Luck and Languages: Superstition Around the World

As today is the 13th, an unlucky number for some, I thought I'd delve a little deeper into how fortune and luck differs across languages. It seems that numbers play a huge role in superstition, and since there are plenty of countable objects that we deal with in everyday life, numbers seem to have made their way into the superstitions of almost every culture.

I won't get through them all today because almost anything can be considered lucky or unlucky, so I thought I'd just pick out a few of the most interesting numbers associated with luck.

4

Numbers are everywhere when it comes to fortune and misfortune. The number 4 is considered to be terribly unlucky in the Chinese culture and gives rise to tetraphobia. In Mandarin, Wu, Cantonese, Hakka, Min Nan, Japanese, and Korean, the pronunciation of the number 4 is very similar to the word for "death".

The luckiest garden ever.

Those aware of the superstitions related to the number 13 in Western cultures (which I'll get to shortly) will be familiar with the practice of avoiding specific numbers. In the cultures where the aforementioned languages are traditionally spoken, particularly South East Asia, the number (and even digit) 4 is avoided when possible, especially when numbering floors, doors, parking spaces, etc.

Despite 4's misfortune in Asia, in Irish and Celtic cultures, the four-leaf clover is said to be a sign of considerable fortune.

7

The number 7 is often considered to be very lucky, especially in prominent world religions. The Old Testament frequently references the  number 7, such as the creation of the world in 7 days in the Book of Genesis. In Judaism, the menorah has 7 branches, while in Islam, the earth is composed of 7 layers. Japanese mythology also features 7 lucky gods. The list goes on and on...

8

Just as the number 4 in Mandarin sounds like the word for "death", the number 8 also has a similar-sounding counterpart. However, unlike the number 4, the number 8 is considered to bring about good fortune. This is because the number 8 in Mandarin sounds like "fortune" or "prosper", following a rule can seemingly be applied to a whole host of numbers in Chinese.

The luckiness of the number 8 also dictates all kinds of behaviours by both people and companies, who love to use the digit "8" in any way they possibly can. For example, Sichuan Airlines paid a hefty sum for a phone number that consisted only of 8s, and the Opening Ceremony of the 2008 Olympic Games started on the 8th August at 8 p.m. local time.

13

In many English-speaking cultures, 13 is considered to be an unlucky number, so much so that it has its own phobia, triskaidekaphobia. The term itself, like most fears and phobias, is named using Greek words. There are a number of suggestions as to why 13 is considered to be unlucky, including the number of people at the Last Supper, the date of the arrest order for the Knights Templar, and the number of full moons in a year.

However, this superstition goes even further, especially in several Western cultures, if the 13th day of the calendar month coincides with a Friday, making the dreaded Friday the 13th.

Friday the 13th

It is suggested that Friday the 13th is considered to be unlucky due to the number's prominence in the story of Jesus: 13 people (12 disciples and Jesus himself) were at the Last Supper, plus the fact that Jesus was killed on the Friday. If you are inexplicably terrified of Friday the 13th, you may have paraskevidekatriaphobia.

Tuesday the 13th

While I grew up with the knowledge that Friday the 13th was an unfortunate day, if you grew up in a Spanish- or Greek-speaking culture or country, you'll probably consider Tuesday the 13th to be the unlucky day.

What numbers are considered lucky and unlucky in your language or culture? Tell us about them and the reasons why they're lucky or unlucky in the comments below!

The Languages Behind US Place Names: Part 2

On Wednesday, I started a little linguistic journey looking at the languages that helped name places around the United States. Today I'll be looking at a few more languages that were used to name settlements, towns, and cities across the 50 states.

Latin

The Olentangy River Bridge, Columbus, Ohio

The European "discoverer" of the New World has lent his name to many things in the US. However, as an Italian working for the Spanish monarchy, Christopher Columbus probably never referred to himself using said name. His actual name was Cristoforo Colombo in Italian and Cristóbal Colón in Spanish. However, the Latinised version of his name came into popular use for naming states and cities in the US.

