Wiktionary:Information desk/2023/October

Xanthochroi, Xanthomelanoi, etc
We have a lot of entries for old anthropology terms like this which don't have labels (as well as several which do). I've labelled these two as "dated, anthropology" but I'm sure more exist so I'm mentioning it here in case anyone wants to try and find them systematically. I notice Melanochroi says "dated, ethnology" instead (whereas xanthomelanous is "anthropology, dated") if we want to make the labels consistent. - -sche (discuss) 06:09, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah Ive seen these pages before, and like the similar cyanope ~ glaucope pair, the etymologies seem quite at odds with their meanings. The first word being used for blond people would make sense if it were something like *Xanthochromoi "yellow-colored", but that's not what it is.  (We even have a word xanthochrome in English though.) Then, we have the Xanthomelanoi, who are also yellow, but this time the first part of the word is for skin color and the second is for hair color.  I wonder if these words didn't catch on because they didn't make sense .... anyway, when you say you have more words, are you thinking mostly of physical descriptions?  Maybe they were all coined by the same small group of authors.  — Soap — 14:13, 4 October 2023 (UTC)
 * I suspect the first word is really . — Soap — 17:59, 4 October 2023 (UTC)

A few beginner questions relating to sourcing, modules, and common practice
Hello,

I am new here so am not sure where to look for for documentation to answer my Q's.

I notice that some languages don't have pronunciation modules or easy ways of generating morphological tables, or the existing ones fail to account for given cases or are overly verbose or etc. I'd like to contribute where I can to these.

This leads to a few questions - and I am aware/assume that there are consenses on these given what I see around witkionary (and I'll allude to that below):

I assume that for most, a specific practice will have been chosen, and that may(?) be the one that features in appendices or IPA-description or phonology-overview pages, where they exist. Say one takes issue with the chosen practices, where would be the best place to raise those? If we are simply following eg. Wikipedia phonology pages, I'm pretty sure that a few pages are explicit about contentious analyses in ways that do not offer 'an ultimate solution' to those contentions (and of course they shouldn't be expected to), which would then raise the issue of which we pick for use here. For example, the Appendix for Nynorsk points out there is no standard, and that entries will simply follow pronunciations of regions where the written form is commonly in use. This is good, but it leaves the questions of which of such varieties one should pick as a default (for a module or suchlike), how one should include multiple varieties, and an issue where there could be a proliferation of different phonemic accounts of any given variety (eg. people might disagree about which distinctions are phonemic vs. allophonic for the same variety, or pick different IPA glyphs for the vowel space), and the issue of how we would go about this for the case where there isn't yet an established practice. But there's another issue there - if you take two relatively current works dealing with reconstruction of forms, they're still (almost certainly) going to contain forms for the same lexeme that differ, or attribute the origin of a given reflex lexeme to some other form (or other lexeme). Those in the know can easily 'translate' one author's reconstruction into the system of another, and we probably all have our own preferred reconstruction (both in a broad sense and for specific lexemes given arguments found in this or that paper). Are there established practices here for dealing with these two issues? Herthaz (talk) 16:08, 2 October 2023 (UTC)
 * 1) How are the standard transcription systems chosen in cases where there are multiple broad transcription practices one may choose for that variety? Do we just pretty much pick a practice from a popular/major work or paper on the phonology of the variety, and request that people take issues to the talk pages?
 * 1) It may be the case that there is an argument that for a group of varieties, no such standard exists. For some of these, Wiktionary has some established practice that I can see.
 * 1) How are we to make such decisions in regard to reconstructed proto-languages? I'd say some of the forms I see for example for proto-Germanic on the site are kind of out-of-keeping with current publications.

Last call for any Yiddish words of interest
Last month I bought a subscription to the 2016 CEYD (Comprehensive English-Yiddish Dictionary) and it's going to expire in about 4 days. I know our good friend Mahagaja has a physical copy of the dictionary, but also it doesn't contain the terms that have since been added to the online version (for example, I kid you not, and ). If you've seen a few of my entries, you'll know that the dictionary is rather US-centric, including such entries as and. I will say though, there are some words that, for how common they are in American English, are just mysteriously absent in the CEYD. No, not even any word for "latte" despite the plethora of other words relating to coffee. Hell, it doesn't even have the word as pertaining to the online video call program, despite being used in the aforementioned phrase.

