Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2010 February 22

Welcome to the Wikipedia Language Reference Desk Archives
The page you are currently viewing is an archive page. While you can leave answers for any questions shown below, please ask new questions on one of the current reference desk pages.

February 22

strange use of quid pro quo

An Indian politician's strange use of this Latin expression is the subject of this question.

Accusing Trinamool Congress chief and Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee of being “quid pro quo” with the Maoists, Brinda Karat, Communist Party of India (Marxist) Polit Bureau member, said here on Saturday that it was “unprecedented in the country’s history where a member of the Union Cabinet is utilising her position to give patronage to a banned outfit.”

It appeared here. It is repeated in the report:

when your party MPs glorify violence against poor CPI(M) victims, the message is clear that you are in quid pro quo with the Maoists

I haven't seen the expression used thus anywhere else. What do you think of it?--Falsebeep0 (talk) 05:11, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

It seems to be used here in a general sense of an exchange, which should suit the meaning, but a Google search seems to show someone being quid pro quo instead of something is rarely used. That "someone being quid pro quo" and "someone being in quid pro quo" are used interchangeably in the examples above suggests uncertainty about its usage. -- the Great Gavini 06:28, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Quid, of course, is neuter and could not literally refer to humans. Metaphorically, however, anything goes. A person may be hand in glove with someone else, so why not [on a] quid pro quo [footing]? Bessel Dekker (talk) 20:41, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Repluralisation of initialisms, not to mention fried chicken

Here’s a question about the pluralisation of acronyms and initialisms that I haven't seen discussed anywhere.

In my line of work, I'm always advising clients how best to frame their responses to Key Selection Criteria when applying for positions. These are usually referred to as KSCs. It struck me that the term Key Selection Criteria is a plural that does not use –s, yet when we pluralise the initialism, we do use –s. Or, more correctly, the initialism is of a term that is already plural (because they always come in groups of more than one), yet we feel the need to repluralise it anyway.

We sometimes talk about a single Key Selection Criterion – "That KSC is one you're going to need to pay very close attention to; it's more 'key' than the others". In a way, it then makes sense to convert the singular KSC to the plural KSCs when referring to more than one of them. Yet, it would not be entirely wrong to use KSC (not KSCs) as the abbreviation for Key Selection Criteria. Except that it would sound quite odd to say "Here are the responses to those KSC you were after". It almost sounds like someone’s talking to fried chicken. (See, there was a connection, for those who thought I was just grabbing your attention in a cheap, tawdry manner.)

Has this issue been covered anywhere, and what are their recommendations? -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 07:56, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

