[Wikipedia-l] Re: Quenya language request, and Chinese Wikipedia again

Sun Feb 20 07:36:17 UTC 2005

On Sun, 20 Feb 2005 12:16:53 +0800, Sheng Jiong <sheng.jiong at gmail.com> wrote:
> > Sheng Jiong, you have lied about speaking Shanghainese as your native
> > language. I know this because there are large grammatical differences
> > between Shanghainese and Baihuawen that you seem to overlook,
> > suggesting you don't know it at all.
> 
> Well, it is extremely impertient of you accusing others of lying when
> you do not have any proof. I am a native Shanghainese, I was born in
> Shanghai, both of my parents are Shanghainese, we speak Shanghainese
> at home.
> 
> > One example is the existance in Wu of the particle "teuq7" meaning
> > "with", that doesn't exist in Mandarin. There is a character to write
> > it, I have seen it before, but I cannot remember it.
> 
> Yes, but that is not a "grammatical difference". It is only a
> different use of a word. Grammatical difference means there is an
> entirely different sentence structure. But Shanghainese has almost the
> same sentence structure as written Chinese. If you take out a book
> written in Chinese, it is perfectly possible for one to read it out in
> Shanghainese and be understood by another person who can speak
> Shanghainese.
> 
> Interesting example would be a story I heard: one Taiwan-born
> Shanghainese(who obviously speak only Shanghainese at home, as
> Shanghainese always find it more natural to speak Shanghainese than
> Mandarin with someone close to them) only use Shanghainese to read the
> novellas by Zhang Ailing, a popular writer who writes a lot about
> Shanghai in the 1930s and 40s.

And what is your point? Just because it can be understood, doesn't
mean it's natural.

> > Some examples of Cantonese grammar differences:
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 他給我三本書.
> > Cantonese: 佢俾三本書我. (notice position of "我")
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 我先上界買東西.
> > Cantonese: 我去界買冶先. (notice position of "先" and use of 去 vs 上, and
> > vocabulary difference of monosyllabic Cantonese word for "things" vs
> > disyllabic Mandarin word)
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 他比我高.
> > Cantonese: 佢高過我. (notice use of "過" vs "比", entirely different sentence order)
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 把他叫來
> > Cantonese: 噭佢來.
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 我上北京去.
> > Cantonese: 我去北京.
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 看不見.
> > Cantonese: 唔睇得見.
> >
> > Mandarin/Baihua: 你吃不吃飯?
> > Cantonese: 你吃飯唔吃?
> 
> Yes, I know that Cantonese has slight differences in the order of
> words compared with Mandarin. But again you are mixing Mandarin with
> Baihuawen. Hong Kongers speak only Cantonese, but they write in
> Baihuawen. So whatever the difference there are between Baihuawen and
> Cantonese, that's the difference between spoken and written language.
> Many colloquial English is also different from standard, formal
> English (Take Singapore English as a best example: "Would you be able
> to attend?" in English would become "You can go or not?" in Singlish.
> Totally different grammar, but is Singlish a written language? No. It
> is still a dialect in English). Does that mean we need to have an
> Colloquial English Wikipedia?

Now, you are just being an octopus. Baihuawen IS Mandarin. It is
colloquial written form of Mandarin. Its grammar and sentence
structure is 100% identical to Mandarin but differs from other
dialects/languages. I wonder why... MAYBE IT'S BECAUSE BAIHUAWEN WAS
STRUCTURED AFTER MANDARIN COLLOQUIAL SPEECH!?!?!?!!!!!!!? That's why I
don't distinction between them. There is same grammar and same
vocabulary between Putonghua/Mandarin and Baihuawen, for the obvious
reason, but there is differences elsewhere.

You are squarely wrong about Singlish. It is not a dialect of English,
it is an English-based creole. The difference between the way you
write that sentence and the way I write it is this: I write it "yu kan
go o no'" but you write it "You can go or not?", this is because you
use an English-based orthography that doesn't reflect extreme phonetic
differences ie pronouncing "children" as if it were Mandarin "qiu-ren"
(not exact, but similar) which your English-based orthography doesn't
convey. It's similar to people who used to advocate a non-phonetic
French-based orthography for Haitian Creole, it was good
intelligibility with French but difficult for schoolchildren to learn.
Similarly if you use an English-based orthography for Tok Pisin it
looks similar somewhat to English and at one time its detractors
called it "bad english" or "colloquial English of New guinea" but now
it is widely recognised as own language and has its own Wikipedia
even. The richness of the Singlish idiom is definitely not adequately
expressed by the English-based orthography as it doesn't make
distinctions between minimal pairs in some cases - Singlish particles
are tonal, but in the English-based orthography it is ambiguous, like
Tibetan writing, except the difference that it conveys entire feeling
of a phrase.

I wouldn't support a Wikipedia for colloquial English because it is
the exact same language as written English. A Wikipedia for Scots or
AAVE or Singlish, I would support, but just normal colloquial English,
I would not. Nor would I support separate Wikipedias for Mandarin and
Baihuawen - they are one and the same.

> > Also there is much differences in Shanghainese too, if you want I can
> > maybe type some examples later.
> 
> Pray show me something I have never learnt about my own mother tongue.

I have a story to tell you Mr Sheng Jiong. Sit back and read please.

有一趟、北風搭太陽辣辣海爭啥人個本事大。爭法爭法來勒一個過道人、身浪穿仔一件厚袍子。伊拉兩家頭就王東道、講好啥人能夠先叫迭個過道人拿伊個夠子脫下來、就算啥人本事大。北風〓足仔勁窮吹八吹。不過吹得越結棍、埃個人拿袍子裹得越緊。後首來北風無沒勁勤、只好就算勤。過一息太陽出來一曬、埃個過道人馬上就拿袍子脫脫。所以北風勿得勿承認、還是太陽比伊本事大。

The moral of the story is that nobody likes the sun and nobody likes
the north wind either. But they both like to write in colloquial Wu.
Very much.

Mark