The Language (and travel) Thread

[T.o.b.y]

That's not how they actually dubbed that scene is it? Please say it's not...

[Caya]

Oh dearie me, no , that was just a joke from when the English version had already aired but the German hadn't. A semi-translated version of the actual, dubbed scene is here.

[Arcadia]

-- thus confusing all of us and necessitating expressions like "y'all" and "you guys."

I believe that's "youse guys," isn't it?

[Carol the Dabbler]

Alex used to say that!  (But he's not from around here.)

 

The expressions for you-plural seem to be regional.  Around here it's generally "you folks" or "you guys," and just a little further south it's "you all."  Some places (also south of here) it's "you-uns."  And I think "youse" is northeastern, maybe New Yawk.

 

So, everybody -- what do they say where you're from?  Not just different parts of the US, but different English-speaking countries as well?

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

One more comment on the German dubbing.  They had really got themselves into a situation, hadn't they?  They just about had to switch to "Du" in the will-you-be-my-best-man scene.  Otherwise you've got someone saying "Of course formal-you are my best friend" -- how crazy is that?!  (Not that it hadn't been pretty damn silly for a long time.)

 

OK, back to regional and global ways of specifying you-plural.  (Or more comments on German dubbing.)  (Or whatever.)

 

[Arcadia]

In my house we always said "all of you" or "each one of you" or something like that. I don't know if that's a regional thing (west coast) or the result of having an English professor for a dad, though.

[Janie]

Well, in Czech there is the same problem with "vy" (you all) and "Vy" (the formal way of "you"). So when addressing more people we just say "vy všichni" (all of you).

 

And yes, I wish we had just one way for addressing people, too. Czech language is complicated enough even without this nonsense.

[Bakerstreet Irregular]

Here in the Northeast, it's "you guys". It takes a person up from New York or New Jersey to get the "youse guys" and I hear that very rarely.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Well, in Czech there is the same problem with "vy" (you all) and "Vy" (the formal way of "you"). So when addressing more people we just say "vy všichni" (all of you).

 

 

Well, now we know how to say "y'all" in Czech! 

 

[Carol the Dabbler]

In my house we always said "all of you" or "each one of you" or something like that. I don't know if that's a regional thing (west coast) or the result of having an English professor for a dad, though.

 

Despite having lived on the west coast for a few years, I have very little sense of any regionalisms there.  Maybe it's because they turn up so often in Hollywood television programs that they quickly become nationalisms.  The only one I ever noticed was a particular way of saying "Exactly!" when agreeing with someone.

 

'Course, that's not counting Valley Speak.

[jesskayding]

Well I live in a world of slang... Which is now a sort of language course taught on several college campuses... They call it Ebonics.

 

You be trippin'- which is like when someone overacts to something. Can also be used when someone exaggerates, ie a big story teller.

 

They/she/he be about that life - usually said in a situation when someone says/does something rude or in some cases, said about someone who says something sarcastic or does something silly or uncool.

 

You got me bent or bent up - can be said if someone approaches,speaks, or reacts to you aggressively. Or if you are asked to do something you don't like to do. In some cases is said if a person misquotes you or assumes an untruth concerning you.

 

 

There's so much more: if you want me to define the following let me know:

 

Suspect

 

Chicken head

 

A Beast

 

Ghetto Pass

 

Cool Points

 

Hatin'

 

You Slippin'

 

A Hot Mess

 

Get your life

 

Shorty

 

My Raise

 

Homeboy/girl

 

Tore Up

 

 

I'll stop now.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Is Ebonics actually considered slang, though?  I thought it was considered more of a dialect -- though maybe that's not quite the correct word either.  (According to Wikipedia, in any case, it's nowadays usually referred to as African American Vernacular English or some similar term.)

 

[jesskayding]

Is Ebonics actually considered slang, though? I thought it was considered more of a dialect -- though maybe that's not quite the correct word either. (According to Wikipedia, in any case, it's nowadays usually referred to as African American Vernacular English or some similar term.)

 

Let me define African American Vernacular English for you: The language of black folk who live predominately in the hood/ghetto. About 15 years ago it was called slang. Then it became a bit overwhelming for any other person who did not use that "vernacular".

 

Henceforth it became a necessity on some fronts, especially in the realm of the entertainment industry to understand the context of hood dialect. Hence was born the term Ebonics.. Maybe Ebonics just sounds so much cooler than slang. Although I'm sure a hipster wouldn't hesitate taking a course in a class called African American Slang.

[Carol the Dabbler]

OK, I see where you're coming from.  And I doubt that a hipster would be interested in a course called "African American Vernacular English" -- that sure doesn't sound "hip"!

 

There seems to be a hesitancy here in the US to acknowledge any sort of regional or cultural variant as a "real dialect."  I've heard that the term Ebonics was coined because black kids were being criticized for talking that way in school.  But white kids are criticized for speaking their local variant as well.  I think it's important for students to know standard American English, to make it easier for them to participate in general American life.  But I do think it would be nice if the teachers would say, "That's not standard American English," instead of "That's wrong," so that they're acknowledging the existence of the local dialect.

