Wiktionary:Tea room/2017/February

discussion rooms: Tea room • Etym. scr. • Info desk • Beer parlour • Grease pit ← January 2017 · February 2017 · March 2017 → · (current)

---

µm, µg, etc. (U+00B5) → μm, μg, etc. (U+03BC)

Currently the pages with μ (U+03BC, Greek small letter mu) are redirected to the pages with µ (U+00B5, micro sign). However, the latter is a legacy character for backward compatibility and we should use rather the Greek mu. I would like to switch the real pages and the redirects. I did so on French Wiktionary in 2013. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 03:13, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

I never realized that. I thought the micro sign was intended for use as the SI prefix. I certainly didn't know it's deprecated, especially since it's available as AltGr+m on my German keyboard. But reading the link you provided convinced me, so I have no objection to your switching the direction of the redirect. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 15:06, 2 February 2017 (UTC)

Since there are dozens of pages to rename, I have to wait for an answer for my problem. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 15:53, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, last I heard, even the Unicode Consortium recommends using the letter mu to represent "micro" instead of the micro sign. However, I still think the micro sign is useful, since it allows a string search to specifically find the letter mu as used in units, as opposed to other scientific uses such as a variable, the symbol for a muon, etc. (e.g. a mu can be a muon or a micron, but a micro sign can only be a micron). Since Wiktionary should be as comprehensive as possible, I would recommend following the Unicode recommendation to use the letter mu for units inside pages, but still leave the micro sign for page names as synonyms, especially since that is how the units were previously coded (even though they are visually identical on most fonts). Entries using the micro sign can simply be labeled as "former encoding for," or something like that. Nicole Sharp (talk) 10:47, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I will keep them as redirects. The difference between μ (U+03BC) and µ (U+00B5) is only in encoding and negligible for human eyes. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 12:39, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I support using the Greek mu in all these entries and keeping redirects wih the legacy character micro. I was already thinking of doing that, but I focused on doing other redirects and left that for later.

In Wiktionary:Beer parlour/2016/October#Proposal: Redirect many single-character entries, I had suggested redirecting the µ (micro) itself to μ (mu). I did that today, if that's OK. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 12:53, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

✓ Done. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 13:26, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I thought about it too but I was too busy. Good job. --Octahedron80 (talk) 13:29, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

蛋蛋

@Tooironic, Wyang, the definitions needs some labels (childish, colloquial, etc.). — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 02:31, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

User:Tooironic has added some. I think the senses "egg", "fruit", "spherical object" and "very" may be dialectal. Wyang (talk) 05:15, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

@Tooironic, Wyang: thanks for your input! Hanyu Fangyan Da Cidian only mentions "boy's testicles" (SW Mandarin: Dafang), "fruit" (Jin: N. Shaanxi) and "very" (Jin), but are these just used in these regions? — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 05:46, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

My feelings are: "boy's testicles" (colloquial: pan-Mandarin, Jin, and potentially others; often childish), "egg" (dialectal or childish), "fruit" (dialectal), "spherical object" (dialectal) and "very" (dialectal). Wyang (talk) 05:48, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

@Wyang: I've made some changes accordingly. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 06:19, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

fear and loathing

Def and usex are very politically charged. Is it accurate? Can it be toned down a bit? Equinox ◑ 07:01, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

The usage example indicates that the definition is wrong. The first question is whether fear and loathing is not SoP or more like milk and honey. What does it collocate with? Eg, NP in "fear and loathing of [NP]". From that we might be able to sort out meanings to determine if any of them are not SoP. The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing is the only OneLook reference that has the term (FoLDIS has copiers.). It has a similarly tendentious definition, but in IT. DCDuring TALK 12:06, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

final illness

I created this but User:SemperBlotto deleted it. The reason given was just nah. I assume the actual reason is sum of parts. However, I would argue the phrase isn't simply sum of parts–suppose Bob has a cold, from which he completely recovers, and then two weeks later he is murdered. That cold was the last illness he had in his life, but few people would call that cold his final illness. final illness means the illness which kills you, which might not actually be the last illness of your life if you die from non-illness related causes (such as murder, accidents, natural disaster, war, etc). Yet, since one of the senses of final is "last", a person (especially a non-native English speaker) might think "final illness" just means "last illness in ones life" not specifically "illness from which one dies". Given this, the term isn't simply sum of parts, therefore I think it should be included. 180.181.102.164 10:19, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Not found in any medical dictionary and all usages that I can find (in a short search) were sum of parts. We do now have terminal illness that has the same meaning, but has lots more usage (and a Wikipedia entry as well). SemperBlotto (talk) 12:55, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

That’s a reasonable objection. I have restored it. @SemperBlotto: Please go to Wiktionary:Requests for deletion to delete it. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 15:33, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

terminal illness and final illness are used in different ways. When a historian talks about the death of a historical figure due to illness, they will usually say "Mozart's final illness" not "Mozart's terminal illness". That is because "final illness" is more non-medical (such as historical or literary) terminology than medical terminology. Compare Google searches of "Mozart's final illness" to "Mozart's terminal illness", you'll find the first phrase is significantly more popular, and also the results for the second phrase tend to skew in a more medical direction. "Terminal illness" also (often) implies an illness that contemporary medicine cannot cure (or at least its attempts to cure it are very hit and miss), e.g. many forms of cancer, whereas in history many "final illnesses" would be things which would not be considered a "terminal illness" today. Historically many people's final illness was syphilis, but it seems strange to contemporary ears to call that a "terminal illness" since today it is quite easily treatable and very rarely fatal. The term "terminal illness" is often (but not exclusively) used in ways which focus on the type of illness a person has–a common cold is not a terminal illness but certain aggressive cancers are–while you can talk about a particular person's terminal illness, you also often talk about particular medical conditions as terminal illnesses without reference to any particular person suffering them–whereas the term "final illness" is used in ways which focus on the person whose illness it is, even when (as in many historical cases) the specific medical condition they had is unknown or can only be guessed at–i.e. one can talk about a specific medical condition (without reference to any person who has it) as a "terminal illness", but to call such a condition a "final illness" sounds very odd. 180.181.102.164 21:10, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I think this should be deleted as SoP even though the two words could theoretically have another meaning. Context and common sense are probably sufficient. Even our classic textbook example of "brown leaf" could mean something else (the brown old page of an ancient book). Equinox ◑ 21:16, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Appealing to "common sense" is a poor argument because what is common sense to a fluent speaker of English may be confusing or unclear to someone with less fluency who simply doesn't know the "common sense" which fluent speakers possess. I don't think "brown leaf" is a good counterexample, because using "brown leaf" to talk about a brown page of a book is not a usage which anyone would say is wrong or particularly confusing; whereas, saying "Bob's final illness" when talking about the chronologically last illness of Bob's life when he died from non-illness related causes is something which very many people would consider at least confusing or even just downright wrong. There is nothing wrong with the sentence "The brown leaves of the book were faded". There is something wrong with the sentence "Bob's final illness lasted six weeks" if Bob was murdered 6 months later. The first sentence doesn't deceive or confuse, the second sentence does, for it implies the illness killed him even though it didn't. ("Bob's last illness lasted six weeks" isn't necessarily as confusing because "last illness" doesn't have as strong an implication of death as "final illness" does–I might say "Bob's last illness took him a long time to recover from" and there's nothing wrong with that sentence but "Bob's final illness took him a long time to recover from" sounds potentially contradictory since "final" implies no recovery.) Where some of the plausible SOP readings are actually ruled out by common usage, the phrase isn't purely SOP any more. 180.181.102.164 01:13, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

trait#English - Different uses of the two pronunciations?

My impression in Australia is that the pronunciation /treɪt/ is the usual pronunciation, and the pronunciation /treɪ/ is typically only reserved for genetic or other academic uses. For example, one speaks of “sickle cell trait /treɪ/” and “thalassaemia trait /treɪ/”, never /treɪt/ (saying this in this situation may cause others to wince.). Wyang (talk) 13:02, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I don't think I've ever heard /tɹeɪ/ in en-US at all; I'm pretty sure /tɹeɪt/ is the only pronunciation in all uses. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:28, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Ditto. I would wince only at hearing it pronounced sans t Leasnam (talk) 15:09, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

What is the fact base or methodology we use to determine or confirm the existence and relative frequency of pronunciations? DCDuring TALK 15:45, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Well, apparently some dictionaries show the other pronunciation without the t as secondary. Leasnam (talk) 16:09, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

So, is it a pronunciation used by French-trained doctors? DCDuring TALK 16:17, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I note that some OneLook dictionaries have the silent-t pronunciation as UK. Medical dictionaries usually don't have pronunciations. DCDuring TALK 16:25, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes UK Leasnam (talk) 16:28, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

John C. Wells in the Longman Pronunciation Dictionary gives both options for UK English but gives preference to /tɹeɪ/. He says nothing about the two pronunciations being used in different contexts. For US English he lists only /tɹeɪt/. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 21:18, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

mute h

This definition seems too narrow. I'm sure the term is also used to refer to unpronounced h'es in Spanish, etc. And what about English? What do you call the "h" in hour or honour? Kolmiel (talk) 15:24, 3 February 2017 (UTC) Hmm, I was a bit overhasty (again). I wasn't aware of the term silent h. However, I've also found "mute h" as a synonym, for example referring to English. I'd create that entry and make a link, but the problem is that any letter can be silent or mute. Kolmiel (talk) 15:30, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

The difference between French and English is that the "h" in hour is silent while the "h" in house is actually pronounced. But French phonology distinguishes between mute h and aspirated h by their behavior, even though both of them are in fact silent: le héros is pronounced /lə e.ʁo/, not */lə he.ʁo/. So mute h in this sense is something English and Spanish don't have, because English just has ordinary silent h’s opposed to pronounced h’s, and in Spanish there's no different behavior between two different kinds of silent h. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 15:45, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

I would say that the more familiar English term is silent h, with mute h being used more when referring to the traditionally silent h in languages like French (mute h always makes me think of French), but that may not be universally true. Leasnam (talk) 20:30, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

live in, live out

Where are these used? They sound unnatural to me (an American English speaker). DTLHS (talk) 21:05, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

Not in Canada... Andrew Sheedy (talk) 21:50, 3 February 2017 (UTC)

The terms are used with reference to household servants, domestic help, nannies, etc. A "live in nanny" vs. a "live out nanny". Or cook, gardner, maid, butler, cleaner, chauffeur, whatever. Once you understand the context (I didn't at first since the entries really don't make the context clear) the terms don't sound unnatural at all. 180.181.102.164 01:22, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

That's not how the entries present the terms. They are defined as verbs. We have live-in which matches the adjectival sense you describe. DTLHS (talk) 01:28, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Imagine three nannies talking. The first nanny asks the other two, "Do you live in or out?" The second responds "I live in". The third says "I live out". To read "live in"/"live out" as verb phrases seems a very natural reading of such a conversation. (The stuff about "My commute is two minutes" in the example for live in is stupid though, since if you have a two minute commute you don't reside at your place of employment – e.g. maybe you bought an apartment across the street from your employer's offices, so you only have a two minute walk to get to work in the morning, but you don't actually live in your employer's offices.) 180.181.102.164 01:55, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Some dictionaries restrict these to the UK, but others do not. In the US live in seems common enough to me, but not live out. DCDuring TALK 15:52, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

(Incidentally, live out probably needs another sense. Can't you live out a dream, or a fantasy?) Equinox ◑ 06:42, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

I agree. More importantly, some idiom/phrasal-verb dictionaries do too. DCDuring TALK 15:52, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

niggerette

I've heard in Urban Dictionary it's also "cigarettes niggers smoke", so should that be another definition here?

