city centre? Mglovesfun (talk) 22:28, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

make money

The entry make money, defined as "To acquire money." was deleted in 2008. I'd like to restore it. --Daniel 10:50, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It seems SOP to me. This is not the most common sense of make, of course, but it doesn't require the object "money"; you can just as easily say, "he made twenty bucks playing poker last night", or "studies show that if a woman makes much more than her husband does, then she's likely to do much more of the housework as well". This doesn't even seem like a very useful translation target, since most languages are likely to use some verb plus their word for "money", and the translation table at [[make]] is the right place to list that verb. —RuakhTALK 11:46, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
OK, I accept your explanation and your new sense[8] of "make". Thanks. --Daniel 12:17, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]
This is a great exemplar of why we need more work on some basic entries. To complete one's idiomatic understanding of English, one needs to understand the scope of verbs like make, do, have, set, and go. To the extent a dictionary entry can help, our entries need work to provide that help. "Make money" is the main path to the applicable sense of "make". It would be nice to be able to use a redirect to get a user from a common collocation like "make money" to the specific sense line at make#Verb. Can that be done without hard-coded HTML, say, with some kind of template located at the sense, to which a template like {{only in}} or a conventional hard or soft redirect could link? DCDuring TALK 13:49, 29 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

French entry abonnir

The current revision of the French entry abonnir has so many contexts, the templates can't even display all of them. Here's the def: 

#{{context|transitive|absolutive|or|reflexive|usually|inanimate|strongly|_|dated|lang=und}} To [[improve]]; to [[render]] or become [[better]].

--Daniel 10:57, 30 June 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I just shortened it a bit, but conveying the same information. Mglovesfun (talk) 23:02, 3 July 2011 (UTC)[reply]
Retrieved from "https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=Wiktionary:Tea_room/2011/June&oldid=82279113"