More Catalan onomatopedia: to meow and to mow

Just a brief note before I discuss meow and mow. Cinderblogger asked me what the Catalan word for cokcadoodledoo is. It's quirquiqu?. When I was really young,I used a different word that I made up arararahooo. In any case, the Catalan word for the rooster's cry is the first.

To meow in Catalan is miaular; the noun meow is miau. Interestingly it's the same noun in French: miaou. The French spelling is frankly secondary as the sounds are identical in both languages.

To purr is very interesting. The verb, when it refers to a cat or engine, is roncar. This verb also means to snore. So Catalans hear purring and snoring as identical sounds. When the verb refers to purring words it's xiuxiuejar which means either to whisper or to whistle. Indeed, I've actually heard people whisper and there were some whistling sound as they spoke in a low voice in someone's ear. A purr when it refers to satisfaction is a ronc. A person who purrs is estar satisfet- to be satisfied

To moo is mugir. This verb comes directly from the Latin mugire.

Harry Potter enfin en fran?ais

American vitality: not what it seems

Cinderblogger est de retour

L'Anglosph?re et le monde: attention ? l'orgeuil

Je suis tan? de lire d'articles semblables qui extolent les virtues de l'Anglosph?re et denigrent la reste du monde surtout les Europ?ens. ?galement, comme dipl?m? en droit civil qu?b?cois, ?a m'agace de lire les vieux clich? de toujours de comment le droit romano-germanique c'est un syst?me ferm? en contraste avec l'ouverture. 'Coute-doncs! La common law brittanique tirent ses origines ? la fois du droit germanique et le droit romain. Eh ouais, les procedures du droit civil de la common law sont tir?s du droit ancien romain; en outre beaucoup de la vocabulaire est fran?ais gr?ce aux Normans. Mais chut! On ne doit pas dans aucune cas, mentionner les influences continentales qui ont forg?es l'Angleterre car on diminuira la monopole de la gloire autochone que les plaideurs de l'Anglosph?re chantes ses louanges.

La seule raison que les Anglais ont pu devenir si influents aux monde c'est parce que Guiiliame le conqu?rent gagna la guerre. Sinon, je vous assure que l'Angleterre aurait evolu? comme une curiosit? comme l'Ic?lande avec une langue qui n'aurait jamais r?pandu avec la vigeur qu'elle a prise en r?alit?. Comme toujours dans l'histoire anglaise, une accident fortu?te l'a permise de devenir une pays influente et qui a jou? un r?le capitale dans l'essor occidental.
Je rappele que tant le droit civil ramano-germanique que la commmon law sont des pierres angulaires de notre civilisation occidentale et les deux syst?mes de droit sont quelques choses ? ?tre tr?s fier.

La deuxi?me pr?tention que m'ennuie tellement c'est cet hubris de qualifier que seule l'Anglosph?re et surtout les ?tat-Unis qui est le sommet, est la plus r?aliste, le moins int?ress? d'appliquer des construction th?oriques,la plus novatrice, la plus dou?e d'accpeter la nature humaine et ent?riner un r?gime politique et ainsi continue les paroles de la chanson. J'ai le sentiment que je r?lis Gobineau et tous les racalistes du XIX e qui elaboraient de hi?rarchie de peuples afin de justifer pourquoi les leurs se trouve ou sommet et ont le droit de cit? sur le monde.

Malheursement je d?gonfle cette ballon car l'Anglospere a ses tendences de devenir un syst?me enferm?. Le protectionnisme croissant aux ?tats-Unis. Comem je rappelle ? chaque occasion que ce pr?sente, le capitalisme anglosph?rique et si exigent, si difficile, si ?puisant que m?me les Am?ricain en finissent d'?tre tann?s de tourjours innover, comp?tir et les gouvernements locaux et f?d?ral succombent ?ventuellemnt et l?gisf?rent des r?glements qui arbitrent certaines d'industries contre leurs comp?titeurs ?trang?res. l'on voit cette tendence de fa?on la plus frappante ? l'?gard de la propri?t? intellectuelle. Les industries de la musique, cin?ma et logiciels tentent d'imposer au monde de la l?gislation d'inspiration am?ricaine qui heurte ? d'autres valeurs autant raisonables. La groupe de pression de la musique en particulier a carr?ment perdu l'or?mus dans sa fa?on ? poursuivre les contrevenant.