 

[jesskayding]

I'm down with that.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Imported from another thread:
 

14. Sassiest character:                not sure what sassy means, so no answer here

"Sassy" means something like a combination of perky and impertinent, like a bratty little kid who's sufficiently endearing to get away with telling the truth a few times too often.  Here's an American dictionary's definition and a British one.
 
Because the word can mean a range of things, I suspect that even we native speakers were actually answering several different questions!

[Schlauer Fuchs]

I also had a look at some dictionaries, but it seems there is no real concept for being sassy in German, so I still can't grasp the exact meaning. But from what I understand it may mean my answer might be "Moriarty," him appearing as a well-dressed and well-behaved gentleman if he likes, but at the same time being bit of a cunning smart-ass and behaving quite naughty at the next moment.

[Carol the Dabbler]

Words of that sort can be a real challenge to translate, or even to explain.

 

I once used the word "corny" when talking to a German woman who was unfamiliar with the term.  I tried to define it, but couldn't come up with anything I was satisfied with, so she consulted her German-English dictionary and found "schmaltzig" -- at which point I did a face-palm which puzzled her till I explained that "schmaltz" is also a common term in Yiddish, which has loaned a number of slang words to American English -- so why didn't I think of "schmaltzy" in the first place?!

 

[SherlockedCAMPer]

trying to translate sassy into German reminds me of a conversation I had years ago with an older man I know.  He & his first wife had worked in Brasil for a number of years.  He was telling me that in Brazilian Portuguese there is a word that doesn't have an English word for it.  He said that the closest was taking the word injustice (a noun) and and making it a verb, injusticed (since we were talking about a past event).

[Carol the Dabbler]

I think we do have some colloquial expressions with pretty much that meaning -- like "he done her wrong."  But yeah, I can't offhand think of a "real word" with that meaning.

 

[Schlauer Fuchs]

trying to translate sassy into German reminds me of a conversation I had years ago with an older man I know.  He & his first wife had worked in Brasil for a number of years.  He was telling me that in Brazilian Portuguese there is a word that doesn't have an English word for it.  He said that the closest was taking the word injustice (a noun) and and making it a verb, injusticed (since we were talking about a past event).

 

I once had a similar conversation with an American woman who at that time had lived for years in Germany and was absolutely (and even accent-free) fluent in German. But she told me that the word "Gemütlichkeit" still made her struggle, because she couldn't understand the concept. She said at some point she thought she had made out the meaning, "Gemütlichkeit" meaning the combination of candels and cushions. That really made everyone present laugh so hard. It's fascinating how different languages have words for different concepts and how hard it really is to describe such a concept even though you'd think everyone would know what it means.

[Arcadia]

I think we do have some colloquial expressions with pretty much that meaning -- like "he done her wrong."  But yeah, I can't offhand think of a "real word" with that meaning.

How about just "wronged" ?

[Carol the Dabbler]

She said at some point she thought she had made out the meaning, "Gemütlichkeit" meaning the combination of candels and cushions.

I thought I had a vague general idea of what that word means -- but now I'm bewildered! 

 

[Bendydoodle Cantaloupe]

 

 

It's fascinating how different languages have words for different concepts and how hard it really is to describe such a concept even though you'd think everyone would know what it means.

 

Which is my favorite thing about languages! I absolutely love words that don't translate outside a language, because usually they describe feelings that there're no words for in some places.

 

And German is so insane. There's a word for everything (I know there's a word for 'a man who sits to pee' -- sitzpinkler).

[Schlauer Fuchs]

 

 

Which is my favorite thing about languages! I absolutely love words that don't translate outside a language, because usually they describe feelings that there're no words for in some places.

 

You're right! But I also love fine nuances in meaning that differ from language to language; for example we had a conversation about friends with the same American woman who got so confused about "Gemütlichkeit". She said that "friend" in America has a much wider meaning than the German "Freund" (which is just the literal translation). So according to her, in America you would refer to pretty much everyone you know privately as a friend, even if you have only met them once on a party. She said you'd only seldom describe them as "acquaintances," that being a word really rarely used. In Germany, however, calling somebody a "Freund" means you really know them and like them, whereas someone you just met would at first just be a "Bekannter" (acquaintance) and maybe later rise to become a Freund. Well, I hope you get what I mean, cause I'd like to know if you'd agree with her (I certainly would, based on my experience of living in MN; got so many friends there, but just a handful of Freunde )

 

 

 

And German is so insane. There's a word for everything (I know there's a word for 'a man who sits to pee' -- sitzpinkler).

 

:lol:  my dictionary says you could translate "Sitzpinkler" into "sitter" or "sit wee'er", so there seems to be an English word for that, too! But no, we don't have a word for everything apparently - as I just had to learn "sassy" for example