If it can be cited, that is, if three durably archived usages can be found (see WT:CFI). -Lücht (talk) 01:18, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Added with three citations. I defined it "as an inferior cigarette" (the term is used e.g. to complain about menthols); not sure whether it really has anything to do with black people's smoking preferences; def may need tweaking. Equinox ◑ 06:48, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

In my long-lost youth "Kool" was a brand of menthol cigarette that was reportedly popular among American blacks. More recently in the US, there have been brands of cigarettes whose popularity was principally due to their low prices relative to the traditional brands like Marlboro. DCDuring TALK 16:09, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

I found a blog post discussing this: [1]. Equinox ◑ 20:39, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

"1/100th" when discussing currency subunits

Many of our currency entries describe a unit as "1/100th" of another. This always looks wrong to me. It's 1/100, or one hundredth, but not one slash hundredth. You wouldn't write "1/3rd", would you? Do others agree these should be changed? Equinox ◑ 19:05, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Seems a bit weird yeah, I'd change it if I saw it. — Kleio (t · c) 19:06, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, this is an error. The correct way to write such a measurement is either as 0.01 or 1/100. A hundredth (one hundredth) can be written as "a 100th" but not "1/100th," since 1/0.01 = 100. Nicole Sharp (talk) 10:35, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

 Done Got rid of all "1/100th". There are probably still a few instances of other numbers than 100... Equinox ◑ 15:40, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

It is rare and dated but attested: [2]. — TAKASUGI Shinji (talk) 05:06, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

farmly

I can't seem to source the 1990 George Bush citation (from a speech), which actually just seems to be Bush mispronouncing "family values". Did he really mean farmly as defined? If not this should be removed. Equinox ◑ 22:43, 4 February 2017 (UTC)

Given that he followed it immediately with "family", the implication is that he either used it as a one-off pun (he got a laugh) or it was a slip of the tongue. As for the second quote, "farmly" is immediately followed by "farm", which would be rather awkward if it was intended to be used with the challenged sense. It looks more like a typo for family influenced by the similarity to the following word. As for the third quote: it's in a poem, and modern poets are well known for bending vocabulary into unnatural shapes for artistic reasons. I don't think any of them really supports a word with any existence independent from the specific circumstances of each instance, and three times nothing is still nothing. Chuck Entz (talk) 01:57, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

2 additional cites with clear "farm"-related meaning. Leasnam (talk) 17:40, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

• I mean, the cites are pretty awful (including an odd poem that may not support this sense, one that seems to be a very clear mistake, one making fun of a half-educated Japanese immigrant's English, and what appears to be a classic Bushism). That said, under the normal interpretation of CFI, these would indeed pass if RFV'ed. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 06:55, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Confusion about cloud ear, Jew's ear, 雲耳 and 木耳

After reading the descriptions and seeing pictures of Auricularia polytricha and Auricularia auricula-judae, if cloud ear is the same thing as 雲耳, then cloud ear should be Auricularia auricula-judae (or Jew's ear), the softer of the two, instead of Auricularia polytricha, the harder, crisper one, contrary to how Wikipedia names these. The Wikipedia article named cloud ear fungus says the Chinese name is 雲耳, but this is not supported on the Chinese Wikipedia or by any sources. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 04:29, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

This calls Auricularia auricula-judae "cloud ear mushroom". — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 04:35, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

fiddle about, fiddle around

I thought these terms suggested unskilled mechanical fixing activity, e.g. fiddling around inside the back of a TV set to try to make it work. The given definitions (from the same IP) suggest they just mean idling, lazing around. Is that right? Equinox ◑ 19:14, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Doesn't seem right to me (or at least it isn't a definition I was aware of). The sense you mention is the only one that is familiar to me. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 19:58, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

I now see that the same IP initially defined "ferret out" as "to fatten by feeding"!! Their entire contributions merit sceptical investigation. Equinox ◑ 20:05, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Fiddle about strikes me as the UK version of US fiddle around. What our definition lacks IMO is the notion that the "fiddler" is engaged in a pointless, valueless activity, the sole result of which is the waste of time. DCDuring TALK 23:10, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

I think it can go either way. E.g. "Quit fiddling around with that TV!" would mean that the person is wasting their time with an unproductive or detrimental activity (in the opinion of the person speaking). However, "I spent the afternoon fiddling around with the TV to improve its color balance" would mean a productive activity. Whether fiddling around is productive activity or not obviously depends on context. I think that "fiddling around" specifically just implies a mechanical or repetitive activity (by analogy of instrument-playing), and not so much as whether that activity is productive. Though in most cases, it is used either in a pejorative (for nonproductive activities) or tongue-in-cheek (for productive activities) context. Nicole Sharp (talk) 10:26, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

invasive carp

I'm intrigued about this being glossed as a euphemism. It sounds worse than "Asian carp", doesn't it? What's the story? Equinox ◑ 20:34, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

See Talk:Asian carp. DCDuring (who created invasive carp) seems to classify it as euphemistic. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 22:15, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

What has happened is that certain laws and regulations seem to use invasive carps where the carps in question are more usually called Asian carps. I believe that this is done not as a euphemism for the fish but for Asian-descended voters, whom some considered to be offended or potentially offended by the association of their continent of ancestry with these invasive species, against which extensive control efforts were or are to be undertaken (revocation of visas?). The invasive Asian carps are bighead carp, silver carp, black carp, and grass carp.

Does anyone know of a better term than euphemism, which term seems to actually fit this situation by our definition. DCDuring TALK 23:05, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

That makes more sense to me now, although perhaps the entry could benefit from an explanatory usage note? Andrew Sheedy (talk) 23:44, 5 February 2017 (UTC)

Or a citation or two. DCDuring TALK 11:39, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

Politically correct? — Ungoliant ^(falai) 17:58, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

I was trying to avoid that label by using something more generic, less political, but that may not be possible. DCDuring TALK 00:59, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Ensemblist is not a word

Why are there entries for words that don't exist? Ensemblist is not a word. Using Soloist as an example is not valid. So why is this entry on the Wiktionary?

Of course it's a word: [3]. Equinox ◑ 00:30, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

About njeri

The current article is lacking two things:

1. A translation of the usage example;
2. A different section (maybe with alternate etymology) for the pronominal use, which at present is only mentioned in a quotation in the references.

So I wonder:

1. Is it correct that "atë njeri e njihja" means "I knew that man"?
2. Does the pronoun "njeri | anyone" share the etymology of the noun "njeri | man" or is it distinguished from it not only "semantically and grammatically" (quoting the reference) but etymologically as well? And in the latter case, where is the pronoun from?
3. Could someone add these things to [the article]?
4. Is the TR the right place to bring up such issues (of articles lacking info) or is there a more appropriate place for this?

MGorrone (talk) 15:05, 6 February 2017 (UTC)

This is one place to discuss it. Usually the best place to discuss language-specific details is the talk page to the "About" page for the language (in this case, Wiktionary:About Albanian), but I don't see much activity there, and the talk page is a redlink. Albanian isn't very widely studied by non-Albanians, and it has a sad history of heavy-handed interference by various parties for various political reasons, so we get a lot of Albanian editors with agendas working on etymologies and not a lot of basic dictionary work. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:27, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

premier

In English this is also pronounced PREEM-ee-er, right? ---> Tooironic (talk) 04:33, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I agree. Here in Canada, I've only heard /ˈpɹimjɚ/. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 06:10, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Not in the UK. SemperBlotto (talk) 06:12, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

As far as I'm aware, it's only /pɹiˈmɪɚ/ in the U.S. —Stephen ^(Talk) 09:05, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Pronunciation of presentation

Is the pronunciation of presentation as /ˌpɹizənˈteɪʃən/ actually used in the UK? — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 08:12, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I've heard it used in at least one British movie/TV show. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 23:17, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

predicate

Looks like we need a new entry for predicate in the sense of criminal predicate. And here's a quote: "Those require a criminal predicate, or reasonable suspicion. New York TimesJan 25, 2017" --Espoo (talk) 09:09, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

artifice

I have been using the word "artifice" as a verb for years, in the sense of "to make artificial (from something natural)," e.g. "to artifice a mine from a mountain," or "to artifice trees into paper." However, I can't seem to find any citations for this. Have I been using this word incorrectly all this time? It does have a nice poetic ring to it. Nicole Sharp (talk) 09:58, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

• It does seem a little odd, but the OED has the verb sense "trans. To make or shape by artifice; to apply artifice to; to construct, contrive. Now chiefly of immaterial things." (with citations from 1652 to 1995) SemperBlotto (talk) 10:15, 7 February 2017 (UTC)
  • Oxford University Press OxfordDictionaries.com came up on a Google Search for "artificing," but it still only lists "artifice" as a noun. If you have any citations or usages, see if you can add them here on Wiktionary, since they don't come up for me on Google. Nicole Sharp (talk) 10:56, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

By the way, shouldn't there be an uncountable sense? DTLHS (talk) 16:06, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

