BS: A language question

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 01 Jan 22 - 11:21 AM

And just to confuse matters, in Tenpin Bowling, three successive strikes is a 'turkey'.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 01 Jan 22 - 09:52 AM

"In hockey, a hat trick is three goals scored by an individual player."

Same as in football (the one played with a round ball, e.g., better than anyone, by Liverpool). In cricket it's a bowler taking three wickets in three successive balls. The latter is fairly rare.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: gillymor
Date: 01 Jan 22 - 09:13 AM

Then there's the Gordie Howe hat trick which is s a goal, an assist, and a fight in the same game.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: EBarnacle
Date: 01 Jan 22 - 09:05 AM

In hockey, a hat trick is three goals scored by an individual player.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 10:41 AM

I regard brace as as colourful and useful word, not at all archaic.

To be a bit more smutty, Dave (you know me...), we often say things like "I'll be with you in two shakes of a donkey's doodah." And, in the gents, "Oi, ,come on, mate. More than two shakes is a w***..."

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: DaveRo
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 09:52 AM

My parents used to say "in a brace of shakes" to mean "in a short while", "in no time at all".

Perhaps related to "in two shakes if a lamb's tail."

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 09:46 AM

"I never just use braces, they are for nesting, to me."

Drifting… And I nest braces but that’s in some (python doesn’t use them in this way) of my occasional attempts at programming. I could for example have this:

 if (a==1){
      //insert code for a equalling 1
      if (b==1){
         //code for both a and b equalling 1 
      }
      else {
        //for a equalling 1 and b not equal to 1
      }
  }
  else {
     //for a not equalling 1
  }

That’s easy but I can get quite confused with more levels of nesting. One missing or misplaced brace can be hard to find.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 09:42 AM

"What is England English for the orthodontic braces?"

Braces. I think we are the same as US on medical types of brace.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 09:38 AM

"But a "brace" (a pair) usually sounds either very old-fashioned or else literary."

(UK) I think the "pair" use of "brace" to refer to game (especially birds) remains current. I also see the word used in sports reporting. In cricket, two wickets in successive balls is a brace (although, in live reporting, it's probably more usual to say the bowler "is on a hat trick") and in football (soccer), a player scoring 2 goals in a game can be said to have scored (or even bagged) a brace.

I doubt it gets much other use.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Mrrzy
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 09:27 AM

What is England English for the orthodontic braces?

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 07:02 AM

Nice one, Nigel. Good job I'm not, er, woke!

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 31 Dec 21 - 06:46 AM

And you can use a brace with a bit to drill a hole.

She was only the carpenter's daughter,
But she was a 'brazen bit'.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 09:26 PM

Though, not so old-fashioned. I have been scanning photos from the collection of two local artists here in Fort Worth. They were born in 1942, died in the early 2000s. Real Renaissance men in some of their art interests, including interested in hunting, taxidermy, etc. And photographing all of their activities (to use images in paintings). There are a lot of ducks and geese photos, along with duck blinds, various aspects of hunting trips. One of the recurring images is what has to be called a "brace" of ducks, two of them hanging via a rope or leather cord from a nail in a shed with the wood tones in the background.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 09:06 PM

Brace yourselves, Brits: we find fresh, cool air "bracing" too.

But a "brace" (a pair) usually sounds either very old-fashioned or else literary.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 08:03 PM

Oops, yes you did mention it, Jon! :-(

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 08:02 PM

And no-one has mentioned a brace meaning "two," as in a brace of grouse. Or, as the royal nobbery might put it, a brace of grice...

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 07:54 PM

I realised that I'd left that out of my post, Jon, and now you've beaten me to it!

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 07:38 PM

And you can use a brace with a bit to drill a hole. And if you had two such tools, you would have a brace of braces...

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 06:51 PM

Braces hook on to the front and the back of your trousers and go over each shoulder. They hold your trousers up. Also, you can brace yourself if you see something nasty and sudden about to happen to you. And you can find the sea air bracing (especially at Skegness).

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 02:02 PM

"Braces" in the US means the metal contraptions that a dentist attaches in your mouth to straighten your teeth. Or it can be a metal support for a back or like leg-braces for polio victims.

I imagine you mean what we call "suspenders." (Which I'm told in other parts of the English speaking world has another meaning entirely.)

