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Eureka
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Most of you have probably seen this before, but...

Post by Eureka »

Rsrecaeh has sowhn taht it deos not mtetar waht oedrer the lteetrs are arnaegrad in a wrod, as lnog as the frsit and lsat ltteers are in tiher crecort pacles. Tihs is bcaseue the mnid raeds the wrod as a wolhe, rtaehr tahn ecah leettr serepalety.



(I haven't got a link to prove that, but it seems to work for everyone.)

What occured to me, though, is that this probably wouldn't work as well for highly inflected languages. If someone isn't particularly familiar with a particular form of a particular word, then they'd probably at least need the inflected ending to be spelled out correctly.

This suggests to me that non-inflected languages are intrinsically easier to read than inflected ones (although there are several other reasons to say that).


Any thoughts?

mercutio
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Post by mercutio »

But all your words were pretty short (only 1 had 3 syllables) & all of them were of common usage. Anagrams cant be used as an argument I guess since the first & last letters have to stay in place. Do you have any sentences with longer & more unusual words?

Eureka
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Post by Eureka »

It seems to be based on the fact that we guess words, rather than reading them completely. So wheither they are long or short isn't as important as wheither they are guessable:

The lsngoet wrod in the Einslgh Laaggune is, "atdeablseianisntarhmistisinm". :)

But I see your point. None the less, inflected words must force you to read most of the letters seperately, because you must detatch the stem from the inflection, then detect any contractions. This would shurely make it harder to speed-read in inflected languages.

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

I hvae no idea waht taht last wrod there is... :?

Raya
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Post by Raya »

Eureka wrote:None the less, inflected words must force you to read most of the letters seperately, because you must detatch the stem from the inflection, then detect any contractions. This would shurely make it harder to speed-read in inflected languages.
I'm not so sure about this. Granted, this is how the average student of Greek or Latin pounds out the meanings of word - but then again, does the average G/L student actually read the language in question, or do they just end up translating it (mentally or otherwise)?

I'd be curious to hear the comments of someone who natively speaks an inflected language. One such friend was telling me that he never even noticed that nouns in his language had declensional endings until he started studying Latin - and he went on to say that he couldn't decline a noun in his native language!

Raya
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Post by Raya »

Emma_85 wrote:I hvae no idea waht taht last wrod there is... :?
antidisestablishmentarianism :wink:

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

ahhh! :D

Well, I can test that inflected language thing... just post some scrambled German and I'll tell you if it's possible to read it or not :P .

Episcopus
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Post by Episcopus »

(I have to delete that word, it was too long messing up the page. If you want it I will PM it to you)
Last edited by Episcopus on Sat Jun 12, 2004 2:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Emma_85
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Post by Emma_85 »

achwieschöndassduhieraufdeuschschreibtsaberesgibteinvielbesseresundlängereswortnämlichdonaudampffahrtgesellschaftskapitänsmützeaberdasinteressiertjaeigentlichgarnichtdennhiergehtesnichtdarumwahlloswörteraneinanderzureihensondernumwasganzanderes

Episcopus
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Post by Episcopus »

Mine was actually 1 word, yours was just german without spaces :lol:

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benissimus
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Post by benissimus »

nitloe pngtaue in hoc lcoo cnstoraeco
flebile nescio quid queritur lyra, flebile lingua murmurat exanimis, respondent flebile ripae

Clemens
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Post by Clemens »

Luat enier sidtue an eienr elgnhcsien uvrsnäiett, ist es eagl in wcheler rhnfgeeloie die bstuchbaen in eniem wrot snid. das eniizg whictgie ist, dsas der etrse und der lztete bstuchbae am rtigeichn paltz snid. der rset knan tatol deiuranchnedr sien und man knan es ienrmomch onhe porbelm lseen. das legit daarn, dsas wir nhcit jeedn bstuchbaen aeilln lseen, srednon das wrot als gzanes.

Well, it works for German, too. But German is not a highly inflected language either.

For those of you who can read some German:

http://home.t-online.de/home/akrue/dumm61.htm

threewood14
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Post by threewood14 »

Actually, I think there are longer english words.

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanokoniosis is a disease.

(Or if you'd perfer paaccccceiiiiiiklllmmnnnnoooooooooprrssstuuvs...alphabetical order...

I think there is another words for a chomosome or something that is over 1000 letters. This one here is 45 letters.

