Monthly Archives December 2008

The Onion in… Zhonglish?!

On maintaining political correctness when other people’s languages still sound funny

New Mexico, USA — Christmas, 1978. In the wrapping paper-strewn living room of grandma’s house, after the midday dinner, the adults are engaged in the safe banter of nostalgia, the children, including nine-year-old syz, engrossed in the newly acquired toys, tools and trinkets.
There is no [...]

For the record

Don’t you hate it when bloggers post about the most recent tweak they made to their color scheme or their home page graphic? It’s kind of like looking at pictures of other people’s babies — a bit grotesque.

Sound off — links 12/16/08

“Other approaches don’t have to be bad in order for your approach to be good” — natural language processing blog
“In my experience few papers are worthless. But I’ve heard lots of papers called worthless.” from the blog of Seth Roberts
“Last week, journalism lost its most incisive, stubbornly accurate, and unfailing hilarious chronicler of the failings [...]

The Final Olympic Judgement

On Beizzhing vs. Bay-Jing — for the last time?

And you thought it was all over! Remember that undecided race from last summer?

Saturday sounds like this

On proper vocabulary, rethinking the third tone, and the Hànzì thought police

It was still before 8 a.m. when the staccato cacophony of metal on tile shocked Mr. Zhao out of bed.
Mere mortal sleepers might have been awakened long ago on this Shangdi Saturday morning, what with the constant pattering of feet, the grinding drone of [...]

Running unopposed

On the inability to write characters, maternal grandmothers, poop, pee

You spend most of your life cowering, trying to fit the whole, sloppy you into the veal crate of polite society, hiding the fact that your underwear is stained and you trim your nose hairs; ashamed to admit that your daughter crashed when you were teaching [...]

哪=nǎ/něi你们的看法

女士们,先生们。
上篇文章上有一个出租车司机问”哪两个字儿?”(听一下儿这个录音)。 因为”哪”的口音就是”něi”,想问母语是汉语的人: 你们认为怎么样? 一听这个口音你觉得是什么样的人? 教育程度,什么地方的人,等
请大家执教。
————–
(request for native speaker intuitions on social implications of nǎ versus něi pronunciation of 哪 — see last post for details)