Lex voit le monde ? se divisier en deux entre l'Anglosph?re et le reste du monde. Est-ce que c'est un bonne chose? Pas moi et les ressentiments du reste du monde ne serait pas parce qu'ils ne sont pas riches etc mais parce que l'Anglosph?re s'impose au monde sans que le deuxi?me puisse influencer la premi?re si modeste que ?a soit.

To bark and to quack in Catalan

Yesterday, I wrote about the Catalan verb to hinny where it originated from as well as to compare it to the English equivalent. Today, I want to focus on 2 Catalan verbs to bark and to quack. To Bark brings to mind a humourous episode in Asterix et les Normands. Idefix, Obelix's dog, meets with the Norman's Great Dane. Ideifix barks 'in French' while the Great Dane responds in 'Germanic' In any case within a few scenes both dogs understand each other and are laughing. Both the Normans and Asterix turn to the dogs and ask what is about them as dogs that facilitates communication.

Catalan has 2 verbs for barking: border and jaupar. The first is the most common verb and is most likely derived from the booowuuuu or booorda sound that dogs make. Jauper is from the French japper and I myself was unaware of its existence. Related verbs like to growl is grunyir. That verb comes from the Latin grunnire, grinyolar is either yelp or howl (I prefer yelp and prefer to translate grunir as howl) Grinyolar is a variant of ganyolr which is from the Latin gannire. The Latin verb latare isn't preserved in Catalan except in one word: the noun lladrucs (masculine) To grunt is grinyolar as well. Wolves ululen in Catalan just like in English (from the verb ulular)

To quack in Catalan is clacar. This is quite interesting as the nouns for thw sound are quac, quac-quac, q?ec-q?ec. Interestingly, the Catalan veb to stammer is closely related to that of clucking of chickens: querquejar. Well, it's not so silly after all one of the more bemusing scenes in Who Framed Roger Rabbit? [2 Discs] is when we see Daffey Duck and Donald Duck trading insults. Daffey eventually insults Donald fors his speech 'impediment' True ducks don't cluck but quack. However, the distinction is how the human brain has processed both sounds and fixed the words that identifies the sound each animal makes. The way I read at the Catalan equivalencies suggest that clucking and quacking arent't really that different. There's: quercquerequerc which is a variation of quirquiriquic (clucking). I've already covered the quaking words so I won't repeat them here.

Onomatopedic sounds in Catalan

I've wanted to write about the onomatopedic sounds in Catalan for some time. It's when I got the Diccionari d'onomatopeies i mots de creaci? expressiva and leafing through it that inspired me to mention some of them.

Today, I'll want to focus on a?nar. Interestingly this verb derives from the Latin: hinnire. English has a very similar verb: to hinny. Could this English verb be similarly derived from the same root? In any case a?nar has 2 other variants: assa?nar and renillar.

The first verb is really a regional variant of a?nar. According the the explanation, assa?nar could either derive from a sound or affiliate word or it could simply be due to popular ignorance as to the word's proper pronunciation. Renillar has an even more interesting background. The verb comes from vulgar Latin: hinnicalare which before was hinnitulare which in term came from hinnitare. Ultimately the word's root is none other than hinnire It's interesting that Catalan has no less than 3 words for the sound that a horse makes.

The other onomatopedic verb is raucar. In English that's to croak. The sound that toads and frogs make; not the slang English term to die. It's interesting to note how English and Catalan interpret the same sound so differently. Even more fascinating is how both are perfectly legitimate proccessings of the sound.

