Wiktionary:Tea room

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A place to ask for help on finding quotations, etymologies, or other information about particular words. The Tea room is named to accompany the Beer parlour.

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Oldest tagged RFTs

• snitch
  coffee
  vive la différence
  seal
  toss around
  seven-up
  arduous
  famously
  last
  in bed
  Manchurian
  affluent
  hump
  beaujolais
  fuddle
  rare
  shortcut
  squared
  drove
  drawl
  morna
  collating
  Twi
  texted
  geeminy
  sumti tcita
  husbando
  stanchion
  ya
  mura
  time
  dzesinu
  widdershins
  disenchant
  chiause
  chaoosh
  kaka
  if
  camouflage
  attention
  みょうが
  goatfucker
  electrocute
  times
  Advaita
  Koxinga
  texed
  Kajkavian
  多
  if I had a nickel for every time
  regnbuefamilie
  絓
  alt-left
  scallop
  界
  over skyerne er himlen altid blå
  頦
  唵
  malloot
  ten to
  祜
  澇
  then
  dog hunter
  栲
  to death
  theme
  鶯
  宋
  嫐
  -tion
  reset
  Ullans
  scrit
  极
  Somalian
  缿
  대
  唐
  清
  eSwatini
  

April 2018

Syllables of whitening

The word whiten has a syllabic nasal at the end: /ˈwaɪt.n̩/ (“white-n”). Dictionary.com shows the pronunciation of whitening as /ˈwaɪt.n̩.ɪŋ/ (“white-n-ing”) having three syllables with a syllabic nasal in the middle, but that seems to be different from the audio file there. Isn’t it rather /ˈwaɪt.nɪŋ/ (“white-ning”) having two syllables? Similarly, isn’t whitener pronounced /ˈwaɪt.nɚ/ (“white-ner”) rather than /ˈwaɪt.n̩.ɚ/ (“white-n-er”)? — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 15:31, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

The two-syllable pronunciation is much more common in normal (rather than careful) speech. In normal speech there is sometimes a need to distinguish between terms like lightening and lightning. But in the more general case, is that kind of syllable-dropping lexical information rather than a general phenomenon of speech? DCDuring (talk) 15:45, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, it can vary from dialect to dialect. For example, I pronounce settler in three syllables with the /t/ realized as a flap: [ˈsɛɾl̩ɚ] and was quite astonished as a teenager when I heard someone from a different part of the States pronounce it in two syllables with the /t/ realized as a glottal stop: [ˈsɛʔlɚ]. This contrasts with butler, which both of us pronounced in two syllables with a glottal stop: [ˈbʌʔlɚ]. So it's not lexical in the sense that it's something specific to the word whitening, but it's still lexicographically relevant as it's not automatically predictable in all accents. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 17:04, 2 April 2018 (UTC)

As another datapoint, I have settler with two syllables but whitening and the like as invariably trisyllabic in my dialect (or at least idiolect (?)). It might be very difficult to pin down which pronunciations are normal in which dialects without finding academic research on the subject. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 21:17, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

Thank you guys. There seems no consensus among native speakers… — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 07:40, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

That is correct, and I can guarantee that in this matter you will find unconscious variability in pronunciation that most speakers and listeners will not notice, quite apart from regional and family-to-family variation. I strongly recommend specifying both pronunciations as valid alternatives. JonRichfield (talk) 03:49, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

I noticed that most American TV anchors pronounce [[meddling]] as three syllables. (I heard quite a few time when there's talk about 2016 election meddling). In Australia, I'm pretty sure, it's two syllables. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 04:18, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Italicising "especially" in sense lines

Italicising "especially" in sense lines is a practice that I dislike and sometimes undo. Example: person might be "any living creature, especially a human being". If you remove the italics, the line still makes perfect sense, and looks less prissy. The apparent distinction is that the italicised text should be interpreted on a "meta" level, i.e. X is defined as Y but is especially defined as Z; however, there is almost never any real difference between saying this and saying that X is defined as "Y, especially Z". I can't imagine us italicising thus: "any small dog, but never a poodle"; it also looks sillier the shorter the entry is. (Would you want italics on the "especially" in alevin?) Policy issue? Equinox ◑ 02:16, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

Bonus argument: putting a word in italics isn't semantically useful either (it's not safe for automated tools to interpret those italics as a gloss etc., because italics inside a sense line could be a genus or anything), so if we are going to do this then we need some kind of template. Equinox ◑ 02:23, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

@Equinox so "if we are going ....", very funny. Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 09:09, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't particularly like the italics, but see the "meta" distinction. Surely it is very common in dictionaries to abbreviate this to "esp.", and this distinctive abbreviation needs no italics to be distinguished from the word "especially" if it occurs in a definition. Why not use "esp." here? Imaginatorium (talk) 09:30, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for the input; however, (i) "esp." and "especially" shouldn't be semantically different (even if they have historically been different in dictionaries); (ii) any actual difference is clearly based on the fact that paper dictionaries needed to save space for print purposes; for an Internet dictionary, saving the letters "-ecially" makes no difference (and would force a few users to look up "esp." to see what it means). Equinox ◑ 02:34, 5 April 2018 (UTC)

averceli

Can we give a direct translation or example, so we can understand something like "Questo utente ha imparato a programmare su uno ZX Spectrum 48k e a distanza di più di trent'anni si ritrova a programmare per lavoro dispositivi che non arrivano a 8kB di ram. Averceli 48kB!"? (Taken from here) Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 09:09, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

QAnon, The Storm

These proper nouns related to a conspiracy theory are citable under hot word criteria, but I'm not convinced that their inclusion is desirable and would appreciate some opinions on this. (For reference, "QAnon" or "Q" is an anonymous 4chan user and Trump supporter who purports to have Q-clearance and has originated "The Storm". "The Storm" or "Follow(ing) the White Rabbit" is a conspiracy theory among Trump supporters that postulates that the Mueller investigation is a "deep-state" effort to support Trump and round up a satanic paedophile ring supposedly operated by several prominent politicians.) ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 10:50, 3 April 2018 (UTC)

Eastern Armenian: Feminine Ending for Nationalities

I'm working through Pimsleur's ten only-audio lessons in Eastern Armenian. Pimsleur always teaches you how to say "I am an American." along with how to say the L2 country's nationality. The male form is ամերիկացի - amerikats’i. The female form sounds like "amerikoohee" 1. How is that spelled in the Armenian alphabet? 2. Could that be added to the entry for ամերիկացի? With the corresponding Armenian words հայ, հայուհի (hay, hayuhi) the feminine form is listed under "derived term"

My guess is ամերիկուհի. Google translates from Armenian to English as "American woman" without any "did you mean ..." corrections.

(It can be very difficult to get Google to reveal feminine and formal 2nd-person plural forms where English is ambivalent.)

@Vahagn Petrosyan —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:16, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

What you heard on the audio is ամերիկուհի (amerikuhi). But use ամերիկացի (amerikacʿi) for both genders. The forms in -ուհի (-uhi) are linguistically marked. Using them is similar to using authoress for a female author. --Vahag (talk) 19:43, 4 April 2018 (UTC)

interrogative lemma and IPA

Are there interrogative lemmata? What is acceptable: to be, or not to be? or, to be, or not to be?
And please, could someone help: what IPA symbol would i use for an interrogative /ˈti ˈðeon ʝeˈnesθe?/ (for τι δέον γενέσθαι) Thank you sarri.greek (talk) 13:00, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

@Sarri.greek There are several here. The page title doesn’t get a ?, but you can add it to the head= (as in who's 'she', the cat's mother).

IPA has characters for intonation if Greek questions are marked with that, but I have never seen these characters used in Wiktionary. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 13:30, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Thank you @Ungoliant MMDCCLXIV: sarri.greek (talk) 13:42, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

amoret, bandon, delightous, etc.

I've been adding some quotes to words in Category:Requests for quotation/The Romaunt of the Rose. The text uses alternate spellings (e.g. baundon, delitous); I added them under alternative forms. Should these forms found in The Romaunt of the Rose be Middle English rather than English? Chaucer was certainly writing in Middle English. – Gormflaith (talk) 13:38, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes please. Webster 1913 did not clearly distinguish ME (or OE) from ModE; I should have entered them as ME in most cases. Equinox ◑ 13:39, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Alright, will do. Thanks. – Gormflaith (talk) 13:51, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

social pattern

This may or may not be a legitimate entry but the definition seems barely meaningful: "The systems of control mechanisms to dominate these entities of the organization to achieve a defined goal." Equinox ◑ 17:00, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

cubalibre etymology

It mentions a battle cry (i.e. "free Cuba!") but Rum and Coke says that the libre is an adjective, not a verb. Who's right? Equinox ◑ 18:01, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

"free Cuba" = "a Cuba that is free", it is not an imperative. DTLHS (talk) 18:03, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

Spanish has a word order that's the reverse of English's for adjectival modifiers, but not for verbs. If libre were a verb, the only way to say this as two words would be "Libre Cuba!". There's nothing wrong with a battle cry being a bare noun phrase- it's actually quite rare for them to be complete sentences. Chuck Entz (talk) 21:33, 6 April 2018 (UTC)

In fact, libre is an imperative verb form, corresponding to the subject usted, so ¡Libre Cuba! does mean "Free Cuba!" as an imperative, speaking formally to one person. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 05:47, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

But it's not "libre Cuba", it's "Cuba libre". DTLHS (talk) 05:59, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I know; I was responding to Chuck's sentence "If libre were a verb, the only way to say this as two words would be 'Libre Cuba!'"; I was pointing out that that sentence needn't be a hypothetical. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 06:58, 7 April 2018 (UTC)

pirog, pierogi

Should we merge these two pages into a singe main entry? DTLHS (talk) 05:43, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

My first answer is no. The etymologies are similar but not the same and they are different types of dishes, which is a confusion not only in the recipient languages but in the source languages as well, to some extent. Basically, these are mostly pies vs dumplings. Less confusion in Polish dumplings and Russian pies, more confusion in Ukrainian pies and dumplings. Care should be taken in English about which dish they are talking about and whose cuisine. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 05:52, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

If you think about it, the main difference between a Russian пиро́г (piróg) and a Polish pieróg is the type of dough. --WikiTiki89 17:16, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

tailgut

There seems to be something called a 'tailgut cyst', so there must be another meaning of 'tailgut' which I didn't put when I started the entry, but I can't find its meaning on its own. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 18:01, 8 April 2018 (UTC)

(It seems to be mentioned in Daniel John Cunningham's Text-book of Anatomy. —Suzukaze-c◆◆ 00:17, 9 April 2018 (UTC))

I see plenty of uses in a medical sense and also in a music sense. Alternative spellings tail gut and tail-gut seem attestable, possibly in both senses. DCDuring (talk) 02:40, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

@Suzukaze-c: Thank you, for some reason that is not accessible in my location. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 00:05, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

@DCDuring: Thanks, the music sense is the only one I knew. I can't add the other sense of 'tailgut', though. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 00:05, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for adding that sense. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 19:45, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Definition of burn missing sense of nuclear fusion

The definition of "burn" does mention the sense in which the term os used here, for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen-burning_process

"The oxygen-burning process is a set of nuclear fusion reactions that take place in massive stars that have used up the lighter elements in their cores. Oxygen-burning is preceded by the neon-burning process and succeeded by the silicon-burning process.”

There are also hydrogen burning, helium burning and carbon burning processes.

• Added sense at burn. SemperBlotto (talk) 05:26, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

罣礙/挂碍 (guà'ài/ke(i)ge/ga-ae)

Term found in the Heart Sutra, appears to be translation of Sanskrit आवरण (āvaraṇa, “covering, or other meanings in this link”). Is there a modern term for this in any of the three major East Asian languages? You can check the usage examples at 菩提薩埵.

Also, can this be allowed to be added by CFI? Likely archaic/obsolete term in my view. ～ POKéTalker (Ŧ◉C) 04:24, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

@Poketalker: This term is still used in modern Chinese, but it's now more often written as 掛礙／挂碍 (guà'ài). Even if it were archaic, I don't see why it would not be allowed by CFI, unless you're talking about a specific Buddhist sense different from the ones listed in the entry. From the translation at 菩提薩埵, it seems to translate to "obstruction", which is easily attestable in Chinese. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 05:23, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

@Justinrleung:, thanks. Thought 罣 was an obsolete variant for 掛/挂. Still, in traditional and non-Chinese texts, the sutra uses 罣. Interesting... ～ POKéTalker (Ŧ◉C) 04:02, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

@Poketalker: No, 罣 is not obsolete, just rare in simplified Chinese and a bit uncommon in traditional Chinese. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 04:06, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

taruf, tarruf, teruf, terf

See Citations:terf: taruf, tarruf, teruf and terf seem to be one or more lexemes for a unit of land in India. Are any of them citable in English? What is the etymon and specific meaning? (Pinging @AryamanA, Mahagaja as users who might know or know how to look it up in Sanskrit or Hindi dictionaries.) - -sche (discuss) 17:26, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

Sanskrit doesn't have an /f/ sound; if this word exists in Hindi it's probably a borrowing from Persian and/or Arabic. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 19:00, 9 April 2018 (UTC)

@-sche: It's तरफ़ (taraf, “side, face; direction”) judging by the first quote, but I haven't heard of any relation to units of land for it. (I'm also not a farmer though) I'll check my dictionaries and see if anything can be cited. —Aryaman^{A (मुझसे बात करें • योगदान)} 01:17, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

I found Bengali তরফ (tôrôph, “revenue-collection area”) (source). It is cognate to the Hindi word, and judging by this Hindi dictionary's "Mughal glossary" it meant the same thing in Hindi-Urdu during Mughal rule. I'll add the definitions to the Hindi entry. —Aryaman^{A (मुझसे बात करें • योगदान)} 01:22, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. I've created an entry for taraf. It's not common, but I think that's just because tarafs are not often mentioned (rather than that taraf is a rare word for a concept often referred to using another word), so I haven't labelled it "rare" or "uncommon". - -sche (discuss) 15:51, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Term shoefie / quotations

How to add / correct quotations? Just came across your definition of this term and noticed the earliest dated quotations are from 2015. However, I have invented this term back in 2014 for our Photoresk art expo in Brussels when I introduced the first automatic shoefie machine. Here is still the web-site of the expo https://disclosure.photoresk.com/shoefies/ How can I have this information amended? Thank you. Claus Siebeneicher claus@photoresk.com

I expect that this dialog will appear on the entry's talk page. Generally we only show citations from "durably archived" sources, which excludes sites only archived on archival sites that may themselves not be durable. DCDuring (talk) 14:24, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Just curiosity

Is it "As continue conveys the sense of progression, it is pleonastic to follow it with on" equals to the following?

• ..., it is pleonastic following it with on
• ..., following it with on is pleonastic

Is one of the ways more formal or diachronically/diatopically marked? Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 13:09, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

"it is pleonastic to follow it with on" and "following it with on is pleonastic" are both fine (I'm not sure if there is a difference in formality). But "it is pleonastic following it with on" is wrong, although if you insert a comma "it is pleonastic, following it with on" then it sounds very colloquial or as though the clarification is an afterthought, meaning you meant to just say "it is pleonastic" and then realized you need to add "following it with on". --WikiTiki89 15:41, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

The former it is not fine because it contains "it" twice with different meaning in it. Rhyminreason (talk) 20:48, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

That's not the reason. --WikiTiki89 20:51, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

wazoo, up the wazoo, out the wazoo

Are these in fact vulgar, as currently labelled? I thought they were euphemistic/bowdlerized words, somewhat like hoo-ha. - -sche (discuss) 16:19, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

These are euphemistic and about as mild as hoo-ha, like you say. Also, it might be worth mentioning that "wazoo" doesn't really exist outside of these two phrases. Ultimateria (talk) 18:15, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

By vulgar we mean "Language considered distasteful or obscene." per Appendix:Glossary. I wouldn't call these obscene and don't think most others would either. If they were truly distasteful E*Trade wouldn't have used "out the wazoo" in their award-winning ad. I suppose they are just informal. DCDuring (talk) 18:23, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks; I relabelled them as "colloquial". - -sche (discuss) 16:40, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

heraldry term?

