Linguistic Miscellany Thread

[zompist]

• Do you lean towards constructions like 'x past y' and 'x to y' or number-quoting like 'xx:yy'? E.g. is 5:10 "ten past five" or "five ten"?
• Do you prefer numbers only or do you use the phrases 'half past', 'quarter past' and 'quarter to'?
• Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?
• What's your typical precision? Do you quote to the minute, or to the nearest five minutes?

1. "Five ten"
2. I think I use the numbers more.
3. Never.
4. Nearest 15 minutes works around here. But since all our clocks are digital, it's also easy to just read off the time. Except for the one in the bedroom which my wife sets 7 minutes ahead, so I usually correct for that, then approximate.

[Nortaneous]

• Do you lean towards constructions like 'x past y' and 'x to y' or number-quoting like 'xx:yy'? E.g. is 5:10 "ten past five" or "five ten"?
• Do you prefer numbers only or do you use the phrases 'half past', 'quarter past' and 'quarter to'?
• Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?
• What's your typical precision? Do you quote to the minute, or to the nearest five minutes?

1) numbers
2) numbers only
3) no, numbers only
4) depends, but nearest ten or fifteen are other options

[Travis B.]

• Do you lean towards constructions like 'x past y' and 'x to y' or number-quoting like 'xx:yy'? E.g. is 5:10 "ten past five" or "five ten"?
• Do you prefer numbers only or do you use the phrases 'half past', 'quarter past' and 'quarter to'?
• Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?
• What's your typical precision? Do you quote to the minute, or to the nearest five minutes?

1) numbers
2) numbers only
3) no, numbers only
4) depends, but nearest ten or fifteen are other options

I do the same.

[Rounin Ryuuji]

Do you lean towards constructions like 'x past y' and 'x to y' or number-quoting like 'xx:yy'? E.g. is 5:10 "ten past five" or "five ten"?

Any of "ten minutes past five", "ten past five", or "five ten", usually the last one.

Do you prefer numbers only or do you use the phrases 'half past', 'quarter past' and 'quarter to'?

It depends on context, but usually [whatever]-fifteen, [whatever]-thirty, [whatever]-forty-five

Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?

No.

What's your typical precision? Do you quote to the minute, or to the nearest five minutes?

Usually to the minute.

[Linguoboy]

So this was a bone contention between me and my spouse. I don't like false precision (we had to reset several of the clocks manually so it's not like we were running on atomic time or something) so I would approximate and say, e.g. "It's like five o'clock already". He would reply, "It's 4:57". And I'd retort, "Yes, that's like five o'clock." (If I were really annoyed, I'd add, "That's how rounding works.")

Now that I think about it, it may have also have been a defence against my tendency to procraste. If I describe it as being later than it is (and I always round up, never down), that helps to motivate me. Say we've planned to leave at 5:15 and I say "It's like 5 now", then that tells me I have less than 15 minutes to get ready, whereas if I say, "It's 4:57" then some dumb part of my brain is like, "It's not even five o'clock yet, you've got plenty of time."

• Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?

Never. I first encountred this usage in Germany, where I had English and Irish friends, and it baffled me because in German the equivalent of "half X" means half an hour before x. (I also learned a variant of German where you can use "dreiviertel acht" to mean "7:15", which even folks from elsewhere in the German Sprachraum don't understand. Weirdly, Catalan has the same system.)

[zompist]

So this was a bone contention between me and my spouse. I don't like false precision (we had to reset several of the clocks manually so it's not like we were running on atomic time or something) so I would approximate and say, e.g. "It's like five o'clock already". He would reply, "It's 4:57". And I'd retort, "Yes, that's like five o'clock." (If I were really annoyed, I'd add, "That's how rounding works.")

We have this sort of conversation about half hours. To my wife, "5:30" is "almost six". To me it's like "no, it's just halfway there!"

[Rounin Ryuuji]

So this was a bone contention between me and my spouse. I don't like false precision (we had to reset several of the clocks manually so it's not like we were running on atomic time or something) so I would approximate and say, e.g. "It's like five o'clock already". He would reply, "It's 4:57". And I'd retort, "Yes, that's like five o'clock." (If I were really annoyed, I'd add, "That's how rounding works.")