If I can remember I'd like to discuss the verbs to bark and to quack.

Les deux soldat am?ricain ?gorg?s:

India, English and the Anglopshere: Dell moves jobs back

Prof Glenn linked this article of how Dell has reversed its outsourcing policy and will return its customer service department to the U.S. From the report, the biggest complaint was that the customers couldn't always understand Indian techies accents.

If the complaint sounds sounds familiar, I wrote a longish post on the Anglopshere, the primacy of English and cited India as an example of the limits of the Anglospherists dreams. Indeed, the business article corroborates my insight that's worth quoting again:

a lot of bloggers cite India as a prime example of English acts a stabilizing lingua franca in a country with hundred of languages and redoutable social cleavages. Um huh right. And when the Americans contact a call centre, the Indian employees have to invent a persona like April or Charlie and hide their accents because the former will be flustered if they have to remember, much less pronounce, a name like Shiva Ranpapunjaganji or Abihijeet Sawheny as well as deal with the lilting IndoEnglish accent. Indeed, by acommodating the Anglosphere, the Anglophones have even less incentive to learn, cope and adapt to non-Anglsopheric cultural-linguistic phenomena. (emphasis added)

I understand that Dell's decision was the correct one when faced with numerous and consistent customer complants. However, the decision to reverse the policy also strikes a blow to the Anglopsherists' fondest dream of an economocically dynamic Anglopshere with India as the poster country of the benefits in adopting English as a lingua franca. There are benefits....as long as you speak and sound like an American. So once again, America's very dynamism provincalizes its citizens. They have no incentive, even with a culture with strong Anglospheric characteristics, to deal as it is with all its quirks and warts and puts even more pressure on the other semi-Anglopsheric countries to adopt American dialect of English in order to stay in buisness So, in the end, the Anglosphere is nothing more than America entrenching itself deeper in the Anglopshere which in turn compels cultural-lingusitic conformity that effectively neutralizes the network's advantages. So much for richness in diversity.

El bal postelectoral catal?: qui es coronor? els princeps de la nit?

Em fa riure a veure el posicionament tant pol?tic com retoric dels partits. Ahir llegint l'Avui remarcava de c?m Zapatero ha donat el seu permis al PSC per pactar amb els republicans. Com si Maragall li calia.

?Vol o no ser president Maragall? El PP enacara es mis discarat. Rajoy va els empresari i llen?a el crit al c?l dels perills de permetre els republicans entrar en la Generalitat. Graci?sament els empresaris desestimaren bastant severament els pr?postits dient que: escolti els republicans han guanyat sufcientment d'escon per esdevenir el balan? de poder i tampoc confonmen el partits amb ETA. Papa opina que si els republicans pactissin amb els socialistes, seria la cosa m?s indigna. Els resultats de les eleccions son palesos: la vict?ria dels convergents i el balan? de poder dels republicans d?na una botifarra als partits nacionals al llur pol?tiques vasques i fortifica aquells partists que defensen els interessos catalans . Diguin que diguin ambd?s partits nacionals sobre la seva ambiv?lencia de la plurinacionalitat; ho hauran de baixar del burro i aceptar un certa flexibiltat en el r?gim pol?tic desde l'interpretaci? constitucional com cedir m?s comp?tencies a la Generalitat. Doncs hauran de mastigar moltes limones.

Pels socialistes catalans, l'?nica manera que governaran Catalunya es de rompre tot enlla?os amb el partit nacional. Hi ha massa fils que controlen el partit local i els barons no-catlans interfereixen massa en la afers purament locals catalans per a qu? la gent ordinari pogu?ssin confiar la presid?ncia als socialists catalans. 7 derrotes en seguida es un misstage for?a clara i no-equivoca que planteja un canvi for?a radical al PSC: o sigui un surcursal d'obed?ncia nacional que no guanyar? mai la presid?ncia tot i que o un verdader partit catal? d'esquerres que oferix una alternativa real i catalanista dels convergents i dels republicans.