There are lots of uses of artificed that seem to be adjectival and of artificing that seem to be nominal, though some could also be interpreted as verbal. I found three uses that seem to me to be clearly verbal. They are in the entry, but I have not provided a definition. DCDuring TALK 16:29, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

take over

I wonder why every single sense has been labelled "idiomatic". DonnanZ (talk) 12:58, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Because none of them can be deduced from the definitions of "take" and "over". A example of a non-idiomatic use would be "I took the horse over the bridge". Siuenti (talk) 13:58, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Hmm, yeah, but I still wouldn't class it at being idiomatic, implying an idiom, even though there's a different sense. Saying "company X took over company Y" is the same as "company X took company Y over". It's just a phrasal verb that can be split, nothing remotely idiomatic about it. DonnanZ (talk) 15:10, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

Lexicographic idiomaticity is principally in the semantics, not the grammar, at least as we consider it. DCDuring TALK 15:53, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I question the value of labelling every idiomatic sense as such, though. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 23:16, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

I've inserted {{&lit}} which, arguably, obviates the need for all those "idiomatic" labels (which I did not remove). DCDuring TALK 00:08, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

They're removed now, the note "used other than as an idiom" is enough to indicate an "idiomatic" phrase. It is still recorded as an idiom after the labels are removed, so the labels are / were actually superfluous. DonnanZ (talk) 10:22, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

"help" meaning "do for"

I've met some African speakers who use the word "help" in the sense of "do for", e.g. "I'll help you wash the car" would mean "I'll wash the car for you". I'd like to add something to "help" to point out this is non-standard in most varieties of English, but I'm not sure how to proceed. (Chinese people also do this [4]) Siuenti (talk) 14:03, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

girl

Daniel C added two curious senses, with idiosyncratic cites that might not reflect normal usage: (i) a person, regardless of their gender, who is perceived as conforming to female stereotypes; (ii) a man who does not have a healthy penis. To me this is deliberate playing with language rather than mainstream dictionary senses. Imagine a woman saying: "My father was never home, so, growing up, I had to be the father in our house." Equinox ◑ 21:09, 7 February 2017 (UTC)

To me, these senses are OK. We have the sense "A person who plays the role of a father in some way." at father. If we found the sentence "My father was never home, so, growing up, I had to be the father in our house." in a book, I'd support using it as a quote for that sense. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 19:52, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Wow, that sense of "father" really surprises me! I mean, it's like having a sense at "spaceman" for "a child playing at being a spaceman" (as in "this time you be the spaceman and I'll be the alien"), or at "teapot" for "a small model of a teapot belonging to a doll's house". I feel the same about "catgirl" defining a cosplayer, as I once mentioned before. Sometimes one just refers to something as X because it is a simulacrum of X, even though you know it's not a real X. Equinox ◑ 20:56, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

Quite. --Droigheann (talk) 23:33, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

Or Shirley Temple at teapot... Chuck Entz (talk) 03:49, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

@Equinox: Allright. I removed the 2 senses from girl. I only left the quotations there, if that's OK. --Daniel Carrero (talk) 13:23, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

heel of a hand

We don't seem to have this either under heel or as a separate entry. Could someone who's - unlike me - quite certain which part of the hand it refers to add it? --Droigheann (talk) 00:03, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm familiar with the term...for the area of the palm nearest the wrist Leasnam (talk) 02:58, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, I'd say add it under heel. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 05:29, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Added by DCDuring - special thanks for finding a picture which made it crystal clear! --Droigheann (talk) 17:28, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

indefatigably/indefatigable

The entry shows the stress on the third syllable, which jibes with most usage I've encountered ... but I've occasionally heard the adverb stressed on the antepenult: AmE /ɪndɨfəˈtɨɡəbli/. Can anyone confirm whether that's considered a standard variant, or a solecism? If the former, can anyone attest a similar pronunciation of the adjective (e.g., /ɪndɨfəˈtiɡəbəɫ/)? — This unsigned comment was added by 138.162.8.58 (talk) at 14:41, 8 February 2017 (UTC).

It's obviously stressed on the penultimate, because it rhymes with Clark Gable. —CodeCat 15:31, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I can't tell if CodeCat is joking or not, but I've certainly never heard either the adjective or the adverb stressed on any syllable other than fæt. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 16:47, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I wasn't aware of the existence of what seems to be the standard pronunciation.... I'm only familiar with /ˌɪndəfəˈtiɡəbəl/ and /ˌɪndəfəˈtiɡəbli/. It's possible my pronunciation is idiosyncratic though, and I've never actually heard the word (although that seems unlikely). Andrew Sheedy (talk) 09:59, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Well, Wiktionary is demotic in that it allows poorly educated people their say here. The only correct pronunciation is indeFATigable, and in England people *would* notice uneducated variants. Maybe in the US, people no longer care about good usage, but that is not the case in England yet. — This unsigned comment was added by 86.131.224.133 (talk) at 17:01, 2017 March 27 .

That's funny, lecturing us about good usage and using * for italics and trying to represent the "correct" pronunciation of a word in the unadorned English alphabet.--Prosfilaes (talk) 08:28, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

In case you hadn't noticed, this is a pretty straightforward, by-the-book troll. The OP may or may not actually believe what they said, but their goal is to get people upset and to elicit heated responses so they can enjoy the spectacle. Personally, I have better things to do- like twiddling my thumbs. Chuck Entz (talk) 13:55, 29 March 2017 (UTC)

A little anecdote related to this: a couple days ago, I was in a group of five (young) guys, and one of them was reading something. He read the word "indefatigable" as /ˌɪndəˈfætɪɡəbəl/, and I was the only other one there who understood the word. Another guy looked at it and said "Oh, indefatigable (/ˌɪndəfəˈtiɡəbəl/)" and the other two guys who hadn't understood replied with an understanding "Oooh..." I suspect that /ˌɪndəfəˈtiɡəbəl/ is a perhaps less-educated pronunciation, but nonetheless valid and used. I note that the audio file at Template:indefatigable uses that pronunciation, so I think I'll add it in IPA. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 03:45, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

The alternative pronunciation indefatígable has the advantage of having the same pronunciation of the morpheme fatig(ue) as the word fatígue. The pronunciation indefátigable has a different stress, and therefore entirely different vowels in the same morpheme. — Eru·tuon 05:16, 5 April 2017 (UTC)

following

Noun sense 2, the plural form should be following, or there should only be a singular form.

For the sense defined as “Something to be mentioned immediately later”, I believe that it is incorrect to use the form followings, even when referring to several things. For example:

The following are common words:

• list,
• item.

However, when referring to several things after this fashion, I do not know if we actually use the plural of following—although with an identical spelling—or if the word in this sense has no plural and we actually use the singular form here too. Either way, the definition for this sense should belong to a different section. --Anareth (talk) 17:06, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

I added a note "singular only". I think this is worth mentioning, for one thing because "the followings" is an error sometimes made by non-native speakers. I also took the liberty of adjusting the heading of this thread. Mihia (talk) 10:31, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Ooops, sorry, I need to revisit this as, of course, we can say "the following are ..." as well as "the following is ...". I have just reverted my edit for now, as I have to go and have no time to look at it now. Mihia (talk) 10:36, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

I had another go. Please anyone change it if you prefer different wording. Mihia (talk) 18:23, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Calques and translations

Where is the line drawn between translations, translations that feature word order that is identical to the source word/phrase, and calques? Like Red Square, which currently claims to be a calque. —suzukaze (t・c) 23:06, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

A calque is a translation, specifically a loan-translation. That means that it's translated, but then this translation becomes part of the language's idiom rather than being a one-off. —CodeCat 00:07, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

-tastic

-tastic, is this really a suffix ? If so, then is -tel a suffix (motel, boatel, floatel, etc.) ? Leasnam (talk) 17:26, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Same for -tacular, -riffic, -licious Leasnam (talk) 17:29, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

FWIW, the OED calls -tastic a "combining form" and defines/describes it "Forming adjectives designating someone or something perceived as excellent or remarkable as regards that which is denoted by the prefixed word. Cf. POPTASTIC adj. In early use freq. punningly used to create a word phonetically similar to fantastic." [5] They also have a "combining form" -riffic [6] but none of the others. --Droigheann (talk) 03:02, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

• It's officially recognised on Oxford Online as an informal combining form, "Forming adjectives denoting someone or something regarded as an extremely good example of their particular type" in words such as poptastic and funtastic.
• As for -tel, I think this is just a blend based on hotel, and not a suffix as such. DonnanZ (talk) 18:22, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Welll, my point is: isn't poptastic just a blend of pop/popular and fantastic in the same way that boatel is a blend of boat and hotel ? A combining form is a suffix, is it ? ok, I see it now. Thanks Leasnam (talk) 21:22, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

I think it depends on how old and well-established it is. The first few words in -athon would have been regarded as blends, but now it's easy to use that on new words without particularly thinking about the root word marathon. Equinox ◑ 21:38, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

in places

Meaning only in some places and not everywhere. It may be worth an entry: I have just found a translation for this, e.g. "... that in places has led to the establishment of grass cover". DonnanZ (talk) 18:06, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

Spatial equivalent of at times — though there are other similar versions like in spots. Equinox ◑ 20:51, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

It's not to be confused with in place either. Anyway, I have created an entry for in places; I have classified it as an adverb for now, but someone will surely reclassify it. DonnanZ (talk) 10:52, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Confused by first definition of agency

The first definition of 'agency' reads: "The capacity, condition, or state of acting or of exerting power..."

This expands to:

   1. The capacity power, or
   2. The condition power, or 
   3. The state of acting power, or
   4. The state of exerting power

The last one is the only one that I understand. Maybe an additional 'of' or other preposition or word went missing. Are the following meanings what are intended for the first three?

   1. The capacity also called power, i.e. 'agency' is a synonym of 'power'
   2. The condition of power, i.e. the state of being in power, or the effects of being in power
   3. The state of acting while in power, i.e. availing oneself of one's power, i.e. the state of enacting one's power
         or the state of acting (pretending to be) powerful

— This unsigned comment was added by 75.115.90.84 (talk) at 21:20, 10 February 2017 (UTC).

EDIT: Oops, now I see that it may have meant

   1. "The capacity, condition, or state of acting, or the capacity, condition, or state of exerting power..."

— This unsigned comment was added by 75.115.90.84 (talk) at 21:26, 10 February 2017 (UTC).