Take the D.C. in Washington D.C., for example. The D.C. stands for "District of Columbia", and "Columbia" is a New Latin term derived from Columbus' name. Of course, Columbus, Ohio, is also named directly after the man.

Greek

A number of settlers used Greek suffixes to name cities. Indianapolis, for example, uses the Greek suffix -polis (meaning "city") at the end of the state name of Indiana. However, Indiana takes the word India and adds the Latin suffix -ana, which designates a place name. This would confusingly make Indianapolis the "city of the place of Indians". Minneapolis is another populous example of this suffix in use.

German

The Angel Stadium, home to the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

While Germanic settlers were common across the US, particularly the Midwest, Germany has had a more lasting effect on food in the States than place names. However, there are a few interesting place names that have taken the language as inspiration. As I mentioned on Wednesday, Charlotte, North Carolina, was named after the German-born British Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. I suppose that can count as both English and German.

In terms of other cities with German names, Anaheim, California takes its name from the Spanish word "Ana", from the Santa Ana river, combined with the German word "heim", an older German term often used in place names to mean "home".

There's also the city of Schaumburg, Illinois, which was originally called Sarah's Grove, until a meeting in 1850 when somebody slammed their fist on a table and screamed "Schaumburg schall et heiten!" (English: "It will be called Schaumburg!") and seemingly the name stuck!

That's all for now. Are there any languages that you think we missed? Tell us the city and the language that helped name it in the comments below.

The Languages Behind US Place Names: Part 1

For a variety of interesting reasons, place names around the world tend to tell a story, whether they were founded in triumphant fashion or just seemed to always be there! Today we're taking a look at the origins of US place names, which come from a variety of different languages due to the backgrounds of the various indigenous groups that lived there and the colonists who arrived later and chose names from their own languages.

A statue of Lincoln (who was not indigenous) in
Chicago, Illinois.

Indigenous Languages

Long before European colonists and settlers arrived in the United States with their native languages, the country's diverse landscapes were home to a wide variety of indigenous groups. Most of these groups spoke their own indigenous languages, which they naturally used to name important places. Many US states are named for the largest indigenous tribe that lived there or take the name that the indigenous people were using before they arrived, which were often adapted to read better in the languages spoken by the colonists. In fact, the names of more than half of the states in the US are thought to come from indigenous languages.

While plenty of cities around the US have names that originated in indigenous languages, the largest is Chicago, which comes from either the Miami-Illinois word shikaakwa (which means either "wild onion" or "wild garlic") or the Potawatomi word Gaa-zhigaagwanzhikaag.

English

It's hardly surprising that most place names in the US come from the English language since it's the most commonly spoken language in the country. In fact, many even duplicate place names from the UK due to the presence of British colonists early in the country's history. The largest US city, New York City, was named after the city of York in the UK. Before that, New York City was named New Amsterdam by Dutch settlers, but the British decided that wasn't right!

Houston, Texas is the second largest city in the US with a name of British origin. Though the city itself is named after General Sam Houston, his name comes from a town in Scotland. Houston actually means "Hugh's Town", so Houston is actually a place named after a guy who was named after a place!

Before the American Revolution, borrowing place names from the UK and using English suffixes was common. The suffixes of town, borough, and burgh (as well as their alternative spellings of ton, boro, and burg) were often used. If you've ever driven around the US, you know just how how popular these were.

A view of the expansive "City of Angels".

Spanish

Spanish colonists and settlers have certainly left their mark on the Americas. The second most common language in the US has also been used to name the country's second largest city, LA. Of course, LA stands for Los Angeles, which is Spanish for The Angels, hence "City of Angels".

Other examples of Spanish place names in the US include San Antonio, San Diego, San Jose, and San Francisco, all of which are named after saints. In fact, most place names in the US starting with "San" are likely to be of Spanish origin.

