3 ms·

How would this be translated into Riau? "Sorry, Charlie. Starkist doesn't want tuna with good taste, they want tuna that tastes good."

lgessler 8y ago
In general, you can expect that anything that is grammatically encoded will be able to be expressed in a language that does not encode that distinction with periphrasis. For instance, Khwe has five past tense time distinctions that are grammatically encoded in verbal suffixes: /-hã/: the recent and immediate past /-tà/: the morning of the day of the utterance /-ǁ'òm̀/: a "remote past" before today /-tĩ/: another "remote past", for a few days or weeks ago /-hĩ/: a "far remote past", used to refer to things that happened years ago or even in mythical times. Does this mean English cannot be used to distinguish events that happened a few days ago vs. a few years ago? Obviously not: we just resort to using expressions like "a few years ago", since we don't have word-parts (morphemes) that encode this variable. The example you give seems complicated, but this is actually mostly a matter of lexicon rather than grammar: it is an accident of English's history that "taste" can be a noun meaning 'aesthetic preference' and it can also be a verb meaning 'having a flavor'. The two noun-phrases in that sentence are "tuna with good taste" (a noun with a prepositional modifier) and "tuna that tastes good" (a noun with a restrictive relative clause modifier). Riau Indonesian definitely has relative clauses, and I think it also must allow modification of nouns by prepositional phrases, so the only interesting difference between English and Riau Indonesian for this sentence would be the fact that "taste" would (most likely) no longer be the same word in the two phrases.
- sverige 8y ago
  Yes, thank you. > the only interesting difference between English and Riau Indonesian for this sentence would be the fact that "taste" would (most likely) no longer be the same word in the two phrases. Which is I guess my point: puns don't usually translate. So is the underlying reality changed? (I used to wonder about this briefly at times when I was studying Russian in college.)
booleandilemma 8y ago
It’s been an hour and no one’s provided a translation, so I’ll take a stab at it: Maaf, Charlie. Starkist enggak mau ikan tongkol yang canggih, tapi mau ikan tongkol yang enak. I’m not a native speaker so what I wrote above is probably riddled with errors, but it won’t be long before a native speaker or someone with a doctorate in the Riau dialect of Indonesian comes along and corrects it. This is the Internet after all :)
- ralphc 8y ago
  Curiosity got the better of me. Google translate, detect language. "Sorry, Charlie. Starkist doesn't want sophisticated tuna, but wants good tuna." Not bad.
- inawarminister 8y ago
  Yeah this is not one of the Riauan dialect, it is in THE high prestige Riau-Johor dialect that became Indonesian though. In my everyday language, modern Jakartan: Sori Charlie, Starkist gak mau tongkol yang dipilih-pilih, tapi tongkol enak aja. [How do you translate with good taste?]

lgessler 8y ago

In general, you can expect that anything that is grammatically encoded will be able to be expressed in a language that does not encode that distinction with periphrasis. For instance, Khwe has five past tense time distinctions that are grammatically encoded in verbal suffixes: /-hã/: the recent and immediate past /-tà/: the morning of the day of the utterance /-ǁ'òm̀/: a "remote past" before today /-tĩ/: another "remote past", for a few days or weeks ago /-hĩ/: a "far remote past", used to refer to things that happened years ago or even in mythical times. Does this mean English cannot be used to distinguish events that happened a few days ago vs. a few years ago? Obviously not: we just resort to using expressions like "a few years ago", since we don't have word-parts (morphemes) that encode this variable. The example you give seems complicated, but this is actually mostly a matter of lexicon rather than grammar: it is an accident of English's history that "taste" can be a noun meaning 'aesthetic preference' and it can also be a verb meaning 'having a flavor'. The two noun-phrases in that sentence are "tuna with good taste" (a noun with a prepositional modifier) and "tuna that tastes good" (a noun with a restrictive relative clause modifier). Riau Indonesian definitely has relative clauses, and I think it also must allow modification of nouns by prepositional phrases, so the only interesting difference between English and Riau Indonesian for this sentence would be the fact that "taste" would (most likely) no longer be the same word in the two phrases.

sverige 8y ago
Yes, thank you. > the only interesting difference between English and Riau Indonesian for this sentence would be the fact that "taste" would (most likely) no longer be the same word in the two phrases. Which is I guess my point: puns don't usually translate. So is the underlying reality changed? (I used to wonder about this briefly at times when I was studying Russian in college.)

booleandilemma 8y ago

It’s been an hour and no one’s provided a translation, so I’ll take a stab at it: Maaf, Charlie. Starkist enggak mau ikan tongkol yang canggih, tapi mau ikan tongkol yang enak. I’m not a native speaker so what I wrote above is probably riddled with errors, but it won’t be long before a native speaker or someone with a doctorate in the Riau dialect of Indonesian comes along and corrects it. This is the Internet after all :)

ralphc 8y ago
Curiosity got the better of me. Google translate, detect language. "Sorry, Charlie. Starkist doesn't want sophisticated tuna, but wants good tuna." Not bad.
inawarminister 8y ago
Yeah this is not one of the Riauan dialect, it is in THE high prestige Riau-Johor dialect that became Indonesian though. In my everyday language, modern Jakartan: Sori Charlie, Starkist gak mau tongkol yang dipilih-pilih, tapi tongkol enak aja. [How do you translate with good taste?]