It can be read in still other ways too. Thanks for bringing the lack of clarity to the attention of the community. DCDuring TALK 23:43, 10 February 2017 (UTC)

oi

Are there really four distinct senses of ety 1? Mihia (talk) 05:22, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

I've encountered all four of those. Equinox ◑ 13:33, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

So how is #1 different to #2? #1 definition is "hey", and, as far as I can see, "Oi! Stop that!" means "Hey! Stop that!". Mihia (talk) 14:28, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Those two could probably be merged. Equinox ◑ 14:30, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

I agree; I have merged them. Mihia (talk) 21:49, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

definition of subdural

Hello, the definition for subdural seems wrong:

The definition for 'subdural' is: "(anatomy) located beneath the dura mater and above the meninges"

When I clicked on 'dura mater' it said: "(anatomy) The tough and inflexible outermost of the three layers of the meninges "

And the definition for meninges was: "(anatomy) The three membranes that envelop the brain and spinal cord."

These three definitions obviously aren't self consistent. It seems more like the definition for subdural ought to be " located between the dura mater and the arachnoid mater" or perhaps, since 'arachnoid mater is a pretty obscure word: "located between the dura mater and the next most inward layer of the meninges"

But, I'm no expert, I'm just basing that suggestion on what makes sense from the three definitions above.

DlronW (talk) 21:21, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, subdural has been modified accordingly. Wyang (talk) 21:54, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Pronunciation of Olomouc

Is there an established English pronunciation of the city of Olomouc? Can the one given in the entry be verified in some reliable sources? --Jan Kameníček (talk) 23:47, 11 February 2017 (UTC)

Not listed in either the 4th edition (1937) or 14th edition (1977) of the Daniel Jones "English Pronouncing Dictionary", so I would tend to doubt that there's any conventional English pronunciation which is very widely known... AnonMoos (talk) 19:48, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

hase?

haze says that hase is an alt form. Is that real? If so, does it need marking as archaic or obsolete? Equinox ◑ 12:31, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

It's obsolete (of course).

1. • 1721, Bailey:

     "A Hase, a thick Fog or Rime."

I've added a label Leasnam (talk) 17:16, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

-ga#Estonian

A relative newbie, Mr. Yazar, just added this as a preposition, but the leading hyphen makes me doubt this analysis. @Strombones, Hekaheka, Hyark, Puisque, Tropylium and anyone else who knows Estonian: what is this really? A preposition? A postposition? A suffix? A case ending? —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:50, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

I'd call it a clitic. Compare -kin and -kaan in Finnish. —CodeCat 16:03, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

It's a case ending for the comitative. Strombones (talk) 21:27, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

We usually call case endings suffixes, don't we? Do we have entries for other Estonian case endings? —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 21:33, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

Should be a case ending, yes. Category:Estonian inflectional suffixes only has a few members so far though. --Tropylium (talk) 21:50, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your help, everyone. I've changed the POS to suffix, and CAT:Estonian inflectional suffixes now has one more member. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 08:46, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Hi, sorry I missed this. Yeah, I haven't taken a full course in Estonian, but I would say it is the comitative case ending (tema sõidab autoga "he/she drives a car", lit. "he/she drives with/using a car"). (CodeCat, -gi/-ki is the clitic cognate with -kin and -kaan. :) -- Puisque (talk) 16:12, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I also agree that -ga is the suffix for the comitative case. ¦ hyark digyik 20:34, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/(s)meyh₂-

Two questions:

• Why is this reconstructed with a laryngeal? Derksen, who is quite laryngeal-happy, reconstucts *smey- without a laryngeal and specifically says the acute tone in Balto-Slavic is an innovation. Sanskrit smita would seem to preclude a laryngeal. The long ī in Latin and Germanic can in both cases come from -ei-.
• Why the s-mobile? The only languages without the initial -s- are Latin and Greek, and both are known to have dropped initial -s- in *sm-. Furthermore, Homeric φιλομμειδής (philommeidḗs, “smiling gladly”) seems to specifically indicate a former -s-.

I think this should be moved to Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/smey-. Benwing2 (talk) 20:38, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

@CodeCat Benwing2 (talk) 20:38, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

LIV has indeed just *smey-. No need to assume s-mobile or a laryngeal, as far as I can see. --Tropylium (talk) 21:52, 12 February 2017 (UTC)

Gloucester

The audio file is not working for me, is it working for anyone else? ---> Tooironic (talk) 03:48, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Not working for me either. It probably needs to be recorded again. — justin(r)leung _{{ (t...) | c=› }} 03:54, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

I fiddled with the audio and it should work now. —suzukaze (t・c) 06:20, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Many thanks, it's working for me now. ---> Tooironic (talk) 16:17, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

It's not working for me though, just a little phut is heard. I have found many audio files don't work properly; I would like to export them to Norwegian, but I won't do this with broken audio files. DonnanZ (talk) 10:29, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Reverting edit about "Spock" gesture

@Equinox, Chuck Entz. This was discussed here a bit: User talk:Equinox#Spock.

I'd like to revert diff. I believe the word "Spock" meaning basically "a gesture in rock paper scissors" is a common noun, not a proper noun. In this sense, we are not talking about the fictional character named Spock. I believe all words for gestures are common nouns, including RPS handshapes (rock, paper, scissors), and other handshapes such as shaka, hang loose, thumbs up, corna (no English section), facepalm, fig (sense missing).

This was pointed out in the discussion linked above: "The hand gesture is named after Spock, but it isn't a direct reference to him, any more than an axel is a direct reference to w:Axel Paulsen." --Daniel Carrero (talk) 04:53, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

But that's a countable common noun: "an axel, two axels". In the finger game, you don't call "a Spock"! It's just the name Spock, a proper noun. More like Old Kent Road in the board game Monopoly. Equinox ◑ 18:55, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Pedophocracy

Please add this word: "Pedophocracy". I'm not a word smith. I don't know Latin or how this word came to be. I wrote an article about it here with lots of references for you if needs be: infogalactic.com/info/Pedophocracy Full disclosure: I was banned from Wikipedia for a year. I'm a truther. I don't believe everything the government or corporate media tells me. Nor do I believe much of the independent media. I believe in letting people know all sides if possible and that nothing should be censored, hiding not only the truth, but the crimes and criminals. Nuf said. Though I'm not happy with the anti-"fringe" fascists at Wikipedia, I've only got good things to say about Wiktionary and Wikiquotes, and most Wikipedians for that matter. Thank you in advance. ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 16:39, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

It can be added if you can find three independent sources (not your own website) using the word and meeting WT:CFI. Looking on Google Books and Scholar it looks like D McGowan is the only one to use it and therefore it should not be added. DTLHS (talk) 17:32, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Good to know. Thanks for the prompt response. McGowan coined it some time ago, but it seems to be catching on. Is Wiktionary like Wikipedia when it comes to "fringe" sources? For example, I learned about it from independent journalists who have used it recently, likely due to the Pizzagate stuff. FYI, InfoGalactic is not my site (terrible name) - it is an encyclopedia forked from Wikipedia intending to grow in ways WP refuses to. Because I just finished that article including living persons, it was moved back under my user page until legal can go through it, whatever that means. ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 17:45, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

We don't care about fringe sources, just that they are durably archived and demonstrating usage (in practice this usually means we rely on Google Books and Google Scholar). DTLHS (talk) 17:49, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for this info, though I'm a little confused and I'm sorry to bother you again. Many independent news and other sites use the term, (pages and pages easily found: https://www.google.ca/search?q=Pedophocracy) and many are well archived on their sites as well as the Internet Archive Wayback Machine. Does this count? Also, if "pedo" means child and "cracy" means rulers, what does "pho" mean besides tasty soup? ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 06:02, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

It sounds like the word is formed by adding -cracy to a clipping of pedophile (with the interfix -o-). I disapprove of the way the word is formed; I would prefer pedophilocracy, but I guess people find that to be too long. Anyway, this means that the -pho- part has nothing to do with soup; it's just the first digraph in the morpheme -phile plus the linking vowel -o-. — Eru·tuon 06:26, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Duh. I feel embarrassed I didn't see that. Thanks. The longer version is better, more clear, and less confusing. The shorter one might be confused with a ruler of feet. Or a ruler in feet. Not inches. ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 09:30, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Also, in addition to being less clear and accurate, why this shortened version of this "new" word is bad, if you actually say it aloud, not that it comes up often in conversations, it sounds kind of like "pedo-fuck-crazy" which is tragically like putting a clown nose on a very very serious subject. I wish this word wasn't invented in the short version and I wish we didn't need any word like it at all. For whatever it's worth the new InfoGalactic article has passed legal and has been released, edited, for better or worse: https://infogalactic.com/info/Pedophocracy ~ JasonCarswell (talk) 15:26, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

That doesn't look like a durably archived source, and it still doesn't look like the word has been used by multiple, independent sources, in other words, by people who have nothing to do with the coiner of the term. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 15:58, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

Yet another word formed from Classical elements by people who know nothing or almost nothing about either Greek or Latin (others are "thealogy", "homophobia", "noctcaelador" etc etc). You'd think those who are not experts would be able to face up to the fact and ask those who are experts for help. As far back as the 1920s, some were complaining that the "o" should be omitted from "psychoanalysis" to be strictly correct, but that seems minor now... AnonMoos (talk) 20:02, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Nothing wrong with mixing roots. What do you call a television? Equinox ◑ 20:05, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Television mixes Greek and Latin (another bugbear of early 20th-century classical purists which seems almost trivial now), but it doesn't show conspicuous faults in word formation (as thealogy and noctcaelador do), or an intended meaning strongly divergent from the meaning indicated by the roots (as homophobia does). AnonMoos (talk) 20:35, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

wigwag

I've seen this specifically refer to two alternating lights at a railway crossing. Should this be added? —CodeCat 18:55, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

I would say so, yes. I've found several cites supporting this usage Leasnam (talk) 19:14, 13 February 2017 (UTC)

I don't think two alternating flashing lights were used originally, just one light suspended on a pendulum-like device which swung from side to side, hence the name wigwag. DonnanZ (talk) 10:22, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

No, it's obviously an extension of usage, much like using torch for the electrical variant. But we don't even have a sense for the mechanical wigwag, let alone the electric one. The current definition is overly broad. —CodeCat 19:02, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Or electromechanical? DonnanZ (talk) 20:50, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

I have added a nice image, maybe they are still used in the USA. DonnanZ (talk) 11:35, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Reconstruction:Latin/amare