With that being said, if you've got any Yiddish words in mind that you want me to look up, or if you want to see if some obscure American English term has somehow found a neologism in the dictionary. drop it in the replies. I'll see if I can find them in the online CEYD. Insaneguy1083 (talk) 10:14, 7 October 2023 (UTC)

soft c, hard r, magic e, comedic K
hard c, bossy r, hard g, soft g, intrusive r/linking r, silent h/mute h vs Germanic h/aspirated h, movable nu, ... are there more, and do we have a category for them yet? I'm not sure what to call it: "Category:en:Types of letters" works, I guess(?), but would also contain consonant and semivowel and the like. - -sche (discuss) 05:54, 10 October 2023 (UTC)
 * ,, , and are in Category:en:Latin letter names. J3133 (talk) 10:38, 10 October 2023 (UTC)

Dead external link
How do I tag a dead link in the "Further reading" section in WT? The usual WP template "dead link" doesn't work in WT due to lack of the corresponding template. Thanks! TheBlueWizard (talk) 00:29, 12 October 2023 (UTC)


 * One thing you can do is append  to the link, which produces []., we have no category for pages with dead links.  --Lambiam 07:56, 14 October 2023 (UTC)


 * If the link can't be replaced with a link to an archived version of the page, should we keep it at all or just remove it? - -sche (discuss) 19:19, 14 October 2023 (UTC)
 * If the link is known to be permanently dead and unsalvageable, I'd remove it. However, sometimes the content has just been moved to another page on the same website and can still be found by a diligent dexterous digital detective, so some care before engaging in drastic excision may be indicated. --Lambiam 14:27, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Bot which adds audio files
Is there a bot on this wiki which does this? I create many audio files and it's very time-consuming to manually add the audio template to each word. Persent101 (talk) 16:52, 14 October 2023 (UTC)


 * See User:DerbethBot. I think you’ll need to contact its operator for more detailed information. --Lambiam 16:04, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

Category:Space
Why is this category only for things related to extraterrestrial space? Where should terms related to space more generally (as opposed to time) go, like 'location', 'distance', 'move'? —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 13:12, 15 October 2023 (UTC)


 * The solution should probably be Category:Outer space and Category:Space (physics). —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 13:18, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Seems sensible. I don't have the foggiest how to implement this without breaking everything. —Caoimhin ceallach (talk) 13:53, 15 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Implementation isn't that hard, but I just want to confirm that there are enough physics-style space terms to justify a category. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 14:04, 15 October 2023 (UTC)

supervalent
The word "supervalent" appears in James Strachey's translation of Freud's Bruchstück Einer Hysterie-Analyse (Fragments of an Analysis of a Case of Hysteria), and I have also seen it used in French, with the same spelling, in Sylvie Pons-Nicolas's translation of the same text. A simple translation of the German ‘überwertig’ would be "overvalued." In an instance or two Freud contrasts the "supervalent" with the "unconscious" (das Unbewusste) - which we might call the undervalued. Ein solcher Gedankenzug darf ein überstarker, besser ein verstärkter, überwertiger im Sinne Wernickes, genannt werden. A train of thought such as this may be described as excessively intense, or better reinforced, or ‘supervalent’ [‘überwertig’] in Wernicke's [1900, 140] sense. Ein solcher überwertiger Gedanke ist nebst tiefer Verstimmung oft das einzige Symptom eines Krankheitszustandes. . . Was tut man nun angesichts eines solchen überwertigen Gedankens, nachdem man dessen bewußte Begründung sowie die erfolglosen Einwendungen gegen ihn mitangehört hat? - A supervalent [overvalued] thought of this kind is often the only symptom, beyond deep depression,. . . Now, what does one do in the face of such a supervalent [overvalued] thought, after having listened to its deliberate justification as well as to the unsuccessful objections against it?

eine Gedanke überstark bewußt, sein Widerpart aber verdrängt und unbewußt ist. - one thought is over-strongly conscious [supervalent], but its counterpart is repressed and unconscious. Wmeaton2 (talk) 10:10, 21 October 2023 (UTC)


 * Is there a question here? The German Wikipedia identifies the term überwertige Idee with what in the English psychiatric terminology is called an . The uses the term overvalued idea, which also appears to have found its way into the literature. I wouldn’t translate Freud’s überstark with overstrong, though;  seems more adequate. If I had been the translator, I might have chosen to translate überwertig by overbearing.  --Lambiam 11:19, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
 * No question. I am proposing that there be an entry for this word in Wiktionary. "Overvalued" is the proposed synonym. 2A01:E0A:A74:F920:1D1C:E178:9475:3D7A 20:11, 22 October 2023 (UTC)