In American English I would say it's simply a matter of how exactingly accurate you want to be. In normal conversation most people would automatically append the 's' as you have just as a reflexive action. Similar things happen to nouns from other languages like "Lego" or "Samurai" -- in these cases being accurate means being unusual. Clearly, KFC in particular is complicated because the abbreviation is the same for both singular (criterion) and plural (criteria). Ultimately, I think this is going to be a 'do as you like' sort of thing... 218.25.32.210 (talk) 08:24, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I think what happens, Jack, is that once you form an acronym such as this one, it takes on a life of its own, becomes a word in itself, with a regular singular KSC, and a regular plural KSCs. Trying to reference this back to the original is unhelpful and unnecessary, in my opinion, and also violates how the acronym 'feels' (ie to me it 'feels' like a new word, not a reference to the original). Maid Marion (talk) 14:10, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Once an initialism is formed people tend to lose track of its inner makeup—i.e., the features of the words inside it are lost. Even the words themselves may be lost, and repeated outside the initialism. For example, "PIN number" (= "Personal identification number number"), "ATM machine" (= "Automated teller machine machine"), and "EMT technician" (= "Emergency medical technician technician"). rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 14:18, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Ah, it turns out there's even a word for this: RAS syndrome (= "Redundant acronym syndrome syndrome", of course). rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 14:22, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, I did consider RAS syndrome before I posted my question, but this doesn't seem to fit there. The definition is "the redundant use of one or more of the words that make up an acronym or initialism with the abbreviation itself, thus in effect repeating one or more words". KSCs repeats none of the words; all it does is, in effect, turn 'criteria' into 'criterias', and thus the 's' is technically redundant. But to insist on dropping the 's' would seem to be taking pedantry to a new high (? low). -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:14, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Another way to look at it, Jack, is that the individuals tend to think of each requirement as an item -- a Key Selection Criterion, if you will. I'll bet you've seen usage like "I had to rewrite one KTC KSC," which is the mirror image of the question you're posting. The initialism nudges the user toward the singular, and so a bunch of these criterion things needs to have a plural. I've seen similar behavior with KSA (knowledge, skills, attitudes [or abilities, though I can't see much distinction between skill and ability]: submit your KSAs, meeting the KSAs, and so forth. --- OtherDave (talk) 22:04, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Run batted in, in baseball, abbreviated to RBI. Runs batted in also abbreviated to RBI on stats sheets, and often colloquially to RBIs (or RBI's, or "Ribbies"). Theoretically, it could be RsBI, but that's not used. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:39, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Not sure what you mean by KTC, Dave? Was that just a slip of the pen, or is this a different example of the same thing? -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 01:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Just a typo, which I've revised with a strikethrough. Thanks. --- OtherDave (talk) 22:23, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Jack, whether or not it's a word that's being repeated, it's still an illustration of the same phenomenon (RAS syndrome). In this case, what's being repeated is a morphological element (the plural -s) instead of a whole word. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 23:26, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I think it may be a cousin, but not quite the same think. The original example was KSC, which was said to be Key Selection Criteria. But it could also be Criterion. In the latter case, you case KSCia, but that's kind of goofy, so you say KSC's instead. Just like KFC could be a single chicken, and you say, "I'm making a run for some KFC's", meaning several servings of chicken. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:31, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I tend to agree with Bugs on this one (except for apostrophising KSCs and KFCs, and for saying "not quite the same think"). Not even the -s is being repeated, because there was no -s there to begin with. What's being "repeated", if that's the right way of expressing it, is the pluralisation of Criterion. First, it's Criteria, then it's effectively Criterias, although that non-word is never actually spelled out. In this context, are the -a of Criteria and the -s of KSCs considered to be the same morphological element? They're certainly not the same lexical item. However, if this truly is an example of RAS syndrome, the definition will need to be broadened to take into account this sort of case where it's not a word as such that's being repeated. And if it's not an example, I'm not sure where we go from here, except maybe just continue to talk about meeting KSCs, without losing a second's sleep. -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 01:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

It certainly is being repeated. This is a basic fact of English plural morphology; sometimes the plural feature is realized as an -s or an -es, sometimes as a spelling change (c.f. "mice", "geese", etc.). "Criteria" within the phrase is clearly plural, and that plural feature is clearly being repeated outside the phrase when you say "KSCs". rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 02:10, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

OK, so the definition of RAS syndrome is a little deficient. Would it be OR to broaden it, or do we need to wait for a reliable external source that talks about KSCs? Are there any similar examples that anyone can think of? -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 02:30, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm not sure the definition needs updating. I never said this is RAS syndrome, I just said it's an "illustration of the same phenomenon": losing track of the inner makeup of an initialism (due to that initialism's reanalysis as a lexical unit) and repeating one or more of its inner features outside it. rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 02:35, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Alright then. So, if it's not RAS syndrome as such, what exactly is it? Or is there even a label we can use for this at all? -- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 05:56, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

A parallel case might be initialisms which start with a vowel sound where the full name doesn't, or vice versa. We use a or an with the initialism according to its own first sound, not the original one; it functions as a new term. ("A non-disclosure agreement"; "an NDA"). Marnanel (talk) 14:08, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

• This might well be viewed as one aspect of RAS syndrome, since that in itself is a misnomer. It is never the acronym which is redundant (akthough it might be maintained that all acronyms are redundant as a phenomenon): one of the elements within the acronym is, and traditionally the reduncancy is taken to be a word (or, optionally, its initial).
• Technically, a redundant morpheme (or its reduced sign), whether realised differently or not, would then be the same phenomenon. However, since RAS syndrome is not defined in that way, RAS syndrome it is not.
• The question is not what it is, if it is not RAS Syndrome. We know what it is: morpheme repetition. The question is: Do we have a name for it? Bessel Dekker (talk) 19:53, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

