On this Amazigh Dutch site, it’s argued that the Moroccan government made a crucial error in the dispute with Spain by using a spurious Arabic name, Laila, instead of the older Berber word, Tura, being prepared to weaken their claim rather than acknowledge Berber language rights. However, there are further views to be considered.
Funny from a piece by Lamya Tawfik illustrating Egyptian anti-Western paranoia: “Responding to claims that the language used by the youth plays a role in the distortion and erosion of the Arabic language, Nabeel Farouq, a famous Egyptian author of adventure stories for youth, said that this fear is baseless because, to begin with, Arabic…
Ali Smith (via Transblawg) makes some ill-conceived remarks in the London Times re the availability of translated literature on the UK market: Of all the books published in the UK, only 3 to 4 per cent are translations. What’s the matter with us? Don’t we like to look at anything but ourselves? Are we so…
The hash-crazed killer etymology we all know and love is, according to Nouvelle Langue Française (via Langue sauce piquante), a nonsense, invented in 1809 by a dilettante orientalist, Silvestre de Sacy. We should, instead, be looking to the Arabic, assas, guard.
There’s still no article on Chistabín in the Oiquipedià, the Occitan version of Wikipedia, believed to have around 1,832 legitimate pages (Arabic = 11,824).
OK, Jordanian Starbucks customers (via Taccuino di Traduzione). More on Arabizi and language death from Jordanian blogger Lina. I know an Itsi-Bitsi-Teeny-Weeny-Honolulu-Strandbikini bit about East African Arabic creoles, but this is new to me. I guess that there must have also existed Romance-Arabic creoles at some stage (Mozarabic was, of course, not one), but I’m…
Mare de Déu Fumadora, Mother of God Smoker, is a local name used in Arenys de Mar on Catalonia’s Maresme coast for the day before yesterday’s feast of the Immaculate Conception, la Purísima. According to the much-maligned Jordi Bilbeny, this is the day when children were allowed to smoke by their parents (picture of kiddie…
I know it’s stupid, but when Catalan writers refer to the “el Beat Ramon Llull”, I always think of Mr Llull as a saintly motorcyclist rather than an almost saintly (beat = “blessed”) medieval scholar. (Llull is notorious for having bought a Moor in order to learn Arabic and then worked him so hard that…
I know it’s banned in English, but it seems perfectly natural to me, just as natural as wetting one’s whistle: if it don’t rain it won’t grow, and the road to the kebab shop is awash with Blairite pub extensions. Gordonio, a medical treatise published in 1495, is against drinking between meals but recommends they…
Last night I had the privilege of singing at Ferrari driver Marc Gené‘s wedding reception, held in a neo-Renaissance palace (built 1940-50) called Bell Recó (something like “Beautiful spot”–it’s tucked away behind some absolutely splendid trees on a hillside up near Argentona). Apart from the kitchen, I found the building of interest principally because of…
Shop deliveries free on foot in Leeds LS1-8 & LS13. Dismiss