Koala
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Post by Koala »

While correct from its Greek origin κονίω -
to make dusty, fill with dust,
in English this lung disease is spelt with a 'c' in place of a 'k' twrosad het den fo shti glno rwod

stuj engib epadncit :D

Bert
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Post by Bert »

Raya wrote:
Eureka wrote:None the less, inflected words must force you to read most of the letters seperately, because you must detatch the stem from the inflection, then detect any contractions. This would shurely make it harder to speed-read in inflected languages.
I'm not so sure about this. Granted, this is how the average student of Greek or Latin pounds out the meanings of word - but then again, does the average G/L student actually read the language in question, or do they just end up translating it (mentally or otherwise)?
I agree. I do not think that a native Greek had to parse a word to know its meaning. Just like we don't have to think about which tense a word is before we understand it (ie. -had brought- -> pluperfect of -to bring-... ah is that what it means.)
Raya wrote:
I'd be curious to hear the comments of someone who natively speaks an inflected language. One such friend was telling me that he never even noticed that nouns in his language had declensional endings until he started studying Latin - and he went on to say that he couldn't decline a noun in his native language!
I don't speak an inflected language but here is an example from Dutch.
If someone had to learn Dutch as a second language, I assume (s)he would have to learn rules concerning which of the two definite articles to use with which word. I don't know such rules but I do know which article to use.

Episcopus
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Post by Episcopus »

Ich know a highly inflected language (yes we have deponents and ablative!) but I did not realise any of these subjunctives or why some verbs are odd, I just use them. For cases they are used, if you do not use a case it is not a mere case of being gramatically incorrect, but it simply sounds odd. You just have the instinct when to you an ablative or accusative depending on what you want to say and what preposition it is. I can not decline a noun, in any case it would take a while since I have not learned them in table form. Similarly, with subjunctive constructions there is a subtle difference in mood required which changes the ending of the verb, but this is made instinctively as the statement would not make real sense if say you used indicative. And (semi) deponents and the like are used with the meaning of active, simple; there is a kind of disregard and lack of care as to why it takes passive forms in some tenses and active in others. My 2 cents :wink:

I would wish to have some kind of spoken instinct in latin but that will never happen if classics does not change from stupid monotonous translations and overloads of literature. The other day I had a test with 10 lines of latin to be translated to english, it was 45 minutes, I finished in 5. They expect you to break apart the grammar and parse decline nouns in your head to find the right one with such an amount of time, I'm glad they are just there for me and I think nothing of diffrangemini, be ye broken apart. At least that's a start :?

Michaelyus
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Post by Michaelyus »

Well, you'd have a hard time if there were certain questions (probably in O-levels papers) such as "Conjugate morior (I had to conjugate mourir in this non-GCSE fashion as a mini- test, but thankfully not in the literary tenses)". Most people cannot grammatically parse English these days. So sad.

Raya
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Post by Raya »

Michaelyus wrote:Most people cannot grammatically parse English these days. So sad.
For myself, I'm not sure whether this is a bad thing or not.

There is fable I recall (somewhat vaguely), where someone asks the centipede how she manages to walk with so many legs - does she take a step with all the left ones and then the right ones? does she step with the frontmost legs, then the ones just behind, and so on through to the back legs? or has she some other way?
And when the centipede stops to think about how she walks, she finds she can't walk anymore...

I found myself in a similar situation today as I was writing an essay. I stopped to think about the grammar in a particular sentence, and - to my amazement - that made me stop dead. As I tried to figure out how my writing was working, I couldn't write! :?

Episcopus
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Post by Episcopus »

I think one advantage of GCSE Latin is that the emphasis is more on linguistic instinct through the CLC rather than huge arrays of tables and requirements for conjugations in the examination which is ridiculous! Plus the set text tests are more geared towards zealous study and perhaps english memorisation of the texts rather than the analysis which is required today. Not saying that many students do not just memorise the translations, which renders the whole study pointless. It's better in the sense nowadays that it's gradually being seen more as a language than a machine, yet still there's a long way to go.

je mourus, mourus, mourut, mourumes, mourutes, moururent.
mourusse mourusses mourut mourussions mourussiez mourussent

Why does the past historic always look so odd.

threewood14
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Post by threewood14 »

Most people cannot grammatically parse English these days. So sad.
Well. As long as they can understand each others' words!

Episcopus
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Post by Episcopus »

egg, noun.

genitive of egg

What are your parsage requirements? it usually states on test papers

Michaelyus
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Post by Michaelyus »

Context was already starting to overrule inflection in Latin, right from the beginning.

Here's something completely mad:

OVBSI EM VINCAMD. MONEN HIMI STE GLICAE... TE OMDI NIGLVMA ALTANIM IDCOS.

*************************************************************

Or, keeping the first and last letters in place:

VIBOS TE DICVNAM. NEMON MIHI EST ANCIGLE... ET DOMI LANIGVM LITANAM DIXO. :wink:

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