"Mexico City" in various languages

It seems to me that the two reasonable choices for the name of Mexico City in a given language X would be the Spanish-language name "Ciudad de México" or a translation of this into the language X. But the articles about Mexico City in the Danish, German, Javanese, Macedonian, Samoan, and Swedish Wikipedias use the English title "Mexico City" (or a straight transliteration). Why? Do the speakers of these languages really use the English name of this Spanish-speaking city? (The Fiji Hindi Wikipedia uses "Mexico City" too, but apparently city is the Fiji Hindi word for "city," so this is not so mysterious. The same might go for Samoan, but I can't find the Samoan word for "city.") —Bkell (talk) 08:00, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

The German article, at any rate, was only called de:Mexico City for a few hours this morning; until then it had been called de:Mexiko-Stadt and is now so called again. I can't speak for the other languages. +Angr 09:01, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

"Mexico City" is very common in German, as can be seen by the fact that there are over 50 articles linking to that redirect.[1] — Sebastian 19:10, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I don't know about other languages either, but when I was there the city's inhabitants did not refer to it as "Ciudad de México", or Mexico City for that matter. As I understand it Mexicans only refer to the city as "México DF". --Richardrj ^{talk email} 09:33, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

In Romanian we usually use the English "Mexico City". I haven't heard anything else. Rimush (talk) 10:11, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

In the case of Japanese, there seems to be a discussion about changing the name to メキシコ連邦区 (literally Mexico Federal District), and that headword already points to the same article. Paul Davidson (talk) 11:15, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I think residents of Mexico City just call it the DF (es:Distrito Federal).

75.62.109.146 (talk) 12:04, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

The Farsi, Marathi and Bengali (but not Hindi) names seem to be English transliterations as well.--Dpr (talk) 12:39, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

FWIW, in Czech it's called "Mexico City" or just "Mexico" (despite that cswiki calls it "Ciudad de México", apparently on account of its being the official name; I've never heard anybody say that).—Emil J. 14:24, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

In Mexico, the city is informally known as México DF, el DF, or even just México when it is clear from the context that you are referring to the city. Marco polo (talk) 16:43, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I've lived in Sweden all my life and I've never heard a Swede call the Mexican capital anything but "Mexiko City" (or "Mexico City"). I suspect that this is a post-World War II phenomenon, however. For example Nordisk familjebok lists the name of the capital as Mejico, with Mexico as an alternative.[2] Gabbe (talk) 17:20, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Most Mexicans regret the dominance of the United States. It seems almost cruel for speakers of languages other than English to add to the humiliation of the Mexicans by using the English name for their capital city, as if Mexico were a colony of the United States. Marco polo (talk) 19:18, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

So, the obvious question is: Why do so many countries use the English name? — Sebastian 21:01, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I guess the standard explanation: "So far from God and so close to the United States" -- AnonMoos (talk) 23:06, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

For Swedish at least, appending "city" to the name in cases of ambiguity is more of a rule than an exception, regardless of the host language. For example, Guatemala City, Panama City, Cebu City, Kuwait City, etc. And as for why that is, I guess the answer is Anglicisation. Gabbe (talk) 12:21, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I've got a hunch that the English language in general is just much better known in those countries than Spanish is, and they might have learned the city's name from English speakers and writers. In English we have a tendency to bring words in from every language on God's green earth. Other languages are a tad less open to the inevitably hodgepodge approach of English. There would be no equivalent Danish word for "Mexico", so it could make sense they would pick up on the English equivalent. It would be interesting for someone with knowledge of German to look into the usage of other Mexican place names, and see if the English or the Spanish version is used. I find it interesting that one Nordic source would list "Mejico", which is what some Spanish language revisionists have tried to call it (along with Don Quijote, etc.) ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:23, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I couldn't think of any off the top if my head, but I looked up Gabbe's list above; the only one where the German Wikipedia article has the English name is Cebu City, but for the others, "... City" is still at least sometimes used. — Sebastian 01:42, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