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Dave the Gnome
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 01:24 PM

I got some braces for Christmas. It's all part of my new 1940s look.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 30 Dec 21 - 11:49 AM

Also to take the place of parentheses within a parenthesis:

"(Gone with the Wind [1939] is a good example of that.)"

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 10:08 PM

The usual use of square brackets in the U.S. is to add or clarify something in the middle of a quotation from somebody else.

"Shakespeare's Caesar says, 'Et tu, Brute? [You too, Brutus?] Then fall Caesar!'"

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Mrrzy
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 09:51 PM

Ooh, I use them differently too, and I nest them in this order: ([{}]).

If I am just adding something (an aside, if you will) I use parentheses.

If I am specifying or clarifying I use [square] brackets.

I never just use braces, they are for nesting, to me.

Fascinating.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 04:37 PM

I use those square brackets when I wish to distance myself from some pretentious bugger who I'm quoting but who's just got something egregiously and ignorantly wrong. The device in question is [sic]. Only to deflate the pretentious, mind...

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: EBarnacle
Date: 29 Dec 21 - 10:48 AM

I have always used [] for editorial comment and () for explanations.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Mrrzy
Date: 28 Dec 21 - 04:25 PM

I did not know that the brackets braces thing was American. I assumed British English because that's what I was taught. Fascinating. A language answer!

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 08:58 PM

Very true. And the fact that cats are reluctant to go out at night until gently biffed with a rolled-up Radio Times explains why they have square arses.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 04:34 PM

As Jon Freeman said "Brackets are square":

If not things roll off your shelves.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 11:19 AM

On the current list of threads herein, ( ) beat [ ] by twelve deployments to one. There appears to be neither rhyme nor reason regarding the selection of one or the other of these devices. It's all good.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 11:06 AM

In the U.S.:

Parentheses: ( )    [OED: 1582]

Braces: { }         [OED: 1656]
            
Brackets: [ ]       [OED: 1750 (or '95); in math, applied as well to
                   parentheses and braces]               
                  

Angle brackets: < > [OED: 1890]

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 07:13 AM

I'm with Jon.

DC

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Jon Freeman
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 07:08 AM

"Brackets are square []"

"Brackets" without modifier are round () to me. Brackets may also be square [], curly {} and angle <>

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Long Firm Freddie
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 07:00 AM

There's the story of the professor who went up to a couple of his students in the physics lab and and "Have you gentlemen finished your experiments with the pendula?" and got the reply "Yes sir, we're now sitting on our ba doing our sa."

LFF

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 04:11 AM

It's fine to call them all brackets. Add modifiers to taste. As I keep saying, standard English is wot people use, so to perdition with the nitpicking naysayers! Merry Christmas (never Xmas from me!)

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Mrrzy
Date: 25 Dec 21 - 12:22 AM

Brackets are square [], parentheses () curved one way, braces {} curved differently.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 09:46 AM

When you say parenthetical, you're referring to the words, not the brackets around them. I wouldn't say something like "the words in parentheses." I'd say "the words in brackets."

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 24 Dec 21 - 06:42 AM

Lighter:
Interesting, and had me checking the various online dictionaries. Adds to the sense of 'learn something new every day'.
Apparently 'parenthesis' is the comment itself, 'parentheses' are the brackets used to enclose a parenthesis.
A parenthesis may also be marked off between dashes (hyphens) or commas.

That's a new one on me.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 04:19 PM

Ah, well, Nigel, one of the delicious beauties of English is its inconsistency. Concerning indexes vs indices, I think I'd probably use the latter, though indexes seems unobjectionable to me. Neither would raise much of an eyebrow. Cervix may be a similar word, but the plural cervices does sound a bit like services (especially in the latter's "serviceez" manifestation). For sheer convenience rather than lexicological correctness, I think it's worth avoiding. Though no big deal.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 11:50 AM

My guess is that the familiar "parentheses" was the strongest influence.

On the other hand, most people I've heard (probably including me at times) use "parenthesis" as both singular and plural.

Welshman David Jones's book-length poetic narrative of the Great War is titled "In Parenthesis" (1937).

I believe it must be a shortened version of the older "in a parenthesis," but I doubt many people think of "in parenthesis" as meaning anything other than between round or square brackets.

