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Mamihlapinatapai
The word ''mamihlapinatapai'' is derived from the Yaghan language of Tierra del Fuego, listed in ''The Guinness Book of World Records'' as the "most succinct word", and is considered one of the hardest words to translate. It has been translated as "a look that without words is shared by two people who want to initiate something, but that neither will start" or "looking at each other hoping that the other will offer to do something which both parties desire but are unwilling to do". A romantic interpretation of the meaning has also been given, as "that look across the table when two people are sharing an unspoken but private moment. When each knows the other understands and is in agreement with what is being expressed. An expressive and meaningful silence." Morphology The word consists of the reflexive/passive prefix ''ma-'' (''mam-'' before a vowel), the root ''ihlapi'' (pronounced ), which means "to be at a loss as what to do next", the stative suffix ''-n'', an achievement s ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Yaghan Language
Yahgan or Yagán (also spelled Yaghan, Jagan, Iakan, and also known as Yámana, Háusi Kúta, or Yágankuta), is an extinct language that was one of the indigenous languages of Tierra del Fuego, spoken by the Yaghan people. It was regarded as a language isolate, although some linguists have attempted to relate it to Kawésqar and Chono. Yahgan was also spoken briefly on Keppel Island in the Falkland Islands at a missionary settlement. In 2017, Chile's National Corporation of Indigenous Development convened a workshop to plan an educational curriculum in the Yagán language, and in June 2019 it plans to inaugurate a language nest in the community of Bahía Mejillones, near Puerto Williams. The government also funded the publication of a "concise and illustrated dictionary" of the Yagán language. Following the death of Cristina Calderón (1928–2022) of Villa Ukika on Navarino Island, Chile, no native speakers of Yahgan remain. Phonology Vowels There are three analyses of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tierra Del Fuego
Tierra del Fuego (, ; Spanish for "Land of the Fire", rarely also Fireland in English) is an archipelago off the southernmost tip of the South American mainland, across the Strait of Magellan. The archipelago consists of the main island, Isla Grande de Tierra del Fuego, with an area of , and a group of many islands, including Cape Horn and Diego Ramírez Islands. Tierra del Fuego is divided between Chile and Argentina, with the latter controlling the eastern half of the main island and the former the western half plus the islands south of Beagle Channel and the southernmost islands. The southernmost extent of the archipelago is just north of latitude 56°S. The earliest known human settlement in Tierra del Fuego dates to approximately 8,000 BC. Europeans first explored the islands during Ferdinand Magellan's expedition of 1520. ''Tierra del Fuego'' and similar namings stem from sightings of the many bonfires that the natives built. Settlement by those of European descent and ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Volunteer's Dilemma
The volunteer's dilemma game models a situation in which each player can either make a small sacrifice that benefits everybody, or instead wait in hope of benefiting from someone else's sacrifice. One example is a scenario in which the electricity supply has failed for an entire neighborhood. All inhabitants know that the electricity company will fix the problem as long as at least one person calls to notify them, at some cost. If no one volunteers, the worst possible outcome is obtained for all participants. If any one person elects to volunteer, the rest benefit by not doing so. A public good is only produced if at least one person volunteers to pay an arbitrary cost. In this game, bystanders decide independently on whether to sacrifice themselves for the benefit of the group. Because the volunteer receives no benefit, there is a greater incentive for freeriding than to sacrifice oneself for the group. If no one volunteers, everyone loses. The social phenomena of the bystander ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
The Guinness Book Of World Records
''Guinness World Records'', known from its inception in 1955 until 1999 as ''The Guinness Book of Records'' and in previous United States editions as ''The Guinness Book of World Records'', is a reference book published annually, listing world records both of human achievements and the extremes of the natural world. The brainchild of Sir Hugh Beaver, the book was co-founded by twin brothers Norris and Ross McWhirter in Fleet Street, London, in August 1955. The first edition topped the best-seller list in the United Kingdom by Christmas 1955. The following year the book was launched internationally, and as of the 2022 edition, it is now in its 67th year of publication, published in 100 countries and 23 languages, and maintains over 53,000 records in its database. The international franchise has extended beyond print to include television series and museums. The popularity of the franchise has resulted in ''Guinness World Records'' becoming the primary international authority on ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Words Hardest To Translate
Untranslatability is the property of text or speech for which no equivalent can be found when translated into another language. A text that is considered to be untranslatable is considered a ''lacuna'', or lexical gap. The term arises when describing the difficulty of achieving the so-called perfect translation. It is based on the notion that there are certain concepts and words that are so interrelated that an accurate translation becomes an impossible task. Some writers have suggested that language carries sacred notions or is intrinsic to national identity. Brian James Baer posits that untranslatability is sometimes seen by nations as proof of the national genius. He quotes Alexandra Jaffe: "When translators talk about untranslatable, they often reinforce the notion that each language has its own 'genius', an 'essence' that naturally sets it apart from all other languages and reflects something of the 'soul' of its culture or people". A translator, however, can resort to vario ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reflexive Verb