I can't find a translation of the Catalan adjective caironat, but I can translate the definition as "In heraldry, that rests on one of its angles, applied to square coats of arms". What is the English term? Ultimateria (talk) 18:13, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't know, but maybe you can find it if you browse http://www.apl385.com/gilling/herldref.htm. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 18:30, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

Es diu cantoned. Bona nit! 猛犸象牙 (talk) 22:04, 10 April 2018 (UTC)

er no. — If I needed such a term I'd probably say lozengewise or bendwise. —Tamfang (talk) 05:55, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, a couple years ago I spent ages trying to find a translation for caironat too. Never got one. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 12:44, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, I've at least added the definition given above (confirmed by Wikimedia Common's category of "Caironat shields"). Probably "(of a square) lozengewise" or "...diamondwise" would cover it. - -sche (discuss) 16:39, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Pornocracy

I made a change in the page Pornocracy, translating Sæculum as Century. It was translated as age and someone undone my translation just because in the Wikipedia page is translated as age but in Latin, Sæculum means century, not age, epoch or whatever. Latin for age is aetate. Someone can help me?

That's a different sense of age. Here is the entry in the dictionary nearest to my hand (Smith & Lockwood):

saeculum (poet. saeclum), ī, n. I. the period of one generation (i.e. 33⅓ years), a generation. 1. Lit. a. Prop.: Cic., Verg., Liv., etc. b. More vaguely: aureum, Cic.; Pyrrhae, Hor. 2. Transf. a. the people living at a particular time, a generation : Pl., Lucr., Cic., Verg., etc. b. In pl.  : successive generations, races : Lucr. c. the spirit of the age, the times : nec corrumpere et corrumpi saeculum vocatur. Tac. II. the full period of a man's life, a period of a hundred years, a century. a. Prop.: Varr., Cic., Hor. b. More vaguely : an age : Cic. [It secolo ; Fr. siècle.]

—Tamfang (talk) 06:08, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

righteous among the nations

Is this really plural only? And are there alternative capitalisations? --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 12:37, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

Really the English phrase is an adjective. The Hebrew phrase is plural (but perhaps it can be used in the singular as well). On a separate note, this is the name of an award, is it really dictionary-worthy? --WikiTiki89 16:32, 11 April 2018 (UTC)

There's some singular use: "[name] was honored as a Righteous Among the Nations in [year]" (with a it's singular and a noun). But is there enough for attestation? The adjectival use, e.g. "the Righteous among the Nations award", could also be a noun in an English spaced semi-compound, but in this case it's no title. As a title, if that exists, it could be a noun too like Lord is a title and a noun. -80.133.99.58 10:12, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

The ordinary use is adjectival "he was recognized as Righteous Among the Nations". Without the "a", it's adjectival. I didn't say that a title can't be a noun. Not all titles are the same. --WikiTiki89 14:15, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

Recently, there was an interesting discussion about (the) use of (the) articles at Wiktionary:Information_desk#that's_the_wrong_direction. Grammar is complicated and apparently arbitrary. Rhyminreason (talk) 21:06, 12 April 2018 (UTC)

en-

These definitions are...pretty bad. Is this the page to find volunteers for rewriting definitions? I'm terrible at lexicography and I don't know where to ask. Ultimateria (talk) 00:45, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Can you point out what you are dinding badly written? The ety is complicated, the definitions seem straight forward.

No, this is not the page for a request like that. At least you need to be more specific. Rhyminreason (talk) 08:04, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

The definitions are incredibly vague. "Covered" how? How does "caused" apply to a prefix? At the very least, each sense needs an example. Ultimateria (talk) 22:31, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

@Ultimateria: Just ignore him. You're right, this entry needs work. --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 22:34, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

onomatophobia

Found at Category:English entries that don't exist

1. pathological fear of hearing a specific word or name.

   A classic case of onomatophobia is the actors' superstition for the word “Macbeth”‎; they never utter it, but use euphemisms instead: “The Scottish Play”‎, “MacBee”‎.

sarri.greek (talk) 19:49, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

It had two citations already; I've managed to find at least one more. Ten years after Conrad's comment that it'd be nice if someone could find a third citation, it's finally citable! So I've resurrected the entry. :)

A miracle! Two...! How nice of you @-sche:. Your citations, always inspiring, especially for us, non-anglophones. Thanks sarri.greek (talk) 21:19, 13 April 2018 (UTC)

Kakistocracy etymology appears to be wrong -- please help

Hi,

I don't the time right now learn how to contribute (but I would like to do so).

Problem: The word "kakistocracy" is topical in the current political environment re Trump, but the entry in Wiktionary has an apparently wrong attribution in its Etymology.

Specifically, the current Etymology states that "The word was coined by the English author Thomas Love Peacock (1785–1866) in his 1829 novella The Misfortunes of Elphin as the opposite of aristocracy (see the quotation)."

However, there is a credible citation to a much earlier (1829-1644=185) use of the word:

1644, Paul Gosnold, "A SERMON preached at the PUBLIQUE FAST the ninth day of Aug. 1644 at St. Maries, OXFORD, BEFORE the honorable Members of the two Houses of PARLIAMENT, There assembled. By PAUL GOSNOLD Master of Arts. And published by authority.", OXFORD, Printed Henry Hall. Cover+30 pages. Early English Books Online-Text Creation Partnership (EEBO-TCP Phase 1) Ann Arbor, MI (USA); Oxford (UK), 2008-09 URL: https://quod.lib.umich.edu/e/eebo/a41582.0001.001/21:A41582.0001.001?page=root;size=125;vid=94937;view=text

"Therefore we need not make any scruple of praying against such: [...] against those tempests of the State, those restlesse spirits who can no longer live, then be stickling and medling; who are stung with a perpetuall itch of changing and innovating, transforming our old Hierarchy into a new Presbytery, and this againe into a newer Independency; and our well-temperd Monarchy into a mad kinde of Kakistocracy." (pages 17-18)

So, someone, please check this out and perhaps edit the entry accordingly.

DLAnderson

• Seems legit. I've amended the entry accordingly. Thanks. Ƿidsiþ 13:55, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

How'd Chell survive sleeping without waking up for anything, for 5 million years?

Also, what's the word for the definition "1 million years"? Please answer both questions. - I is American English.

mega-annum or megayear. The Chell question isn't relevant to a dictionary; try asking at Wikipedia. Equinox ◑ 00:00, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

It's a Portal 2 question. It's about a game. Let someone from Game Theory answer that one. Also, I thought I was on Wikipedia. - I is American English.

Hylax

Anyone have an idea where the name of the wolf-like dog in Lessing's fable has it's name from, what it means? These are closely modeled after Aesop's fables. "Hylax" looks foreign enough to be from Greek, as the less mysterious Lykodes from the same story, while the well known Meister Lampe seems to be a pun on french lapin (rabbit) and Lampe (lamp). Is it related to hyena (which has a surprising etymology)? Also a play on words? Here's the reference at Deutsches Textarchiv. --Rhyminreason (talk) 02:42, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

See LSJ for some Greek words that seem to have the same root. The stem seems to be a verb meaning "bark, howl". L&S has an entry for Hylax, the proper name of some dog, glossed as Barker. DCDuring (talk) 03:33, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

å#Norwegian_Bokmål

Hello,

Is there any particular reason there are two sections « Letter » for this entry—perhaps could they be merged? — Automatik (talk) 10:53, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

 Done (formatting of the first letter section was obvy not correct: definition about head, missing definition in the definition section). -84.161.4.90 23:56, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Please advise how to add the word "citadel" as a reference to a Salvation Army place of worship

I would like add the word "citadel" (a Salvation Army place of worship but there doesn't seem to be a "wizard" tool to assist people in adding content to wiktionary. A google search for:

"citadel definition Salvation Army"

turned up the following results:

www.thefreedictionary.com www.thefreedictionary.com%2FSalvation%2BArmy&usg=AOvVaw1zQvNFW1XtNBCNHZgR8s9K

en.oxforddictionaries.com en.oxforddictionaries.com%2Fdefinition%2Fcitadel&usg=AOvVaw3qdipkGXdyPgQ6qEbbuW0t

www.bbc.co.uk www.bbc.co.uk%2Fnorfolk%2Fcontent%2Farticles%2F2007%2F08%2F20%2Ffaith_salvation_army_20070820_feature.shtml&usg=AOvVaw2Csd_-zhJkE-QWGQ4oYgjm

www.sheffieldcitadel.co.uk www.sheffieldcitadel.co.uk%2Falpha%2F&usg=AOvVaw1dfWbnaFedZAif43tfUCJq

Please help. Adrian816 (talk) 14:14, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

• I have added the definition to citadel and also added a "see also" section to Salvation Army. SemperBlotto (talk) 05:21, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

spin alley, spin row

WP gives these as synonyms of spin room. Is that correct? --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 15:19, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

single-issue

As in "single-issue politics", "single-issue party". Is this lexicalised? --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 15:24, 15 April 2018 (UTC)

treasure chest

"The chest that held the royal treasury." What royal treasury does this refer to specifically? ---> Tooironic (talk) 02:35, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

“Sugar beet” in Persian

In “Lauferica” (1987, Orient), Eiichi Imoto writes:

On the streets of Iran boiled sugar beets sell well. The sugar beet (Beta vulgaris) is called labū or lapū in Persian. Pers. labū or lapū is derived from Pahl. *lapūy, *lapūg or *lapūk. Pahl. *lapūk is derived from O Pers. *lā̆pūka-.

Can these Persian words be confirmed, and what are their native-script forms? @ZxxZxxZ Could you help? Hayyim has:

لبو‎ (laboo) Noun Boiled beet.

And Steingass:

لبلبو‎ lablabū, Beet boiled and eaten with whey and garlic.

Asking because these words bear an interesting resemblance to Chinese 蘿蔔 (and variants, < Old Chinese *rabuk ?).

Also, could the Persian be borrowed from Akkadian 𒇻𒊬 (laptu, liptu, “turnip”) (~ Hebrew לֶפֶת‎ (lefet, “turnip”), Classical Syriac ܠܰܦܬܳܐ‎ (laftā, “turnip”), Arabic لِفْت‎ (lift, “turnip”)), like proposed in TURNIP in Encyclopædia Iranica? Is the -ūka an explainable element?

Thanks in advance! Wyang (talk) 13:26, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

There are lots of interesting resemblances when it comes to words for turnips: there are cognates or borrowings to the Akkadian word in Arabic and Hebrew, Latin has rāpum and nāpus, and Greek has νᾶπῠ (nâpu) (said to be a possible borrowing from Egytian). My impression is that there's a very old word for turnip and related plants (see Ancient Greek σῐ́νᾱπῐ (sínāpi), for instance) that's been wandering around the Middle East and elsewhere for thousands of years, perhaps as long as there have been domesticated turnips. Sugar beets, on the other hand, are only a couple of centuries old. New things tend to receive variations of existing names for similar things, so this is what one would expect. Chuck Entz (talk) 14:06, 16 April 2018 (UTC)

Don't forget Ancient Greek ῥάπυς (rhápus), which corresponds to the Iranic cognate most closely. Crom daba (talk) 00:33, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

The sense "boiled beet" is correct for لبو‎ (labu) and لبلبو‎ (lablabu), but regarding لبلبو‎ (lablabu) in particular, it is less common in Iran, and I can't confirm that particular sense based on dictionaries other than Steingass. لبلبو‎ (lablabu) also has other senses in some dialects of Iran, including "blackberry" in Persian of Gorgan. --Z 09:41, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

@ZxxZxxZ Thank you! Any luck with the Middle and Old Persian forms? They look like they were taken from somewhere, though it is not clear what the source for them was. Wyang (talk) 09:50, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

No problem. We can derive it from Middle Persian because the suffix ـو‎ (-u) (from Middle Persian suffix [Term?] (/-ūg/)) which forms adjectives from nouns (if I'm not mistaken) is not a productive suffix in Persian, though I know it is a productive suffix in some other modern Iranian dialects, beside Middle Iranian languages. The first component could be لب‎ (lab, “lip”). --Z 15:46, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

OED sex and gender

The last OED update included a load of revisions and additions to terms related to sex and gender – there's a very interesting summary of it here which I think even non-subscribers can access. Since this is an area we've struggled with a bit, and which attracts a lot of attention, it might be a useful read. Ƿidsiþ 07:47, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

Their update pages are visible to non-subscribers and can be an interesting source of information and ideas, or at least an interesting read.--Prosfilaes (talk) 20:30, 17 April 2018 (UTC)

underneath

Can someone clean up underneath? The quotes for the adverb use the word below instead of underneath, and I'm not convinced that her underneath is an adverb. It should be a noun, fitting that definition well. Danielklein (talk) 09:05, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Good catch. Looks like someone had a thinko. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 12:36, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

schmule

seems to require a proper definition. Equinox ◑ 09:08, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Seems, shmeems. DCDuring (talk) 19:27, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Memes. —Suzukaze-c◆◆ 02:01, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Note: This was deleted without RFD. Rhyminreason (talk) 03:35, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

By the entry's creator and sole contributor. DCDuring (talk) 03:41, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

RFV: sweep for English natives

Did I write this "# An expanse or a swath, a strip of land." taken from swath right?

In other words: are swath, expanse, sweep, spread, stretch all synonyms?

Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 09:39, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes. Swath might be dated; sweep might be 'literary'. There are probably other slight differences in usage, but not much in definition, IMO. DCDuring (talk) 19:16, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm English and "swath" doesn't work for me. But "swathe" does. A vast swathe of southern England.

I learned it as swath (noun), as in "a broad swath of the population", and swathe (verb), as in "the forest was swathed in fog". Similar to breath (noun) + breathe (verb), or loath (adjective) and loathe (verb), where the verb forms have voiced final consonants. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 04:01, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian budemo/будемо

@Crom daba, Demilux, Dijan, Maria Sieglinda von Nudeldorf, Vorziblix and anyone else who knows Serbo-Croatian: an anon just created budemo/будемо and called it a pronoun meaning "we". Is that right? I thought it was a verb form, but I don't know Serbo-Croatian. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 19:32, 18 April 2018 (UTC)

Now cleaned up by Per utramque cavernam. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 11:50, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Night of Broken Glass

WP gives this as a translation of German Kristallnacht, but the evidence of GB looks pretty scarce. Is it actually used? --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 09:50, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Google Books makes it pretty clear it's a translation of Kristallnacht. HathiTrust offers at least this cite for a use; there seems to be a lot more if we accept versions in quotes.--Prosfilaes (talk) 22:59, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Well, it's not a proper translation of Kristallnacht; at best it's a semi-calque (Nacht = night; Kristall = crystal – broken glass) or explanation.
"quotes" as in usages with quotation marks (AKA quotes) around it, or as in citations? If it's the second, there could be a proper non-quote usage (only "could", as there are exceptions like the quote not being a proper quote but a translation). -84.161.4.90 23:53, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

брегова

So, I'm creating entries in Bulgarian now apparently. I figure брегова means coastal, but is probably not the lemma. Then I get no further, as I suck at Bulgarian. Can someone check the entry? --Cien pies 6 (talk) 13:45, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

If you suck at Bulgarian, maybe you should leave the creation of Bulgarian entries to people who don't. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 13:55, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

I totally agree with you! --Cien pies 6 (talk) 17:09, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

 Done --WikiTiki89 16:09, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

hogging

Sense 2 of the noun ("Taking up too much of something so others cannot use it"). Is that not just the present participle of hog? – Gormflaith (talk) 21:51, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

To be precise, it's a w:gerund.

The etymology of the corresponding verb under hog is peculiar, what's the relation to castrated animals? German hocken in the sense of besetzen might be related (literally to squat), could it be? 178.24.236.73 07:20, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

-cast suffix entry?

Should we have one? It seems to have developed its own life and personality beyond the parent broadcast. Possible candidates might include blogcast, multicast, nowcast, peercast, podcast, unicast, videocast, vodcast. Equinox ◑ 07:16, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

That would be a normal development. The uses in peercast, singlecast, and unicast, in particular, seem to contrast with the meaning in broadcast. And it doesn't seem like a return to cast#Verb. DCDuring (talk) 23:32, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

exuvi-um-a-ae

I am doing a bit of editing and encountered Wikipedia's [1] in which they say, mostly believably (to me anyway, Latin always was Greek to me)
"The Latin word exuviae, meaning "things stripped from a body", is found only in the plural. Exuvia is a derived singular usage that is becoming more common, but in fact this is incorrect. Only a single work by Propertius uses the term Exuvium as a singular form"
In the Wiktionary entry OTOH, we have a whole table of Latin inflections, singular and plural, and ploughing through Ainsworth, I don't see where the author of that table got her/his authority from. I am tempted to edit the item in line with WP's entry, but could I first beg a bit of input at this end.

I must admit that exuvia/e always did set my teeth on edge, just as virus/i did (as I am sure it used to set true-blue Romans' on edge, who never failed to say "viruses" whenever they desired the plural), but let that wait till we have these exuviuses settled.