Now that I think about it, it may have also have been a defence against my tendency to procraste. If I describe it as being later than it is (and I always round up, never down), that helps to motivate me. Say we've planned to leave at 5:15 and I say "It's like 5 now", then that tells me I have less than 15 minutes to get ready, whereas if I say, "It's 4:57" then some dumb part of my brain is like, "It's not even five o'clock yet, you've got plenty of time."

I imagine your husband being an amusing person.

[Kuchigakatai]

So this was a bone contention between me and my spouse. I don't like false precision (we had to reset several of the clocks manually so it's not like we were running on atomic time or something) so I would approximate and say, e.g. "It's like five o'clock already". He would reply, "It's 4:57". And I'd retort, "Yes, that's like five o'clock." (If I were really annoyed, I'd add, "That's how rounding works.")

We have this sort of conversation about half hours. To my wife, "5:30" is "almost six". To me it's like "no, it's just halfway there!"

I find this very annoying hearing it from other people, but I think it's because they think of the entire afternoon in such cases. It's "almost" 6 in terms of the period that started at 12 noon.

[bradrn]

I’m trying to track down a paper I saw some time ago (possibly linked by someone here?) but have now forgotten. It was about the details of rule application in sound changes which can be applied multiple times: I remember it citing two languages with the same sound change, except one language applied the rule left-to-right and the other applied it right-to-left. (I have a vague memory of the former language being Slovenian and the latter one being some Australian language, but can’t really remember.) Does anyone here happen to know which paper I’m talking about?

[zyxw59]

• Do you lean towards constructions like 'x past y' and 'x to y' or number-quoting like 'xx:yy'? E.g. is 5:10 "ten past five" or "five ten"?
• Do you prefer numbers only or do you use the phrases 'half past', 'quarter past' and 'quarter to'?
• Do you ever abbreviate "half past x" to "half x"?
• What's your typical precision? Do you quote to the minute, or to the nearest five minutes?

• If I'm reading the time off a digital clock, almost always number-quoting; if it's off an analog clock, I'll often use "x to y" for x = 20,quarter,10,5, but use number-quoting for other times.
• "quarter to" more often than "quarter past" more often than "half past"
• no
• Digital clock: usually minute but I might round to five minutes; analog clock: almost always round to five minutes

[linguistcat]

Maybe I interpreted something wrong, but I read something recently in passing that makes me think there's a connection between the vowel /a/ and pharyngealization, at least in some languages. Are pharyngealized consonants more likely to lower vowels around them? Is /a/ likely to cause pharyngealization? Both?

[bradrn]

Maybe I interpreted something wrong, but I read something recently in passing that makes me think there's a connection between the vowel /a/ and pharyngealization, at least in some languages. Are pharyngealized consonants more likely to lower vowels around them? Is /a/ likely to cause pharyngealization? Both?

Not sure about [a], but [ɑ] is the vowel corresponding to [ʕ] in the same way that e.g. [i] corresponds to [j]. Also, I’ve heard that vowels tend to be fronted around pharyngeals (most commonly ɑ → æ), though I don’t know why.

[Travis B.]

Maybe I interpreted something wrong, but I read something recently in passing that makes me think there's a connection between the vowel /a/ and pharyngealization, at least in some languages. Are pharyngealized consonants more likely to lower vowels around them? Is /a/ likely to cause pharyngealization? Both?

Not sure about [a], but [ɑ] is the vowel corresponding to [ʕ] in the same way that e.g. [i] corresponds to [j]. Also, I’ve heard that vowels tend to be fronted around pharyngeals (most commonly ɑ → æ), though I don’t know why.

I have heard the same for all of the above.

[linguistcat]

Maybe I interpreted something wrong, but I read something recently in passing that makes me think there's a connection between the vowel /a/ and pharyngealization, at least in some languages. Are pharyngealized consonants more likely to lower vowels around them? Is /a/ likely to cause pharyngealization? Both?

Not sure about [a], but [ɑ] is the vowel corresponding to [ʕ] in the same way that e.g. [i] corresponds to [j]. Also, I’ve heard that vowels tend to be fronted around pharyngeals (most commonly ɑ → æ), though I don’t know why.

