Talk:zha bo

Etymology

@Sonofcawdrey Hokkien is a subset of Min Nan. We use "Min Nan" rather than Hokkien. "Singapore" is already used in the context label. The term is used by Min Nan speakers, including Hokkien speakers in Singapore. I'm going to revert your change in the etymology. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 09:40, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

1. @Atitarev Well, that seems to be a shame to me as surely it makes it less accurate. I guess the English usage may also partly come from Teochew (the other Min Nan language here) - but I couldn't really say without some further research. In any case, I don't know why "we" (is there actually some Wiktionary policy about this somewhere?) would use Min Nan rather than Hokkien, since Min Nan is a family of languages and Hokkien is a particular language in that family - wouldn't that be equivalent saying that a smorgasbord is derived from Germanic rather than from Swedish? - which we would hardly countenance. According to speakers here in Singapore, Singaporean Hokkien differs from other varieties of Hokkien, and since the word is localised to Singapore, then it stands to reason that it is from Singaporean Hokkien. I don't see any special merit in being less specific when we can be more specific and hence more accurate.--Sonofcawdrey (talk) 08:35, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

@Sonofcawdrey Yes, it's a language policy (after series of votes), which drives how Chinese entries are structured and how translations are used and nested. Your analogy is flawed, since we use a language code for Swedish - "sv" but Hokkien is used as one of the standard pronunciations for Min Nan, as the best known and described variety. For words, specific to Hokkien only {{qualifier|Hokkien}} or {{cx|Hokkien|lang=zh}} are used at best. I don't argue that Singaporean Hokkien differs from other varieties but the term is recorded in a Min Nan dictionary, which means it's not only Hokkien and not only Singapore but these context are there. See also 查某, expand the pronunciation section, you'll see "Hokkien" nested under "Min Nan", there are contextual labels on the definition line as well. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 09:16, 23 October 2015 (UTC)

@Atitarev Oh well, if it is a policy - then that's good to know. However, I'm still not clear on a number of points. Is the policy only about how Chinese entries are structured, or does it extend to English etymologies? An etymology is meant to give details of word transmission - that is, how a word entered a certain language - so, even though 查某 exists in Min Nan generally, it didn't get into Singaporean English from the language spoken in Taiwan, for instance. The local Singaporean English pronunciation, connotations, denotational range, collocational associations, etc., all come from local Singaporean Hokkien. You see what I mean? So I think generally (i.e. beyond this term) there could be a case for more accurate transmission history of words borrowed from Singaporean Hokkien into Singaporean English. That said, if "zha bo" is also used in Taiwanese English, then a more general etymology (such as the one you have written) would be needed.Sonofcawdrey (talk) 12:44, 24 October 2015 (UTC)

RFC discussion: October 2015

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for cleanup (permalink).

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zha bo

sibo

The creator doesn’t make it clear whether this is English or Hokkien. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 12:48, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

The quotations are in English, so I attempted to clean it up. Aryamanarora (talk) 21:24, 20 October 2015 (UTC)

@Wyang, Atitarev, suzukaze-c I'm not sure which script/spelling combination is appropriate and attestable here, but it certainly won't work the way it is. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:02, 22 October 2015 (UTC)

@Ungoliant MMDCCLXIV, Metaknowledge, Aryamanarora "zha bo" has to belong to Singapore English and a new entry 查某 to Singapore Chinese which does have a Min Nan reading "cha-bó͘". --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 06:24, 22 October 2015 (UTC)