Why do we have a reconstruction for this when it's very obviously attested? —CodeCat 01:49, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I assume some of the conjugated forms are unattested. DTLHS (talk) 01:55, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

It's a reconstruction for Vulgar Latin, so many of the forms are probably unattested. Do we have a ruling on this? Reconstructing a word which is attested in a language for a poorly attested dialect of that same language? At least I think the argument shouldn't be that it would be allowed if the infinitive happened to be something other than amare but this way it's not. Kolmiel (talk) 04:41, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

If we needed it, it should be at Reconstruction:Latin/amo, since we use the 1st person singular present active indicative as the lemma for Vulgar Latin just as for Classical. But IMO we don't need a reconstruction page for an attested lemma just to show its unattested inflected forms. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 22:03, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

While we're on the subject, it may be interesting to have those Vulgar Latin inflections somewhere on the main entries where applicable? — Kleio (t · c) 22:29, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

I agree with Angr. — Ungoliant ^(falai) 22:33, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Well, I also agree, kinda, but having the inflections is nice, while putting them on the main entry -- I don't know. Kolmiel (talk) 02:19, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Why not create an appendix with Vulgar Latin inflections (compare with the appendices in Category:Latin appendices)? Then one could conjugate Vulgar Latin amo by knowing that it stayed in the first conjugation and then one wouldn't need Reconstruction:Latin/amo. -84.161.3.60 01:13, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

ying-yang, yin-yang

ying-yang means 1. anus and 2. penis; while yin-yang means vulva. That seems odd. Can't both forms mean all three things, in slang? Equinox ◑ 22:39, 14 February 2017 (UTC)

Why??? This is a sacred Chinese concept. This needs to be explained in the etymology (of one or both entries). Wyang (talk) 08:43, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

There aren't that many slang senses under yin-yang on Google Books or Google Groups. Maybe they should all go to ying-yang, which could be just a reduplication. Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 15:50, 22 March 2017 (UTC)

Category:English terms spelled with ’

What's the correct response to this strange category? I noticed it when someone changed Dollo's law to use the curly apostrophe (I prefer the plain one, and it prevents this category happening!). Equinox ◑ 19:55, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

The pages should be moved. DTLHS (talk) 20:25, 15 February 2017 (UTC)

suck off

Is it always until the ejaculation? I think I've read some instances where it was not the case. --Barytonesis (talk) 01:57, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

I've added "usually" to it Leasnam (talk) 03:14, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

What do citations say? UseNet and Google Books (fiction) would be the sources.

It seems like suck + off to me. DCDuring TALK 13:16, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Could it also be a blend of suck and get off, with the off added alluding to the latter ? Leasnam (talk) 18:11, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

I strongly suspect that off has the same meaning ("achieving orgasm") in combination with any of several verbs. See WT:RFV#suck off for other problems with the definition. DCDuring TALK 18:31, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Same could be asked about pull off and jerk off (though we don't currently define them as reaching orgasm). Equinox ◑ 18:41, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

adaption

Calling this term 'rare' is a bit of a stretch I think. I have heard native speakers use it from time to time. Any thoughts? ---> Tooironic (talk) 02:43, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

You have? I've only heard Germans use it as a mistranslation of Adaption. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 08:40, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

OED labels it "now nonstandard" and comments that "despite the long history of adaption in English, adaptation is now the preferred form". (Their quotations range from 1615 to 2007).[7] --Droigheann (talk) 21:15, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

In light of that, I have changed the label to "proscribed". ---> Tooironic (talk) 03:07, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

tautology and pleonasm

I wanted to edit these because they sound very negative. Of course, according to our present "capitalistic" stylistic norms we should say everything as fast and simply as possible. But tautology and pleonasm are rhetoric figures, not defects as such. Depending on the language and age they may be regarded as signs of great eloquence. And even now they are used for emphasis etc. — Now the problem that I have is that I might do this wrong because the German use might be different from the English. German wikipedia describes Tautologie and Pleonasmus as synonymic per se, with different not generally accepted attempts at distinguishing them (e.g. that there's a tendency to use Tautologie when the two are of the same part of speech as in "fright and fear"). English wikipedia's Tautology_(rhetoric), however, is a very different and somewhat strange entry. Thanks for your input! Kolmiel (talk) 04:04, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

I can't think of an example off the top of my head where it makes a difference (if there is one), but my impression is that a tautology is a repetition of either the whole term or just the meaning, while a pleonasm is unnecessary extra verbiage, whether it's a repetition or not. Chuck Entz (talk) 04:16, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that sounds very similar to what my mother's old Advanced Learner's English dictionary says. Kolmiel (talk) 04:29, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

That would make tautology a hyponym of pleonasm. DCDuring TALK 13:39, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

FWIW, Oxford perceives tautology as negative, "a fault of style" [8][9], while being kinder to pleonasm, "a fault of style, or a rhetorical figure used for emphasis or clarity" [10][11]. Then again, the entries may have been dealt with by different editors. --Droigheann (talk) 21:51, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

sectary

In Act 1, Scene 2 of King Lear, Edgar asks Edmund, "How long have you been a sectary astronomical?" Does "sectary" mean "believer" here? If so, we are missing that sense on Wiktionary at the moment. ---> Tooironic (talk) 04:26, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

• I think that means "member of a sect". SemperBlotto (talk) 07:52, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

暗算

Does this never mean "to plot against; to scheme" in Japanese as it does in Chinese? If so, this would appear to be a false friend. ---> Tooironic (talk) 04:37, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

• @Tooironic: According to the monolingual JA resources I've consulted, in Japanese, this only ever means "to calculate in one's head, without using tools or writing anything down". ‑‑ Eiríkr Útlendi │^{Tala við mig} 19:12, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

tax return

I seem to have seen Americans using this to mean the amount that is refunded if you have overpaid. To me it refers only to the form that you fill in, does anyone else have any thoughts on this? Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 21:28, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

It isn't supposed to mean the amount that's refunded; that's tax refund in American English (at least). I wouldn't be surprised if some people get confused because of the similarity in sound and because of the ambiguity of the word return, though; nor would I be surprised if such confusion is occasionally found in permanently archived sources. But I would still call it an error. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 22:29, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Looking at Twitter, though, most of the recent tweets using 'tax return' are from Americans using it to mean the refund: https://twitter.com/search?f=tweets&vertical=default&q=%22tax%20return%22&src=typd There's even memes about spending your tax return, which was what confused me at first. Kaixinguo~enwiktionary (talk) 22:41, 16 February 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, a lot of people misuse the term. Though I noticed that it wasn't only Americans, since some people were talking about their tax "returns" (i.e. refunds) in pounds sterling. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 09:47, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

• Maybe it should be cross-linked to a new entry for tax refund, or a note added saying a tax return is not to be confused with a tax refund, which is the return to a taxpayer of overpaid tax. DonnanZ (talk) 11:00, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

classical conditioning

What sense of classical is invoked in this term? ---> Tooironic (talk) 03:17, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

Probably it was just the type studied earliest by academics and understood somewhat before the other types... AnonMoos (talk)

nootropic

Nootropic should be added to the derived forms of -tropic, which (going by a peek at one word that is) is apparently done with a confix template in the etymology. But there is no entry for the other half noo-, and the only other word I can think of beginning with that is noosphere. I have exhausted my small knowledge of templates. Should we do it anyway? --Hiztegilari (talk) 14:54, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

noocracy! I suppose we'd best create noo-. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:16, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

ooch

The current entry for "ooch" seems to be a French usage. But there is a good English usage of the term and it should be added to the wictionary:

Ooch -- move in small steps

http://www.dictionary.com/browse/ooch http://www.thepalife.com/ooch/ http://andyburkhardt.com/2014/02/17/ooching-cultivating-an-attitude-of-experimentation/

See “ooch”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. It is a redirect to scrunch in a single dictionary of American slang. We need citations, which IMO may include usage examples from DARE. DCDuring TALK 17:08, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, I did look at DARE and did find a couple of usages of "ooch." It looks like a contraction of the word scooch, so maybe the action to take (if any) is to add "ooch" as an Alternative form.

As for usage examples, there are actually quite a few, listed below, and a usage in the rule book for the America's Cup, which may date as far back as 1851

42.2 Prohibited Actions

Without limiting the application of rule 42.1, these actions are prohibited:

(a) pumping: repeated fanning of any sail either by pulling in and releasing the sail or by vertical or athwartship body movement;

(b) rocking: repeated rolling of the boat, induced by

(1) body movement,

(2) repeated adjustment of the sails or centreboard, or

(3) steering;

(c) ooching: sudden forward body movement, stopped abruptly;

(d) sculling: repeated movement of the helm that is either forceful or that propels the boat forward or prevents her from moving astern;

(e) repeated tacks or gybes unrelated to changes in the wind or to tactical considerations.

When your economy is kind of ooching along, it's important to let people have more of their own money.

To echo UM ‘73, my career was chosen such that I would never get away with ooching towards a solution with woulda, shoulda, coulda.

What he needed to do, he realized, was OOCH! To "ooch" is to construct small experiments to test one’s hypothesis.

Ooching is the opposite of jumping in headfirst into something. Ooching is conducting “small experiments to test one’s hypothesis.”

several

It's also used as a pronoun, but we have no entry.

As a determiner: Several people got on the train.

As a pronoun: Several of those waiting got on that train.

DonnanZ (talk) 20:27, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

We would not have to include a pronoun L3 header if we could count on our users to know what a determiner is and that (almost?) all of them can be used in "fused head" or pronominal constructions. I don't know whether the duplication of definitions in Determiner and Pronoun L3 sections is more or less confusing than eliminating the Pronoun L2. Some modern UK dictionaries do a pretty good job of handling this question, eg, Collins, Longmans DCE, probably Oxford and Cambridge advanced learners, etc. DCDuring TALK 00:20, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Clearly, having the header "Determiner and Pronoun" is totally lame. --Quadcont (talk) 11:17, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Hmm, OK, I have made a combined L2 header [12], and added {{en-pron}}. Will that be OK in an odd situation like this? Usage examples can be added, of course. DonnanZ (talk) 11:20, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure that I'd do it that way, but we should get reactions from others. This should probably go to WT:BP (or WT:AEN). DCDuring TALK 16:52, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

As you wish. DonnanZ (talk) 18:51, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

I take it this should also mean changes to many, few, either and probably others. What about those like some where there is only a partial overlap? --Droigheann (talk) 00:45, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

The broader the reach of the changes, the more we need some kind of broader consensus. Someone is going to have to wade into the contemporary distinction between pronoun, adjective, and determiner both in function and as word classes. They should also remain aware of the incompleteness of acceptance of "determiner" as a word class rather than "pronoun" or "adjective" among many humans. As an indication, MWOnline, AHD, and RHU (all "US") do not include "determiner" among the word classes of several. One US dictionary even has several as a noun not a pronoun. In contrast most UK dictionaries do.

