Search results for 'tag:Phonetics tag:Inflections' matching tags 'Phonetics' and 'Inflections'

lINGUISTICS as a conversation

noel gomez — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 02:39:42 GMT

Good day! Hi there! i just would like to know if Lingustics can be used as a tool for everyday's conversations, public speaking and many more; how does it benefit us and what are its effects to us. Thankyou. I just would like to sahre something i've read about linguistics - its history and unique characteristics. Correct me if i'm wrong. The article goes like this:

Wikipedia

Main article: Arabic grammar

Due to the rapid expansion of Islam in the 8th century, many people learned Arabic as a lingua franca. For this reason, the earliest grammatical treatises on Arabic are often written by non-native speakers.

The earliest grammarian who is known to us is Ê¿Abd AllÄh ibn AbÄ« Isá¸¥Äq al-á¸¤aá¸ramÄ« (d. 735-736 AD, 117 AH). The efforts of three generations of grammarians culminated in the book of the Persian linguist SibÄwayhi (c. 760-793).

Sibawayh made a detailed and professional description of Arabic in 760 in his monumental work, Al-kitab fi al-nahw (Ø§ÙÙØªØ§Ø¨ ÙÙ Ø§ÙÙØÙ, The Book on Grammar), bringing many linguistic aspects of language to light. In his book he distinguished phonetics from phonology.

Traditionally, the Arabic grammatical sciences are divided into five branches:

al-luÄ¡ah (lexicon) concerned with collecting and explaining vocabulary

at-taá¹£rÄ«f (morphology) determining the form of the individual words

an-naá¸¥w (syntax) primarily concerned with inflection (irÄb) which had already been lost in dialects.

al-iÅ¡tiqÄq (derivation) examining the origin of the words

al-balÄÄ¡ah (rhetoric) which elucidates construct quality

Thanks!

Re: imperative mood in the third person?

Cool Breeze — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 07:08:05 GMT

Tanit

Now I am curious. How does Finnish tackle the issue of expressing the imperative mood in the third person? Do you have an inflected form of the verb for it?

Hi Tanit

I'm very pleased someone takes an interest in my mother tongue. Finnish must be one of the most inflected languages in the world. It has an inflected imperative form for both third person singular and third person plural. The inflection isn't the same for all verbs; the choice depends on the phonetic form of the verb, and some letters are omitted from the infinitive of the verb before the inflection is added. There may also be other changes in the middle of the verb as the inflection is added. In informal Finnish people often use the third person singular inflection even for the third person plural. I suppose this phenomenon can be likened to the English way of saying there's books on the table.

There is also an imperative for the passive. I'm not quite sure what would be the best way to express that in English. Perhaps:

May this be written twice! This be written twice! Let this be written twice! And of course: This must be written twice!

I know these don't all sound very good and natural. I hope a native speaker will suggest one or some of them, or something different. The idea is that someone is giving an order whereby he wants something to be written twice but he doesn't indicate who should write it. In other words, Write this twice! is wrong.

Cockney Accent

Anonymous — Wed, 02 Nov 2005 10:16:17 GMT

I'm searching for assistance to learn several lines of a play with an authentic cockney accent.

Best to have recording of a male voice - WAV or MP3 file. Otherwise phonetic text spelling, or even learn it by phone conversation. Want to get the inflections correct.

Here are the lines....

Yes, all right, all right, I can hear you.

Nigel's having a spot of trouble.

We've had nine sugar plum fairies, three country and western and
A Night In Old Vienna, we're doing our best.

You want a follow spot - all right, darling, I heard you before.

- you want the cyc and boom to start,
in with the spot, bring up the front of house
and kill the spot. Next?

For you, darling, the lot.

Sorry, ladies, our mistake, whenever you're ready.

Five seconds.