translation crowdsourcing: Titan Autonomous University motto

Sat, 2013-07-20 05:23

#2

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

jackgraham wrote:Challenge

jackgraham wrote:
Challenge for the Scandinavians on the forums: Translate the TAU motto, "Onward. Upward. Outward!" into Skandinaviska, the post-national hybrid Nordic lingua franca of Titan.

I would say: "Framåt. Utåt. Uppåt!" This reverses upward and outward; "Framåt. Uppåt. Utåt!" (same order) also works, but for some reason I like the first alternative best. I think the Danish version would be something like "Frem. Udad. Opad!" - looks very different, but actually sounds somewhat similar.

jackgraham wrote:
Arguing against the very concept of Skandinaviska is not out of bounds, as long as I end up with an answer eventually. ;)

I think it makes plenty of sense: Swedish, Danish and Norwegian are close enough to blend together under the right conditions. A lot of the differences are pronounciation and spelling rather than formal structure.

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Sat, 2013-07-20 11:31

#3

Quincey Forder Quincey Forder's picture

and what about the French in New Québec?

If I remember well, another vastly used language on Titan is French, right? But is it more metropolitan French and neighbors (Belgian French, Roman Swiss French, Luxemburg French), or Caribbean/Creole/Acadian/Canadian French? From what I see above, there are similar variations between the French I speak as my mother language, and the one spoken on the other side of the Pond ((btw, and a bit off-topic, Arenamontanus, do you think it would be possible to have a written interview for the french language EP themed webzine Alpha+Phase for the second issue, this Fall? The first is being wrapped shortly))

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Sat, 2013-07-20 12:55

#4

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

Arenamontanus wrote:

Arenamontanus wrote:
I would say: "Framåt. Utåt. Uppåt!" This reverses upward and outward; "Framåt. Uppåt. Utåt!" (same order) also works, but for some reason I like the first alternative best. I think the Danish version would be something like "Frem. Udad. Opad!" - looks very different, but actually sounds somewhat similar.

And the same goes for Norwegian: "Fremover. Utad. Oppover!". Any Swede, Dane or Icelandic would understand it. People who work or live in each others countries pick up the language much faster than other languages. A Dane, for example, who comes to Sweden can almost immediately make them selves understood and pick up the Swedish as fast as 3 months or less. They just adjust their pronunciation and learn a couple of new words. So the concept of "Skandinaviska" is in no way strange or wrong, it is actually very real, especially these days when we have Internet and the close collaborations among the university's and the "no passport"-agreements and people living in one country but works in another. Good examples of this is Malmö and Copenhagen which in some sense has become one city since the bridge was built.

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Sat, 2013-07-20 14:27

#5

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

Quincey Forder wrote:((btw,

Quincey Forder wrote:
((btw, and a bit off-topic, Arenamontanus, do you think it would be possible to have a written interview for the french language EP themed webzine Alpha+Phase for the second issue, this Fall? The first is being wrapped shortly))

Sure!

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Sat, 2013-07-20 15:23

#6

Smokeskin

Arenamontanus wrote:

Arenamontanus wrote:
I think the Danish version would be something like "Frem. Udad. Opad!" - looks very different, but actually sounds somewhat similar.

In Danish I would call it "Fremad. Opad. Udad!" Of special note is that all the 4 d's in that are the dreaded soft d! Check this video at 2:00 for how that sounds: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=77LSqPpzulo

Arenamontanus wrote:
I think it makes plenty of sense: Swedish, Danish and Norwegian are close enough to blend together under the right conditions. A lot of the differences are pronounciation and spelling rather than formal structure.

Yeah. Most people in the eastern part of Denmark can easily understand Swedish, and Norwegian almost reads like phonetic Danish - all the words are spelled wrong but exactly like we say them :) I even had a math textbook in Norwegian at university. Spoken Norwegian is hard though.

Sun, 2013-07-21 01:34

#7

TheRawrnstuff TheRawrnstuff's picture

And Finns?

Since the French contributed, I'm thinking the Finns (being among the original settlers, even if not Scandinavian) should as well: Onward. Upward. Outward! Eteenpäin. Ylöspäin. Ulospäin!