Some "UK" dictionaries have determiner and pronoun as word class labels for all almost all definitions of several (excepting true adjective usage as in "the several states"). Others distinguish by individual definition. One includes "quantifier" as a word class.

Hardly any dictionaries dispense with word class labels entirely, so we need to address the question to be taken seriously as a dictionary, IMO.

And, of course, older reference grammars, older dictionaries and older editions (pre 1980?) did not have "determiner" as a word class.

Do WP's articles cover the lack of historical consensus very well? Can we rely on them to even show what the contemporary consensus among grammarians is? Should we rely on a single reference grammar, eg, Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (CGEL) or also consider learner's grammars and older reference grammars (Comprehensive Grammar of the English Language, Houtsma, even Jespersen)? CGEL distinguishes its more controversial positions from more settled matters. Is that reliable enough for us? Can we stretch the Usage notes header to include the mostly academic question of word class membership? DCDuring TALK 17:04, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

frei

One of the synonyms gives the sense "unbound". However, none of the actual senses in the entry is "unbound". Which sense does this synonym belong to? —CodeCat 20:55, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

cat

Similar to the German entry above, here it's also not very clear which senses the synonyms belong to, as the given senses do not appear listed. Moreover, the translations also give senses which do not actually exist in the entry. At the very least, I would suggest moving many of the translations to a more accurate synonym, e.g. put the translations meaning "member of Felidae" at felid. —CodeCat 21:04, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

pie#Norman

There's a sense label for "sex" here but there's no such sense listed in the entry. —CodeCat 23:01, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

aesthetics and massage

What does aesthetics mean in the context of "massage and aesthetics" or "body work and aesthetics"? (google these phrases to find uses). DTLHS (talk) 23:52, 17 February 2017 (UTC)

It means they offer the services of an aesthetician (= beautician). Equinox ◑ 00:26, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Forcouth: English?

There is currently no citation for "forcouth" in the English language, but only in Middle English (dating from 1200). Should this entry be relabelled as a Middle English word, or is there a citation of it in Modern English (post-1500)? Dylanvt (talk) 04:33, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Definitely only Middle English. DTLHS (talk) 04:34, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

nolle prosequi, nolle prosequis

Both nolle and prosequi are Latin infinitives, and the 'nolle prosequi' entry is OK.

'prosequis', however, does not exist in Latin. It is at best an informal English plural. It is, therefore, wrong to say that 'nolle prosequis' is a 3rd person singular.

They are English entries, and as English entries they can be correct even if for a Latin entry it would be incorrect and nonsense. -Slœtel (talk) 10:38, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Cosar

Is the entry correct?
The mentioned book contains for example: "כוזרי [?] Liber Cosri" (title page), "Liberum Cosri", "Cosri pars prima" (p.1, followed by Semitic characters), "[number] Cosri"; "Regem Cosareorum" (title page), "Regem Cosar" (p.6), "nomen viri Cosroes" (p.6), "Regem terrae Cosar" (p.6), "[...] [5.] Socii, h.e. sapientis cujusdam Doctoris Judaici, qui agebat apud Regem [6.] Cosar, qui annis abhinc quadringentis amplexus est Religionem nostram [...]".
I would guess that Cosri could be a proper noun and a book title, known in English as Kuzari (w:en:Kuzari) - which is already present at Cosri. The German wikipedia (de:w:Jehuda ha-Levi) writes: "Der Titel „Kusari“ bezieht sich auf den gleichnamigen König der Chasaren", i.e. "The title 'Kusari' refers to the king of the Khazars with the same name". So even if "Cosri" appears without "Liber" or "pars", it could have another meaning than Khazars.
As the entry Cosar explicitly mentions the title page as a source for the meaning and as the title page only contains "כוזרי [?] Liber Cosri", "Regem Cosareorum" and "Cosareorum Historia" (it's "Cosareorum", not "Cosrōrum" as in the entry) (or did I miss something?) the entry would be unsourced. -Slœtel (talk) 10:34, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

For a better comprehension of the Latin text I compared it with an English translation of the original text found at wikisource. As the English translation is a translation of the original text and not a translation of the Latin text, it does not translate the Latin annotations of course.

"Regem Cosar" = "King of the Khazars", "Religione Cosaritica" = "Khazar religion", "populus Cosariticus" (precided by "multus") = "Khazars", "Rex Cosar" = "King of Khazar", "[number] Cosri = "[number] Al Khazari" and "the Khazari" etc., "Posthaec ergo dixit Cosri in corde suo" = "After this the Khazari said to himself", "tibi" = " to thee, a Prince of the Khazars", "Sabaeis, Indis, Cosareis (Persis)" = "peoples of Sind, India, and Khazar", "Rex Cosar" = "O King of the Khazars"

So it should be:

• Cosri = 1. Kuzari (book title), 2. Al Khazari, the Khazari
• Cosar (indecl.; pl. in meaning, but could also be a collective singular) = Khazars (pl.)
• Cosarei (-orum, m.) = Khazars (people of Khazar), hence: *Cosareus (-i, m.) = Khazar
• Cosariticus (-a, -um) = Khazar -

It seems like no singular Khazar occurs in the English text, so the Latin text could miss it too. Latin "Cosroes" in "Ego puto esse nomen viri Cosroes, quod Perficorum Regum olim fuit." in an annotation would miss a translation, but should be a name of a man ("nomen viri").

-Slœtel (talk) 13:12, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

@JohnC5. As for the etymology:
On the Latin title page is written "כוזרי" which without adding unwritten vowels should be kvzry or kuzri in an English transcription. This should be the origin of Cosri. A vocalised Hewbrew spelling and a proper English transcription could however be "כּוּזָרִי" and "kuzari" (from Khazar#Translations, cp. English Kuzari). Compared with the text from here English [number] Al Khazari: should be ":אמר הכוזרי [number]" [number] 'mr hkvzry: which could mean "[number] The Kuzari said:" (cp. אמר, ה). As Latin has no article it's omitted and like in the English translation said is omitted too, so only Cosri remains. Thus the Latin origin for both meanings should be an unvocalised כוזרי.
"King of the Khazars" could be "מלך הכוזרים" mlk hkvzrym in the Hewbrew text (cp. מלך). So Cosar could come from a vocalised כּוּזָרִים without the im (cp. ־ים).
So how about "From an unvocalised {{etyl|he|la}} {{m|he|כוזרי}}" and "From a vocalised {{etyl|he|la}} {{m|he|כּוּזָרִים|tr=kuzarim}} without ''im''"? -Slœtel (talk) 22:50, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

I think you're making this more complicated than it needs to be. Hebrew is normally written without vowels, but it always has vowels. The entry at Hebrew כּוּזָרִים (kuzarim) gives the singular as Hebrew כּוּזָרִי (kuzari) . The -i at the end is an adjectival ending that's often used with places and nationalities (think of Israeli from Hebrew יִשְׂרְאֵלִי (yisr'elí)), but such adjectives can be used as nouns, as well. As for Hebrew כּוּזָרִים (kuzarim), it's simply the plural, so "כּוּזָרִים without the im" is just the singular, Hebrew כּוּזָרִי (kuzari). As for whether to include the vowels or not: the links module generates a link to the correct lemma whether you supply vowels or not, so either way is fine inside most templates. It would be best IMO to write it with the vowels, as I have. There's no entry yet for the singular, so it's a redlink, but if there were an entry, it would link to it correctly. Chuck Entz (talk) 03:43, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Diacritics in Middle English

Randomly browsing the Wiktionary, I bumped into this page. I saw the Middle English part, and I was wondering: what are the dot below and the breve below denoting in those Middle English words? E.g., in what is "hẹ̄rest" different from "hērest"? Or "ẹ̮̄rde" from "ērde"? Or "hē̱rd" from "hērd"?

MGorrone (talk) 10:43, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Those were added by User:Doremítzwr, who is no longer active here. User:Doremítzwr had a special love, or obsession, with diacritics. I believe that he added the macron to indicate a long vowel. To that, he added a dot below (ẹ̄) for an open vowel (bate, pate, late), or a breve below (ē̮) for a closed vowel (bet, pet, let). To my knowledge, Middle English was not written with these things. At the moment, I'm at a loss to explain ẹ̮̄ and ē̱ . —Stephen ^(Talk) 16:10, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

It would be helpful to indicate the distinction somehow. In Proto-Romance or Vulgar Latin transcription, I think the underdot (ẹ, ọ) is sometimes used for the close-mid vowel and the hook below (ę, ǫ) for the open-mid vowel. Middle English has the same distinction in long vowels, so it would be nice to mark this somehow. I wonder if there is an existing convention for how to mark it. — Eru·tuon 21:22, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Scholars could use diacritics, even if Middle English was originally written without them. But different scholars could use different diacritics. Wiktionary:About Middle English#Diacritical marks mentions that dictionary editors used different diacritics to indicate "length and stress of vowel sounds". Maybe some dictionary editors or some grammar authors also used other diacritics.

