h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Another example...

You know the little indentation at the back of your leg, at the rear of were the kneecap is? That place where it's nice to get kissed? (or is that just me?). I understand that in German and French there's a word for it (although In forget what they are at present). Did the lack of a neat word in English* make it any less difficult to think about? Does it mean that English speakers are less likely to get kissed there?








*If you'd done any anthropometry, like I have, you might have known it's the politeal fossa.

poPliteal

Edward presumably you've seen the 'English Patient' The tragic hero who is without a defined nationality, who is trying to map the landscape of Africa, amidst all the hellish stuff going on in WW2, and the national boundaries created by the western powers, becomes obsessed by that place on his beloved, just above her breast bone, and keeps asking 'what is the name of that place' and discovers it is called the 'supra sternal notch. God that film makes me cry every time.

Are you trying to ape Ralph Fiennes? Neigh chance

Possibly not...but I bet you're no Juliette Binoche either.

>> ...as soon as we realise we need a word for something like ''taking pleasure in the suffering of others' pick we right up on it. <<

I believe the search for such a word in English has long been suspended by a quorum of opinion in which it is held that revenge is a dish best served cold.

Although why 'vichyssoise', a cold French potato soup, should satisfy a lust for inflicting pain and suffering is well beyond my ken. Borscht I could understand, it can be served hot or cold.


~jwf~

Ed, your post 636 reminds me of The Power of Babel, by John McWhorter. He agrees with you that language is wonderful in itself, but tells us little about the culture. Germans have their verbs at the ends of their sentences. So?

TRiG.

anhaga I googled a bit about the mythology/history of Hengist and Horsa because its been bugging me. You are quite right.

TRiG:

Ecaxtly what I mean. I'm not doubting for one moment that different peoples can think differently, and this is shaped by/reflected in their culture. (There's a for you: which is the chicken and which the ?)...but what does this signify?

There are many possible influences on thought. The fact that we are mammals counts for a lot. Ditto that we are primates. What percentage can we call 'cultural'...and how much of our culture is independent of our primate nature? It's in this sense that I talk about window dressing.

I was being needlessly pedantic, Effers.

but one does learn about Hengist and Horsa (in passing) in the first day of introductory Anglo-Saxon.