#32305
06/19/2001 1:27 PM
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persons of gender.CLEAR AS MUD! Which gender?!?!?!?!?! Re: "guys" Rod and I had discussed this at length previously by PM. From that, and reading these comments, I've now given up trying to explain it. It's all about context, and maybe the accepted uses are regional, and as long as I can understand my friends (both guy friends and girl friends), and they can understand me, I now am officially giving up trying to explain it to anyone!    
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#32306
06/19/2001 2:02 PM
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Bean wonders: CLEAR AS MUD! Which gender?!?!?!?!?!
In standard Germanic grammar compound words take the gender of the last element in the compound. Since man, the English word for human being, irrespective of sex, is grammatically masculine, both sex specific compounds, woman and wapman (no longer used, since it is assumed that to be fully human one must be male) are masculine gender.
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#32307
06/19/2001 5:28 PM
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Until Betsy has a chance to pack up her whips and chains.. there are plenty of us around who can readily get to where you live-- a beat you to an inch of your life for that little comment Dave! You really must like like to be punished! i can just see, sitting there, grinning from ear to ear-- as gleeful as cat with little yellow canary feathers all about your mouth!Betsy--just give us the word-- ( or are you looking forward to it so much you don't want to share the pleasure? --perfectly understandable!We'll have to have an on line "shower" for Betsy and make sure she has all instruments of torture! i am willing to contribute my straight jacket..i'd offer the handcuffs, but i've lost the key..and yes, i seriously own these things!
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#32308
06/19/2001 5:33 PM
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Ms. Ledasdottir is willing to contribute her straight jacket.
Won' do ya no good. Betsy oney wears crooked jackets.
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#32309
06/19/2001 5:49 PM
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Oh-- but i expected Betsy might want to outfit you in the jacket-- and straighten you out!
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#32310
06/19/2001 5:56 PM
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and straighten me out
I ain' goin' there.
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#32311
06/19/2001 6:28 PM
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Posts: 1,773
Pooh-Bah
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and straighten me out
I ain' goin' there.
Too late.
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#32312
06/19/2001 6:31 PM
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and straighten me out
I ain' goin' there.
Too late.
Make mine strait up.
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#32313
06/19/2001 6:37 PM
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veteran
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... no matter how strait the gate, how charged with punishments the scroll ..."??
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#32314
06/19/2001 6:41 PM
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how charged with punishments the scroll
Ain' nobody punishin *my scroll.
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#32315
06/20/2001 2:09 AM
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stead of which, we're scrollin your punishment
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#32316
06/20/2001 3:48 AM
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guysAnd, of course, there's absolutely NO discrepancy of gender when you use the phrase "Guys and Dolls!" Oh-oh, the PC Police are after me!...blame Frank Loesser and Damon Runyon! It's not my fault it's immortalized! Besides, Dolls was a New York expression, so it must be worth a reprieve, right Of Troy???... No!...No, not the handcuffs, please!
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#32317
06/20/2001 7:58 AM
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addict
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The proper term for people of either sex...I thought it was "bisexuals" Rod
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#32318
06/20/2001 8:15 AM
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With "you" on its own,one can't easily discern whether 2nd person singular or plural is implied. This problem, like so many others, does not exist in other European languages.In the context of "guys", "you lot" this is true, at least amongst the European languages I know a bit of. However, the problem reappears for some contexts in French, German, and Czech (at least) with the use of the 2nd person plural for the polite form. Does anyone know of a list (or can we compile one between us) of languages which use the 2nd person plural as a polite form for the singular. Italian and Spanish have polite forms but they are distinct. Please correct any inaccuracies in the above. As if you needed any prompting . Rod
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#32319
06/20/2001 8:55 AM
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 315
enthusiast
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enthusiast
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2nd person plural as a polite form for the singular. Italian and Spanish have polite forms but they are distinct.
Even in Italian it is possible to find the 2nd person plural as a polite form, but it is archaic or southerner.
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#32320
06/20/2001 10:50 AM
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The proper term for people of either sex...Rod thought it was "bisexuals" Don't you mean "ambisexuals"?
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#32321
06/20/2001 10:59 AM
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Does anyone know of a list (or can we compile one between us) of languages which use the 2nd person plural as a polite form for the singular. Italian and Spanish have polite forms but they are distinct.
Turkish.
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#32322
06/20/2001 1:32 PM
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"ambisexuals"Oi troid ridin' one o they fings, but me hands kept slippin orf the andlebars
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#32323
06/20/2001 4:13 PM
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.......concave or convex to fit either sex.....
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#32324
06/20/2001 4:44 PM
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2nd person plural as a polite form for the singular. Italian and Spanish have polite forms but they are distinct.
Even in Italian it is possible to find the 2nd person plural as a polite form, but it is archaic or southerner.
Same is true for Spanish, although the full form of the 2nd person plural pronoun (vosotros) is shortened to "vos" in some countries.
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#32325
06/21/2001 5:41 AM
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As my comparative anthropology professor likes to remind me (although I'm not sure I necessarily agree)...
"Sex" is based on physical characteristics, while "gender" is a social construct based on the characteristic social roles of each sex.
And if anyone takes "Sex is based on physical characteristics" out of context....