Germans use phoentic transcriptions with diacritics to mark close- and openness, and besides systems in the late 19th and early 20th century which could be individual systems used by single authours there is en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teuthonista . But Teuthonista is intended to be used for German dialects and could likely be insufficient for Middle English. -84.161.3.60 00:50, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

This information is best shown in the =Pronunciation= section. Ƿidsiþ 16:16, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Stephen G. Brown -- in some forms of Middle English, there was an [ɛː] long vowel and an [eː] long vowel which were phonemically distinct. The former often became "ea" in modern English spelling and the latter "ee". Eventually they ended up mostly merging in modern standard English pronunciation (with a few sporadic exceptions). Using ē̮ for [ɛː] and ẹ̄ for [e:] was a philological practice common in early 20th century scholarship, where you could mark up the spellings in a medieval manuscript to indicate the probable medieval pronunciation, rather than producing a separate phonetic transcription... AnonMoos (talk) 20:22, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Comments in the 'discussion' sections in entries of Arabic in https://en.wiktionary.org/

Hi community, I've been added comments on some entries for arabic terms on the 'discussion' tab. Obviously, and I am terrible sorry for it, I've learned of the 'tea room' a bit too late, so I'd like to know whether somebody can check my history and automatically transfer them all on the 'Tea room' so that those entries can be discussed and improved. Thank you so much in advance. --Backinstadiums (talk) 14:16, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

@Backinstadiums: You can check your own history at Special:MyContributions. You can select "Talk" from the dropdown menu labeled "Namespace:" to see only your contributions to entry talk pages. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 14:49, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

@Angr: May I post them all in one single post in the 'tea room' --Backinstadiums (talk) 14:51, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

@Backinstadiums: You may, but you might be more likely to get good responses if you don't overwhelm us with a bunch of questions at once. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 15:29, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Sanskrit words in "bahuvrihi"

Hello, could someone familiar with Sanskrit kindly check if I indicated the two Sanskrit words in the 1825 quotation in bahuvrihi correctly? Much obliged. — SMUconlaw (talk) 17:08, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Look good to me. —Stephen ^(Talk) 17:38, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

Great! Thanks. — SMUconlaw (talk) 17:53, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

naturalist

Sense 1 is given as "dated", but no indication is given of a "more modern" term. Is it really dated as stated? DonnanZ (talk) 21:53, 18 February 2017 (UTC)

It is not dated in BrE. As far as I can guess from Google results, it is not dated in AmE either. I don't know where the idea that it is dated comes from. Mihia (talk) 18:26, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

My impression too. I'll probably end up removing the label, but I'll give it a few more days. DonnanZ (talk) 18:42, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Webster 1828 has: "One that studies natural history and philosophy or physics; one that is versed in natural history or philosophy. It is more generally applied to one that is versed in natural history."

I think the underlined portion is dated, but not our definition. DCDuring TALK 23:02, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

I have attempted a new def to cover the dated part; criticism/improvement is welcome. —Μετάknowledge^{discuss/deeds} 01:14, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

There is yet another (current) sense relating to art and literature: "a person who practises naturalism in art or literature" (Oxford); "a person who writes, paints, etc. in the style of naturalism" (Cambridge). DonnanZ (talk) 09:46, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

We have that ism at naturalism. We could replace our current second def. with "One who adheres to or practices naturalism." That would include even more usages (even future ones) without requiring more definitions. DCDuring TALK 13:17, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

mob cap

It's labelled "chiefly historical". Is this true and if so, what are the similar modern head coverings prevalent (not only) in food production usually called? The term should be there as a synonym because clearly people do use mob cap [13]. --Droigheann (talk) 00:52, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

This supplier, at least, still refers to them as "mob caps". Mihia (talk) 18:32, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

The Wikipedia article is worth a read, it mentions both historical and modern senses. The original mob cap wasn't meant to be disposable, unlike the modern mob cap. I think the entry could be amended accordingly. DonnanZ (talk) 22:18, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

I have added the modern sense, and left the "mainly historical" label in, it may still be possible to buy the historical type. DonnanZ (talk) 22:31, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

Note that there's also a modern sense that may or may not meet CFI. DTLHS (talk) 22:35, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

revenue

We are missing, aren't we, the reading and sense of rev-EN-yoo (sometimes spelt revènue)? E.g. in King Lear, et al. ---> Tooironic (talk) 09:00, 19 February 2017 (UTC)

have been in the wars

The form "be in the wars" is also used, but I'm not sure how to handle it. Should the entry be made at in the wars? Mihia (talk) 04:49, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

• Yes. I've added it. Some paper dictionaries have "be in the wars" but I think such forms are SoP. SemperBlotto (talk) 07:10, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks ... Do we need both in the wars and have been in the wars? While I feel that "in the wars" can't mean exactly the same in both, I wonder if it would nevertheless be clearer to treat everything under one entry. Mihia (talk) 20:33, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

The OneLook lemmings speak with three weak voices: there is is one dictionary for each of in the wars, be in the wars, and have been in the wars. Though I have not yet investigated, I feel that one could say was in the wars in the sense in question, but not use the present tense or any infinite form. One could say in response to "How did he get all banged up?", "In the wars". One common expression is that one "like one was in the wars". That makes me think that the core idea is that a metaphorical war (some arduous struggle) is the cause of some injury. Perhaps we should just have the metaphorical "definition" of in the wars and redirect everything else to it. DCDuring TALK 20:53, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

That is my feeling too, but I also feel an uncertainty about "have been in the wars" meaning damaged/injured (now) and "be in the wars" also meaning damaged/injured (now). Mihia (talk) 21:42, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Yes, that's the fatal flaw of the in the wars entry as it now stands. How can it be an adjective if it's used with a past participle to describe present condition? If it were an adjective, you could say "that hat is in the wars", or "it will be in the wars when I get through with it".

It's also more complicated than what we've discussed so far: I can find usage for "been through a few wars", "been through the wars", "been in a few wars", "been in the wars", "been through a war", even "been through war". There's also similar usage for "through the mangle/wringer/ringer". It all points to "war" as something metaphorically difficult or horrible that leaves its marks on anyone/anything that goes through it or has been in it. The only commonality is a verbal expression in the past perfect indicating being or experiencing + a preposition indicating location or movement inside + a noun phrase including war. This seems like a metaphor that's given rise to a few set phrases, but is still live in its own right. Chuck Entz (talk) 23:00, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure that there is a "fatal flaw" the in the wars entry as it now stands. People do say things like "He's in the wars", for example, to talk about present condition, which matches that definition. I just think the different interpretations (present condition versus past experience) make it a little more difficult to reconcile both uses under one heading, in terms of the actual wording and presentation used (which is where I came in). Mihia (talk) 23:18, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

tweeter-in-chief

This was (and maybe still is) a generic nickname for a Twitter user who is also a leader (used for Barack Obama and Kevin Rudd). Since July 2016 it has increasingly become a personal nickname for Donald Trump. The generic sense maybe a little hard to cite under CFI and the personal nickname would have to be a hot word. Worth adding? Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 14:26, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

If attestable by three durably archived cites (WT:CFI), it should be worth adding as "all words of all languages" (WT:Main Page). If not attestable by durable arcived cites, one could at least add it to Appendix:List of protologisms/Q–Z. -84.161.3.60 01:06, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

looking for a word

How would you describe countries like BRIC that are surpassing the economic development of other countries? Surpassing development? Is surpassive an attestable word? (I'm trying to translate 趕超發展.) ---> Tooironic (talk) 15:56, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Can you use faster here? Faster-growing, faster-developing. DonnanZ (talk) 16:22, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

outpacing, surpassing? It's a bit out of date, though, only India and China are outgrowing the rest of the world now. Lingo Bingo Dingo (talk) 16:11, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Seems like this would be best translated by rephrasing – there isn't a good adjective that does this job in English, AFAIK. Ƿidsiþ 16:13, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

German genitive of Olmütz

I created the entry Olmütz and the template {{de-proper noun}} has automatically created its genitive. However, it seems that this word has never been used in genitive, at least I failed to find such an example. If it is true, what can I do so that the template did not form the genitive? I found there only possibilities of adding alternative forms, but not how to turn it off. --Jan Kameníček (talk) 18:59, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

The expected genitive is Olmütz' (with an apostrophe) before a noun, e.g. in Olmütz' engen Gassen. In other contexts the genitive is probably identical to the nominative, e.g. die Häuser des alten Olmütz or wegen Olmütz. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 19:16, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! --Jan Kameníček (talk) 19:18, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

@Angr: There are three expected genitives: Olmütz' <thing>, Olmützens <thing>, <thing> des Olmütz. But an expectation does not attest a genitive.
Genitive in - but with article does exist: "Ruhm des alten Olmütz", "Bauwerk des alten Olmütz", "Mauern des alten Olmütz" (post 1945).
Genitive in -ens does exist: "von der Belagerung Olmützens", "sich Olmützens zu bemachtigen", "hatte Olmützens Bischof Bruno" (Der Spiegel, so post 1945).
Genitive in -' I did not find as google ignores the apostroph and as e.g. "Olmütz' Bischof" or "Olmütz' Belagerung" did bring up unfitting results.
"wegen Olmütz" alone does not attest a gentive as wegen is also used with dative and already occurs with dative in the 19th century. Only if the author uses wegen with genitive elsewhere, one can assume that he uses it with genitive in "wegen Olmütz" too. Anyhow, two texts I arbitrarily picked used it with genitive.

@Jan Kameníček: You could use {{head|de|proper noun|g=n}} which does not create a genitive form. One could also replace {{de-proper noun|n}} by {{de-proper noun|n|?}} to indicate that the genitive is unknown, but it would be better if the template wouldn't link and maybe wouldn't show the question mark similar to {{en-noun|?}}.