Cheers JonRichfield (talk) 11:51, 21 April 2018 (UTCT)

The Cassell's New Latin Dictionary gives only "exuviae, -arum". All the examples given are in the plural. Caeruleancentaur (talk) 19:07, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Georges' dict gives "exuvium, iī, n. (exuo), Nbf. v. exuviae (w. s.), Prop. 4, 10, 6." and "Sing. exuvia, ae, f., Augustin. serm. 59, 1 Mai (nova bibl. patr. 1. p. 118).". In later ML and (early) NL, exuvia could have become more common than in antique Latin and early ML. It's possible that the "is becoming more common" properly is "is becoming more common IN ENGLISH". -84.161.5.181 22:16, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Both the replies so far are reasonable thank you. I cannot find any example of exuvia or FTM exuvium in Ainsworth, singular or plural, nominative or any other case. Given so few examples of the singular in past usage, I am not sure which of the ancient specimens to trust, either as scholarship or possible levity. It seems that apart from the inevitable but unpredictable pressures on languages, even Latin, we shall be compelled to accept the modern forms in English et alia including Late Latin. That leaves us with the question of what to put into our entry. How about something like:
"The Latin word exuviae, meaning among other things, "things such as clothing or spoils stripped from a body", was rarely found except as a plural. Exuvia is a derived singular usage that has gained de facto acceptance in modern biology, either as singular or plural by various writers, with exuviae as the plural, though in terms of the original Latin that singular form arguably is incorrect. In Classical Latin only a single extant work by Propertius uses any singular form, and understandably, he used the term exuvium, which also appears in some modern works."
Correction, discussion and proposals for how and where to include such a screed welcome. I am concerned because, although it is less likely to create international discord and rebellion than Swift's Big/Little-Endians, it certainly is a point that reflects long-standing and ubiquitous confusion in modern usage. JonRichfield (talk) 03:06, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

"[...] in English [...]" and "[...] in modern biology [...]" could mean that the text merges the usage of two different languages. Latin entry exuvia (usually in plural in classical times with very few exceptions) is different from an English entry exuvia (also or even often or solely singular). As for the Latin entry which might rather be exuviae something like this seems good enough: "The word exuviae is rarely found except as a plural [maybe to add because of Middle and New Latin: in ancient Latin]. A singular is used in [place/citation, giving Propertius' exuvium (n. sg.), Augustinus' exuvia (f. sg.)]." As for the English entry, it could be something like: "In [to add?: ancient] Latin it's rarely found as sg., see [Latin entry's usage notes] for more." -84.161.52.37 03:43, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks, I'll be back to do something on those bases. About ancient Latin, should I not be using the term "classical"?JonRichfield (talk) 04:47, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Say "Classical Latin" if you mean the language from about 75 BC to AD 200; say "Old Latin" (for which we have a separate code, itc-ola) if you mean the language before 75 BC. It's probably best to avoid the term "ancient Latin" as it's potentially ambiguous (I personally would interpret it as a synonym of Old Latin, but other people might interpret it differently). —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 07:41, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

'Twas "ancient Latin" with sense 3 of ancient (relating to antiquity as a historical period), making it a cover term for "(Early,) Old, Classical and Late Latin". Alternatively there's antique, antiquarian, antiquitous, antiquary in reference to sense 3 of antiquity (historical period preceding the Middle Ages). Else a wording like "Old, Classical and Late Latin" or "Latin from x to y [~500 for the end of LL]" is needed to replace it. -84.161.40.184 00:36, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

question

hi why very words in wiktionary not reference in bodem of word

Maybe doesn't properly answer the question, but English Wiktionary has WT:CFI (rules for inclusion) and WT:RFV (for verification if a term really exists by Wiktionary's inclusion rules). Reference material, like dictionaries, can have invented terms which English wiktionary doesn't accept. -84.161.5.181 22:09, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

Borinquen

So, I'm creating entries in Taíno now apparently. I figure Borinquen means Puerto Rico, but it is probably missing something. I get no further, as I suck at Taíno. Can someone check the entry? --Cien pies 6 (talk) 18:29, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

No way this is attested, right? @Victar, -sche —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 21:00, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

If you spend time in PR, you'll see this and related terms.  :)

FWIW, I'm used to seeing the forms Boriquén (“Puerto Rico”) and Boricua (“a native Puertorriqueño”). The ES WP has articles at w:es:Boriquén and w:es:Boricua. The ES WT entry at es:boricua gives an etymology source as Arqueología lingüística: estudios modernos dirigidos al rescate y reconstruccíon del arahuaco taíno by Manuel Álvarez.

HTH, ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 01:03, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I think you may be missing the point... attested as Taíno. (We have boricua, by the way, with the correct capitalisation.) —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:15, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Ah, yes, any attestations as Taíno in a Taíno context (not just word lists) would be very hard to find. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 16:23, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Yep, all Taíno words should be reconstructions as there isn't a single passage in Taíno. Also, all reconstructions need to have cited etymologies. If they can't be cited, it should in most cases end at a Spanish entry. --Victar (talk) 22:48, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

ανάμεσα

This is a preposition, not an adverb, right? Caeruleancentaur (talk) 19:03, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

No, I think it's an adverb indeed; it's always used (as far as I know) with σε (se), which is the real preposition. --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 19:16, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

estage

This seems like some kind of restaurant term:

2017 November 26, Natange Smith, “How To Cook Like A Bajan with Chef Rhea Gilkes”, in Nation News‎^[2]:

It was at The Cliff restaurant where I did estage for six months, I was then hired by Sandy Lane Hotel.

Also [3], "I am definitely planning on returning to the Fat Duck for another estage, don’t get me wrong it’s no summer camp, it is very (very!) hard work from the early hours of the morning until late into the night."

What does it mean? DTLHS (talk) 23:34, 21 April 2018 (UTC)

• I believe that it is an internship - where the person works for (next to) nothing but gets experience. With luck he gets offered a job at the end. SemperBlotto (talk) 10:31, 22 April 2018 (UTC)

odegracie

So, I'm creating entries in Polish again apparently. I figure odegracie is a form of odegrać, going by what grać says. A couple of dictionaries say it's role-play, but what do I know? I suck at Polsih. Can someone check the entry? --Cien pies 6 (talk) 07:29, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

ashiyu

Is this Japanese term (in Wikipedia) common enough in English? DonnanZ (talk) 14:55, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

• google books:"the ashiyu" only gives 17 hits, collapsing to 14 when paging through. A quick glance suggests that most of these are treated as non-English words, with glosses and italicizing. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 01:07, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Digging through those 14 hits, only 5 gave any preview, and all 5 treated ashiyu as non-English. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 01:10, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

So an English speaker would usually call it a footbath, they even look like a paddling pool. Thanks. DonnanZ (talk) 08:11, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

@Eirikr: I tried googling "an ashiyu" and found enough to make an entry worthwhile. I borrowed the Japanese from Wikipedia, which needs checking of course (if you or someone else would be so kind). Cheers. DonnanZ (talk) 11:15, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

@DonnanZ -- google books:"an ashiyu" generates 22 ostensible hits, collapsing to 18 when paging through. Of the four hits that offer preview and include this term, all treat the term as non-English.

What sources did you find that treat this term as English (i.e. without providing a gloss and without italicizing)? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 16:31, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

It's pretty obvious that it's not an English word, but the mere fact it is recorded in English script should be enough. But if you are not satisfied with that RFV it or something. But we have sayonara and probably quite a few other Japanese words in English, see Category:English terms derived from Japanese. DonnanZ (talk) 17:02, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

"It's pretty obvious that it's not an English word, but the mere fact it is recorded in English script should be enough." It sounds like you're saying that any term in Latin script in an English text is therefore English. I cannot agree with this.

Some terms, like sayonara or skosh, have demonstrably entered the English-language lexicon, and these terms are used by English speakers as English terms in English-language contexts. I am wholly supportive of treating these terms as English.

Other terms, like ashiyu, are unknown to English speakers who have not studied Japanese culture and language, and are demonstrably treated as non-English when used by English-language writers. I cannot support treating these terms as English.

I am supportive of us having an entry at [[ashiyu]] -- provided this indicates those languages that treat this term, with this spelling, as part of their respective lexicons, and/or provides soft-redirects to the appropriate entries in the relevant scripts. That ensures that users can still look up this term, which is good for usability. However, treating this as English does our users a disservice, especially English-language learners, as doing so effectively misinforms them. English speakers don't say ashiyu, they say heated footbath or wading pool.

Re: RFV, I suppose I could go that route, though I'd rather we just resolve this. You began this thread with a question that I took to be requesting confirmation that this is an English term and worthy of an English entry. I've provided my own viewpoint and data to state that this term is not English. Even the EN WP article at w:Ashiyu treats this as a non-English term. I would have thought that to be sufficient...? Would you prefer RFV? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 17:02, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

The choice is yours, my argument would be that there is no other suitable word in English to describe something that seems to be uniquely Japanese. I also found quite a few images in Wikimedia Commons when searching for ashiyu. DonnanZ (talk) 10:32, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

出た！ Do we have an entry for "uniquely Japanese"? Imaginatorium (talk) 06:52, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

This discussion is too damn similar to Talk:Cookie. We need to decide what to do with borrowings. —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 06:43, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Add to that the previous discussion over the alleged borrowing of the English word Flash (“multimedia platform”) into Chinese – spelled in English letters of the alphabet, not Chinese characters. The word was eventually deleted due to lack of verification: see Talk:Flash. — SGconlaw (talk) 07:16, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Autarchy/autarky

The article autarchy claims autarky as a synonym. It is not! It is a homophone with an entirely different meaning. I tried to correct it but was reverted and referred to this page to discuss. Is there a convincing reason to permit this error to persist? --88.97.11.54 15:01, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Following the advice at template:rfv, I had a look at Google books and found this, which reports the OED as saying that the terms have been used interchangeably. So I guess the article has to reflect reality, even if reality is wrong[!]. But it matters: North Korea is both an autarchy and an autarky whereas the Irish Free State was the latter but definitely not the former. So surely there ought to be indicator that caution is advised? --88.97.11.54 15:15, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

If there is a reliable source stating that the words are not equal, you could add a usage note with the source as reference. -80.133.104.193 23:00, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Hindi

So, apparently I'm editing i Hindi now. I took a stab at तालियों. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 20:48, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

I'm so sorry, @AryamanA. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 20:59, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

@Cien pies 6, Metaknowledge: It's good. I'll try to add the WT:ACCEL entry creation shortcuts for the inflection tables at some point. —Aryaman^{A (मुझसे बात करें • योगदान)} 21:44, 23 April 2018 (UTC)

Chinese: Alternate Characters (异体字)　

Two weeks ago, I added an alternate character to a character's page (瑰), no problem. (see [4]). The result was perfect (looks like this: alt. forms 瓌). Right.

Today I added an alternate character to another page (旗) by the exact same method as above (see [5]). But for some reason, the alternate character appears on the page next to the character itself (looks like this: alt. forms 旂／旗). Wrong.

请问, how can I get the ／旗 out of the alternate character box on the 旗 page???

Thanks for any help! --Geographyinitiative (talk) 09:27, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

挑剔 (Pinyin): tiāoti, tiāotī, tiāotì

The tiāotì reading is labelled as a 'common misreading'.

(Standard Chinese, common misreading)+

Pinyin: tiāotì

Isn't it better to say 'common variant reading' or maybe 'common variant reading, considered as a misreading' or something else? idk

xiandai hanyu guifan cidian ed 3 pg 1287 specifically says that tì is a misreading: "不读tí或tì。"

--Geographyinitiative (talk) 08:25, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

@Geographyinitiative: I think "common variant" would be fine. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 17:38, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

dialect

Is sense 4 ("one of the non-Mandarin Chinese languages such as Cantonese, Hakka, etc") really specific to Chinese and distinct from senses 1 and 5? How? Yes, some of the Chinese languages are not intelligible with others in speech and are thus arguably languages and not dialects, but this is not unique to Chinese; many people speak of German "dialects" that are likewise separate languages, and German itself is likewise often treated as "not a dialect" vis-a-vis them (like Mandarin). - -sche (discuss) 16:54, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

German and Chinese languages reasonably fall under sense 5. Collin's refers to this more precisely as "any language as a member of a group or family of languages". Ultimateria (talk) 18:07, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I understood this to mean that Mandarin is considered the "true" Chinese language, and the others are considered dialects. In many language groups, there is one dialect that is considered the most proper form, or the "high" form. (Like Castilian Spanish, as opposed to the dialects spoken in South and Central America). I thought that was what this was getting at. It is not quite the same as the "improper or wrong" definitions, but reflects an attitude that distinguishes "dialect" from the "high" form. Given that you can get this distinction in other language groups than the Chinese languages, it should probably be generalized, but I think it may be a distinct meaning. Kiwima (talk) 03:39, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I've generalized it and merged it with the former sense 5, the "regional or minority language" sense: "A language (often a regional or minority language) as part of a group or family of languages, especially if they are viewed as a single language, or if contrasted with a standardized variety that is considered the 'true' form of the language (for example, Cantonese as contrasted with Mandarin Chinese, or Bavarian as contrasted with German)." Is this OK? It's a bit wordy (but could be shortened by dropping the parentheticals)... - -sche (discuss) 16:06, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

dialect meaning a single dialectal word

Superintendent Chalmers: You call hamburgers steamed hams. Principal Skinner: Yes, it's a regional dialect.

Should we have a sense for this? Or am I interpreting this quote wrong? DTLHS (talk) 17:00, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

I reckon "it" is refering to "the calling of hamburgers steamed hams in this region ". Seems perfecty cromulent to me. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 17:32, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, "it" here is one of those things grammar teachers call a "vague pronoun reference", and clearly does not refer to the expression "steamed hams". --WikiTiki89 20:13, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Or perhaps you could analyze "a regional dialect" as meaning "in a regional dialect", as is done with language names and such (compare "Yes, it's German"). You wouldn't say that "German" can mean "a single word in German". --WikiTiki89 20:19, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

Hmm, I would have thought that was using German as an adjective, you wouldn't say "Yes, it's a German". I'm more inclined to agree with Wikitiki89, that the "it" refers to the act of calling hamburgers steamed hams. Kiwima (talk) 03:42, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

You wouldn't say "it's a German" because German in reference to the language is a proper noun. But if I was back in the States and said "Oh, I left my Handy at home" and someone said "You call a cellphone a Handy?", I could answer "Yes, it's German", and I would certainly be thinking of the proper noun, not the adjective. Likewise if someone questioned my use of y'all's or a might could, I might could answer "Yes, it's my dialect". —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 08:41, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

In the absence of other citations, I think it's simpler to analyse that line in the way Cien Pies and WikiTiki do. But if there were examples of the plural dialects being used to refer to dialectal words (especially if all from one dialect, like "...speaking of olykoek, egg cream and other dialects"), that would lend more persuasiveness to the idea that "dialect" can mean "dialectal word". - -sche (discuss) 16:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

What do you think of citations such as

1. 2017, Rinaldina Russell, Sonnet: The Very Rich and Varied World of the Italian Sonnet:

   In line 9, abbo is dialect for ho, meaning “I have.” In line 10, saleppe is dialect for grilli, or crickets.

Do they fit with the current first sense? DTLHS (talk) 16:20, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, they seem like sense 1, even more parallel to "Hund is German for 'dog'" (like also olykoek is dialect for doughnut) than the Simpsons example is. - -sche (discuss) 18:17, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

tilastotulos

The Finnish term tilastotulos is currently defined like this:

1. (sports) A sports result recorded in the official statistics kept by a a national sports association. In addition to statistical purposes these records may serve as qualification requirements to certain tournaments, championship games etc.

I have two questions:

1. Is this clear to an English-speaker?
2. Is there an English term for tilastotulos?

--Hekaheka (talk) 22:00, 24 April 2018 (UTC)

LOL. From that definition, I'd say

{{lb|fi|sports}} [[result]]

would pretty much cover it. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 09:02, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

It is clear but sounds possibly over-defined. Could you just say "official sports result" (that's the best "translation" I can think of)? Equinox ◑ 10:02, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your help. I changed the definition to "official result", which is halfway between your suggestions. --Hekaheka (talk) 14:33, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

toiletný

So, apparently I'm editting in Slovak now. check toiletný, etc. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 07:07, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

@Wikitiki89, Dan Polansky —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 16:13, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Target, but pronounced like "Tar-jay"

There is a citeable trend of people referring to the store chain "Target" as if it were pronounced "Tarjay", to put a comic air of culture on the brand. Examples include:

• Jade Parker, Making a Splash #1: Robyn (2014): "It was mostly decorated with stuff from Target, but Mom always pronounced it Tarjay — like it was French and fancy."
• Ann Hood, How I Saved My Father's Life (and Ruined Everything Else) (2010): "She has the whole floor, which sounds very fancy, but it's really the attic of their house, so it's just a big open space covered with stuff from Target. She pronounces it Tar-jay, which is really annoying. Eliza should go and work at Target because she loves it so much. One day she said, “Have you seen the dollar bins at Tarjay? I got all this stuff for pedicures there and it only cost thirteen dollars.”
• Mark Tungate, Fashion Brands: Branding Style from Armani to Zara (2012), p. 35: "A whole range of previously uninspired retailers – Oasis, Target in the United States (fashionistas have taken to giving it an ironic French inflection, as in 'Tar-jay') – have ramped up their creativity with the aid of young designers."