Sun, 2013-07-21 06:12

#8

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

I wonder about the language

I wonder about the language mixing. The Scandinavian mix is easy, but French is a Latin language and Finnish is... well, Finnish. So I think that is a bit more of an oil/water situation - people actually switch to those languages, rather than meld stuff together. There are no doubt plenty of borrowed words and slang anyway, but the basic language structure are far apart. Still, the Finnish version of the slogan sounds pretty awesome.

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Sun, 2013-07-21 07:09

#9

cbdurietz

The evolving of Scandinavian

To be able to answer that, I guess one have to begin with understanding how the Scandinavian languages could evolve and converge into a common future language. My guess is that Swedish would be the 'base' language but with mixed-in Danish and Norwegian elements. I would also guess that - due to internationalizing, the specific Scandinavian letters (åäö and its counterparts in Danish and Norwegian) would fade away. In future Scandinavian, it might be something like 'Frammad. Uppad. Utad!' The 'd' in the end of the words emulates a Danish/Norwegian influence in the original Swedish base words. In 'Frammad', I've added an 'm' since it makes more sense from a pronounciation perspective.

Sun, 2013-07-21 08:52

#10

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

Quincey Forder wrote:If I

Quincey Forder wrote:
If I remember well, another vastly used language on Titan is French, right? But is it more metropolitan French and neighbors (Belgian French, Roman Swiss French, Luxemburg French), or Caribbean/Creole/Acadian/Canadian French?

The NAC, while most strongly influenced by the Scandinavians, had significant Canadian membership as well. So it probably sounds most like the French spoken in Quebec... including the sacres. :) I've only heard Acadian French spoken once, in northern Maine. The accent is very hard to describe given my limited French. This dialect seems to be dying out, and probably wouldn't have survived until the present time in EP.

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Sun, 2013-07-21 08:58

#11

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

cbdurietz wrote: I would also

cbdurietz wrote:
I would also guess that - due to internationalizing, the specific Scandinavian letters (åäö and its counterparts in Danish and Norwegian) would fade away. In future Scandinavian, it might be something like 'Frammad. Uppad. Utad!'

Not that I want to imply that you are wrong, but I humbly suggest with page 91 in Rimward in mind; "Even in those days, nationalism was no longer the done thing, but with the spread of Mandarin and English, linguistic preservationism was a popular meme.", that the Skandinaviska kept those letters. Probably the Swedish switched to Danish/Norwegian Å,Æ,Ø to be uniform. Found some good wikipages on the matter, language-family and other stuff: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Germanic_languages The Finns are not to forget in this of course. As a part of my profession I can see that the Swedish and Finnish military almost worked as one army during the Fall. Historical and present operations gives us a hint about that this would evolve in a mutual cooperation and command chain. Sweden and Finland has been a union longer than the both countries has been sovereign. (In my setting there are two battle cruisers named "Gustaf Mannerheim" and "Sisu" ;)) There has been a suggestion by the historian Gunnar Wetterberg that Scandinavia (Finland included) should come together in a new "Kalmarunion 2.0" just like its historical equivalent "Kalmarunionen" which was in function 1397–1523 A.D. Wiki: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kalmar_Union Here is a link to an article by Gunnar Wetterberg translated by Google Translate. There can be some weird translations but that shouldn't be a problem: http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=sv&sl=sv&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Fw... One can speculate if these ideas was the base when the North Atlantic Consortium was founded. Not out of nationalism (Scandinavians in general thinks nationalism sucks big time) but out of necessity.(Rimward p. 93; "Prior to the Fall, Earth’s northernmost nations, with the conspicuous exception of Russia, bought in heavily to transhumanism. Climate change on Earth had disrupted ocean currents that once kept northern Europe warm and livable. The populations of Scandinavia, Canada, and other northern countries had huddled into overcrowded, frozen conurbations, and now they left them in a mass migration for Titan." Hm, I start to feel like a real nerd over this matter, but I think this is fun part of EP for me to speculate about. :)

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Sun, 2013-07-21 09:54

#12

Lorsa

In the future I hope we will

In the future I hope we will simply speak english instead of scandinavian. Since most of the world understands that we would be better off that way. Which will become the ruling language influence would depend on who the original or most numerable settlers were. It's easier for danes and norweigans to adapt to swedish for some reason but on the other hand those two are also quite proud people as far as cultural heritage goes (I find swedes not quite so much, being one myself).