French

Using French in US place names became common after the American Revolution. French place names were common in several areas, but the suffix -ville (meaning town or city) only became popular after the American Revolution, especially in the southern and western Appalachian regions of the US. Jacksonville, Florida, and Nashville, Tennessee are two of the largest cities to make use of this suffix.

Detroit is one of the largest cities in the US to have a fully French name. Detroit was originally détroit in French, which means "strait". There's also Charlotte, North Carolina, which sounds a bit French, but is actually named after the German-born British Queen Charlotte of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, who was married to King George III.

We think that's quite enough place name origins for one day. We'll be back on Friday with even more languages that inspired US place names! We look forward to seeing you then!

Why There's No Such Thing As "Untranslatable"

A lacuna is also a type of hole, as illustrated
in this beautiful picture of shells.

While celebrating the diversity of language is somewhat of a hobby of mine, I am also somewhat irritated by words (often on the internet) that are labelled as "untranslatable". It often seems that most of these untranslatables merely lack a direct linguistic or cultural equivalent, known as a lexical gap or lacuna.

If you throw "untranslatable" into a search engine, you'll be met with plenty of listicles (a portmanteau of "list" and "article", if you were wondering) designed to provide light reading online, generate ad revenue, and provide you with an opportunity to kill some time. Every one of these will give a number of "untranslatable" words along with a description of what they mean.

Translation is often so much more nuanced and complicated than throwing out a word-for-word equivalent and, in the case of these articles, an actual translation appears alongside the words that are supposedly untranslatable!

Depending on your outlook, translation can come in almost any form. You may remember from our "Intro to Translation Studies" posts that scholars Vinay and Darbelnet categorised translation into a number of methods, some of which don't require you to have found an exact equivalent to have translated a term.

It's also important to consider what you need the translation for. If these "untranslatable" words had appeared in a novel, for example, the translator would probably be unable to provide a dictionary-style definition as has been done in these articles. However, while translating them may be difficult, it would not be impossible for the best translators. Sometimes even the best translators cannot find an equivalent term or phrase, and might have to make use of footnotes to explain the term. However, whether you consider this to be a good or bad translation, the word has technically still been translated.

With that all said, most of these lists are very fascinating and I enjoy reading them. I just wish they wouldn't call them "untranslatable"!

What are your favourite hard-to-translate words that don't have a direct equivalent in English? Put them in the comments below and don't forget to provide the translation... if you can!

Intonation: Music in Language

After looking at speech tempo on Wednesday, I got distracted reading about intonation and thought I'd share a bit of information on this wonderful linguistic phenomenon that occurs in spoken language.

Pitch varies with frequency, much like these waves that represent
visible light.

Since spoken language is transmitted by sound, every word you utter has pitch. Intonation is how your speech changes pitch, which is one of the things that makes language so amazingly nuanced. Intonation serves a number of functions in speech, all by doing little more than increasing or decreasing its pitch.

Intonation helps us to determine whether a statement is interrogative or affirmative (a question or an answer) by noting if intonation rises in pitch or falls. In English, a rising pitch indicates a question and a falling pitch indicates an answer. However, you may notice that if you doubt your own answer to a question, your speech tends to rise regardless.

San Fernando Valley, California

A number of English dialects around the world have a feature known as the high rising terminal (HRT) in which pitch rises at the end of the sentence. This is common mainly in a number of Australian and American dialects. This feature of speech has been popularised thanks to the valleyspeak sociolect spoken in southern California's San Fernando Valley, where everyone sounds like they're asking questions constantly.

It can also be used to place emphasis on certain words or clauses in a sentence. In written language, this is often indicated by the use of italics (in the case of words) and parentheses in the case of clauses.

Intonation also helps you to remember things. Next time you find yourself repeating your shopping list back to yourself in the aisles, listen to your rising intonation as you name each item. Apparently, this is because the items are easier to remember that way. It's also a useful thing to know if you're studying for an exam!

My favourite function of intonation is undoubtedly the way that it can give your speech emotion. Those listening to you talk can often guess how you're feeling due to the variations in your pitch.