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#32326
06/21/2001 7:23 AM
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Posts: 724
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> Does anyone know of a list (or can we compile one between us) of languages which use the 2nd person plural as a polite form for the singular.
Almost all the Indian languages will go into the list. Bengali (or Bangla) has only 2nd person plural and no familiar form for the Singular. Hindi/Urdu has three levels :
- the 2nd person plural as a polite form (aap)
- a part polite- part familiar form, distinct from the 2nd person plural (Tum)
- a familiar form (Tu)
This reminds me of lines from a Ghazal by the Pakistani singer Mehdi Hassan. The translation :
As love passed all limits, all ceremony we overcame
First 'aap' then 'tum', and then worthy of 'Tu' became.
For those who know the language this is the original:
Pyaar jab hud se badhha, saare takalluf mit gaye
'Aap' se phir 'tum' huye, phir 'tu' ka unwan ho gaye.
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#32327
06/21/2001 8:28 AM
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Avy, thanks for that post and the poem. I find it interesting that a wide range of languages have this trait of using the 2nd person plural as the polite form of the singular. A couple of follow up questions, if I may: Do these languages have a word for using the familiar form as French does (tutoyer)? When and how did English lose the 2nd person singular? Was it through using the plural as a polite form and the English being over polite? . Like the story of the two Englishmen travelling on a train for days in India and not speaking to each other because they hadn't been introduced. Rod
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#32328
06/23/2001 12:42 AM
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No Rod, there is no word for familiarity arising from the word tu (I think that is what you mean). There are other words for familiarity.
>I find it interesting that a wide range of languages have this trait of using the 2nd person plural as the polite form of the third person singular.
Indian languages also have third person plural used as a polite form for third person singular. Does that happen in French too?
> When and how did English lose the 2nd person singular?
I thought thee thou was dropped because it was thought too polite?
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#32329
06/23/2001 4:38 PM
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When and how did English lose the 2nd person singular?
Bunch of Revolutionaries, that's us Americans!
All men (and women) created equal ....
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#32330
06/25/2001 7:18 AM
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there is no word for familiarity arising from the word tu (in Malay)
French has the verbs (and nouns from them) tutoyer and vouvoyer which mean using the familiar and polite forms of "you". So children might be instructed to "vouvoyer" a distant uncle, or acquaintances might agree they have known each other long enough to "tutoyer" each other.
I will have to look at my reference books to see if any other languages in my pile have a third person polite form. I am fairly sure French doesn't (which is where someone pops up with an obscure french dialect and proves me wrong).
The other point of interest is the common use of the word "tu" for "you" in Malay and French (and other languages in variation). Is this an example of an "early" word surviving all this time?
Rod
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#32331
06/25/2001 11:58 AM
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Another aspect which has always interested me is that certain (basic) words begin with the same sounds in Hindi/Urdu and English perhaps other languages too. For example the word for Sun is Suraj/ Surya in my language - something about the sound "S" that fits the characteristics of a sun? The word for Door is Darvaza, perhaps "D" is a nice solid door-like sound. There are other words too - but maybe this is just a coincidence.
I have not been able to find the equivilant of "tutoyer" in Hindi. I think children are told "Don't say tu say Aap!" But I will keep looking - there must be a word.
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#32332
06/25/2001 6:47 PM
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In reply to:
When and how did English lose the 2nd person singular?
As to how, it just stopped being used, replaced by the plural, except that the nominative "Ye" was replaced by "You". As to when, it happened in the first half of the 17th century in England. It was still in regular use at the time the King James Version of the Bible was produced (1611), but you have to bear in mind that that work was produced by mature men who, presumably, spoke and wrote the language they learned in the last quarter of the 16th century. But by the 1620's, you find it being used less, and by the Restoration period (1660's), it's not being used regularly except for poetical and liturgical purposes. In fact, you can track the process to some degree in the work of a single author, John Donne, in his poems, letters and sermons. (By the time he died, 1630, he was not using the singular regularly, although he did in his early works.)
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#32333
06/25/2001 7:01 PM
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When and how did English lose the 2nd person singular?
There was a transition period during which both were used. The 2nd plural was used when speaking up to someone, i.e., a peasant to a lord. The 2nd singular was used when speaking down or with people with whom one was intimate. A careful reading of Shakespeare plays will show that this is pretty much the way he depicted people speaking.
It is my guess that this was rooted in the desire to aggrandize the upper levels of society. The point at which you switched from 2nd singular to 2nd plural gradually rolled downhill until everyone became the recipient of the 2nd plural.
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#32334
06/25/2001 7:50 PM
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" the nominative "Ye" was "
A point of information, please: Was the "Y" actually a "thorn" or not" ? Was "Ye" pronounced "Thee"?
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#32335
06/25/2001 8:00 PM
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Was the Y in Ye a thorn?
No, it was pronounced Ye. The use of a Y to represent thorn, as in Ye Olde Shoppe, is a cutesey-wutesey modern practice not based on any historic use in English.
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#32336
06/25/2001 8:04 PM
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Was the "Y" actually a "thorn" or not" ?
The Y in Ye Olde Frappe Shoppe was a Þ. The one in you was not. The OE dative and accusative 2nd person plural was Eow. Incidentally, the subjective and objective in the 2nd person plural were ye and you respectively. In the 2nd person singular they were thou and thee with the vowels reversed.
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