I doubt that Target, the store chain, meets WT:BRAND, but would we consider Target ironically mispronounced as "Tarjay" to be a separate sense? bd2412 T 16:06, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I don't think so. The pronunciation /tɑrˈʒeɪ/ doesn't refer to anything different than the pronunciation /ˈtɑrɡɪt/, it's just a humorous way of referring to the same thing. But if Target does meet WT:BRAND and is added, then we can certainly list both pronunciations. (See also w:Target Corporation#Targét.) —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 16:37, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Playboy Bunny

Is Playboy Bunny a proper noun or common noun? What's a good way of telling the difference? — SGconlaw (talk) 16:25, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

I'd call it a common noun because it has to take an indefinite determiner: "She was a Playboy Bunny", not *"She was Playboy Bunny" (which sounds like something a Russian speaker with imperfect English would say). —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 16:33, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

Right, thanks. — SGconlaw (talk) 16:44, 25 April 2018 (UTC)

This is gonna be a WOTD! Lol. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 08:49, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Yeah, I thought about it a bit, but figured it was not that offensive (compared, for example, to fur burger and nudie which were also nominated). — SGconlaw (talk) 11:11, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Also, it denotes a member of a class with many members (and the possibility of inducting more members), rather than denoting a singular entity. I note we even consider Muse/Muses a common rather than a proper noun. Whereas, the specific muse Hypate, or e.g. Zeus, are specific entities. People do speak of Zeuses, but chiefly as multiple iterations of that entity or claimants to be that entity, as with Frances as the plural of France. - -sche (discuss) 16:46, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

So, to be clear, the name of a singular entity is a proper noun, and the fact that it is possible in some situations to refer to that entity in the plural (e.g., Christmas Days, Frances, Zeuses) is to be disregarded. However, if a word refers to a class of entities (e.g., Frenchwoman), then it is a common noun. Is that correct? — SGconlaw (talk) 09:45, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

pereo Latin perfect passive

In the Conjugation section of the Wiktionary page for the Latin verb pereo it lists the perfect passive form as "itum" and the perfect infinitve as "itum esse". Should these be peritum and peritum esse?

Yes, but I can't figure out how to fix it. I suspect something needs to be changed at Module:la-verb; maybe GuitarDudeness or Erutuon can help. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 07:44, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: Fixed, I think. — Eru·tuon 20:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

evolutionary arms race

@DCDuring, Metaknowledge, Chuck Entz: Is this entry worthy? I'm hesitant; it's SOP, but at the same time it's a term of art, right? --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 13:18, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

I'd say no. In a biological context, you find people just saying "arms race", which supports the idea that the term is not an indivisible whole. I think what really needs to be created is a second sense at arms race to cover more metaphorical uses, not just in biology. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 17:29, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 19:06, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

trigenous

Citations:trigenous now has seven attestations, so it's entryworthy. I've created an initial entry with the botanical/zoological sense (as per tetragenous), but from the citations I've found it looks like there are other senses to be defined. I honestly don't know what they should be, though. -Stelio (talk) 16:11, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

monogenous and digenous suggests that "X-genous" terms sometimes mean "relating to X-genesis" (or perhaps, looking at -genous, that's intended to be the same sense??). I seem to recall that at least some speakers also use it to mean "having X genders (classes, kinds)"; indeed, there seem to be enough or almost enough citations to support that sense. - -sche (discuss) 16:21, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Yes. I expect the other sense is descended from homogeneous converting into the alternative form of homogenous, and that -genous suffix being reused. The "teatragenous" is one of the citations looks to me like a simple misspelling of tetragenous instead. -Stelio (talk) 09:05, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

tectotype

Similarly, I've bulked Citations:tectotype up to six entries now. It seems apparent that there are two senses:

• A naturalism sense, which has a clear definition. However it all boils down to references back to a single paper (Frederick Chapman's 1912 What are Type Specimens? How Should They be Named?). If all cited references to tectotype are actually just quoting Chapman, that doesn't seem like sufficient independence to pass CFI.
• A geological sense, relating to plate tectonics. But for this sense, the citations don't provide sufficient context for me to divine what the definition should be.

-Stelio (talk) 16:16, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

I've defined them now — feel free to ask me in the future if you need help with anything in the geosciences or palaeontology. The citations you added were not sufficient for either of the senses: some of them were giving the definition rather than actually using it (see Use-mention distinction) and the last two seem to be by the same authors. However, I saw a few more for each definition on Google Books, so all is well. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 04:12, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for that. It seems to me that the only 'mention' citation for tectotype is the 2010 dictionary definition (please do correct me if I'm wrong, so that I can improve my contributions). That dictionary citation is the only one I didn't add. :-) But yes, the 1979 and 1981 geological citations look like they may be separate translations of the proceedings of the same 1978 conference. -Stelio (talk) 08:17, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

shemozzle

The recently-added context label "(dated, East London slang)" is far too limiting; for example, the word seems to still be current in Irish English and probably also among US speakers with some connection to Yiddish or Jewish communities, e.g. I find hits for "shemozzle in New York", which have motivated me to simply remove the label. If anyone wants to add a more accurate label, go ahead. - -sche (discuss) 18:12, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Old Burmese

So, I'm editting in Old Burmese now. JK. Plain on Spanish for me. Is there a catchier word in English for a baldeadora - a street washer? street washing truck SWT? --Cien pies 6 (talk) 20:38, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

Street sweeper or street cleaner, I think. - -sche (discuss) 20:40, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

healthy, adverb sense

In "She eats healthy." "healthy" must be an adverb. Should we have an entry for eat healthy, or are there other constructions in which "healthy" can be an adverb? DTLHS (talk) 22:06, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

run healthy, drink healthy, breathe healthy, sleep healthy. --Per utramque cavernam (talk) 22:18, 26 April 2018 (UTC)

"He's acting healthy."

"He's been taught to talk white."

"The company has been run lean for many years."

"Drive smart; stay alive."

"He sat naked on the floor."

"The light shined bright."

IMO it simply isn't worth it to add an Adverb section for all the adjectives that may be used in a way that looks adverbial. DCDuring (talk) 01:29, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

As PUC says, it's not specific to "eat healthy"... and yes, it's not even specific to "healthy". (I can also find "For a doctor, he sure eats unhealthy.") It's not even specific to English; German adjectives can likewise be adverbed. But it has limited lemming support: as Grammarphobia notes, most dictionaries only have it as an adjective, but AHD does have it as an adverb. Should we follow? I'm on the fence, leaning towards "sure". We do already have an adverb section for "direct" (as does AHD). - -sche (discuss) 02:14, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

DCDuring's examples are not all analogous. "He sat naked" is not the same as "he sat nakedly" (though "the light shone bright" is the same as "the light shone brightly"). "She eats healthy" does to me seem adverbial (is it informal?): "he sat naked on the floor" means he was naked while sitting, but "she eats healthy" doesn't mean she is already healthy while she eats; it adverbially qualifies the action of eating. Equinox ◑ 13:29, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

There are at least two flavors of the possibly adverbial use, as Equinox has pointed out. One seems to be replaceable with "being/while X" (He, while naked, sat on the floor); another possibly replaceable with "X-ly" or "in an X manner" (The light shined brightly; Drive in a smart manner.). Inevitably, some usage doesn't fit either pattern. To stay/remain/seem/become/appear/look/sound/feel/taste alive/fresh/etc. illustrates a different pattern in which the verbs all seem like copulas, with the adjuncts seeming very much adjectival.

I don't think that any of these usages warrant adding a semantically redundant adverb section to the entry for the adjective. This reminds of some of our more finely divided definitions, which can readily be seen as a more general definition as applied in a specific context. DCDuring (talk) 15:06, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

How do you feel about our adverb section at fast? Equinox ◑ 15:52, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

(chiming in) -- The as [ADJ] as construction shows up in a couple of those purportedly adverbial usage examples. However, this generally takes an adjective, no? "He jumped as high as he could." No one says "He jumped as highly as he could," do they? ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 16:22, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Perhaps this could be considered a resultative usage? The usage in above mentioned "He sat naked" is called depictive and they are somehow related but different. Crom daba (talk) 20:40, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

@Equinox:. All but one of the 5 adverb senses at our entry for fast has a corresponding adjective sense (1:1, 2:7, 4:4, 5:11). I didn't find one for 3. I'd argue that we should have an adjective definition that corresponds to 3. But other dictionaries have adverb sections with the same duplication. I think fast has several adverb meanings beyond "in a fast manner". Those adjectives that have only the "manner" sense when used adverbially seem to merit an adverb PoS section much less than others.

At least two OneLook dictionaries have adverb definitions for healthy: AHD and Collins. I defer to the practice of lemmings. DCDuring (talk) 21:32, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

vantage point

Does this term have a special meaning in photography? ---> Tooironic (talk) 11:44, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Side note: the second definition probably needs to be fleshed out. I don’t think you can say something like “the variable changed its value at two vantage points”. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 12:37, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

walking on sunshine

I would like to have an entry for walking on sunshine. Is there a format for expressions that are technically verbs (the lemma would be walk on sunshine), but which is only ever used in the present participle? It might technically be an adjective comparable to elated, but there are no comparative forms. bd2412 T 14:20, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

Meh, it's perfectly decent as a normal verb entry. Created and cited (without Katrina or The waves) --Cien pies 6 (talk) 21:14, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

That will do. bd2412 T 17:50, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

disjunct particles - how to name entries?

Do we want to create entries for not only ... but also or not so much ... as? If yes, do we have an established scheme for them?

Both are abundantly found in other dictionaries:

• not only:
  • “not only” in the Collins English Dictionary, Glasgow: HarperCollins Publishers.
  • “not only” in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
  • The Free Dictionary
• not so much:
  • “not so much sth as sth” in the Cambridge English Dictionary, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  • “not so much” in the Collins English Dictionary, Glasgow: HarperCollins Publishers.
  • “not so much as” (US) / “not so much as” (UK) in Macmillan Dictionary
  • “not so much as” (US) / “not so much as” (UK) in Oxford Dictionaries, Oxford University Press.
  • “not so much as” in Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English

--Per utramque cavernam 19:38, 27 April 2018 (UTC)

stronzo

This has three senses, two of which are:

1. (vulgar, slang, figuratively) bastard, shit, son of a bitch
2. (vulgar, slang, figuratively) A generally despicable person.

Granted, I'm not well versed in the ways of abusive vulgarity, but I don't see the difference between the two. Chuck Entz (talk) 11:00, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

Sent to RFD. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 03:53, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

capirotejo

Hi. There's a game called capirotejo which looks awesome - a cross between leapfrog and piggyback riding, stage diving and Human Centipede. There's a video here and here. Has anyone played this before? But lexicographically speaking, do we have a word for it in English? My definition was going to be a variety of leapfrog but that is lame. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 20:23, 28 April 2018 (UTC)

@Cien pies 6 That's a super find; it looks great! But not even an ES Wikipedia article to document it. :-( Perhaps, "A traditional game played in Ecuador, in which as many players as possible jump on the backs of other participants that have formed a head-to-hips line." -Stelio (talk) 08:40, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

That will do. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 11:18, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

t#French

Should the "interfix of liaison" be at -t- instead? How do we decide this? I note that e.g. English -k- and -n- are things that go inside a word morphologically, while the French t is always set apart by hyphens (fera-t-il). Equinox ◑ 15:06, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

I dunno. My first instinct was that it should be at -t-, because the hyphens are always there; English doesn't have an equivalent because we don't have anything that's always written between hyphens like that. But then I realized that in a phrase like ferait-il we just have entries for the words and ignore the hyphen, which could be evidence for fera-t-il instead. I guess what it comes down to is this: when someone just learning French first encounters fera-t-il or the like, what are they most likely to look up, t or -t-? I kind of want to list them both, and call one of them an alternative form of the other, but that's also a little silly because in a running text there's no difference between them. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 16:18, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

If you check the edit history of -t-, you see that the French particle was originally there, then Connel merged it into t, leaving a hard redirect. Then two years later I undid the hard redirect so I could create the Old Irish entry, meaning that from 2006 to 2009, looking up -t- would take you either directly or indirectly to the French, but now it doesn't take you there at all. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 16:21, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

And now I see that -t-#Old Irish is actually redundant to t-#Old Irish, meaning we could restore the hard redirect. That might be the best option. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 16:23, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Cancer and autism

Cancer is informally used to indicate highly unpleasant things or persons.

Autism is informally used to indicate excessive irrationality.

My edits regarding the definition of these words were reverted, but I say that they're entirely valid. To claim inaccuracy on the grounds of pre-existing definitions, is an ad dictionarium fallacy. Meaning is contingent on what someone thinks a word means. And, people online use these words in the way described above alot. AltHypeFan (talk) 20:19, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Easy solution is to prove it by finding real-world citations that meet WT:CFI rules. Equinox ◑ 18:05, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

'Twas the edit at cancerous not cancer: diff.
At least image boards use "cancer" in another sense, which may or may not be covered by the figurate sense. -84.161.24.205 00:20, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

google:4chan autism —Suzukaze-c◆◆ 00:23, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

The point of my revert was that the definition was too broad and vague: there are lots of ways someone can be irrational, and I doubt anyone means all of them when they say someone is autistic. My impression is that there are very specific personality traits people have in mind, and leaving those out would be misleading. I would be the last one to advocate removing a sense that's legitimately in use because I personally dislike it. Even if it's vile and disgusting, offensive or totally wrong-headed, an uncensored, descriptive dictionary is incomplete without it. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:52, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I see your point. I guess it's a “I know it when i see it” type of thing. But that is obviously useless for a dictionary. So, to clarify things more, how about I define it as a synonym of moronity, imbecility, or idiocy? We all know what those things are supposed to signal. AltHypeFan (talk) 20:19, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

Question: How can "autism" describe excessive irrationality when one of the core traits of Asperger's syndrome is extreme rationality. Aspies are said to think like Vulcans. They follow logic and rules obsessively. They are most often xNTx on Myers-Briggs (the type called Rational!) It'd be like defining "autism" as "extreme skill at reading body language". Khemehekis (talk) 02:34, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Well, this is about the nonliteral use of the term, which is probably quite unattached to reality. That said, all of the above doesn't ring true to me. By the way, I should mention that I blocked this user for using a sock-puppet account to remove tags from an entry, so they won't be able to respond for the time being without risking a longer block. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:08, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Do you mean the conception that Aspies are hyperrational beings doesn't ring true to you, or the conception that "autism" can be used, as AltHypeFan claims, to mean "excessive irrationality" doesn't ring true to you? And thanks for letting me know about the sockpuppetry and block. Khemehekis (talk) 03:31, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Sorry for being unclear: I meant the latter. It seems vague and off the mark. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:20, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Aj, thanks for the explanation. I'll agree with you on "off the mark". Khemehekis (talk) 05:27, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Sharp

"A Japanese and Taiwanese multinational corporation that designs and manufactures electronic products, headquartered in Sakai, Japan."

