Conference thebay::joyoflex

Re .0 (by ABSZK::SZETO)

>   Americans often pronounce "Tsk! Tsk!" as "tisk tisk."  In my opinion,
>   that's about as bad as writing "Here! Here!"

I think this is similar to some people (like me) saying "sigh" as a
substitute for sighing, or saying "snicker" as a substitute for
snickering, as though they were speaking through talk balloons, like
comic strip characters.  (Of course, to do that properly, one shouldn't
just say "sigh"; one should say "asterisk sigh asterisk"!)

>   Actually I don't know the derivation of the interjection.  (It is an
>   interjection, isn't it?)  But I believe that just as it is spelled with
>   no vowel, it should be pronounced with no vowel.  My linguistics is
>   rusty, but I think it's some sort of click (lingual-dental, maybe, if
>   that's the right term).

Yes, I've heard that.  My grandmother used to make that sound to (at) me
when I was a little boy and I did something she didn't approve of.
It sounds rude to me, but saying "tisk, tisk" doesn't.

Dave C.

    G'day,
    
     I guess I tend to say 'tusk tusk' rather than 'tisk tisk'  - but that
    may be a one off.... The _actual_ sound is made with tongue up behind
    the teeth, is it not? (or is that what lingual-dental means?) 
    
    It's certainly a sound that Skippy made famous downunder...
    
    
    derek
    

    �		The _actual_ sound is made with tongue up behind
    �the teeth, is it not? (or is that what lingual-dental means?) 
    
    Yup. [Latin: lingua - tongue, dens -tis - tooth.  Get it?]
    
    I have a feeling that the spelling `tsk tsk' is an Americanism. I think
    I first saw it in MAD magazine.  Of course, it's widely used all over
    the place now.  Until about twenty years ago, the only spelling I'd
    seen was `tut tut'; in British English this is even a verb ' - you
    can tut-tut someone.
    
    b

    Well...as one being old enough to remember how it's done properly, and
    who does it onesself, let me try to describe it (having just been doing
    it with a bent toward analysis).
    
    It is easiest with the back teeth slightly apart.  The tongue is placed 
    behind the upper front teeth.  The action of pressing the tongue upward, 
    and then pulling it downward against slight, self imposed, resistance,
    causes the sound as air enters the small, evacuated area left there. 
    Saliva varies and heightens the effect as desired.
    
    Cheers...Gary

Re .2

Ok, I give up.  Who is Skippy? 

Dave C.

    G'day,
    
     Skippy is the antipodean land-borne version of Flipper. Skippy is a
    kangaroo pet of a child of a National Parks and Wildlife Ranger. He
    often makes a ticking sound - just like the watch at the start of sixty
    minutes(given that the US version is the same as the Oz version) -
    hence Skippy's favourite program 'tsk tsk tsk tsk tsk'    (at about 1/5
    second intervals)
    
    derek
    

French readers will be well aware that although the actual meaningis broadly
the same, the gallic enunciation is a dramatic combination of a long drawn out 

ti.......................Ti....................TI!
|<- approx .75 seconds-->|

combined with a foreboding dissenting head turning and chiding eye lowering.
This is a true theatrical art, best mastered by gendarmes, douaniers and system
managers.

    And of course there is always the extension of this, used to grand
    effect by Basil Fawlty.  It is the transition from the aforementioned
    construct to the "cleaning of one's teeth without manual intervention"
    action.  That is followed (in scale) by the "pshhh", to be used only in
    extreme cases.
    
    Cheers...Gary 

    Well, as the offender who used 'tsk' as a rhyme for '*', I must
    admit I didn't know what sound it was supposed to represent until
    I read .4, though I knew it was supposed to convey disapproval!
    I've seen the word in American comics, and I use the sound to 
    'tut-tut' my children, but I never realised that 'tut' and 'tsk'
    had the same reference.  By the way, does anything rhyme with the
    (lingual-dental) sound to which these words refer?
    
    Liam

    re .1:  -< *sigh* >-
    
    Well, I suppose that many such onomatopoeic words come into the
    language and become regularized in their pronunciation.  However, in
    the example of "sigh" which you ci-ted, I don't remember hearing people
    pronounce "sai" instead of sighing, until Mork and his "heavy sigh." 
    (Not being an actor, I have no idea what actors do when they rehearse.)
    
>It sounds rude to me, but saying "tisk, tisk" doesn't.
    
