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From: eric@snark.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.std.internat,sci.lang
Subject: Re: Computers and human languages (was Re: What is a byte)
Message-ID: <167@snark.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 31-Dec-69 18:59:59 EDT
Article-I.D.: snark.167
Posted: Wed Dec 31 18:59:59 1969
Date-Received: Sat, 19-Sep-87 08:56:48 EDT
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Xref: utgpu comp.std.internat:241 sci.lang:1309
Summary: Alright, already...

So would *someone* who knows quit tantalizing us and *translate* 'gezellig'?

I'm curious about both the 'literal' (presumably etymology-based) translation
and whatever paragraph of circumlocutions is necessary to express the concept.

Inspection of various possible cognates (notably German ge + selig) suggests
a guess-translation of "wisdom-struck" to this amateur linguist; some sort of
metaphorical inversion (as with English "silly") seems not unlikely, yielding
something like "foolish" or the idiomatic "loopy". Now, how far off base am I?

I'll contribute an example from the days when I spoke reasonable Italian.
Er, make that "Tuscan"; I lived in Rome for two years but found out the
hard way when visiting Naples and Sicily that different 'dialects' of Italian
can be mutually utterly incomprehensible. "A language is a dialect with an
army" --and the Tuscan dialect of Rome and environs is the "national" language
of Italy.

When translating the italian term 'simpatico', you can choose the etymological
cognate "sympathetic" in English, or you can translate the actual concept --
but not both.

In English, "X is sympathetic to Y" != "Y is sympathetic to X"; the term
implies an unequal relationship in which one party accepts "sympathy" and
potential help from the other.

In Italian, "simpatico" is a fellow-feeling between equals. You say "those
two are simpatico", or "we are simpatico". "Those two are compatible" comes
close, but doesn't convey the mild but definite emotional warmth of the
Italian.

There is no really good translation in English, which is why some English
speakers have naturalized 'simpatico' in its Italian form.








-- 
      Eric S. Raymond
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