Is that actually the name of the company, or is it just a brand name? DonnanZ (talk) 20:26, 29 April 2018 (UTC)

Answered my own question. Found and added a wp article on the Sharp Corporation. DonnanZ (talk) 15:32, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Is acrostatic a synonym of acrodynamic

As the entry says now? DTLHS (talk) 00:07, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

@JohnC5 —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 18:21, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

@DTLHS, Metaknowledge: So depending on your system (e.g. here), acrodynamic may refer to mobile ablauting monosyllables (e.g. {*h₂énts ~ *h₂n̥tés), though these are also just called mobile in some systems because the Erlangen model doesn't really deal well with anything that isn't of the form "R-S-E." In other systems acrostatic and acrodynamic are bewilderingly identical in meaning. —*i̯óh₁n̥C^[5] 00:18, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@JohnC5: Really, I was hoping you could revise the definitions... —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:19, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@Metaknowledge: I'm not really sure how to do so without the definitions becoming overly specialist. —*i̯óh₁n̥C^[5] 01:23, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@JohnC5 That's, er, one of the central challenges of lexicography, isn't it? You'd do far better than I would. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 02:49, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

If you take a stab at it, the rest of us can try to trim or generalize anything that seems too specialist. Maybe the entry should have two definitions, one for the distinctive use and one for "synonym of..."? - -sche (discuss) 05:07, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

I've made some changes to acrodynamic which should be synchronized with @-sche's changes to acrostatic. —*i̯óh₁n̥C^[5] 09:05, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Are there situations where the "root syllable" and the "first syllable" are not the same? The use of the first phrase in one entry and the second phrase in the other implies the two terms are coordinate terms rather than synonyms (which they were listed as also prior to my edits). - -sche (discuss) 16:09, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Kermode bear, Kermodism

These entries more or less claim that all Kermode bears are white or cream-coloured, but the few sources I read all suggested that only a minority of Kermode bears have leucism and that the other ones are black. Does anybody know what definition is correct? ←₰-→ Lingo ^Bingo _Dingo (talk) 14:04, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

There are black Kermode bears (indeed, a white bear can have two black parents), so the bears are not definitionally white. I've changed the entries. - -sche (discuss) 16:29, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

eSwatini

Can we verify the pronunciation /ɛˈswɑːtɪni/? --WikiTiki89 14:12, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

This video seems to pronounce the last bit /tini/ (around the 15 second mark), which is in line with what Wikipedia now says and with the guide I can find in a Snopes message board, "eh-swa-teeny". If there are more newscasts about the name change available, perhaps from local news, South African broadcasters, or the BBC, they could also be informative. - -sche (discuss) 14:41, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

I suppose the English pronunciation will just be as close as possible an approximation to the original Swazi, which can be heard here from the king himself. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 18:20, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Etymology of écharpe

I've moved this to Wiktionary:Etymology_scriptorium#Etymology_of_écharpe Leasnam (talk) 02:16, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

missing sense of industrial complex

I've seen this applied to plenty of systems besides (but modeled on) military-industrial complex and prison-industrial complex: medical-industrial complex, peace-industrial complex, non-profit industrial complex, etc. I'm not sure all these terms deserve their own entry, but I think it merits a mention at industrial complex (or just complex, as in military-entertainment complex). I just don't know how to define it. Ultimateria (talk) 19:07, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

MW's first definition of the noun complex is:

a whole made up of complicated or interrelated parts

a complex of welfare programs - the military-industrial complex

Unless we are attempting to convey some complex set of PoV connotations, I don't see any advantage to having the entry [[industrial complex]] when the denotative meaning is SoP and the word complex appears in usages like "medical-pharmaceutical complex", "industrial agricultural complex", "media sports cultural complex", "surveillance industrial internet complex", "defense education complex", "minority education complex", "welfare state complex", "government media complex", "marketing/manufacturing/media complex", "government-biotech complex", etc. DCDuring (talk) 20:02, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

Political buzz-phrase, like useful idiot, Great Satan, or bloated capitalists (the latter is actually in Chambers: "a political catchphrase used by Marxists and other socialists (and also jocularly by others) to describe the ruling or managerial class"). Feels as though complex ought to cover it really. Equinox ◑ 21:38, 30 April 2018 (UTC)

May 2018

"Last April" "Next October"

It looks as though the entries for Russian months all include examples like:

1. в апре́ле про́шлого го́да ― v apréle próšlovo góda ― last April

   в апре́ле бу́дущего го́да ― v apréle búduščevo góda ― next April

The Russian is clear (I think, though I am a beginner): "April [genitive] of last year", and so on. I am an English speaker from southern England, and this does not match my understanding of the English phrases: to me, "Last February" was February 2018, and "next October" is October 2018. Notoriously these phrases vary wildly within the British Isles, let alone anywhere else. I would like to change these to "April last year" and "April next year", but invite comments in case I have totally misunderstood something. Imaginatorium (talk) 07:52, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Maybe in Russian, unlike in English, "April of the past/coming year" does not imply a calendar year? —Tamfang (talk) 16:38, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@Atitarev? --Per utramque cavernam 18:17, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

@Imaginatorium, Per utramque cavernam: "April of last year" and "April of next year" are more accurate translations than "last/next April". --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 23:58, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

strangles

A request for a quick check that I've done the right thing in giving strangles two separate "Noun" entries, since one is a lemma (horse disease) and one is a non-lemma (plural of strangle (noun), an option trading strategy). I followed ducks as an example of the same. -Stelio (talk) 12:35, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Etymological discussion moved to: Wiktionary:Etymology scriptorium/2018/May#strangles. -Stelio (talk) 13:58, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Jizz

I'm only an occasional contributor here, so would be grateful if someone would kindly check and improve my recent addition to jizz. Andy Mabbett (Pigsonthewing); Talk to Andy; Andy's edits 16:54, 1 May 2018 (UTC)

Malagasy

So, I'm editting in Malagasy now. My contribution to the sum of human knowledge is fanogon-, a form of the noun fanogo. --Cien pies 6 (talk) 10:57, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

白滝

Can't this also mean shirataki? ---> Tooironic (talk) 16:02, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

 Done. All these gosh-darned "proper name" entries that don't include normal usage... —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 00:08, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

place names?

example Dixfield, Swanville etc... --74.124.128.224 16:20, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

• What about them? SemperBlotto (talk) 16:23, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

Can i add place names without deletion? --74.124.128.224 16:26, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

See Wiktionary:Criteria_for_inclusion#Place_names. There isn't a consensus about all place names, but as long as you stick to the ones in the first list at the link I just provided, you should be OK. Personally, I only find place names interesting enough to include if they have non-obvious foreign translations, but I'd never nominate one for deletion solely for the reason of failing to meet that criterion. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 18:03, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

The origin of some place names can be quite interesting, I'm about to enter Spartanburg. Regarding uninhabited islands: some have crept in even if they're not meant to be included. DonnanZ (talk) 18:12, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

adding a "translation to be checked"

I wanted to add a Serbian word to the "translations to be checked" on the page for (English) "mold" but I just can’t figure out how it works. E.g., when I enter "sr" as language, an error message comes up, although it’s the correct abbreviation.

Any pointers? Or rather: Isn’t there a wizard or easier way to edit those things?--Geke (talk) 16:20, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

• I'm afraid that this Wiktionary considers Serbian to be a form of Serbo-Croatian - language code sh. Have a look our entries for some Serbian-only words to see how we handle them. SemperBlotto (talk) 16:26, 2 May 2018 (UTC)

For me, the translation-adder script "autocorrects" sr to sh. The script only works if you're adding a translation for a specific sense, though; you can't (AFAICT) add to the "translations to be checked" box with it, because adding translations you're not sure of is discouraged. - -sche (discuss) 04:31, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Spybag

Any research on this? Spybag may be new coinage, with a nominal definition which is intuitive in describing humor fiction (or nonfiction) which deals with the espionage domain.. which is hampered by poor intel or poor operation. Similar military intelligence in its idiom form. Also the usage of -bag as suffix may be interesting. -Inowen (talk) 20:35, 3 May 2018 (UTC) PS: link: spybag

tíha vs. váha: compare and contrast

tíha is glossed as weight and váha as weight (mass). Now, I see two problems here:

1. Are they really synonyms or is there a difference, e.g. váha is a technical term in physics whereas tíha is more "colloquial" (and can perhaps be used metaphorically to mean "hardship")?
2. The gloss at váha makes "weight" and "mass" appear synonymous, which is not the case in physics, so maybe a better gloss is in order; also, maybe we should add a usage note to clarify the distinction between the two? Depends on what comes out of problem 1…

Oh btw those are Czech words.

MGorrone (talk) 20:41, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Slip 2.3 is quite incorrect

The current definition of "slip" as "young" and "person" is incorrect on two accounts, a misgeneralization from contexts in which it often occurs. Please check a source such as OED for the correct definition as something slight, small, slim. It's often qualified ("...of a girl" or "...of a boy") to apply to children, and more generally "of a" is needed to transform it into a person, but youth is not inherent to the meaning of the word itself. I'm not going to make the edit myself because I'm too long out of practice and not tuned in to the community curating English and don't have time to chase up literary examples to cite. Alden/Onyx or something like that. 107.77.235.214 20:49, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

I've never heard it applied to anyone except a girl, a young woman, or an old, usually frail, woman. The notion seems to me to be "slim, slender, willowy, slight", not "small".

Macmillan (Online) has an entry for a slip of a boy/girl, defined as "a small thin boy/girl". I have heard the collocation "a little slip of a thing", referring usually to a young girl. Citations would clarify whether there is a gender limitation on use and thus whether its use might be a microagression in the eyes of some. DCDuring (talk) 17:08, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I've certainly no quibble with you about "small." But in writing fiction, I wouldn't hesitate to describe a character as "a [mere] slip of a man," understanding, of course, that this could be seen as quite a denigrating description of an exceptionally slight person -- denigrating not because it compares him to a girl (it doesn't at all, in my far, far pre-millennial ear) but because it describes him as physically insignificant. To me, though, it's merely descriptive, not inherently judgmental. I've simply never understood any inherently young or female connotation to slip, though I agree that at least in the realm of cliché, latterday usage tends toward girls. Intuitively there is little difference between this slip and the origin of "a slip of paper." When you get to "pink slip," then it's inherently paper, but that's an evolved term. Underneath all of these, a slip is really a physical trifle or a trifling thing, isn't it? In "slip of paper," which may very well be something torn and irregular, it gets transformed into a trifle consisting of paper. In "slip of a [person]," it's transformed into a physically trifling person. If it were inherently female, we wouldn't need "of a girl." I see that the error had already slipped into Merriam-Webster by 1989, but M-W has always been known for that very kind of imprecision, and the notion has not yet corrupted the OED. I will trust OED over M-W every single time. There we also see that "slip of a [person]" does share its origin with "slip of paper," among other slips. When you look at the etymology, there's simply no reason to describe a slip of a person as inherently young or female -- and in all my reading, this entry is the first time I've seen a suggestion that femininity would be inherent to "slip" rather than to "girl" or "woman" in the expression. I think this instance of devolution and loss of meaning should be resisted. But English Wiktionary is not my domain. Either someone will correct it or it will continue to be erroneous. It's off my mind and out of my hands now.

Alden/Onyx or something like that. 99.93.9.16 00:10, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

chlad vs. zima: synonyms or not?

Wiktionary gives Czech chlad and zima as synonyms, but my (half-)Czech friend says chlad means cool, so cold but not very cold, whereas zima is more appropriately rendered as cold. Czech Wiktionary seems to suggest that they are indeed synonymous in terms of "temperature lowness", but chlad refers to sensory perception (smyslový vnímání) while zima is actual factual cold. Who is right, or is either right? MGorrone (talk) 20:53, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Synonyms don't have to mean exacdtly the same thing. I'd say cool and cold are synonyms in English too. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 21:40, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

A dictionary is supposed to help with word choice (diction!). Even if we declare such words to be synonymous, shouldn't we make clear the distinction in the gloss or in usage notes? DCDuring (talk) 22:57, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

We should try to make the distinction clear in the definition itself. Only if that is insufficient should there be a usage note. --WikiTiki89 16:43, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

My friend went on to explain that "chlad" is used for shadow in summer and for air conditioning. I take it that "chlad" is, in her usage, a pleasant sensation of freshness (shadow and air conditioning), whereas "zima" is actual "cold" as in winter (which coincidentally is also called "zima"). She also asked her Czech mother, who answered with two messages, «Chlad je poloviční zima» (chlad is half zima), and «Chladnička chladí potraviny na 4 stupně» (the fridge "chlads" (cools down) food to 4 degrees). That is not quite the "pleasant freshness" vs. "cold" distinction, but it is indeed "cool" vs. "cold(er)". MGorrone (talk) 12:46, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

@Mahagaja: and @DCDuring: this issue came up because I translated a song into Czech and had my friend correct the result, and she corrected my chlad to zima, and I asked her why. If there is enough difference to warrant such a correction, it is worthwhile, IMO, to investigate exactly what this difference is, and clarify it in a usage note. MGorrone (talk) 12:48, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Sure, a usage note is a good idea. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 13:56, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

An etymology would also be nice. Zima has one meaning winter, chlad, if the same as холодный, would be from PSlav meaning cool, cold; uncertain beyond this. That doesn't explain much, but it's a hint that the former is perhaps more specific.

cool and cold are almost like antonyms (with overlap) because I like it cool but dislike the cold. Those are slightly different senses so we could expand the definitions. I guess hyponym and metonym respectively wouldn't be clear either. Very fuzzy. 109.41.1.155 15:38, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

In English "cold" sometimes appears as a gloss or synonym of wintry, but some sources restrict "cold" in these definitions to its non-literal senses. Whether or not this specifically parallels the Czech words definitions, it may suggest possibilities. DCDuring (talk) 16:49, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I think Czech chlad and zima are basically synonyms (Czech speaker here). The sentences Venku je zima and Venku je chlad seem synonymous. SSJC definitions do suggest greater intensity in zima, per SSJC:zima[6] "velmi nízká teplota" contrasting to SSJC:chlad's[7] "nízká teplota", where "velmi" (very) is missing. I personally would not say "Chlad je poloviční zima", but what do I know. As for translation, "cold" seems to be a good one for chlad; Glosbe[8] seems to agree; there's even the phrase "polární chlad" (polar cold), which can hardly refer to mild cold. --Dan Polansky (talk) 18:29, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

Badass

Is badass still regarded as “vulgar”? I had updated the label to “possibly offensive” but @Tharthan begs to differ. — SGconlaw (talk) 22:14, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

I wouldn't use it in any professional correspondence, for instance, so I suppose "yes", it's still vulgar. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 22:23, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks. Is that the test, though? The word now seems mild enough to be used in general conversation without raising too many eyebrows unlike, for example, the C-word and F-word which remain widely taboo. — SGconlaw (talk) 22:29, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

I wouldn't say it's vulgar, it's just (very) informal; same thing for kick ass. OTOH, take it up the ass is vulgar. --Per utramque cavernam 22:51, 3 May 2018 (UTC)

One wouldn't freely use it around their conservative pastor or churchfolk though, so caution should still be given per its use Leasnam (talk) 12:26, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

There are lots of things I wouldn't say around conservative churchfolk that aren't vulgar, though, so that's hardly an adequate test. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 14:37, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

True, but this is one because it's considered vulgarity. Leasnam (talk) 20:20, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

If ass is vulgar, then badass is also, very likely. Ass has become an intensifier, likely because it's obscene.

The term profanity literally stands in contrast to sacred (sacrecy?). Vulgar is itself vulgar or pejorative, depends on perspective. The difference to obscene as a label is not quite clear to me. At least, I don't think badass is used offensively or as a slur. 109.41.1.155 15:48, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

I think the test should be whether a term would be considered vulgar in ordinary conversation and not if said to any specifically sensitive audience (e.g., conservative churchfolk) or special context (e.g., business correspondence). I’d also disagree that simply because the word incorporates the word ass it is automatically vulgar. I think the word has lost most of its vulgar connotation, which is why “possibly offensive” is sufficient (Oxford Dictionaries Online doesn’t label it as “vulgar”, for example). However, if there is consensus that the word would still raise many eyebrows in normal conversation I’ll leave the “vulgar” label in place. — SGconlaw (talk) 00:14, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

"I’d also disagree that simply because the word incorporates the word ‘’ass’’ it is automatically vulgar." Yes, I agree with you. To me, the word ass has lost its "edge" in this specific word, through some kind of "erosion". --Per utramque cavernam 20:35, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

IMO this isn't vulgar, whereas Per utramque cavernam's example of "take it up the ass" is. Given that it's approbative or even self-applied, I'm not convinced "sometimes offensive" would be right for sense 2 (of the noun or adjective, the latter of which is currently so labelled), either. - -sche (discuss) 20:30, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

OK, looks like there's a consensus. I've removed the labels "possibly offensive" and "vulgar". — SGconlaw (talk) 21:29, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

@Sgconlaw Hey, I know that you pinged me after reading this, but I didn't get your ping for some reason. If you want to remove the vulgar label, that's fine I guess (although I do not agree at all). But removing "possibly offensive" is taking a big leap, because there are plenty of people who would take issue with this being used in public or being used in polite company (I know that some people were surprised [as was I] at seeing this when I went into a large book shop which had a book with that in its title not long ago [the use of the word was directed at the reader, in case you were wondering]). Tharthan (talk) 01:02, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

@Tharthan: the usage note you added seems fine to me. — SGconlaw (talk) 18:00, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Your idea of "concensus" is quite interesting. I count 4 to 4 voices here (the IP being me).

The use of ordinary to mean not vulgar is also peculiar, considering sense 4 and ordinär (vulgar). That's the same difference as with vulgar.