    That distinction didn't occur to me before, but, yes, I think I can
    understand "tisk, tisk" as an affectation, just as I could conceivably
    say "heavy sigh" (though not as well as Robin Williams can).
    
    But part of what I was trying to say in the topic note was that
    frequently we learn the language through reading only, and sometimes
    through hearing only, but in the process miss the origin of what's
    written or spoken.  In the case of "Here! Here!" I don't think that
    it's merely a case of bad spelling; I think the writers imitate the
    "Hear! Hear!" without understanding why it's "Hear! Hear!" and as a
    result write its homophone instead.
    
    re .4:  That's a very good description of a lingual-dental click.
    (I'm speaking as a layman, of course.  Any of you clever linguists
    out there, feel free to correct me.)
    
    re .9:  No apologies are necessary.  Language is a living thing, and I
    suppose that in a few decades "tisk tisk" might even become the correct
    enunciation, when most people don't know how it once sounded like.
    
    Hmmmm.....
    
    Speaking of which, how do you enunciate the above?  
    
    --Simon
    

    I've pronounced it tisk-tisk all my life and I don't intend to
    apologize for not making a proper British lingual-dental click.  I
    don't aspire to being a butler. . .  There's nothing affected
    about it, it's just the way I learned it from my family and the
    people around me.
    
    I also use a variation that I learned from my Bohemian
    grandmother.  It's a lingual-dental sibilant, probably best
    represented as "tsch tsch."
    
    It strikes me that the concept of a correct pronunciation of an
    onamotapoeic word is an oxymoron, anyway.  Ask a cow how it really
    pronounces "Moo."
    
    --bonnie

    The IPA has four symbols for the "clicks", which are more exactly
    affricates driven by the ingressive velaric method.  This means
    that the tongue makes contact with the roof of the mouth, and pulls
    downward in the center while keeping a seal along all the edges,
    creating a region of lower pressure.  When the seal is broken, air
    rushes in, making noise.  Since the non-moving contact point is at
    the velum, it's velaric; since the air is going in, it's ingressive.
    Normal speach is egressive pulmonic, and there's also a glottalic
    mechanism--but I digress.

    If you break the seal at the ridge behind the teeth, you get the
    "T"-like "tut".   You can also break the seal at one side, giving a
    more "K"-toned click, or at both sides simultaneous, giving an "L"-toned
    click, or you can use the tongue and the lips to seal the whole front
    of the mouth to get a "B"-toned click when you open the lips.  There
    are more possiblities, of course, but those are the main four.

    These sounds can be pre-nasalized and post-affricated based on the
    velar closure, so that one Khoi-san dialect's word for "lion" is
    "n!xami", where the "!" represents the "T"-toned click.

    If you're in ZKO, stop by my office for a demonstration.

    			-John Bishop

    Speaking of clicks, a long-forgotten joke from college linguistics
    class came back to me; I think it was from my sophomore year.  The joke
    was about quadrilabial clicks.
    
    --Simon
    

    OK, in case anyone didn't read it in dec.rumor:
      In order to conserve energy during the next shortage, all VT1000
      terminals will be restricted to 80 klicks per hour.
    
    I also think "moo" is not a bad approximation of a cow's speech.
    It should be pronounced with a short "oo" rather than the long "oo"
    that is usually pronounced.  On the other hand, it should be held
    for several syllables, making it a long short "oo".  If the syllables
    are stressed, it might be held for four feet.

re: prev.
>   I also think "moo" is not a bad approximation of a cow's speech.
>   It should be pronounced with a short "oo" rather than the long "oo"
>   that is usually pronounced.  On the other hand, it should be held
>   for several syllables, making it a long short "oo".  If the syllables
>   are stressed, it might be held for four feet.

    What kind of bull is that?  Feet have syllables - syllables don't have
    feet.  Iamb shock-ed!  Tsk tsk!

    What about roosters?
    
    American ones say, "Cockadoodledoo."
    German ones say, "Kickereekee."  (I know I've spelled it wrong.)
    
    How does the rooster know which to say in the morning?

    > How does the rooster know which to say in the morning?
    
    He looks it up in his human's dictionary.
    
    A chicken went into a library, looked up at the librarian, and went
    "boo-o-o-k!"  The librarian looked at the chicken, the chicken looked
    at the librarian, and the chicken said "boo-o-o-k!"  So the librarian
    said OK, took a book down from the shelf, and gave it to the chicken.
    The chicken put the book under its wing and walked out of the library.
    