What should I name this page?
In my user sandbox I've been working on this matrix of English verbs that come from prefixed Latin verbs to add as a page in the Appendix namespace. I think I'm pretty much done drafting it and am ready to add it to Wiktionary, but I'm not sure what to title it. I still don't grok the differences between derived/inherited/descended/borrowed/etc. Some help choosing a page name, please? – Vuccala (talk) 03:33, 25 October 2023 (UTC)


 * I don't have a ready answer for you, but I just wanted to point out that omitting the verbs at the bottom from the main table to avoid having a horizontal scroll bar is in vain, as I already need to use a scroll bar to see the right side of the table (and I suspect it will be the same for most users). Andrew Sheedy (talk) 04:48, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * As it is, the table just manages to fit on a 1080p monitor in the Vector (2022) and Monobook skin. If I translocated the least-used prefix to the bottom ("circum-" with only 12 filled cells), then it'd also fit in the Vector Legacy (2010) skin. Long columns of empty cells are what I'd really like to avoid. If you or anyone has any table designing/styling advice to make this attractive to the most users, I'd be happy to hear it. – Vuccala (talk) 17:36, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Update: I've found that what all the rare prefixes have in common is that they come from Latin adverbs. As such, I've removed the 'overflow' table at the bottom, and moved those entries to an "other" column, the contents of which are explained at the top. – Vuccala (talk) 20:22, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Instead of "[derived/inherited/descended/borrowed?] from" how about "with" or just "from"? Since the exact nature of derivation versus inheritance, etc. is not really the point of the page. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 06:30, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Sorry, I'm not entirely sure what you're suggesting. "Appendix:English verbs from Latin prefixed verbs"? Correct me if I'm wrong, but I feel like there should be a word before the 'from', like 'deriving' or something. – Vuccala (talk) 18:09, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Yeah, something like "English verbs with Latin prefixes" or somesuch. Sorry for being obscure. —Justin ( koavf ) ❤T☮C☺M☯ 18:11, 25 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Thanks, that sounds like a good page title! I've decided to go with it: Appendix:English verbs with Latin prefixes. – Vuccala (talk) 20:22, 25 October 2023 (UTC)

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Most common 'word' across languages
Just wondering whether there's a 'word' listed in Wiktionary that shows up in more languages than any other. One measure would be to count languages for a given word listed in en.wiktionary. Thus ma shows 111 languages. Is that the most? Another measure might be to count listings in different Wiktionaries, but only in the 'native language' for each Wiktionary, to avoid counting the same language more than once. Thus counting through e.g. en.wiktionary.org/wiki/ma#English, it.wiktionary.org/wiki/ma#Italiano, and so on. —DIV (1.129.104.79 08:20, 27 October 2023 (UTC))
 * I think the biggest is a, with 166 entries. Would be very hard to beat that. CitationsFreak (talk) 21:37, 28 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Whichever page it ends up being, this seems like something for Hall of Fame. Andrew Sheedy (talk) 21:46, 28 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Ah, I wasn't even thinking of single-letter entries. (I did briefly think of entries with non-Latin characters, but figured they would not likely show up in numerous languages.)  I wasn't sure if there was a clever way to automate the search/check.
 * Adding to the Hall of Fame sounds like a good idea. I won't do that myself, however.  But I'll post in the discussion there.
 * —DIV (1.145.44.122 08:30, 2 November 2023 (UTC))

Proper syllabification of Polish marznąć, zmarznąć and related cases
As of now, we have "marz.nąć" but "zmar.znąć" and similar variation elsewhere. I think it's clear that this can't be correct. This dictionary gives "marz.nąć, zmarz.nąć". However, I don't really trust it because I suspect that the syllabification is automated and fails to distinguish between the digraph  and the here underlying  + . 88.64.225.53 09:57, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * Sorry. This should be moved to "tea room", but I can't delete it here as an IP. 88.64.225.53 10:10, 29 October 2023 (UTC)
 * marz.nąć follows this syllabigication, which is correct. The linked dictionary does not give syllabification, but hyphenation, there is a difference, but nonetheless the prefixed variations should indeed have that syllabification. Vininn126 (talk) 10:16, 29 October 2023 (UTC)