I agree that even ass itself does not have a strong edge. I approximately say "'ba-dass", not "bad ass-car" anyway and apparently that makes a difference as xkcd has it]. It probably helps that it's a sweet as rhyme on as.

A positive connotation is not offensive by definition, but doesn't exclude vulgarity. If anything has lost it's edge, it's the perception of vulgarity. So perhaps it's not a suitable label at all.

The label "youth slang" is an endearing compromise. I suppose the usage is somewhat ironic -- powerful precisely because it's using an explicative. If you think it's not at all offensive, that's pretty badass style. Rhyminreason (talk) 20:04, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

@Rhyminreason: Many people these days, especially many youths, swear and use other vulgarities every other word. They think that it's cool, when it isn't. It makes them sound like buffoons. Soon, I think English's vulgarities will go the way of some of the French vulgarities, where they aren't even really perceived as vulgar anymore due to overuse and normalisation in the culture. It's quite sad, really. It's the dumbing down of society, in my opinion. Tharthan (talk) 21:58, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

It's the reverse of the w:euphemism treadmill and probably isn't particular to this generation. A certain quote from the Greeks lamenting the ethics of young people comes to mind. Rhyminreason (talk) 18:07, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

mind the gap

Is this UK English? I thought so, but I can see some usage online from Americans. Would they say 'mind the gap' in the US? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 16:01, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

It's fairly clear English--I'm not sure why we need an entry for it--but if I heard it in the US, I'd think it was a Britishism sneaking over.--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:29, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

infidel

This entry needs some labels for the senses. Is it archaic (per Oxford), offensive (per American Heritage), derogatory, etc.? — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 16:07, 4 May 2018 (UTC)

It needs some work, certainly. "One who does not believe in a certain religion." is supported with "Some Muslims are taught that non-Muslims are infidels and are to be shunned." which does not fit; all non-Muslims are people who do not believe in Islam. I'm not sure how phrase the definition or the labels, though.

I don't know why Oxford is saying that it's archaic. I guess a little bit, but it still has currency in sentences like the quote above.--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:26, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

It's not archaic. It does seem at least somewhat derogatory. - -sche (discuss) 02:58, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

I think it has become increasingly derogatory over time. At some point, it was simply a statement of fact. An infidel was someone who was not of "the Faith": literally an infidel. Now it sounds dated and pejorative if used seriously. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 03:21, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, usually now ironic in some way. Equinox ◑ 16:25, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for all the feedback, but does someone want to take a stab at improving the entry? Also, the fact that the translation table at unbeliever redirects to infidel is just wrong. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 03:02, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

ax to grind

We have not only two senses but two claimed etymologies — yet I think they are the same thing and should be merged. Chambers only has "a personal reason for getting involved". Equinox ◑ 15:53, 5 May 2018 (UTC)

hella

Is anyone familiar with (or able to track down citations of) the use of this as a bare adjective, meaning "great" (presumably an elision of "hella good/cool"). "I just scored free tickets to the show!" - "Oh, that's hella." It seems parallel to how "wicked" can be either an adverb ("wicked cool") or a standalone adjective ("that's wicked!" / "wicked guitar solo"). - -sche (discuss) 02:55, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

hearts beat as one

Is it right for this to be entered as a verb, and to have the "to"-infinitive on its definition line? Seems fishy to me. Equinox ◑ 15:02, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

It's rather a phrase, and the "phrase inflection" is similar to usuall phrase changes, like regarding person (changing one's into my, his, .... as in to one's knowledge). But phrases beginning with a verb are often added as verb entries in wiktionary: return to one's senses, stick to one's knitting... -84.161.20.186 17:01, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Tá's ag

The entry for Tá's ag is capitalised, but I can't see any indication as to why. Is there a reason for this or should it be moved to lowercase? Zumley (talk) 15:18, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Considering that there is tá a fhios ag and that tá is capitalised in a fhios a bheith agat because it's the beginning of a sentence, it looks like a miscapitalisation. www.teanglann.ie/en/fgb/fios has "Is bréag é agus tá a fhios agat gurb ea,   it is a lie, and you know it is.", thus lowercase should indeed be correct (and not be a wiktionary mistake). -84.161.20.186 16:47, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Fixed. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 12:08, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Thank you very much for your help! Zumley (talk) 19:49, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

-bilia, -abilia?

Should we have an English entry for one of these, for words like automobilia (okay, bad example, it could be a blend) that come from memorabilia? It's a lot like -ana. I just saw this:

• 2017, Steve Radlauer, ‎Ellis Weiner, Monsters of the Ivy League

  Over the course of Yale's first two centuries, Calhoun was the only graduate to be elected to a superprestigious position in the US government. Ergo, Yale is, or at least was, proud of its association with him and is, or was, rife with commemorative Calhounabilia, including a statue […]

Equinox ◑ 16:23, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Probably. It seems to be a quite productive suffix:

• 1975, Georgie Anne Geyer, The Young Russians, ETC Publications, →ISBN, page 277:

  In "Lenin rooms," those patriotic corners in the schools and in the Pioneer palaces where Lenin memorabilia are displayed in effusion, I had the feeling that this was no more than the kinds of patriotic display of Lincolnabilia or Washingtonabilia in schools in the United States.

• 1995 November 24, Caroline Sullivan, “CD review: The Beatles Anthology 1”, in The Guardian‎^[9]:

  Why not just put the whole lot out as a bargain-priced odds'n'sods set, and save the hand-tooled luxury pack for worthier Beatlesabilia? The genuinely interesting artifacts could have been released as an EP, which would have saved listening to the rest.

– Einstein2 (talk) 17:00, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Kannada Wiktionary

I have been through the list of wikitionary and found that Kannada witionary has not been created yet so I'm interested, please help for the same. If anyone can see it please help me in new to this realm thanking you. Regards Prasannaloop —This unsigned comment was added by 157.49.168.111 (talk) at 01:17, 7 May 2018‎.

Hi, there is a Kannada Wiktionary at https://kn.wiktionary.org, which you can certainly help to edit. — SGconlaw (talk) 17:57, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Or if you'd like to add Kannada entries here (English explanations of Kannada words), take a look at how the Kannada words we already have at formatted (Category:Kannada lemmas) and make some new entries modelled on that. :) - -sche (discuss) 19:22, 6 May 2018 (UTC)

Dragon Ball

I added the definition of Dragon Ball to this site - who removed it? —This unsigned comment was added by Inowen (talk • contribs) at 10:02, 7 May 2018‎.

It was speedily deleted as an administrator felt that it did not satisfy the requirements of the WT:FICTION policy. See "Wiktionary:Requests for deletion/English#Dragon Ball". — SGconlaw (talk) 03:08, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Victim of..

[[victim of [their] own success]] is an idiom catchphrase. -Inowen (talk) 02:02, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

It would be victim of one's own success here; arguable. Equinox ◑ 02:16, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

I think it would be sum-of-parts. — SGconlaw (talk) 03:03, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Liberalism

I've added a definition for liberalism to define it as interchangeable with progressivism. But it got reverted. I think it should be undone.

https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-difference-between-liberalism-and-progressivism.

https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Progressive AltHypeFan (talk) 02:53, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

Finding some random Web sites is not enough. You must urgently read WT:CFI regarding what we accept. Thanks. Equinox ◑ 03:01, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

tagete

I think it should be tagetes, which is given as the plural; @SemperBlotto who created this. See also Tagetes in Wikipedia, Translingual Tagetes, “tagetes” in Den Danske Ordbog, tagetes in Oxford. DonnanZ (talk) 09:30, 7 May 2018 (UTC)

google books:"a tagete" (which gets hits) vs google books:"a tagetes" (where the hits are all for capitalized Tagetes) suggests that the common noun singular is tagete. Tagetes seems to be attested as the genus name, and also by elision in the place of a species name. - -sche (discuss) 02:35, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Unfortunately people are human and make false assumptions. Apparently tagetes should be treated the same as species, i.e. singular and plural the same (coz it's Latin?).

I also checked Tagetes in Duden, interestingly all inflections are the same, without variation (just like Spezies). DonnanZ (talk) 08:06, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I think it could be treated as a common misspelling. I checked also “tagetes” in The Bokmål Dictionary / The Nynorsk Dictionary., “tagetes” in Det Norske Akademis ordbok (NAOB)., and SAOL / SAOB. Swedish inflections are similar to German. DonnanZ (talk) 09:17, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

@Donnanz: Misspelling implies an error in writing. Here, not only the writing but the manner of speech is in question. So misspelling would be a misnomer. Rhyminreason (talk) 20:19, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Digging through more books, I finally found ones that use lowercase tagetes as a common noun singular. (Two are attributive, but two are plain noun attestations.) Lowercase tagete seems like a back-formation in the mode of pea. I've moved the content around so tagetes has the translations and tagete is listed as a synonym / probable back-formation. - -sche (discuss) 04:16, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Brilliant, more or less what I would have done, thank you. DonnanZ (talk) 08:35, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

octochamp

The octochamp page (https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/octochamp) lists "octochamp" as 'informal', but it is used by Nick Hewer (the presenter) in-show, and there is no other word for it. Therefore, it seems to be more like jargon than an informal word. —This comment was unsigned.

Well, "eight-time champion" would be the other/formal way of expressing it. - -sche (discuss) 02:21, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

The same rules as for works of fiction, or names (see WT:CFI) should apply to neologisms, ie. references to the work don't count as use, but as mention, and therefore don't qualify the term for inclusion. We don't include protologisms, is that correct? I'd add an RFV but I don't feel strong enough about it, yet. Rhyminreason (talk) 20:48, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Sara, Sarah

Aren't these homophones? I mean, there are several ways of pronouncing them, but I don't think any applies to only one spelling. The pronunciation sections should either be synced, or one could even be reduced to "like [the other]". - -sche (discuss) 02:37, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I have heard Sara being pronounced as /ˈsɑːɹə/ (most commonly) or even /ˈzɑːɹə/, but I've not heard Sarah pronounced that way (it's always been /ˈsɛəɹə(ɹ)/ in my experience, which can also be used for Sara and hence, yes: homophones in this case). That's just my personal anecdotal experience rather than a prescriptive opinion. -Stelio (talk) 09:00, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Where I live, both Sarah and Sara are pronounced /ˈsæɹə/ (due to a difference in the distribution of /æɹ/ and /ɛəɹ/ in words between British English and some North American English dialects which lack the Mary-marry-merry merger, such as mine. This can also be seen in words like vary and various, which are /ˈvæɹi/ and /ˈvæɹi.əs/ respectively in my dialect, as well as the word parent, which is pronounced /ˈpæɹənt/ in my dialect. Interestingly, though, my parents pronounce vary and various as /ˈvɛəɹi/ and /ˈvɛəɹi.əs/, whereas most of the friends I grew up with and others who I know pronounce those words as, like I said above, /ˈvæɹi/ and /ˈvæɹi.əs/. My parents pronounce parent, Sarah and Sara as /ˈpæɹənt/, /ˈsæɹə/ and /ˈsæɹə/ respectively, however). Tharthan (talk) 13:58, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Amusingly, however, at the moment /ˈsɑɹə/ is listed as a pronunciation only of Sarah and not Sara, the opposite of your anecdote! Dictionary.com's dictionaries and Collins have them being pronounced identically, whereas Merriam-Webster asserts they are different, and a user on stackexchange asserts that in Scotland Sara has the vowel of "bat" and Sarah has the same vowel of "air", but I doubt how widely that (or any) distinction holds in practice. /ˈsɛəɹ.ə/ is noted for Sarah and Sara by Dictionary.com, and for Sarah by Collins (as a British pronun) and by Merriam-Webster. /ˈsɛ(ː)ɹə/ is noted for Sarah by Collins (as an American pronun) and by OxfordDictionaries.com. /seɹ.ə/ is noted for Sarah by Collins (as an American pronun, but with the stress on the last syllable!) and approximately by Merriam-Webster (in their non-IPA notation as /ˈsā.rə/). /ˈsɑɹə/ is noted for Sara by Merriam-Webster and for Sarah by Collins (as an American pronun, but with the stress on the last syllable!). /ˈsæɹə/ is noted by Collins as another American pronun (with stress on the first syllable, as expected!). - -sche (discuss) 15:35, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I think the truth of the matter is simply that different women named Sara(h) pronounce their name differently. As a merry-merging American I'd pronounce them both /ˈsɛɹə/ at first encounter, but would alter that if someone told me she preferred, say, /ˈsɑɹə/ or (here in Germany) /ˈzaːʁa/ or anything else. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 15:48, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

That's absolutely what I would expect. Unless someone has reasoned objections, I would like to update Sara to just say "in any of the ways Sarah can be pronounced; see that entry" or similar. - -sche (discuss) 16:28, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

doleful

doleful currently uses {{en-adj|er}}. While there are citations for dolefuler and dolefulest, in practice more doleful and most doleful are significantly more common (links to Google Ngram Viewer). While I could change the template use to {{en-adj|more|er}}, is there a standard way of indicating that "more" is common and "er" is rare on the page for doleful? -Stelio (talk) 09:14, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

A lot of entries don't make any such note, although they probably should. Those that do make such a note probably use usage notes. IMO this is a common enough phenomenon, and stardardizing the wording of a note about it is desirable enough, that the template should probably accept a parameter the way en-noun accepts a parameter to display "usually uncountable, plural [x]". I'll start a GP thread about that. For now, usage notes are your best bet. The usage note(s) should be templatized, like Template:U:en:equal, since many entries can use them. Maybe name them something like Template:U:en:adj more vs er? - -sche (discuss) 16:07, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

• Anyway, it would normally be dolefuller/dolefullest. The single-L version is pretty uncommon. Ƿidsiþ 05:53, 19 May 2018 (UTC)
• The Google n-gram for the last 100 years is interesting. It would nice to include this as an image on such pages. Ƿidsiþ 05:57, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

social constructivism, social construct

Worth entries? --Per utramque cavernam 13:56, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

'sad!'

Is 'sad!' now an interjection? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 19:38, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

How do you know it's new? DTLHS (talk) 19:39, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't, but people keep on making statements and then saying 'sad!', I don't remember that before Trump popularised it. People used to say, 'that's sad' or, 'how sad', didn't they? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 19:48, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Maybe. Unsurprisingly it's hard to search for this construction to date it. DTLHS (talk) 19:51, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Can you give examples? Is it distinct from exclaiming e.g. "pitiful!" or "pathetic!"? Equinox ◑ 20:07, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

You're right, it's not different and it's just a new way of using the word. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 20:12, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't think that it is new at all. As far as I can tell, people have been saying "Sad!" as a short form for other phrases for quite some time. "It is sad to hear that!"/"I am sad to hear that" → "Sad to hear that!" → "Sad to hear!" → "Sad!". Also, alternatively, (or concurrently), "That's sad!" → "Sad!", "So sad!" → "Sad!", "How sad!" → "Sad!" Tharthan (talk) 20:17, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

ISTR also that in the '90s (when losers were called "sad cases") people might exclaim "saaaaad!" too. It's in an I'm Alan Partridge scene but I think it's part of a sentence there. Equinox ◑ 20:34, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Such a use of the word sad in speech seems normal and somewhat common to me. I seem to remember my mother saying it a few decades ago. I might even say it myself after having heard a description of a situation I found sad. I agree especially with Thartan's comment. DCDuring (talk) 23:38, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

• Unrelated, but ought we to have an entry for the Donald? —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:59, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

如是, part of speech

The Chinese entry has this as an adjective, but the Japanese entry has this as a noun and is exclusively a Buddhist term. Closest translation is "like this". Anyone help me clear this confusion? ～ POKéTalker（═◉═） 20:58, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

To be fair, the JA sources I've looked at don't actually give a POS. The implication is that terms with no stated POS are nouns, but that's not always the case: for instance, 如実 (nyojitsu) has no stated POS in the KDJ monolingual JA entry, and it's most commonly used as an adverb. The JA definition for the "like this" sense is given as:

「かくのごとき」「このように」の意で、経の最初に書かれていることば。

Meaning of just this way, like this, used as a word written at the start of sutras.