    Next day, the chicken came back, dropped the book on the floor, looked
    up at the librarian, and said "boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k!"  The librarian
    was amazed.  The chicken had read the book, and wanted two of them?
    The chicken went "boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k!".  The librarian took two
    books down from the shelf, gave them to the chicken, and the chicken
    walked out of the library.
    
    Next day, the chicken came back, dropped the books on the floor,
    looked up at the librarian, "boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k!".
    The librarian gave the chicken three books.
    
    Next day, "boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k!".
    Four books.
    
    Next day, "boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k! boo-o-o-k!".
    The librarian couldn't believe this.  After all, even bright
    human readers have trouble reading five entire books in one day.
    The librarian took five books down from the shelf, gave them to
    the chicken, and the chicken put the books under its wings.  The
    chicken walked out of the library, and the librarian followed, in
    order to see how the chicken could do this.
    
    The chicken walked down the steps, turned left, and walked along
    side the road.  The librarian followed.  Eventually they reached
    the outskirts of town, and the chicken kept going.  The road ran
    along side a small stream, eventually leading to a moderate-sized
    pond.  The chicken turned off the road, went and sat down next
    to the pond, and set the books down.  Then, to the librarian's
    amazement, the chicken opened each book with the text facing
    outwards, and the cover facing the chicken.  A frog in the pond
    went "red-it! red-it! ...".

   Russian roosters say, "Ku ku ra ku!"

    Really?  My Bohemian (as in Czech) grandmother taught us that
    roosters say Koo-koo-roo--koo-roo, which is rather close to the 
    Russian.
    
    Somewhere my brother picked up er-er-er-er-oo as a rooster sound. 
    I don't know if he learned it or simply thought it up in his own
    fertile imagination
    
    --bonnie

>   Somewhere my brother picked up er-er-er-er-oo as a rooster sound. 
>   I don't know if he learned it or simply thought it up in his own
>   fertile imagination

Mary Martin er-er-er-er-errrred as Peter Pan.

    G'day,
     re er-er-er-er-roooo...
    
    
     I'll buy that. Much more lifelike! - perhaps its bantam cocks say
    this?
    
    
    derek

    French roosters say "cocorico" or something close to it.
    

    Male ones: 		co-co-ro-co
    Female ones:	ca-ca-ra-ca
    Immature ones:	qui-qui-ri-qui [but the `qu' spelling just 
    			makes a /K/ sound]

    Re: .24
    
    What's a female rooster?
    
Lew Lasher

    >Re: .24
    
    >What's a female rooster?
   	
    	 Must be the one that lays the cockatrice egg...
    
    					andrew

    .24 needs an explanation (does it?):
    
    I'm blowed if I'll call a cock anything but a cock. So as not to raise
    hackles (only ratholes) I decided to use `ones' to refer to poultry 
    of the same family. Cocks are male ones (referred to in some parts of
    the world as roosters); hens are female ones; chicks are immature ones.
    
    b

    This reminds me of a discussion I once had with a couple of
    friends when we were trying to figure out the 7 words you can't
    say on radio in the US.
    
    Mark:  "Cock" can't be a word you can never say, because it could
           be talking about a rooster.
    
    Mike:  Then maybe you could say <compound word with rooster
           element> if you were talking about chickens.
    
    Mark:  I dunno.  Somebody who went around chewing on roosters
           would be too weird for prime time, too.
    
    --bonnie

    
    Indian� roosters say. "Ku-ku-du-koo"
    
    
    � at least the North Indian ones.

    re .14 ff.
    Fascinating isn't it how animal sounds are represented in different
    languages.
    
    Fascinating too that sounds humans make, after being written down,
    become regularized with the language.
    
    I'm not sure though that it's always the case.  When you sneeze, do you
    pronounce "aachoo!"?  Probably not.  However, "ouch!" is probably said
    in various ways, influenced by language and/or culture.  (There is also
    the "@#%^&*" variant which isn't what I mean.)
    
    --Simon
    

    In Korean, roosters say gawkoodeh!  The word for sneeze is onomatopoeic
    and is +pronounced jeh-cheh-gi.  Oddly enough, the work cough, gi-chim
    sound more like a sneeze that the word for sneeze.  We always said
    "ouch!" as "ah-yah!".
    
    One of my roomates in college used to say "bless you!" even as he
    sneezed in case no one said it for him.
    
    Wook