-84.161.3.60 00:32, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

I see. Thanks for explanation and for fixing it. --Jan Kameníček (talk) 10:51, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

gouttière

Judging by the definition "gutter (duct for water)", one would think this refers to a gutter in a street, but it looks to me like it refers specifically to a rain gutter or eavestrough in a roof. If I read the entry at TLFI correctly, it also has a number of other senses that mostly don't overlap with those of English gutter. I had two years of college French three decades ago, so I don't feel comfortable fixing this myself. Chuck Entz (talk) 20:06, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

Indeed, I wouldn't use it to refer to a street gutter; that would be a caniveau. --Barytonesis (talk) 09:41, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

Guianan

Is Guianan OK? --Quadcont (talk) 21:24, 20 February 2017 (UTC)

See WT:ATTEST and “Guianan”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.. DCDuring TALK 00:38, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

pozzed

What does that mean? --Barytonesis (talk) 13:44, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

In modern slang, HIV positive. There may be older meanings. DTLHS (talk) 15:08, 21 February 2017 (UTC)

roof over one's head

How should we configure the plural form here? roofs over one's head? roofs over their head? ---> Tooironic (talk) 08:12, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

• Whichever one(s) you can find usages of. SemperBlotto (talk) 09:35, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Just to complicate things, my preferred plural is rooves. DonnanZ (talk) 10:23, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

To simplify things Google ngram shows rooves to be about 1/400th as common as roofs. Roooves over our|your|their heads cannot be found at all at Google n-gram, whereas the roofs forms can. DCDuring TALK 17:04, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

OK, but I prefer to be in the minority. And I'm not surprised you can't find "Roooves over our|your|their heads." See [14] DonnanZ (talk) 00:17, 2 March 2017 (UTC)

боҙтау

This word does not exist in Bashkir. How do I have it deleted? Borovi4ok (talk) 10:49, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

• Make an entry in RFD (Requests for Deletion). DonnanZ (talk) 11:38, 22 February 2017 (UTC)
  • Better yet, make an entry in WT:RFV (Requests for Verification). Sometimes, people assert that a given word "does not exist" in a certain language, but it turns out that the word is used in that language, but isn't standard or is looked down by language purists, or that sort of thing. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 13:36, 22 February 2017 (UTC)
    • Thanks guys. Put it for deletion.
    • Yes, I'm pretty sure it does not exist in Bashkir. Its exact cognate exists in Kazakh though.Borovi4ok (talk) 16:58, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

If it's a Kazakh spelling can it just have a change of language? It still needs double-checking though. DonnanZ (talk) 21:37, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

Kazakh doesn't use the letter ҙ (ź). iceberg in Kazakh is айсберг (aisberg), көшпе мұз (köşpe mūz) or мұзтау (mūztau). The last one is a Bashkir cognate. --Anatoli T. ^{(обсудить}/^вклад) 00:39, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

OK, it's been marked as RFD but not listed there, would someone like the honour of adding it there? DonnanZ (talk) 18:32, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

Did so. Borovi4ok (talk) 08:13, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

ahold

I just noticed that we have get ahold of and get ahold of oneself. Is this truly a use of ahold and not merely a hold ? Leasnam (talk) 20:14, 22 February 2017 (UTC)

The noun sense at ahold smells a bit fishy to me. Doesn't it stem from confusion/error, like alot? (Perhaps, for example, get a hold has been confused with get ahead.) Is it in other dictionaries? I think ahold's noun might benefit from more usage notes and a separate ety section. Equinox ◑ 16:50, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

OED has it as an adverb and says:

2. So as to hold on to someone or something; with a firm hold or grip. Chiefly with of. Cf. aholt adv.

Chiefly regional, and in representations of colloq., and nonstandard speech. Some examples may represent instances of the indefinite article with hold n.1 2. Cf. to catch, get, lay, lose, seize, hold at hold n.1 2a.

• 1850 Graham's Mag. Aug. 119/2 The good sailor who had caught ahold of her when she was fallin', told her to cheer up.
• 1879 Scribner's Monthly May 17/1 With one bee a-hold of your collar..and another a-hold of each arm.
• 1887 W. Morris tr. Homer Odyssey x. 264 He caught ahold upon me.
• 1905 Southwestern Rep. 88 491/1, I had one hand ahold of the car.
• 1925 E. Hemingway In our Time (1926) v. 79 Nick dropped his wrist. ‘Listen,’ Ad Francis said. ‘Take ahold again.’
• 1994 J. McNaught Perfect 238 He grabbed ahold of the branches of the fallen aspen.

--Droigheann (talk) 19:33, 23 February 2017 (UTC)

• I think it may have been construed as a- (“in”) + hold (“a grasp or grip”). AFICT a-#Etymology 2 has been a productive prefix until fairly recently. Words like abed and amidst are examples, but see Category:English words prefixed with a-, among which are more. It is hard for me to see how any other reading of "I had one hand ahold of the car." is possible. DCDuring TALK 15:39, 24 February 2017 (UTC)
• Collins dictionary [15] gives "get ahold of" as an example for both noun and adverb. Personally I find it hard to see the supposed noun sense as anything other than an error for "a hold". Mihia (talk) 19:05, 28 February 2017 (UTC)
  • Cambridge Dictionary says it's an adverb. That's seems right to me. —Stephen ^(Talk) 18:15, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

    Adverbs with an apparently mandatory following phrase with of? DCDuring TALK 18:52, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

right as variant of completely

I don't know etymology of it. d1g (talk) 10:41, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

I'm not sure exactly what you mean. An appropriate definition ("veritable") appears as def. 6 of the adjective under Etymology 1. Are you saying that you don't get the connection between that definition and the others? DCDuring TALK 15:19, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

I meant this one:

"windows right to the floor" - all the way

окна до самого пола (или: окна у самого пола) d1g (talk) 19:14, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

Etymology two, adverb, "Immediately, directly.". DTLHS (talk) 19:22, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

Are you sure? My understanding that it is ADVdef4 from MW, not 6a or 6b d1g (talk) 19:36, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

It seems that many speakers simply say "floor to ceiling", without any adverb. I don't understand if MW is wrong or right. d1g (talk) 19:45, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

Sorry about missing that the adverb was in question, not the adjective. I like MWOnline's adverb definition 6a for right to the floor. I don't think that "immediately, directly" is accurate for this purpose. 6a "In a complete manner" (ie, "completely") is semantically related, but distinct, and covers some other usage for which the other definitions are not substitutable. DCDuring TALK 22:27, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

is it OK to add redirects for phrases?

If you lookup the phrase "by that token" in English Wikipedia, you won't find anything. I was thinking I would add a redirect to the page "token" but I'm not sure if this would be a good edit. Any thoughts, or could you redirect me to a relevant policy? Proxyma (talk) 18:25, 24 February 2017 (UTC)

• It is normally OK if the meaning is obvious. In this case though I don't think it is - so I have added by that token. SemperBlotto (talk) 05:04, 25 February 2017 (UTC)
  • SemperBlotto I merged that entry with "by the same token" using a redirect. Can you take a look to ensure I setup the alternative form correctly? Proxyma (talk) 20:27, 5 March 2017 (UTC)

onwæcnan

The Conjugation table at onwæcnan displays a preterite of onwōc, which is identical to the past forms of onwacan, a strong verb. According to Bosworth & Toller, the past for onwæcnan should be weak (e.g. Ðá hí onwæcnedun) Leasnam (talk) 19:04, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

nm, Fixed. Leasnam (talk) 19:13, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Edits of User:86.130.177.116

This user has been editing a lot of Old English entries, in particular pronunciations. Many of the edits are fine, but not all of them are. For example, they removed the phonetic transcription of sagu, and put an invalid phoneme in scafan. I don't know what to think of the edit to prætt. @Leasnam, can you have a closer look? —CodeCat 19:52, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Serbo-Croatian сврбјети

Can someone who knows Serbo-Croatian help with the tone? The entry says свр̀бјети but Derksen says свр́бјети. Normally I would check the Hrvatski jezični portal, but the entry for this word has the r garbled. Derksen sometimes gets his Serbo-Croatian tones wrong but I've also seen mistakes in Wiktionary. Derksen quotes Chakavian forms with both long and short r, so they are of no help. Benwing2 (talk) 21:57, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

@Ivan Štambuk, Zabadu Benwing2 (talk) 21:58, 26 February 2017 (UTC)

Garbled r is р̀, HJP uses some encoding of their own. You can also check Vuk (Karadžić)'s dictionary wherefrom most works get their accents anyways, which has свр́бјети.

As a native speaker I think I have свр́бети, although my accents and especially the short rising accent is instable. You should add both accents in any case.

Crom daba (talk) 23:04, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

Category:en:Backformations

We want the etymology category Category:en:Backformations, right? --Quadcont (talk) 10:04, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

@Quadcont: It's at CAT:English back-formations. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 10:56, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

go raibh maith agat. --Quadcont (talk) 11:01, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

dāh -> daoch ?!

Why exactly does dāh redirect to daoch when dāh is an Old English word whose entry is under dah? Shouldn't dāh redirect to dah (maybe dah#Old_English) instead?

MGorrone (talk) 10:09, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

The redirect is there because the page daoch used to be at dāh, and the redirect was kept when the page was moved. In fact, dāh shouldn't redirect anywhere (that's not how we used redirects here), so I'll just delete it now instead. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 10:55, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

get up to

Is this British English, as the OED claims? ---> Tooironic (talk) 15:43, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

Not exclusively British English, at any rate; Americans certainly use it in the senses illustrated by the usexes too. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 16:07, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

It's used all the time in Canada as well. Maybe it was originally exclusive to Britain, but not anymore. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 23:27, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

vertan

In Dutch, its cognate verdaan is a past participle. Is this true of German as well? —CodeCat 20:00, 27 February 2017 (UTC)

@CodeCat: Yes, it's also the past participle of vertun. —Aɴɢʀ (talk) 15:29, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

deadwrong

deadwrong, one word. Isn't this just dead (adverb sense 2) +‎ wrong ? Leasnam (talk) 23:02, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

I've RfVed it. Under WT:COALMINE the main entry would be at [[dead wrong]], if this is attestable. DCDuring TALK 23:10, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

Some collocations using dead (adverb) are: dead certain, dead last, dead quiet, dead honest, dead still, dead asleep, dead tired, dead fast, dead slow, dead on, dead earnest, dead honest. But dead is collocated with relatively few adjectives and the ones it collocates with are not entirely predictable semantically (or otherwise) IMO. DCDuring TALK 23:32, 28 February 2017 (UTC)

143

I recently deleted a string of number including 143 pursuant to established consensus on inclusion of numbers. However, I seem to recall from my youth that 143 was at some point used as shorthand for "I love you" (based on the 1, 4, and 3 representing the number of letters for each word in the phrase). There appear to be a smattering of sources for this proposition, e.g., 2011, Dr. Brian Snow, Santa Claus and Little Sister: “I love you. Love always, Your wishful daughter, Lupe. P.S. 143” I put Lupe's heart down and wiped my eyes. I learned from the girls that “143” meant “I love you” from the old military days when messages had to be quick and cheap on Western Union. Does this ring a bell for anyone else? bd2412 T 02:50, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

I have seen 143 used for I love you over the past several years. —Stephen ^(Talk) 18:09, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

pwn

Is it accurate that this was originally leetspeak? Andrew Sheedy (talk) 03:17, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Whatever you want to call it, it originated as a frequent typo in textual computer communications which was later elevated into a thing of its own, like "teh", "pron" etc. AnonMoos (talk) 16:40, 1 March 2017 (UTC)

Although the typo pwn has surely occurred many times since the typewriter was invented, the slang verb pwn was first deliberately used and popularized in leetspeak. —Stephen ^(Talk) 18:07, 1 March 2017 (UTC)