With that stated usage, it sounds much more like an adverb. Ferreting out some actual usage examples could help clarify. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 21:45, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

Xiandai Hanyu Guifan Cidian (《現代漢語規範詞典》) defines it as a pronoun ("like this"). Wyang (talk) 22:46, 9 May 2018 (UTC)

The Chinese definition of 代词 is wider than "pronoun". Pronouns can only substitute NPs, but 代词 is the general term for pro-forms. I think 如是 and 如此 are adjectives/adverbs since they can replace adjectives or adjectival phrases (AP, AdvP, PP, etc.). — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 05:36, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

FWIW, we have "particle" as a POS for things that don't clearly belong to any other part of speech. - -sche (discuss) 04:34, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

In Japanese contexts, a particle is a more clearly defined category. Using that POS for terms like 如是 might be akin to applying an ===Article=== heading to an English term of otherwise-indeterminate POS-ness. Personally, I'd be much happier if we find usage examples, and base POS decisions on those. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 17:00, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

beknownst

Probably needs labels of some kind; I surmise it's not completely standard? --Per utramque cavernam 12:20, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

• Maybe mainly British/affected/formal/old-fashioned as in -st? Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 12:34, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

What causes you to surmise that it's not standard ? Do you mean not universal to all English varieties ? Leasnam (talk) 15:08, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

• No, it's not old-fashioned in that way. unbeknownst is fairly common, a slightly jocular formalism that has hung around in common speech, and in most uses of beknownst it's actually a kind of locution for unbeknownst (the examples use "little beknownst" and "beknownst to only them"). I would usually read it as a bit jokey, in the same way as a comment like, "Well I wouldn't say he was disgruntled, but he definitely wasn't entirely gruntled either." Ƿidsiþ 07:53, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

RFV: Podunk, US?

Isn't this specially American as said in wikipedia and the etymology (stated there) suggests? Sobreira ►〓 (parlez) 12:32, 10 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I've checked a few dictionaries and confirmed this is US only. (But we have a synonym/alternative form problem and a part of speech problem in the entries.) Ultimateria (talk) 21:12, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

by definition

Do we need two senses? --Per utramque cavernam 09:45, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

There is some (mis?)usage that does not conform to the more literal, but idiomatic, first definition. In these cases it seems to mean something like "by its very name". But there are other readings and usages too. DCDuring (talk) 12:42, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

tramp trade

Just a term I came across at trampfart, and there is an article Tramp trade in Wikipedia. I'm not sure how common it is now with containerisation in shipping; I worked for a shipping agency in Sydney years ago who dealt with all manner of ships in the tramp trade, usually chartered. DonnanZ (talk) 10:15, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

• I've added a definition. Feel free to improve it. SemperBlotto (talk) 10:19, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

Cheers, that was quick. Do we still use the term tramp steamer, no entries for tramp ship or trampship either. DonnanZ (talk) 10:29, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

translations of 'the curse' (menstruation)

This is a highly dated, or even obsolete, way of referring to menstruation with obvious strongly negative connotations, but the translations seem to be for the neutral 'menstruation'. I think ideally the translations should either attempt to reflect the tone of the English or have qualifiers. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 22:51, 11 May 2018 (UTC)

I would support removing these translations. I would also move the translation table to the page of a word that's more common to refer negatively to menstruation, but I can't think of one. Ultimateria (talk) 21:14, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

@Ultimateria: I have updated the translation table in the style used by User:Per_utramque_cavernam for other words with neutral and colloquial translations, what do you think? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 07:51, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

@Kaixinguo~enwiktionary: Hmm, I like the note, but I think our standard practice of labeling the table "derogatory: a woman's menses" is sufficient (but often ignored...). The point that I didn't really make before is that the previous translations would all be more useful at either "menses" or "menstruation" or "period"; I don't think anyone would think to look for them at "curse". Is there a more common derogatory term? Also, the Finnish term isn't labeled as derogatory, so I would remove the translation. Ultimateria (talk) 19:50, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

I like the idea of leaving room for any translations that captured the pejorative sense while sending folks directly to the more neutral (and common) entry for the corresponding neutral translations. DCDuring (talk) 23:31, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Arabic عُوَيْنات‎‎ (ʿuwaynāt)

Please check this entry. I have two questions:

1. Why is this derived from the plural, not dual?
2. What's the relationship between عيينة and عوينة?

Thanks. Wyang (talk) 01:08, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

I believe عُوَيْنَة‎‎ (ʿuwayna) is singulative, not plural. It's a singular diminutive. The ending ة‎‎ () often forms singulative nouns.

عيينة‎ is the Standard Arabic singulative diminutive of عين‎.

عوينة‎ is (I believe) a dialectal singulative diminutive of عين‎ (Libyan dialect). —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:18, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

@Stephen G. Brown Thank you Stephen. Sorry I should have made #1 clearer... I was wondering why عُوَيْنات‎ ("spectacles; eyeglasses") was derived from the plural, rather than dual (since it's an object occurring in pairs?). Thanks for the answer to #2. عوينة is also in Wehr, and is cited as the source of a 14th-century Chinese word. It seems to be the assimilated form of عيينة. Wyang (talk) 09:45, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Well, عُوَيْنات‎ is not derived from either the dual or the plural of عين‎ (eye), it is derived from the singulative diminutive عُوَيْنَة‎‎ (ʿuwayna) (eyelet). Inanimate feminine nouns such as عُوَيْنَة‎‎ (ʿuwayna), ending as they do in ta marbuta (ة), normally have the feminine sound plural in ات, hence عُوَيْنات‎‎ (ʿuwaynāt). The dual form of عُوَيْنَة‎‎ (ʿuwayna) is عُوَيْنَتَانِ‎ (ʿuwaynatāni).

So why do we use the plural instead of the dual of عُوَيْنَة‎‎ (ʿuwayna) for eyeglasses? I think the reason is (1) that eyeglasses did not exist 1300 or 1400 years ago (so there is no record of the dual being used for that), and (2) that today's Arabic dialects have dropped the dual. —Stephen ^(Talk) 11:55, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

Nom Foundation characters

The readings provided by the Nom Foundation [10] seems to cover also simplified Chinese characters. Here are a few examples: 马 (mã, refer [11]), 鸟 (điểu, refer [12]), 红 (hồng, refer [13]), Most of these are sourced from the gdhn reference code provided by Giúp đọc Nôm và Hán Việt [14]

Are characters such as 马 and 鸟 actual Han characters used in Vietnam? Are the readings provided by the gdhn reference code reliable? Curiously 馬 is given as mở [15] while 马 is given as mã [16] under the gdhn reference code. In Wiktionary, the page for mã includes simplified Chinese characters such as 马, 码, 蚂, 玛, 唛 but the corresponding traditional characters 碼, 螞, 瑪, 嘜 are not included. Is there a mistake here? KevinUp (talk) 09:09, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

@KevinUp It's not a mistake, but gdhn includes these simplified characters so as to inform Vietnamese readers how these simplified characters should be read. (The name gdhn literally means "help read Nom and Sino-Vietnamese"). The content in that book can be queried here- as you can see the traditional and simplified are listed side by side. Most of the simplified characters are not attested in the Nôm literature, unless they have existed as informal variants prior to the official simplification. Wyang (talk) 09:40, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

@Wyang: Thanks for the reply. That makes sense. Unfortunately I have problems accessing that page. I need to check the readings provided to see if it is linked to a traditional form. And some of the readings appear to be inconsistent: 馬 (mở) [17] and 马 (mã) [18], 勝 (sền) [19] and 胜 (tanh) [20]

Greetings. I just created the following page: Module:vi/nom-data. Hopefully it will be of some use in future. I've also figured out how to query the contents of the gdhn book. I can see that the simplified characters are listed along the traditional ones. KevinUp (talk) 19:38, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

actual sense 5

Sense 5 says "Used to emphasise a noun or verb": example: part of the brain that does the "actual thinking". I believe this sense should be removed and the cite should go to sense 1 ("Existing in act or reality, not just potentially; really acted or acting; occurring in fact"). Thoughts? Equinox ◑ 11:34, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

I suppose the difference is figurative vs, well, actual meaning. Simply because the dividing line between fact and imagination is not clear cut, so the term might be used erroneously under the assumption that sense 1 applies. The nebulous meaning of the quote being a fitting example. Not sure that's lexical, if the speaker is actually convinced. I don't think so. Not sure whether there is inflational or ironic usage as in "that was a real circus". "for actual" is a jocular substitution of "for real". Rhyminreason (talk) 20:45, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

I think the definition and example fall well within sense 1. Ultimateria (talk) 21:16, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't know how good that example is, but I think there is a difference. The OED distinguishes between "Existing in fact, real" and a separate "intensifier" sense "In weakened use, emphasizing the exact or particular identity of a following noun: precise, exact". I suppose this is what they were getting at. Ƿidsiþ 07:48, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

Latin: -īs for -ēs (acc.pl.)

I read here editions having "omnīs" for "omnēs" (acc.pl.) and "-ntīs" for "-ntēs" (acc.pl.). Should not this variation be noted on our templates? -GuitarDudeness (talk) 12:40, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

It's an archaic feature, which we should treat as the infinitives in -ier (audirier), imo; see the conjugation table of audio. @Mahagaja, JohnC5, Metaknowledge? --Per utramque cavernam 12:49, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Here particularly of Quintilian I see one edition with "-ēs" and one with "-īs" (but acc. "testēs" "partēs"). I still have not understood the reason of the latter editor for this. Which would be right? -GuitarDudeness (talk) 22:15, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Redirect of superscript numbers to normal numbers

Why was this done: https://en.wiktionary.org/w/index.php?title=⁰&diff=next&oldid=39814265? Is it because ⁰'s only definition is "superscript of 0". See also: ¹. --Bringback2ndpersonverbs (talk) 21:43, 12 May 2018 (UTC)

Oscan and Umbrian on PIE *h₁entér

I apologize if I'm not posting in the right section, but on the PIE entry *h₁entér, it lists oscan and Umbrian "antep" Are you sure someone isn't conflating the letter r with rho (p-lookalike)

Yeah, somebody accidentally put a P instead of an R (when the content of that article used to be part of *h₁en). Fixed it. mellohi! (僕の乖離) 16:41, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

I trust that's according to the source material. Otherwise I would suspect a remote possibility for the 𐌐, eg. as in en. up, *upo (“under”), which seem to be conflated in Proto Germanic. By the way, the glosses for the cognate untar at its own page and at 𐌀𐌍𐌕𐌄𐌓 (anter) don't agree. *under has both senses but a slightly different root for Latin inter, not exactly *h₁entér. Rhyminreason (talk) 23:20, 13 May 2018 (UTC)

gammon

Judging by recent articles in the British press, this is used by (mostly white?) leftists there to refer to (well-off?) white male conservatives. (Some articles say it was originally used by Remainers to refer to Brexiters.) It's apparently likening the people's complexion to ham (or accusing them living high on the hog?). It was supposedly used as early as a June 2017 BBC Question Time (from York, in the phrase "wall of gammon"), so there might be enough durable citations to "hot word" it (and check back in a couple months to see if it meets the spanning-a-year criterion). In any case, it's getting a rush of attention (the referents find it offensive), if anyone wants to take a stab at adding it. - -sche (discuss) 21:10, 14 May 2018 (UTC)

It has now been pointed out that Charles Dickens used "gammon tendency" in Nicholas Nickleby, chapter 16, so it may not be "hot" at all. - -sche (discuss) 06:53, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

No, I think this is new. Dickens used "gammon" (AFAIK) in an old sense of "nonsense, rubbish, tommyrot", whereas the new independent coinage seems to refer to elderly men with pinkish faces. Equinox ◑ 18:33, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

In case it's helpful, I've added a reference to gammon for a BBC News article that traces this recent sense to February 2016, so it's already spanning more than two years. -Stelio (talk) 11:21, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

peely-wally

Entry for Etymology of peely-wally links to unrelated article

I'm not familiar with proper editing, however... on looking up "peely-wally", I see that the Etymology claims it is an extended form of "peelie" with a -link- to a sole English definition of: a coupon, attached to product packaging, which can be peeled off. However, peely-wally seems to be a Scottish phrase denoting: Pale, pasty; off-color or ill-looking ...originating long before peel-off coupons. The Scottish definition of "peelie" is: Thin; gaunt; pale. So peely-wally does perhaps seem to be an extension... of the Scottish definition of peelie. Perhaps an experienced Wiktionary editor might include the Scottish definition on the "peelie" page ...or remove the link (to the inappropriate English 'coupon' definition) from the "peely-wally" page.

Scottish definition of "peelie" at... https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/peelie or http://www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/snd/peelie

Just noting a discrepancy.

• Yes, thanks, I've changed this a bit. The reference should ultimately be to the Scots word peelie (which we were missing). Ƿidsiþ 07:44, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

verga

This word is commonly used by weather forecasters throughout the USA to describe rain that has evaporated before reaching the earth from its clouds. I see no logical reason for it to have been redacted from my original effort to add it to the "approved" vocabulary. Scott MacStravic

• That's virga. SemperBlotto (talk) 15:20, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

abend

The etymology is given as "Blend of abnormal + end", and yet the etymology of "segfault" is given as "Clipping of segmentation fault". Is the former not also a clipping, since it contains all of the second element? &mdash 89.197.103.111 16:00, 15 May 2018 (UTC)

• I wouldn't call it a clipping – seg is a clipping of segmentation, but segfault is better described as a blend or contraction IMO. Ƿidsiþ 11:50, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

A clipping is a kind of blend, according to WP (see w:Blend_word#Linguistics). Rhyminreason (talk) 16:11, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, but not all blends are clippings. Ƿidsiþ 05:51, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

da

Ety 3:

1. (in the US, especially used in Chicago and New York) Eye dialect spelling of the.

Is this "eye dialect"? According to Wiktionary's definition, "eye dialect" is a nonstandard spelling that indicates a standard pronunciation. Is "da" considered a "standard pronunciation"? Mihia (talk) 22:15, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

If you read w:eye dialect, you'll note that it's used liberally and less pejorative. I mean, yes, dat's da idea. It's supposedly the standard pronounciation in the region. "pronunciation spelling" would be more informative, of course. Rhyminreason (talk) 23:57, 16 May 2018 (UTC)

I agree that "pronunciation spelling" is better. I have changed it. Thank you for alerting me to this alternative way of labelling these. IMO this "eye dialect" thing is overused and/or often misused in Wiktionary. If I encounter further examples like this I intend to change them to "pronunciation spelling". Mihia (talk)

Prior to 2015 (when the "pronunciation spelling" template was created and started to be deployed, although the issue had been discussed already in 2012), "eye dialect" was widely used on Wiktionary in this idiosyncratic way, so most of the entries that use it need to be reviewed. - -sche (discuss) 01:27, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

hearts beat as one

Today's WOTD, "hearts beat as one", is defined as "to share the same feelings". This definition is the wrong part of speech. I'm not sure that "hearts beat as one" even exists as a dictionary phrase. Mihia (talk) 00:50, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, the definition is awkwardly non-substitutable (although I think it is the right part of speech). The definition could be made less awkward, and the includability more obvious, by moving the entry to "beat as one" and labelling it "(of hearts) to share the same feelings"... but if "hearts" are the only things that "beat as one", it might be weird to not include them in the headword. - -sche (discuss) 01:17, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Usually the owners of the hearts are stated, or at least implied, so "hearts beat as one" seems incomplete as a phrase, and it is certainly not a verb as presently defined. It seems more like a fragment. I agree that the lexical item is "(to) beat as one", used almost exclusively with the subject "hearts". Mihia (talk) 01:46, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Pronunciation sound levels

Can something be done about the audio volume of the pronunciations on pages like bloedzuiger? —67.14.236.50 02:52, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Not by us, unless there's another recording that can be substituted. All of our recordings are hosted on Wikimedia Commons (this one is c:File:Nl-bloedzuiger.ogg). Perhaps someone there might be able to fix the volume. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:44, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

to have been and gone

Worth an entry in some form? Perhaps it is SoP, but feels less so than e.g. "[he has] been here and gone". Equinox ◑ 20:23, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

Some slang dictionaries have been and, which seems to be the same as go and. There is also some support for been and gone and. Get this:

• 1848, William Makepeace Thackery, Vanity Fair (novel):

  Sir Pitt has been and proposed for to marry Miss Sharp, wherein she has refused him

DCDuring (talk) 03:46, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Also, see go and at OneLook Dictionary Search. DCDuring (talk) 03:52, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

• But it's not slang in the Thackery quote – Pitt has been (i.e. visited) and also proposed. Ƿidsiþ 07:12, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

This makes me think of try and (as a substitute for try to). --Per utramque cavernam 08:52, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Try and only substitutes for try to in the plain form, not in the -ed or -ing forms. That might make it a lexical item, eg, entryworthy. Alternatively, we could have a long usage label. I'd think that a usage note would be separated by too many page-downs from the definition. DCDuring (talk) 17:34, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

• The idiom "been and gone and done it" means "actually done it" rather than just planning it or talking about it. SemperBlotto (talk) 08:58, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Comparing been and gone with some of the other expressions mentioned makes me think it is not entryworthy, though it does seem usage-note-worthy at the appropriate sense of be.