This use of what we could call a "third-party exonym" is not unheard-of. For example, English uses the Venetian term "Montenegro" rather than the English "Black Mountain" or the Serbian "Crna Gora." We use the French word "Prague" rather than an English-looking word or the native Czech "Praha." -- Mwalcoff (talk) 00:06, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Oh, yes! Now that you mention it, there are more examples for English using third-party exonyms: (All French in this case:) Cologne, Aix-la-Chapelle and Mayence (both historically), Nuremberg, Danube and Lake Constance. — Sebastian 03:08, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Not quite the same thing but, as we've discussed here before, the English-language names Czech, Czechia and Czechoslovakia all use not Czech orthography, but Polish, for the initial /ch/ sound, and English for the rest. (In Polish, Czechoslovakia was Czechosłowacja. In Czech, it was Československo.) It looks like a stupid thing to say, but there is no -cz- cluster in the Czech language. They use Č č for the /ch/ sound. This is not normally anglicised at all (Janáček is never respelt as "Yanachek" or even "Janachek"), but if it were, it would be done via -ch-, not -cz-. The Russian name Чехов, which refers to the Czech people, is romanised "Chekhov", and not "Czechov", because the latter would be considered very silly. Yet a whole country gets this "silly" treatment. High time the Chekh Republic/Chekhia threw off its Polish shackles and changed its English name. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 07:42, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

According to our article on Czech orthography (there's a little more at cz:Český pravopis), the Czech language used digraphs similar to those still used in Polish until Jan Hus replaced most them with diacritics, e.g., cz → č, rz → ř, ʃʃ → š, etc. So the English name of the Czechs may date back to those times before the 15-century orthographic reform. — Kpalion^(talk) 09:09, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

That's what I originally thought, too. However, according to the online OED the word only entered English in mid 19th century, first with funny spellings like Tshekh or Tschech that eventually stabilized on the current Czech, and they give "[Boh. Čech, Pol. Czech.]" as its etymology.—Emil J. 12:59, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

As for the third-party exonym for the Mexican capital city, what I think is unique in this case, is that many of those languages that use the English name for the city have their own exonyms for the whole country; cf. German Mexiko, Javanese Meksiko, Polish Meksyk. It looks like the English name is used to distinguish the country from the city. — Kpalion^(talk) 09:23, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Especially as Americans say "Meksikoe" and Mexicans say "Meheekoe" (with a strong guttural "h" sound). ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 09:27, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Still, we perhaps should share the blame equally--almost all the languages mentioned above (Javanese, German, Polish)...and others including French, use the IPA /ks/ ("x") pronunciation instead of the IPA /x/ (Spanish "j", German "ch", Russian translit. "kh"). The culprit of course is the Spanish-language orthography change from "x" representing a "sh" (/ʃ/) sound -- as in Portuguese-- to "j", while leaving the word Mexico unchanged in most countries except Spain (Mejico). Perhaps Mandarin is the only one to get it close to right: 墨西哥, where 西 xi comes close to the guttural /x/ ("ch") sound used in Spanish (close to /ç/), since Chinese has no /x/. But even that's ambiguous. --Dpr (talk) 14:12, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Hmm, interesting. In Welsh the city is Dinas Mexico or for stricter compliance with Welsh orthography, Dinas Mecsico since "x" doesn't normally occur in Welsh. We do famously have the [x] sound in the language, but we don't use it in either the country or the city name, which would be "Mechico" if that were the case. -- Arwel Parry (talk) 22:27, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Mandarin Chinese does have [x], it's written h in pinyin.—Emil J. 14:31, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Thanks for pointing that out--I don't know what I was thinking!!! But Mandarin does forbid the /x/ sounds before a /i/ vowel.--Dpr (talk) 17:18, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

The Chinese transliteration probably came through Cantonese via English, not directly from Spanish. 墨 is mo is mandarin whereas in Cantonese it's /mak/. --Kvasir (talk) 16:14, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

