Language/Linguistics | Forum profile

For what it's worth (which isn't much), I neither capitalize Nazi nor hyphenate the term when I say "grammar nazi". On the other hand, Soup Nazi is probably a proper noun, on account of its being a specific character from a Seinfeld episode.

Also, might I suggest lower-case-n nazi for the totalitarian kind, and the upper-case-n Nazi for the third Reich. Lowercase is generic, uppercase is specific (proper) - so while it loses the connection (totalitarianism -> Nazi Party -> national socialism...but totalitarianism doesn't go directly to national socialism) it's maybe less offensive? So, soup-nazi, book-nazi, grammar-nazi, but genocidal Nazi. <^>

Simbera wrote: utual intelligibility is pretty much the base for a language - if two people are speaking "English" but there are aspects in one's dialect that are missing from the other's, they're not both speaking the same language. Yes, but intelligibility is possible across dialects, especially if the differences are as small as the ones we're talking about - less vs fewer, there's vs there are,...

What bobber said, with the marginal difference of me being Norwegian. The 160 character limit hasn't been an issue for some time; phones have been able to seamlessly split and rejoin messages for quite a while now. As for the typing itself, the T9 dictionary means that using a full word isn't much more work (less, in some cases) than spelling out the short forms used to be. The end result is that I very seldom see the stereotypical...

Nope, Nazi works. Flows off the tongue nicely. I don't get it, why not go with Nazi? It happened, it sucked, we all got the same stories from our parents/grandparents, (haha, it's the soup nazi episode on atm in the background), the word isn't taboo and originally meant a political philosophy of socialist nationalism, not specifically that one group (who weren't even socialist). In short order (I give it 30-40 more years...

cooldude76 wrote: Just a question to Non-American's (quite a lot of you, huh? ): In your gradeskool/middle skool or collegiate education structures do you have to study your native language. For instance, in America we have to do 8-12ish years of "English" class, sometimes its "Grammar". You can also major in "English" in college. >.< ridiculous. I don't think there...

Well, I guess then that you're still rather young, then. Older speakers most often clearly show this distinction which of course is fading due to the influence of the north. I even know some younger people from less urban regions who do not use the voiced sound.

ok, though you should learn it on your own time just because, its a great language to know

I think that "zealot" and "fanatic" has been mentioned here a couple of times before, especially in connection with the "grammar" thing. "Spelling zealot" and "phrase fanatic" have a ring to them, don't you think?

mgcclx wrote: 0.432 apple(s)? 3/2 apple(s)? 3i apple(s)? 0 apple(s)? 1 apple... then 1+0i apple(s)? a pear(s)(a is a real number)? -1 apple(s)? <1,0> apple(s)? \lim_{x\to 0}\frac{1}{x} apple(s) (limit don't exist unless it's in real projective line)? “zero point four three two apples” but not *“zero point four three two apple” “three halves apples” but not *“three halves apple” “three /aɪ/ apples”...