Try and, go and, up and, and (more datedly dialectal) take and all seem to have some quirkiness of usage, such as limitations in the form of the following verb or the assumption of a meaning not present in the and-less usage of the verb. They are also distinct in register and relative frequency among English-speaking regions. They appear in usage and style guides like MWDEU and Garner's Modern American Usage. To bury the quirkiness in the overlong entries [[go]] and [[try]] seems to place unreasonable demands on a user. Take and, being more dated/obsolete, might be adequately accommodated at a definition at [[take]]. Up (verb) is similarly short enough so a user should find relevant definition easily. DCDuring (talk) 17:55, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

cittie

An old spelling of city, used around the 17th century. Any volunteers? DonnanZ (talk) 22:32, 17 May 2018 (UTC)

of

1. Used to link singular indefinite nouns (preceded by the indefinite article) and attributive adjectives modified by certain common adverbs of degree.

   not that good of an idea

This usage is viewed as incorrect in BrE. Is it fully accepted in AmE? Mihia (talk) 00:05, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

• I would say colloquial, surely – you don't see it in the NY Times or whatever. Ƿidsiþ 05:49, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Usage note at haughty - Moved from RFV

This was added to RFV, but it is more appropriate here. Kiwima (talk) 00:22, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

A usage note at haughty suggests, "Possibly due to the similar sounding (and utterly different in meaning) hottie, haughty has become rare in some parts of North America." I can't find any published sources making a similar suggestion – though there are a few that suggest the two words are easily confused (e.g. [21], [22]). The usage note was apparently added by User:Facts707 with this edit. The suggested effect is not impossible, but it's also not obvious. I would prefer to see outside verification, or else remove the note. Cnilep (talk) 23:22, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

One more data point I should have checked earlier: According to Meriam-Webster.com, haughty is in the "top 10% of words", making the claim of rarity dubious. I'm not sure, though, whether M-W's "popularity" is by usage or by look-ups. Cnilep (talk) 23:27, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

This Google n-gram suggests that haughty has had a recent spurt in usage at the same time that hottie has achieved fairly wide usage. I'd remove the note. DCDuring (talk) 23:39, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Identifying the "top 10%" of words by usage is quite a tricky proposition. If every word that has ever been used in English is included, every word that you and I know might be in the top 10%, since 90% of all words may be highly obscure or rare or specialised. Having said that, "haughty" surely cannot be in the top 10% of usage of "reasonable" English words. (I don't in any way oppose the removal of the label, btw.) Mihia (talk) 23:55, 18 May 2018 (UTC)

Haughty is 5230 in the PG frequency list.--Prosfilaes (talk) 01:16, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

As the n-gram shows haughty was previously significantly more common. I've been wondering how to plausibly interpret MWOnline's relative frequency number. They must have some defined list of terms, which I haven't seen specified. Perhaps they have some minimum level of required attestation. If we were to include lexical items like species names we would swamp the normal vocabulary-in-use of virtually any speaker and exceed the number of other lexical items in the language. DCDuring (talk) 01:52, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Why are you looking at overall usage, anyway? The note says "in some parts". And it appears to be an unverifiable opinion. Slightly embarassing to say, I didn't know the word, though I might have seen it. Surely, haughty is rather rare outside the cot-caught merger, in North America? 5000 words is a lot, more than the average for a common word inventory, as far as I know, so place a place behind 5000 seems to be rare, indeed. Project Gutenberg might not be quite up-to-date and biased for out-of-copyright, ie. old material.

Also: some people say "notty"? Never heard that in person, either. Rhyminreason (talk) 18:32, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

"In some parts" people write hawty for hottie. The mere fact that someone makes an unsupported claim is bad enough. When it is qualified in such a way as to make it unfalsifiable it should be considered worthless. DCDuring (talk) 18:39, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@Rhyminreason: Haughty is by no means rare. Perhaps it is used less than it once was, but it is not rare. Then again, where I live, the cot-caught merger is not present (except coming from the mouths of some youngsters). Tharthan (talk) 23:36, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@Tharthan: I thought you were from Eastern New England, which is one of the epicenters of the cot-caught merger. The merger is complete in the traditional accents of Maine, New Hampshire, eastern Massachusetts, Rhode Island, and eastern Connecticut. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 21:01, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I am from Eastern New England, but (without revealing exactly where I live) I would note that not all of the traditional accents in Eastern New England have the cot-caught merger. In fact, in one of the states you mentioned, the merger is only complete in certain areas of the state (many, but not all) [and I am not referring to Connecticut; I do not live there]. One big city, and a few smaller cities in that state do not have the merger. I happen to live in one of those smaller cities, in the suburbs. My mother was born in a city in that state which does have the merger, but she moved to the city in which I live when she was a child, so she only has the merger in a word or two [laundry and laundromat are the only ones that I can think of]. My father is from another New England state, but close by to mine, and also does not have the merger. If you would like more details, I can e-mail you. Tharthan (talk) 22:01, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Well, the traditional Eastern New England accent is pretty recessive now anyway (I've met more Bostonians without it than with it), so it's quite possible that you and your parents don't have the same accent that people in your area did 60–80 years ago, when the data for The Pronunciation of English in the Atlantic States (where I got my info from) were collected. Also, the merger in Eastern New England is different from the merger in the western half of the U.S., because in traditional Eastern New England there is no father-bother merger (father having a frontish unrounded vowel and cot/caught having a backish rounded one), while in the western half of the U.S. all three vowels have merged to a centralish unrounded vowel. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 22:33, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

You may well be right, but I e-mailed you some more information, just FYI just in case. Tharthan (talk) 23:24, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

5000 is more than the average for the common word inventory? Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone has about 5500 distinct words, and the Half-Blood Prince, sixth book in the series, has 10,000 distinct words, including four instances of "haughty". Tom Sawyer has 7000 distinct words. Combined, the first six Harry Potter books, Tom Sawyer and Pride and Prejudice have 23,000 distinct words between them. In that selection, or just the Harry Potter books alone, "haughty" sits around place #6500. ("haughty" would jump up quite a few places if only root words were counted, or if names were exclude.) I'm pretty sure any educated native speaker knows way more than 5,000 words.--Prosfilaes (talk) 23:44, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

"Combined, the first six Harry Potter books, Tom Sawyer and Pride and Prejudice have 23,000 distinct words between them": How did you arrive at that number? --Per utramque cavernam 22:13, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

I took text copies of the works, lower-cased them, and counted the number of unique words (defined as strings of letters.) It's a bit rough, but eyeballing the list of distinct words, it's not too far off.--Prosfilaes (talk) 19:30, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

It's a number I heard in school, referring to chinese: "Studies in China have shown that functional literacy in written Chinese requires a knowledge of between three and four thousand characters" (w:Chinese Characters). So it's a minimum, not average, sorry. Still though, knowing and using a word are two different things. Rhyminreason (talk) 15:53, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Chinese characters aren't the same as English words- they're syllables. If you look at Category:Chinese lemmas, most of the entries have more than one character. That's not to ignore the semantic component- you can say more with fewer characters than if they were strictly phonetic- but there's a lot more to basic Chinese vocabulary than the number of single characters. Chuck Entz (talk) 22:44, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Anyway, I removed the usage note. - -sche (discuss) 01:07, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

lady-in-waiting

Why is the second sense labelled as 'rare'? The Queen has ladies-in-waiting, it might be unusual (not rare) to hear much about them, but the name for them is not rare. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 02:54, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I think sense 2 is the main sense, and the "rare" label can be removed. DonnanZ (talk) 09:17, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I agree. There is no reason to label this "rare". Mihia (talk) 10:19, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

 Done. DonnanZ (talk) 10:28, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@Donnanz: Thanks. I think the definitions need improvement, though, but I don't know much about it. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 08:35, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't know enough either: the 1st sense I imagine is virtually obsolete (but I could be wrong), and a royal lady-in-waiting seems to be more of an attendant and a companion than a servant, being an honour is probably correct. This is where the links to Wikipedia and Oxford (with its usage examples) come in useful. DonnanZ (talk) 11:05, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

The senses should be merged, IMO. Ƿidsiþ 11:29, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Hmm, I don't think the majority of the translations are for a "woman who is servant to a lady" anyway, but for a royal lady-in-waiting, to which can be added “hofdame” in Den Danske Ordbog and “hoffdame” in The Bokmål Dictionary / The Nynorsk Dictionary.. DonnanZ (talk) 13:18, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Bogus Japanese "god"

The entry トレント has just been added by a new user Testaccount9000, almost certainly the same person (or possibly persons) as Wikipedia user YodogawaKamlyn‎ (sorry, I don't know how to do proper cross-wiki links, or exactly what the rules are on having different accounts). This is almost certainly completely bogus - the article as it is makes no sense, and is completely unsupported by evidence, except for en:WP and ja:WP articles, created by the same person. I suggest it should be peremptorily deleted. Imaginatorium (talk) 08:33, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@Chuck Entz, Eirikr, does this seem to be same user who adds other bogus Japanese mythology terms under a variety of IPs? If so, perhaps our colleagues on Wikipedia should be notified of the scope of the issue. - -sche (discuss) 16:40, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I have a list of four WP user names involved in the original addition of this "torento" to the WP:List of Japanese deities page, and they seem to have similar curious habits, such as "translations" of "edit" or similar words into a random language as the edit summary. It would help to know whathese other bogus terms are. Oddly enough, user YodogawaKamlyn‎ has just added an entry to the list which appears to be genuine. Imaginatorium (talk) 17:50, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Hardly. This user speaks Japanese and has trouble with English. The other IP user couldn't get anything right in Japanese after years and years of trying very hard. Chuck Entz (talk) 18:17, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

I don't think this user actually does speak Japanese, judging by the edit summaries on ja:WP, and by the bits of Japanese pasted into the Talk page of the List of deities page. But this discussion should surely happen on WP... Imaginatorium (talk) 18:31, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Whoever they are, the JA WP editors remarked on this user's poor Japanese abilities in the deletion discussion for the machine translation of this same bogus Torento no kami article on the JA WP. Surveying this user's activity across the MediaWiki sites, I see nothing to suggest competence or good faith. I posted more details at w:Wikipedia:Articles_for_deletion/Torento-no-kami. ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 05:15, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

Yes, I wasn't paying attention when I wrote the above. Since then I posted some details about the behavior of their socks on Imaginatorium's WP talk page, which seems to have spooked them. Without any use of checkuser tools at all, I would guess we're dealing with a kid or clueless adult in Minot, North Dakota who thought that they could fool people by copying content from various places and editing from IPs and sockpuppet accounts. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:29, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

Pronunciation of 㧡

I would like to add a Chinese section to the 㧡 entry, so I need Pinyin (and perhaps other dialects). I looked at Chinese Wiktionary, and it gives "hрi, wшi" for Mandarin and "hoi6" for Cantonese. What is going on with that Mandarin? It must be some sort of Mojibake. I was able to decipher hрi (which features a Cyrillic letter in the middle - nope, that ain't no p) as hài thanks to zdic, but wшi is still mysterious. I mean, it starts with w and has a final featuring a diphthong with -i as the second element, is it's either wai or wei, but which, and what tone?

Moreover, what is it pronounced like in Hakka? hakkadict gives kai24 (= PFS khâi) for Sixian and Southern Sixian, kai11 (= PFS khài) for Raoping, kain11 (= PFS khàinn with -nn indicating a nasalized final) for Shao'an, and kai53 for Hailu and Dabu, but this video seems to have khan for a word that means exactly what 㧡 is reported to mean by Hakkadict, so what is up with this?

twblg.dict.edu.tw doesn't even have the character, so does this have a Min pronunciation?

MGorrone (talk) 16:32, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

Assuming we are looking at a simple code point shift, à is U+00E0 and was turned to р which is U+0440, so ш, which is U+0448, should be from U+0448, which is è, giving us wèi. Is this a thing? MGorrone (talk) 16:46, 19 May 2018 (UTC)

@MGorrone: @Suzukaze-c and I have expanded the entry. Indeed, р should be à and ш should be è. This character is a rare character outside of Hakka. AFAIK it is definitely not normally used in Mandarin, Cantonese or Min Nan. In Hakka, it should be read as khâi (Sixian). (Note that the version of PFS we use here in Wiktionary is only applicable to the Sixian dialect. We currently don't have support for other Taiwanese dialects. 53 in Hailu, 33 in Dabu and 11 in Raoping/Zhao'an correspond to 24 in Sixian.) I don't have an explaination for khân in the video yet; it's probably an idiolect thing. I'll probably elaborate on that when I answer your question on Chinese StackExchange. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 02:50, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

guestfriendly

I had never, ever seen this as one word until I edited مهمان‌پرست just now. I have seen 'guest-friendly' before, but never 'guestfriendly' as one word. So is 'guestfriendly' (one word) American English? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 16:12, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

No. It seems to have been created as an Anglish-ism; it should be moved to the hyphenated spelling. - -sche (discuss) 16:15, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Should probably be RFVed. It famously appears in Finnegans Wake, but that hardly counts as an English-language citation… Ƿidsiþ 16:29, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Oh, I'm sorry, I completely missed the label. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 16:51, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

Guestfriendly (no space or hyphen) seems to be becoming a staple in tour guides and hospitality-industry literature. Guest-friendly remains more common and thus should be the lemma. DCDuring (talk) 19:41, 20 May 2018 (UTC)

truth is,

Is this includable as a sentence adverb (≈to be honest)? "Truth is, I don't like movies that are only good once", "Truth is, he's clean and sober", "Truth is, he's too tired to think about it much right now". --Per utramque cavernam 22:08, 21 May 2018 (UTC)

• Just an elision of the definite article. Like "Problem is…", "Thing is…" etc. Ƿidsiþ 04:16, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Wake, Wake Islander

It seems odd to have an entry for Wake as Wake Island (created 2013) and another one for Wake Islander (created before that in 2011).

• Is Wake Island usually known as just Wake?
• Are there actually any Wake Islanders? According to Wikipedia the population is nil, with around 100 people stationed there (non-permanent residents). DonnanZ (talk) 08:58, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

They both look attestable. DCDuring (talk) 10:55, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm not worried about the attestability of using Wake as a short form of Wake Island, the question is how common is it; I feel there should also be an entry for Wake Island. As for Wake Islander, I fear that may be a myth, so it needs proper attestation. It reminds me of Mustique, a private island, I read somewhere that no babies are allowed to be born there, so no one can claim they are a native of Mustique. DonnanZ (talk) 12:06, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Japanese SOP question

@Suzukaze-c, Eirikr and anyone else who knows Japanese: At WT:WE there's a request for Japanese 富士の山 (ふじのやま, Fuji no yama), but wouldn't an entry just be SOP as 富士 + の + 山? —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 18:55, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

🤷 It's included in the Digital Daijisen. —Suzukaze-c◇◇ 21:42, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

One lemming does not a summer make. I remain unconvinced. —Mahāgaja (formerly Angr) · talk 22:46, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I'm with Mahāgaja on this one. Moreover, the DJS citation is for the Taketori Monogatari, a tale about a thousand years old, and the grammatical construction in the quoted text itself suggests non-lexicality:

「富士山」に同じ。
「士(つはもの)どもあまた具して山へのぼりけるよりなむ、その山を―とは名づけける」〈竹取〉

Similarly, 岩手山 (Iwate-san, “Mount Iwate”) and 高尾山 (Takao-zan, “Mount Takao”) can be called ～の山 (XX no yama). While the former appears to be a lexicalized compound, with some instances even showing rendaku, the latter with the particle の (no) is just "the mountain XX". ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 23:20, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

cheerio (as a greeting?)

The entry for cheerio seems sure that it can mean "hello", in Britain, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. As a speaker of British English, I can fairly confidently say it only ever means "goodbye". The entry contains a large number of translations for the purported "hello" sense. I don't want to undo all that work when I might be wrong. Does anyone use it to mean "hello"? 81.109.108.218 21:41, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I use Br. English (born in NZ) and (to me) it has always meant "goodbye". DonnanZ (talk) 21:51, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

Ditto. No such sense in Chambers Dictionary. Equinox ◑ 22:27, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I added one example that appears to be a greeting. DTLHS (talk) 22:30, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

kennels as singular

2005, David Brian Plummer, Practical Lurcher Breeding, page 177:

So how does the owner of a house who wishes to build a kennels go about getting planning permission?

Is this British? It's definitely not American. Our entry doesn't cover this. DTLHS (talk) 22:42, 22 May 2018 (UTC)

I think it is British. From Oxford:

1.1(usually kennels) [treated as singular or plural] A boarding or breeding establishment for dogs.

‘I put my dog in kennels if I go away’

Planning permission could be obtained from the local authority, but there could be objections to setting up a kennels. DonnanZ (talk) 23:38, 22 May 2018 (UTC)