Fun fact: square brackets were once called "crotchets," "crooks," or "hooks."

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Mrrzy
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 09:28 AM

I say PARiss is English and ParEE in French when pronouncing Paris.

Americans who say Budapesht in English sound wrong.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 07:51 AM

....insisting on retaining a word's original "foreign plural" form is pretentious once the word (in its singular form) has been fully subsumed into everyday English.

Is it pretentious to insit on retaining a word's singular form once the plural form has been fully subsumed (as singular) into everyday English?

I will accept "data" as a mass noun, thus giving "the data is ..." rather than "the data are ..."; I don't flinch at "It was decided by the rolling of a dice"; but I draw the line at "one pence".

DC

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 06:27 AM

As this started from a comment about the pronunciation of the plural of 'cervix', and I then mentioned 'index' as being a similar word. Steve's latest comment seems to totally ignore these to go off on a tangent.
Clearly he has found something in 'stack exchange' which supports his view.
I'll quote from that same source: Stack Exchange
Kenneth Wilson, The Columbia Guide to Standard American English (1993) notes that both plural forms are currently standard in English and then focuses on the idea of "foreign plurals" versus "regular English plurals":

index (n.) has two Standard plurals: indexes (pronounced IN-deks-iz) and indices (pronounced IN-di-SEEZ). See FOREIGN PLURALS [where Wilson makes the following relevant observations: "But when loan words cease to deem foreign, and if their frequency in English increases, they very often drop the foreign plural in favor of a regular English -s. Thus at any given time we can find some loan words in divided usage, with both the foreign plural (e.g., indices) and the regular English plural (e.g., indexes) in Standard use."]

Wilson seems to take the view that, all things else being equal, indexes will eventually win out over indices as index becomes less and less a foreign loan word and more and more a naturalized English word. This same expectation probably underlies Garner's view that insisting on retaining a word's original "foreign plural" form is pretentious once the word (in its singular form) has been fully subsumed into everyday English.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 23 Dec 21 - 04:47 AM

A few years ago someone on the Stack Exchange site asked about the pronunciation of "processes." Here are a couple of replies:

"parenthesis (singular) has a short last vowel; parentheses (plural) a long one. It helps distinguish the words when pronounced. It is the same for emphasis/emphases."

"The process-eez pronunciation is a hypercorrection, based on the misconception that process belongs to the other class of plurals which you've identified. Latin singular nouns ending in -is are pluralized as -es '-eez': e.g. thesis, theses; axis, axes; metropolis, metropoles. Some of them have only reached us in their plural forms: e.g. menses, testes."

Although the second writer is wrong about "testes" I think that their hypercorrection explanation holds water. What starts as an affectation (as you say) spreads like wildfire and becomes an undesirable and ultimately mainstream hypercorrection. It's an ignorant misconception that we're probably stuck with for ever.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Lighter
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 08:40 PM

The first of the affacted "eez" pronunciations I ever heard was "premiseez" as the plural of the logical "premise" as well as the real-estate "premise."

This was way back in the late '70s: in the U.S., of course. I was in grad school at the time.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 04:17 PM

Indiceez maybe. But, for me, it's policizz and countrizz every time. Of course, you're a sing-songy Welshman whilst I'm a hard-bitten flat-cap northern git...

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Nigel Parsons
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 02:35 PM

Steve:
You're really reaching now.
Plenty of other "es" plurals pronounced that way these days, Doug. Listen out and you'll hear 'em...

Yep, lots of plurals ending "es" are pronounced as if they were 'ees'
Indices, policies, countries. . .
But unlike your claim for 'services' they are not being mispronounced.

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: The Sandman
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 02:26 PM

how nice to hear Joan Bakewell Tart is still broadcasting, i first heard her dulcet tones back in the mid sixties, which is why she sounds a bit like a queen

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 02:13 PM

Plenty of other "es" plurals pronounced that way these days, Doug. Listen out and you'll hear 'em...

Subject: RE: BS: A language question
From: Doug Chadwick
Date: 22 Dec 21 - 01:40 PM

I can't recall hearing anyone refer to motorway (or any other) "serviseez" but, in the same way as book/berk, Joan Bakewell presents a TV programme on Sky Arts which she calls "Portrait Artist of the Yaar".

DC