It is worth noting that intonation does not refer to tone, which is the change in pitch utilised in tonal languages to distinguish between words. I'll have to have a look at that one another day!

Speech Tempo: What is the World's Fastest Language?

If you speak a foreign language, at some point you've probably been in that mildly embarrassing situation when you've had to ask somebody to speak either more slowly or more clearly. Then you may have wondered, "why do they speak so fast anyway?"

From my experience, it seems quite clear that most people (regardless of their mother tongue) believe at least one particular language to be spoken more quickly than their own. I imagine that part of this is due to the fact that when hearing a foreign language (especially when first learning it), your brain is working so hard that you barely have time to keep up, making the language feel really quick with a sensation that you're trying to keep thousands of different plates spinning at the same time.

How fast you speak a language is known as the speech tempo and, as I suggested, human perception of this phenomenon is largely subjective. However, there are ways to measure speech tempo, including measuring it as a rate of syllables over time, since the length of words varies wildly across languages. This measurement can be taken either with or without considering pauses in speech. It is known as speech rate when counting pauses and articulation rate when ignoring pauses.

An interesting study on this subject was published a few years ago, which found that the quickly spoken languages (of those studied) tend to contain less information per syllable. However, those spoken more slowly tend to contain more information per syllable. I've put the results into an interactive chart below so you can see for yourself.

A CROSS-LANGUAGE PERSPECTIVE ON SPEECH INFORMATION RATE | Create infographics

As you can see from the chart, languages with a low information density had a high syllabic rate, and vice versa. Mandarin was shown to contain the most information per syllable (since Vietnamese was a reference) while Japanese contained the least. In terms of speed, Japanese was the quickest and Mandarin the slowest.

Spanish was the fastest European language and German the slowest. Spanish also had the lowest information density of all European languages, while English had the highest. It seems to be that as humans, we all tend to deliver information at the same speed.

Which languages do you think sound like they're being spoken the fastest? Do you struggle with the speed of native speakers' speech for any languages you've learnt? Tell us about your experiences with speech tempo in the comments below.

Good Friday and the Language of Easter

For many Christians around the world, today marks the celebration of Good Friday, the day that marks the crucifixion of Jesus. Throughout human history, religion has been an important part of life for many people, so it is unsurprising that it leaves a lasting mark on language. Today we're looking at a few of the ways Good Friday, Easter, and Christianity have left their marks on the English language.

Jesus being betrayed, with a kiss from Judas Iscariot.

Good Friday

For many English-speaking Christians, naming the day when their lord and saviour died good may seem a bit peculiar. While the meaning of Friday is uncontested, the explanation behind the term good is fairly complicated.

Some believe that the use of good may refer to the actions of Jesus, rather than some of the other events of the day, meaning that the term is being used in reference to God and holy things instead of its more common everyday usage.

Etymologically speaking, the good in Good Friday is also thought to have originated from "God's Friday", Gottes Freitag, or from the German Gute Freitag.

Ostara, the Pagan goddess of spring and fertility.

Judas Iscariot

Judas Iscariot was the disciple who betrayed Jesus by delivering him to the Romans in exchange for thirty pieces of silver. Due to his betrayal, his given name, Judas, is sometimes used to refer to a traitor either by referring to them directly as Judas or even as a Judas. This is used across most varieties of English in a very similar way to how Benedict Arnold is used American English. Arnold defected from the American Continental Army to the British Army during the American Revolutionary War.

Easter

English differs from other languages in that it doesn't use a term related to the Latin word Pascha to refer to this holiday. The roots of Easter go all the way back to the Proto-Indo-European term aus, which refers to shining. This later become austron in Proto-Germanic from *aust-, referring to the East and the sunrise. This became Eastre or Eostre and then the Old English term Easterdæg before finally becoming Easter. It should be noted that the English term for the Christian holiday actually comes from the name of a pagan god of spring and fertility!