3 ms·
How about "Whoa!"? That seems to me like it preserves some of the ambiguous sense (calling for attention vs. remarking upon a discovery).
by zahlman 10mo ago
How about "Whoa!"? That seems to me like it preserves some of the ambiguous sense (calling for attention vs. remarking upon a discovery).
- cvoss 10mo agoThe issue is really focused on the grammatical function of the word. The researcher is arguing that it's not ever used as an interjection, which "whoa" always is.
- zahlman 10mo agoI would say the presence of an exclamation mark, in a context where exclamation marks are rare, is strong evidence of use as an interjection. Unless we're arguing that some other mark was mistaken for an exclamation, generally I would say rare typography is "marked" (noteworthy) rather than being likely mistaken. I think the researcher's position is not likely to hold much sway going forward.
- tsimionescu 10mo agoThe exclamation mark is added in transliterations of the manuscript because it is believed to be an interjection. If you look at the manuscript, there is no such mark: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf#/media/File:Beowulf_Cotton_MS_Vitellius_A_XV_f._132r.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beowulf#/media/File:Beowulf_Co...
- Sharlin 10mo agoWhy would you assume the original had an exclamation mark? Indeed the whole symbol was not invented until the 1300s.
- LudwigNagasena 10mo agoThe article puts punctuation into its rendering of the original text. That confused me too.
- tsimionescu 10mo agoI'll note that it's not this decision is not coming from the newspaper article's writer, it's coming from any common transliteration of the manuscript that you'll find. But it's clearly a transliteration decision made because the people doing this assume it is an interjection, and they're using modern punctuation rules accordingly.
- zahlman 10mo ago> But it's clearly a transliteration decision made because the people doing this assume it is an interjection, and they're using modern punctuation rules accordingly. I think that's what I missed.
- deleted 10mo ago[deleted]
- badgersnake 10mo agoBill and Ted kill a dragon.