The Cantonese origin sounds likely. Pointing that out shows that whoever promulgated the original transliteration may have intended the English-style /ks/ sound to be adopted into Chinese, but obvious Mandarin's lack of syllable final consants (except nasals) removes that in Mandarin. --Dpr (talk) 17:17, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Secretaría de Turismo | Gobierno del Distrito Federal uses "mexicocity" in its web address. -- Wavelength (talk) 16:37, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Wow, that pretty much blows away most claims of Anglo chauvinism and dominance...--Dpr (talk) 17:17, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I like the idea that one's Mexico-ness (whatever that means) could be measured by reference to one's "mexicócity". I imagine that in virtually all cases people's mexicocity would be 0, since I don't know of anyone who actually is Mexico. But it's a nice conceptual idea, all the same. And not entirely unprecedented - L'état, c'est moi. :) ---- 202.142.129.66 (talk) 22:19, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

This isn't the science RD, but it is important to point out that the above value is not correct. Given that there are 111,211,789 people per 1 Mexico, the average Mexican has a mexicócity of about 9 ppb. (8.991852473 ppb, to be exact). — Sebastian 23:41, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Fair enough. But I can beat that. My Australicity is 82.2062 at the moment, but falling constantly. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:27, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

See, it's already dropped to 45.1147 in just over 16 hours, thanks to Sebastian. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 12:49, 25 February 2010 (UTC)

hip hip hurra

What are the origins of the expression: "hip hip hurra" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 65.199.189.6 (talk) 15:05, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Online Etymology Dictionary says: [3]

hip (interjection)
exclamation used to introduce a united cheer (cf. hip-hip-hurrah), 1827, earlier hep, cf. Ger. hepp, to animals a cry to attack, to mobs a cry to attack Jews (see hep (2)); perhaps a natural sound (cf. L. eho, heus).

Does that help? Gabbe (talk) 15:36, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

The Penny Cyclopedia (quoted in the OED) considered "hep" to be the initials of "Hierusalem est perdita", since it was used as a cheer in anti-Jewish riots in the ninteenth-century. (I think we had this question before, and someone said that phrase was also a cheer used during the crusades, but I've never seen any use of it that far back.) Adam Bishop (talk) 15:43, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Hep-Hep riots... -- AnonMoos (talk) 23:04, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

The Royal Navy, by tradition, has 3 "hips" for each "hooray"[4]. Why, I don't know. Alansplodge (talk) 16:20, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Verbs

In the sentence I eat an apple, I am the subject, eat is the verb and the apple is the object, is that correct? What about I found something to eat? Then 'found' is the verb and 'to eat' is... what? Is it an intransitive verb? Is 'something to eat' just the object? What about She performs her toilet? Is toilet ever a verb? It seems to function more as a noun here. 195.60.13.52 (talk) 15:43, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

In your second sentence, you could describe something to eat as the object of the verb found, or you could describe something as the object and to eat as a verbal adjective modifying something. I've never seen or heard the word toilet used as a verb. There is the verb toilet-train, but toilet cannot stand alone as a verb. In your example, it is a noun. Marco polo (talk) 16:36, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, toilet can be a standalone verb. Merriam Webster:

Toilet (verb). Date: 1840

Intransitive verb

1 : to dress and groom oneself

2 : to use the toilet —usually used of a child

Transitive verb

1 : dress, garb

2 : to help (as a child or sick person) use the toilet

It is used in hospital, care home or childcare settings, where a person requires help to use the toilet or cannot get to the toilet without assistance. "I toileted Mrs Smith and Mrs Jones straight after breakfast, then helped them dress." Sounds horrid, I know, but it is a genuine current use. Karenjc 17:46, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

English (and maybe other German languages] has these fascinating strange verb schemes. I have found these verb schemesApparently, these verb schemes are called complex-transitive verb structures. Here the complement is a verbal adjective, as Marco Polo already pointed out above; nouns, predicatives and adjectives also suit the verb find. Pallida  Mors 18:21, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I stand corrected. Apparently toilet has been used as a verb. However, I am an educated, middle-aged native speaker of English, and I have never heard or seen the word used as a verb. I think that I can say that the use of the word as a verb is rare—except perhaps by healthcare professionals as a kind of jargon—and sounds awkward. So, if the person who posted the question is learning English, I would advise that person not to use toilet as a verb unless they find themselves in a context where others are using it as a verb. Marco polo (talk) 19:13, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I'm a native speaker and agree it's extremely rare in common use. If you're a non-native speaker I would be be sparing in using it and only in the right context. However, I will report that occasionally, a native speaker might say (intransitively), "I have to toilet", meaning, "I have to use the restroom/WC". --71.111.229.19 (talk) 20:25, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Really? That sounds as made up to me as "She will probably medal at Vancouver but whether she'll gold medal is another question". Or "I spent my afternoon Wikipediaing". Or "Katharine Hepburn Academy Award for Best Actressed four times in her career". Surely there's a limit beyond which it is simply not OK to take any noun or noun phrase at random and convert it into a verb. -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:33, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