I have heard the same for all of the above.

Thank you. This is very useful.

[Qwynegold]

Also, I’ve heard that vowels tend to be fronted around pharyngeals (most commonly ɑ → æ), though I don’t know why.

What?? I thought pharyngeals had the same effect as uvulars; that vowels lower and/or back near them.

[Creyeditor]

Post-velars have complex effects. The dissertation by Sylak-Glassman (2014) gives a good typological overview at some point.

[Kuchigakatai]

I’m trying to track down a paper I saw some time ago (possibly linked by someone here?) but have now forgotten. It was about the details of rule application in sound changes which can be applied multiple times: I remember it citing two languages with the same sound change, except one language applied the rule left-to-right and the other applied it right-to-left. (I have a vague memory of the former language being Slovenian and the latter one being some Australian language, but can’t really remember.) Does anyone here happen to know which paper I’m talking about?

I don't remember that paper at all, but it reminds me of a difference I like between French/Spanish. From Latin to both languages, there's two interacting sound changes, the "first syncope" (of unstressed unchecked medial vowels, typically near /l r/, less so /n s/) and "intervocalic voicing", but somehow, in French the former one is applied first, and in Spanish the latter is applied first.

Classical Latin: vēritātem [weːrɪˈtaːtɛm]
spoken Late Latin ca. 4th century: [βereˈtaːte]

with first syncope: [βerˈtaːte]
with intervoc. voicing: [βerˈtaːde]
early Old French, 11th century: vertéṭ [veɾˈteθ]

with intervoc. voicing: [βereˈdaːde]
with first syncope: [βerˈdaːde]
Old Spanish, 13th century: verdad [βerˈdad]

And note you can't say Old Spanish underwent [-ret-] > [-rt-] > [-rd-] because on the other hand there's curtus/a > corto/a, corpus > cuerpo(s), circā > cerca, gentēs > yentes... which show that intervocalic voicing must've actually been applied first, unlike French!

[dɮ the phoneme]

It's surprising to me how stable the word "name" is across IE languages. It's one of vary few words (along with the likes of father, mother, brother, sister, and the number 1-10) that seems to be consistently, recognizably cognate across every IE language I've encountered. This is of course not very scientific. But still, I wonder what makes it so enduring. Is it like this in other language families?

[Linguoboy]

It's surprising to me how stable the word "name" is across IE languages. It's one of vary few words (along with the likes of father, mother, brother, sister, and the number 1-10) that seems to be consistently, recognizably cognate across every IE language I've encountered. This is of course not very scientific. But still, I wonder what makes it so enduring. Is it like this in other language families?

I think it's just that, overall, the nasals are more resistant to change in Indo-European languages than other consonants.

But here's a test for you. One of the words in the following Welsh-language paragraph is a direct descendant of PIE *h₁nómn̥. Can you tell me which word it is?

Hollalluog dduw, i ti y mae pob calon yn agored, pob dymuniad yn hysbys, a phob dirgel yn amlwg: Glanha, gan hynny, feddyliau ein calonnau trwy ysbrydoliaeth dy lân ysbryd, fel y gallom dy garu di'n berffaith, a mawrhau'n deilwng dy enw santaidd; trwy grist ein harglwydd.

[KathTheDragon]

But here's a test for you. One of the words in the following Welsh-language paragraph is a direct descendant of PIE *h₁nómn̥. Can you tell me which word it is?

Hollalluog dduw, i ti y mae pob calon yn agored, pob dymuniad yn hysbys, a phob dirgel yn amlwg: Glanha, gan hynny, feddyliau ein calonnau trwy ysbrydoliaeth dy lân ysbryd, fel y gallom dy garu di'n berffaith, a mawrhau'n deilwng dy enw santaidd; trwy grist ein harglwydd.

That's not very fair, since the Celtic cognates don't derive from the form *h₃nómn̩/*h₃néh₃mn̩ (I'm undecided exactly which form is correct) - they reflect *h₃n̩(h₃)mn̩ with a zero-grade root.