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**Sikander** · August 23, 2004, 03:07

Originally posted by Last Conformist
A truly bizarre language is Pirahã, from Brazil. Apart from some extremely freaky properties you need some linguistics background to appreciate, it includes an utter lack of numbers, and of colour terms. It also has an extremely limited array of sounds (11 for men, and only 10 for women!).

So is the extra sound available to men a burp, a grunt or a fart?

I voted Arabic, in part because of the way it sounds and in part because of the histrionic character of the speakers most of the time I've heard it spoken (mostly on the soccer field, though a fair amount on television as well). I do agree with Dissident's theories regarding language however. For instance, at one time I thought German and Russian were really ugly languages, largely because I mainly heard them spoken by real Nazis, Nazi caricatures and Brezhnez.

I soon learned differently when I started to take Russian while in the Army. It sounds a lot more like Italian (sound pallet wise, though the cadence is very different) than I could have imagined. Once I got the 6 foot tall blonde bade from Leningrad teaching my section all resistance to the language was demolished.

A similar thing happened with German when I was stationed there. Firstly I found German women to be quite attractive, which softened my mood immensely. Everyone in Germany was so nice to me, and eventually I fell in love with the recorded voice that announced the street car stops. She was probably a rancid old lady in reality, but what a pleasant voice!

**Agathon** · August 23, 2004, 04:51

Originally posted by Vince278

I guess I should also mention that I know Tsolyani as well.

I don't even know what that is. How sad am I?

The only knowledge of Star Trek I have is of the original series which I watched avidly as a child in the 70s.

Oh... and that the Greek woman on TNG has a really awesome pair of breasts.

**Gangerolf** · August 23, 2004, 06:04

Originally posted by Monk

Western Jutland dialect: http://www.elkan.dk/filer_lyd/dialekter/vestjysk.mp3

This is how I'd imagine proto-Saxon sounds like. I think I understood about half of it. Something about cows, WW1 and rye bread.

Southern Jutland dialect: http://www.elkan.dk/filer_lyd/dialekter/sonderjysk.mp3

What's a "hohohom" - the thing the boys were throwing rocks at? It doesn't die until sunset?

Maybe I got it all wrong though, it wasn't exactly easy to understand.

**Vince278** · August 23, 2004, 06:13

Originally posted by Agathon
I don't even know what that is. How sad am I?

Don't worry. Fewer people speak Tsolyani than Klingon. Its from the Empire of the Petal Throne (TSR 1975) and Adventures in Tekumel games by a language professor named MAR Barker. It has similarities to Urdu, Arabic, and other South Asian tongues with a little Mayan sprinkled in.

**Gangerolf** · August 23, 2004, 06:32

Originally posted by Monk

Sorry

I went with spooky dialects to see if Gangerolf would have a clue what's going on. As you know, Norwegians are celebrated for always understanding what we mean.

Not always...

But what's really strange is that you Danes don't always understand us. My experience is that 1/3 understands me, 1/3 doesn't understand me (or pretends not to, see below

) and the last 1/3 thinks I'm Swedish

(see below).

Like the time I went into a small store in Denmark, hoping to find a disposable camera:

Gangerolf: Hei. Har du et engangskamera? (Hi. Do you have a disposable camera?)

Clerk: Væ? (Huh?)

G: Har du et engangskamera? (Do you have a disposable camera?)

C: Væ?

G: Engangskamera? Har du et? (Disposable camera? Do you have one?)

C: Væ?

G: En-gangs-ka-me-ra?

C: Væ?

G: Kamera?

C: Væ?

G: Ka... me... ra...?

C: Jeg forstår ikke! (I don't understand!)

G: (In English) Camera?

C: Å! Nej, desværre. (Oh! No, sorry).

G: OK. Ha det bra. (OK. Good bye)

C: (Smiling) Hvor i Sverige kommer du fra? (Where in Sweden are you from?)

G:

**molly bloom** · August 23, 2004, 06:34

Originally posted by Agathon

Oh... and that the Greek woman on TNG has a really awesome pair of breasts.

Mmm, Greek via Norf London, judging by her accent.

I think she was lashed across a naked breast in the remake of 'The Wicked Lady' with Faye Dunaway.

Give you something to track down and rent, eh?

**Spiffor** · August 23, 2004, 07:25

Originally posted by Gangerolf
Gangerolf: Hei. Har du et engangskamera? (Hi. Do you have a disposable camera?)

Clerk: Væ? (Huh?)

G: Har du et engangskamera? (Do you have a disposable camera?)

C: Væ?

G: Engangskamera? Har du et? (Disposable camera? Do you have one?)

C: Væ?

G: En-gangs-ka-me-ra?

C: Væ?

G: Kamera?

C: Væ?

G: Ka... me... ra...?

C: Jeg forstår ikke! (I don't understand!)

G: (In English) Camera?

C: Å! Nej, desværre. (Oh! No, sorry).

G: OK. Ha det bra. (OK. Good bye)

C: (Smiling) Hvor i Sverige kommer du fra? (Where in Sweden are you from?)

**Gangerolf** · August 23, 2004, 07:34

Nice Norwegian
Awful Norwegian
The same in German

**Agathon** · August 23, 2004, 07:39

Give you something to track down and rent, eh?

I'm not that desperate, I can see awesome breasts just by asking my wife.

**Last Conformist** · August 23, 2004, 07:44

No comments on Pirahã? The percentage of linguistically inclined people must be quite low here.

**Spiffor** · August 23, 2004, 07:53

Originally posted by Last Conformist
No comments on Pirahã? The percentage of linguistically inclined people must be quite low here.

It is an absolute anomaly of mankind. A culture that cannot have a collective memory, and thus is bound not to know progress? How the hell did it manage to survive?

**Gangerolf** · August 23, 2004, 07:57

Odd.

a. Pirahã is the only language known without number, numerals, or a concept of
counting.
b. Pirahã is the only language known without color terms.
c. Pirahã is the only language known without embedding.
d. Pirahã has the simplest pronoun inventory known and evidence suggests that
Pirahã's entire pronominal inventory may have been borrowed.
e. Pirahã has no perfect tense.
f. Pirahã has perhaps the simplest kinship system ever documented.
g. Pirahã has no creation myths – its texts are almost always descriptions of
immediate experience or interpretations of experience; it has some stories about the past,
but only of one or two generations back.
h. The Pirahã in general have no individual or collective memory of more than
two generations past.
i. Pirahã people do not draw, except for extremely crude stick figures representing
the spirit world that they (claim to) have directly experienced.
j. Pirahã has no terms for quantification, e.g. 'all', 'each', 'every', 'most', 'some', etc.

**Ecthy** · August 23, 2004, 07:59

let's just call them a primitive society on the pre-homo sapiens level

can they thus be deemed animals and extincted? no.

**lord of the mark** · August 23, 2004, 10:25

Originally posted by Trajanus

foreign languages: ... swedish sounds bad, and hebrew sounds a bit gay too, especially its R is wierd

Then you need to hear more American accented Hebrew, about 90% of American Jews pronounce Hebrew "resh" like standard English "R". Its totally incorrect of course, but so what? I mean we can maul French, why not Hebrew too?

On the topic, I think every language is capable of beauty in the hands of great poets. Certainly German is.

**Fake Boris** · August 23, 2004, 11:42

I don't see the problem with German. It sounds great in opera.

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