Groups | Search | Server Info | Keyboard shortcuts | Login | Register [http] [https] [nntp] [nntps]

Groups > sci.lang > #306863

Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France

Cross-posted to 2 groups.

Show all headers | View raw

 Ar an t-ochtú lá is fiche de mí Deireadh Fómhair, scríobh Peter Moylan: 

 > [...] When it's someone speaking Irish, an extra factor comes in: my
 > vocabulary is so limited, and my command of Irish spelling so poor, that I'm
 > struggling to understand anything at all. Under those conditions, I can fail
 > to distinguish two words even though their pronunciation is different.

OK, so no deep-rooted lack of perception, “just” a deficit in practice.

 > There's also the fact that recognising an accent does not imply being
 > able to analyse the features of the words being spoken. I used to live
 > in Melbourne, at a time when it had many recent immigrants, and when I
 > was in a crowd -- on a railway station, for example -- it amused me to
 > guess which languages people were speaking. I think those guesses would
 > have been very accurate. These were languages that I didn't speak or
 > understand, but I could pick them because different languages have
 > different rhythms and dominant sounds, and one can respond to that
 > without knowing what any of the words mean. A lot of what registers is
 > subconscious.

Yeah, I get you, but I do think this can be leveraged to pick up on phonemic
distinctions when learning another language.

 > Here's another example. I once got lost in central Paris at midnight, so
 > I stopped a passer-by and asked for directions. He told me where to go,
 > I thanked him, and we went in our different directions. It wasn't until
 > I had walked a whole block more that it suddenly hit me that that man
 > had been speaking French with an Australian accent. The recognition was
 > in my head, but it hadn't come to the surface. And he, presumably,
 > hadn't noticed that I was an English speaker.

Clearly the French of both of you was good enough for the task to hand, no bad
thing.

-- 
‘As I sat looking up at the Guinness ad, I could never figure out /
How your man stayed up on the surfboard after fourteen pints of stout’
(C. Moore)

Back to sci.lang | Previous | Next — Previous in thread | Find similar | Unroll thread

Thread

[embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@devnull.tb> - 2024-05-07 16:33 -0700
  Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France bebercito@aol.com (Bebercito) - 2024-05-08 15:49 +0000
    Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@dev.null> - 2024-05-08 19:32 +0000
    Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Hibou <vpaereru-unmonitored@yahoo.com.invalid> - 2024-05-09 06:07 +0100
      Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France occam <occam@nowhere.nix> - 2024-05-09 10:55 +0200
  Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@dev.null> - 2024-05-10 19:19 +0000
    Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France bebercito@aol.com (Bebercito) - 2024-05-11 05:25 +0000
      Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@dev.null> - 2024-05-11 07:32 +0000
        Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@devnull.tb> - 2024-06-15 17:42 -0700
          Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Peter Moylan <peter@pmoylan.org> - 2024-06-16 11:29 +1000
            Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@dev.null> - 2024-06-16 03:24 +0000
              Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@dev.null> - 2024-06-16 05:07 +0000
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Peter Moylan <peter@pmoylan.org> - 2024-06-16 15:28 +1000
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Julien ÉLIE <iulius@nom-de-mon-site.com.invalid> - 2024-06-16 09:08 +0200
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France HenHanna <HenHanna@devnull.tb> - 2024-06-16 00:44 -0700
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Hibou <vpaereru-unmonitored@yahoo.com.invalid> - 2024-06-16 09:03 +0100
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Peter Moylan <peter@pmoylan.org> - 2024-06-16 19:41 +1000
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> - 2024-06-16 19:26 +0100
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> - 2024-10-27 11:43 +0000
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Bertel Lund Hansen <rundtosset@lundhansen.dk> - 2024-10-27 19:53 +0100
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Peter Moylan <peter@pmoylan.org> - 2024-10-28 12:43 +1100
                Re: [embonpoint] was once a completely positive term in France Aidan Kehoe <kehoea@parhasard.net> - 2024-10-28 18:47 +0000

csiph-web