Foreigners' help needed for a media/linguistic project

Thursday, December 04, 2008

(5) Comments

Currently I am researching how
linguistically the words representing
the virtual space are being mapped in various languages and I would
appreciate if you took a minute to leave a comment about the words mentioned
below in your native languages. I think this could potentially reveal
a fascinating kaleidoscope of how we define the virtual in various
cultures. While I understand that English lexicon is quite popular,
perhaps some new words are being invented to replace the English ones?
A few words I am interested in are:

***********
'web site'
'blog'
'internet'
'internaut' (or other words defining the users of the internet)
************


I can give you examples in Lithuanian language which in a way explain
the beginnings of this modest attempt:

'web site' is 'interneto svetainė' which in fact means a
living/sitting/common room in the internet.

'blog' is 'tinklaraštis' which means a script on the net or a net that
is weaving a pattern/script. Funny enough, the word 'blogas' (we add
the ending -as to male nouns/adjectives) in Lithuanian means 'bad'.

If you could take a minute to reply with as precise
definitions of the above words with as correct transcription of them
(with dots, umlauts and other diacritics), I would be forever
grateful. If you come up with some other interesting words circulating
within that context or would like to forward the link to other people
from across the globe, you are more than welcome.

Please leave a comment or reply to lina[dot]zigelyte[at]gmail[dot]com . The overview and
an essay will be posted on the blog.
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5 Responses to "Foreigners' help needed for a media/linguistic project"

N said :
December 4, 2008 at 4:02 PM
I gather that other languages don't necceserily are in the habbit of translating everything from English to native tongue as it has been the case with Lithuanian where
krepšinis goes for basketball, straigtasparnis for helicopter. So it could be very difficult to come up with tangible conclusions. By the way, standard translation of blog to Lithuanian goes by the name of internetinis dienoraštis web/internet diary that it is. It is something very close to log. Worth mentioning fact is that internetinis dienoraštis is artificial word created and suggested by the Lithuanian language standard body. Thanks to god it became naturalized. Blogas for bad and blogas for blog are homospelled only if I can say that , don’t make any mistake there, they are not homophones at all.
Lina said :
December 4, 2008 at 5:57 PM
Re 'blogas'=bad I regard that more as a word play of course. The habit of translating is one thing, yet I'm interested to see what are the practices in other languages. I.e. the Dutch word for 'cinema' is 'bioscoop' which I find quite fascinating because of the proximity of bio+scoop. bio deriving from 'organic, live'. Hence cinema becomes not only 'moving pictures', but almost 'moving life or watching life move by'.
As far as I know, Iceland has some interesting traditions in these terms and I'm curious to find out the traditions in Asia.
N said :
December 4, 2008 at 8:10 PM
Yeah, still and all it is an interesting idea. Look forward to see an essay.
Anonymous said :
December 7, 2008 at 6:09 AM
"Web site" = "suíomh Gréasáin". Literally "a place on the Web". The G is capitalised as the W is in English to differentiate the World Wide Web from other webs.

"Blog" = "blag". No meaning; just a phonetic spelling.

"The Internet" = "an tIdirlíon". Again, the I is capitalised as in English to differentiate the Internet from any other internet i.e. a connection of two or more networks. "Idir-líon" is literally "inter-net".

"Surfing" = "scimeáil". Literally "skimming"

"Browser" = "brabhsálaí". Gaelicised form/phonetic spelling of the English.
Lina said :
December 8, 2008 at 5:15 PM
Primal, thanks for the Irish input! I particularly liked 'skimming'...

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