In grammar, a reflexive verb is, loosely, a verb whose direct object is the same as its subject; for example, "I wash myself". More generally, a reflexive verb has the same semantic agent and patient (typically represented syntactically by the subject and the direct object). For example, the English verb ''to perjure'' is reflexive, since one can only perjure ''oneself''. In a wider sense, the term refers to any verb form whose grammatical object is a reflexive pronoun, regardless of semantics; such verbs are also more broadly referred to as pronominal verbs, especially in grammars of the Romance languages. Other kinds of pronominal verbs are reciprocal (''they killed each other''), passive (''it is told''), subjective, idiomatic. The presence of the reflexive pronoun changes the meaning of a verb, e.g. Spanish ''abonar'' to pay, ''abonarse'' to subscribe. There are languages that have explicit morphology or syntax to transform a verb into a reflexive form. In many languages, ref ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grammatical Voice
In linguistics, grammaticality is determined by the conformity to language usage as derived by the grammar of a particular speech variety. The notion of grammaticality rose alongside the theory of generative grammar, the goal of which is to formulate rules that define well-formed, grammatical, sentences. These rules of grammaticality also provide explanations of ill-formed, ungrammatical sentences. In theoretical linguistics, a speaker's judgement on the well-formedness of a linguistic 'string'—called a grammaticality judgement—is based on whether the sentence is interpreted in accordance with the rules and constraints of the relevant grammar. If the rules and constraints of the particular lect are followed, then the sentence is judged to be grammatical. In contrast, an ungrammatical sentence is one that violates the rules of the given language variety. Linguists use grammaticality judgements to investigate the syntactic structure of sentences. Generative linguists are la ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stative
According to some linguistics theories, a stative verb is a verb that describes a state of being, in contrast to a dynamic verb, which describes an action. The difference can be categorized by saying that stative verbs describe situations that are static or unchanging throughout their entire duration, whereas dynamic verbs describe processes that entail change over time. Many languages distinguish between these two types in terms of how they can be used grammatically. Contrast to dynamic Some languages use the same verbs for dynamic and stative situations, and others use different (but often related) verbs with some kind of qualifiers to distinguish between them. Some verbs may act as either stative or dynamic. A phrase like "he plays the piano" may be either stative or dynamic, according to the context. When, in a given context, the verb "play" relates to a state (an interest or a profession), he could be an amateur who enjoys music or a professional pianist. The dynamic interpr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Dual (grammatical Number)
Dual (abbreviated ) is a grammatical number that some languages use in addition to singular and plural. When a noun or pronoun appears in dual form, it is interpreted as referring to precisely two of the entities (objects or persons) identified by the noun or pronoun acting as a single unit or in unison. Verbs can also have dual agreement forms in these languages. The dual number existed in Proto-Indo-European and persisted in many of its descendants, such as Ancient Greek and Sanskrit, which have dual forms across nouns, verbs, and adjectives, Gothic, which used dual forms in pronouns and verbs, and Old English (Anglo-Saxon), which used dual forms in its pronouns. It can still be found in a few modern Indo-European languages such as Irish, Scottish Gaelic, Lithuanian, Slovene, and Sorbian languages. The majority of modern Indo-European languages, including modern English, however, have lost dual through their development and only show residual traces of it. In all these lan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Game Theory
Game theory is the study of mathematical models of strategic interactions among rational agents. Myerson, Roger B. (1991). ''Game Theory: Analysis of Conflict,'' Harvard University Press, p.&nbs1 Chapter-preview links, ppvii–xi It has applications in all fields of social science, as well as in logic, systems science and computer science. Originally, it addressed two-person zero-sum games, in which each participant's gains or losses are exactly balanced by those of other participants. In the 21st century, game theory applies to a wide range of behavioral relations; it is now an umbrella term for the science of logical decision making in humans, animals, as well as computers. Modern game theory began with the idea of mixed-strategy equilibria in two-person zero-sum game and its proof by John von Neumann. Von Neumann's original proof used the Brouwer fixed-point theorem on continuous mappings into compact convex sets, which became a standard method in game theory and mathema ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Annual Review Of Sociology
The ''Annual Review of Sociology'' is an annual peer-reviewed review journal published by Annual Reviews since 1975. It is abstracted and indexed in the Social Sciences Citation Index. As of 2022, ''Journal Citation Reports'' gives the journal a 2021 impact factor of 10.032, ranking it fourth out of 148 journals in the category "Sociology". History In 1969, a joint panel including sociologists from the National Academy of Sciences and the Social Science Research Council made a formal recommendation for the creation of an annual journal that published review articles about sociology. As a result of the recommendation, the American Sociological Association initiated a collaborative agreement with the nonprofit publisher Annual Reviews for the creation of such a journal. The ''Annual Review of Sociology'' was first published in 1975, making it the twentieth Annual Reviews journal title. Additionally, it was the third title in the social sciences after the ''Annual Review of Psycholo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Samuel Johnson
Samuel Johnson (18 September 1709 – 13 December 1784), often called Dr Johnson, was an English writer who made lasting contributions as a poet, playwright, essayist, moralist, critic, biographer, editor and lexicographer. The ''Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' calls him "arguably the most distinguished man of letters in English history". Born in Lichfield, Staffordshire, he attended Pembroke College, Oxford until lack of funds forced him to leave. After working as a teacher, he moved to London and began writing for ''The Gentleman's Magazine''. Early works include ''Life of Mr Richard Savage'', the poems ''London'' and ''The Vanity of Human Wishes'' and the play ''Irene''. After nine years' effort, Johnson's '' A Dictionary of the English Language'' appeared in 1755, and was acclaimed as "one of the greatest single achievements of scholarship". Later work included essays, an annotated ''The Plays of William Shakespeare'', and the apologue ''The History of R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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