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Suppose I am trying to guess someone’s native language or country of origin based on a blog entry or something they wrote in English without using the content. What kind of clues could you gather from incorrect grammar, spelling, word usage? Can you give specific examples of grammatical mistakes you may have seen and what country that mistake may lead you to believe the author is from?
To take a first stab at answering my own question, I'd say first look for American English versus British English. Things like lift/elevator or color/colour, since this will not only tell you that they might be from England, but any number of former British colonies as well. Aside from this I'm at a loss. I assume people may sometimes incorrectly use English words in the grammatical form of their native language. So would you have any guesses to who might not use "to" like a sentence "I want go the park" Or what countries a person might be from if they always put their subject after the verb? I don't have any specific reason for asking this, I just am interested in seeing what people respond with for what clues they might hypothetically see in text that would give them good incite into guessing the authors country of origin.
Anythingapplied (
talk) 19:03, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
The absence of a definite or indefinite article may suggest that the writer is Russian, as his language manages very well without either. I know offhand of no other language which is like that, except Latin. Irish people routinely say "What happened him?" when they mean "What happened to him?" Pavel ( talk) 20:21, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
Having consulted the Oxford English Dictionary and Webster's, I see that neither concedes the use of "happen" as a transitive verb. With the demise of the Celtic Tiger, our young people may once again have to go abroad to earn a living, and the fact that we speak English is one of our greatest assets. It would be better for us if we speak it properly. Some Hiberno-English usages are quirky and appealing, others are just annoying and wrong; and leaving out prepositions falls into that category. Is mise le meas. Pavel ( talk) 00:35, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Thrice is lovely. One tends to wonder why "twice" survived in everyday usage in England and "thrice" fell by the wayside. You also wonder, if you've never been there, what other treasures, grammatical and otherwise, survive in the Indian subcontinent, apart from Royal Enfield motorcycles. They seem to have valued the gift of English, because it served as a unifying factor in a country with countless languages and dialects, and is still an official language of India; although I don't doubt there are those who would wish it otherwise. In any case, they've probably taken better care of their English than people at home, who mangle it mercilessly. Pavel ( talk) 14:08, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
"When will X be finished?" -"It is being finished now." "Right, so when can I expect it?" -"As I said, it is being finished now." "What does that mean? A few minutes? An hour? Tomorrow?" -"As I said several times already, it is being finished right now. It is already being finished."
"When you say 'being finished' you mean that it exists in the state of finishedness?" -"Yes, that is correct. Isn't that what I said?"
btw I'm British, and "thrice" wouldn't make me bat an eyelid. I didn't even realise anyone considered it archaic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.173.22.48 ( talk) 20:04, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
It's certainly not something you hear every day. The last time I heard it used was probably by Frankie Howerd in Up Pompeii! His character Lurcio had a habit of saying 'Nay, nay, and thrice nay!' You overseas chaps missed a treat if you missed that. Pavel ( talk) 20:29, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Maybe, when the word "thrice" was originally coined, life was a lot simpler. People counted to three, and any more than three was simply "a lot."
Pavel (
talk) 14:11, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
You seem to have lot of examples there, I just thought I'd offer the info that there's a web ap somewhere out there that has been trained on blogs to distinguish between male and female writers. Perhaps a similar ap exists, or could exist, to do the same with native language. Aaadddaaammm ( talk) 14:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)
Language desk | ||
---|---|---|
< January 29 | << Dec | January | Feb >> | January 31 > |
Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives |
---|
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages. |
Suppose I am trying to guess someone’s native language or country of origin based on a blog entry or something they wrote in English without using the content. What kind of clues could you gather from incorrect grammar, spelling, word usage? Can you give specific examples of grammatical mistakes you may have seen and what country that mistake may lead you to believe the author is from?
To take a first stab at answering my own question, I'd say first look for American English versus British English. Things like lift/elevator or color/colour, since this will not only tell you that they might be from England, but any number of former British colonies as well. Aside from this I'm at a loss. I assume people may sometimes incorrectly use English words in the grammatical form of their native language. So would you have any guesses to who might not use "to" like a sentence "I want go the park" Or what countries a person might be from if they always put their subject after the verb? I don't have any specific reason for asking this, I just am interested in seeing what people respond with for what clues they might hypothetically see in text that would give them good incite into guessing the authors country of origin.
Anythingapplied (
talk) 19:03, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
The absence of a definite or indefinite article may suggest that the writer is Russian, as his language manages very well without either. I know offhand of no other language which is like that, except Latin. Irish people routinely say "What happened him?" when they mean "What happened to him?" Pavel ( talk) 20:21, 30 January 2009 (UTC)
Having consulted the Oxford English Dictionary and Webster's, I see that neither concedes the use of "happen" as a transitive verb. With the demise of the Celtic Tiger, our young people may once again have to go abroad to earn a living, and the fact that we speak English is one of our greatest assets. It would be better for us if we speak it properly. Some Hiberno-English usages are quirky and appealing, others are just annoying and wrong; and leaving out prepositions falls into that category. Is mise le meas. Pavel ( talk) 00:35, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
Thrice is lovely. One tends to wonder why "twice" survived in everyday usage in England and "thrice" fell by the wayside. You also wonder, if you've never been there, what other treasures, grammatical and otherwise, survive in the Indian subcontinent, apart from Royal Enfield motorcycles. They seem to have valued the gift of English, because it served as a unifying factor in a country with countless languages and dialects, and is still an official language of India; although I don't doubt there are those who would wish it otherwise. In any case, they've probably taken better care of their English than people at home, who mangle it mercilessly. Pavel ( talk) 14:08, 31 January 2009 (UTC)
"When will X be finished?" -"It is being finished now." "Right, so when can I expect it?" -"As I said, it is being finished now." "What does that mean? A few minutes? An hour? Tomorrow?" -"As I said several times already, it is being finished right now. It is already being finished."
"When you say 'being finished' you mean that it exists in the state of finishedness?" -"Yes, that is correct. Isn't that what I said?"
btw I'm British, and "thrice" wouldn't make me bat an eyelid. I didn't even realise anyone considered it archaic. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.173.22.48 ( talk) 20:04, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
It's certainly not something you hear every day. The last time I heard it used was probably by Frankie Howerd in Up Pompeii! His character Lurcio had a habit of saying 'Nay, nay, and thrice nay!' You overseas chaps missed a treat if you missed that. Pavel ( talk) 20:29, 1 February 2009 (UTC)
Maybe, when the word "thrice" was originally coined, life was a lot simpler. People counted to three, and any more than three was simply "a lot."
Pavel (
talk) 14:11, 2 February 2009 (UTC)
You seem to have lot of examples there, I just thought I'd offer the info that there's a web ap somewhere out there that has been trained on blogs to distinguish between male and female writers. Perhaps a similar ap exists, or could exist, to do the same with native language. Aaadddaaammm ( talk) 14:28, 4 February 2009 (UTC)