It could be an Americanism; it could be very idiosyncratic...I didn't make it up. But in response to your comment, you're clearly a prescriptivist, not a descriptivist :) At least in the States, there is (descriptively) NO limit on making nouns into verbs (e.g. to google, to bork, etc.) I'm nor arguing normatively here. In any case, I would NOT be totally shocked if I heard any of the bolded examples you gave in daily speech--Americans love to nominalize, especially people under 50.--71.111.229.19 (talk) 20:42, 22 February 2010 (UTC) (Dpr)

I don't like to be tied down by labels such as precriptivist or descriptivist. Just because people say or write things - and they do, God knows they do - does not make those things acceptable. There is a natural law operating here, and I have been given the authority to interpret it for the benefit of those less fortunate.  :) :) -- Jack of Oz ... speak! ... 20:51, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

Middle-aged, native English female speaker with social care background here! The original question "She performs her toilet" - toilet here is not a verb, it is a noun with the meaning of "ablutions" and comes from the French "toilette". Maybe in this case the French spelling should be used. The verb "to toilet" is in common use in social care settings. If you've never either been a care worker in an old people's home, or a carer for an elderly or disabled person, you've probably never come across this usage. --TammyMoet (talk) 21:35, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

One thing the OP should probably be aware of is that the idea that parts of speech are determined by semantics is a lie to children. (A verb is a doing word! A noun is a person, place, or thing!) In fact, parts of speech are determined by syntax. In She performs her toilet, there is no way "toilet" could be a verb, because verbs cannot have possessive pronouns operating on them. Marnanel (talk) 19:28, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

I hope you don't mind my saying, but verbs can have possessive adjectives operating on them as in the first part of this sentence. Possessive pronouns are also possible, but I don't understand why you suddenly said that when your example, She performs her toilet, did not contain one. --KägeTorä - (影虎) (A word...?) 17:45, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

In "I hope you don't mind my saying", "saying" is a gerund, a type of noun derived from a verb. In "She performs her toilet", "toilet" can't be a gerund because it doesn't end with the -ing suffix. +Angr 18:30, 24 February 2010 (UTC)

Yes, but I think the discussion shifted from merely that single example sentence to the more general use of toilet alone as a verb.--Dpr (talk) 23:38, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

Looking for a 1997 definition of "Font" as "a specific member of a type family."

Where can I find a dictionary published in 1997 that defines the word "Font" as "a specific member of a type family such as roman, boldface" or "a specific style of type within a type family?" I found this current definition in Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia on February 18, 2010 under the heading, "Typeface." My problem is that most dictionaries such as Webster's or The American Heritage define "Font" as "A set of type of one size and face." Can you please respond to my question at your earliest convenience? Thank you. Mary Ann Becker, Librarian, —Preceding unsigned comment added by Maryannbecker1 (talk • contribs) 17:49, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

I removed your email address, in accordance with our policy, and to prevent spam. Is there a reference number given in our article by the definition? If so you can click on that number and find the source for the definition. --TammyMoet (talk) 18:01, 22 February 2010 (UTC)

You don't need a dictionary; try Google Books. I searched for "font versus typeface" (without quotation marks) and found many references, including this one.174.131.122.254 (talk) 03:00, 23 February 2010 (UTC)

• The question was about font versus type family, but 174's quote is correct. A type family is a family of fonts: thus, the Times family includes numerous fonts, such as Types roman 12 pt, Times italic 10 pt, Times boldface 14 pt and so on and so forth. Countless permutations are possible, but as long as it's Times, it's a type family. Courier in all its sizes and guises would be another family, and so on. Sometimes contaminatory font face is used. Bessel Dekker (talk) 19:39, 24 February 2010 (UTC)