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Month: August 2017
Was Mario Pei the greatest linguist of the 20th century? How many languages could he speak?
Yeah. I read his popularisations too back in the day, and they were good. But I’m struggling to think of what he contributed to the discipline. Wikipedia: Mario Pei. He was an old school philologist, I see. And I have all the respect in the world for that. But I suspect that, if you’re not […]
Does the Greek word for watermelon, karpouzi, come from Ancient Greek?
Now, the notion that karpouzi ‘watermelon’ would derive from karpos ‘fruit’ is so preposterous, the only mentions of it you’ll see online are in a comment on a Greek blog article on karpouzi ( Το ελληνικό πεπόνι με τα πολλά ονόματα : “Is it out of the question that karpouzi should be a Rückwanderer? Just […]
Which city is better Athens or Thessaloniki?
What are the main differences, i heard Thessaloniki is more cosmopolitan Oddly enough, my wife (who is not in any way Greek) spontaneously said Salonica was cosmopolitan when she visited it. So there’s something to that. The hostility between Athens and Salonica within the Modern Greek state is of very long standing: Salonica was incorporated […]
Is it possible to speak Klingon without sounding aggressive?
As Jarno Peschier’s answer says, the brief for Marc Okrand was to create an aggressive-sounding language, that would map onto the “Blakh Vakh Gakh” aggressive sounds James Doonan had made up for the first Star Trek movie. And Okrand accordingly went shopping for gutturals: /x, q, qχ, ʔ/ <H, q, Q, ’>. I guess you […]
Why do Europeans say, “Where there are Italians, there is dirt”?
Because there was a perception 50 years ago that Italians were dirtier than Northern Europeans. They may not be saying that now, but there is still stereotyping between parts of Europe, and the claims that this saying is impossible ring hollow to me. I don’t have a smoking gun of someone saying it; but I […]
What is the most British thing ever?
This is obscure. But Quora is a stamping ground for me to pass on anecdotes. This anecdote involves one of the doyens of Mediaeval and Modern Greek Studies in Fair Albion, Professor Geoff Horrocks. Author of the most authoritative English-language summary of the history of Greek there is: That’s the second edition cover. The first […]
What are the most “moving” and “emotional” Greek songs of all time?
… No, I don’t think I’ve posted enough about Greek songs, actually. Other than Nick Nicholas’ answer to What’s the most recent song you’ve cried to?, here’s three more torch songs. Yes, all sung by George Dalaras, and I make no apologies for that. 1. My favourite song ever is Don’t Be Angry At Me, […]