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Sun, 2013-07-21 10:50

#13

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

Lorsa wrote: It's easier for

Lorsa wrote:
It's easier for danes and norweigans to adapt to swedish for some reason but on the other hand those two are also quite proud people as far as cultural heritage goes (I find swedes not quite so much, being one myself).

I strongly agree with you on that. To say "I am proud to be Swedish!" in front of other Swedes is almost as saying "I am a Nazi!", if we overreact things a bit. :) (As you might have guessed, I am a swede myself.) As all things it has its roots in history; Norway and Denmark where both occupied during WW2. Sweden played its part with cold logic and no interference with ideas like "fight bravely to the bitter end". We don't have any history of being occupied so that feeling of being autonomous and unified under one flag is not a clear memory among swedes. This is of course just a part of the explanation. We where also accused by others that we didn't do anything to stop the Nazis, and that gave us a sense of guilt for a long time. Some swedes explains their lack of nationalism in a very logic way. According to them, it is just a coincidence and a random chance that one becomes a Swede and therefor it is illogical to be nationalistic. And it makes sense, doesn't it? This blog makes a comparison between Swedes and Vulcans and has its very strong points even if you should read it with humor: http://www.swedishfishtofry.com/1/post/2013/04/10-things-swedes-share-in... Yet others see nationalism and all what it brings (including cultural pride) as something that just brings bad stuff like war, nepotism, racism and so on. Sweden is in many aspects a very odd country when it comes to its selfpicture. But that is something I want to leave out of my game.

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Sun, 2013-07-21 11:06

#14

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

http://youtu.be/tWU0CGfj-SU

http://youtu.be/tWU0CGfj-SU Translation: Tanzen = Dance Essen = Eat Feiern = Commemorate Der morgen danach = The morning after

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Sun, 2013-07-21 11:06

#15

Chertan

I'd assume that a future

I'd assume that a future Skandinaviska would have more then a few english words in it. Of the non-native english speaking countries scandinavians show the highest proficiency (along with the dutch and belgians) http://www.ef.se/epi/ The Danish language in particular has a lot of English "take words" often using them without adjusting them to the Danish grammar. As for the TAU motto: "Fram á við. Upp á við. Út á við!" is the Icelandic translation

Sun, 2013-07-21 14:01

#16

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

Yes, Scandinavian is likely

Yes, Scandinavian is likely to be pretty mixed with English. I just came back from a gaming weekend with some Swedish friends, and I would say the English-to-Swedish ratio was 30-70. Not just me, the 7-year emigrant, occasionally lapsing into English but all of us shifting into English whenever a sentence or word seemed more suitable for it. This suggests to me that TC-Scandinavian might be a kind of sub-language used (perhaps like French or Finnish) for expressing certain things within a group rather than a generic language for communication: the Titanian crowd might be chatting away in Scandinavian-English, but instantly shift into pure English when an outsider approaches. As for nationalism, I suspect that cultural nationalism - cherishing various symbols and practices - was something that was much bigger than ideological nationalism - identifying with a country or cultural identity - before the Fall. And afterwards ideological nationalism became even less tenable. In fact, it might be seen as slightly disruptive on Titan where the rational thing to do is to be "nationalist" about the Commonwealth. And, I think, this is the ultimate Scandinavian-style thinking: actually picking apart your nationalism into sociological modules, discuss which ones are efficient to keep, and then updating it. It drives people with traditional patriotic views crazy.

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Tue, 2013-07-23 17:28

#17

TheRawrnstuff TheRawrnstuff's picture

Arenamontanus wrote:Yes,

Arenamontanus wrote:
Yes, Scandinavian is likely to be pretty mixed with English.

I agree. However, I think TC people themselves would consider their language still the original Norwegian/Swedish/Finnish/etc. even if horribly mutated by our standards.

Arenamontanus wrote:
...TC-Scandinavian might be a kind of sub-language used (perhaps like French or Finnish) for expressing certain things within a group rather than a generic language for communication: the Titanian crowd might be chatting away in Scandinavian-English, but instantly shift into pure English when an outsider approaches. As for nationalism, I suspect that cultural nationalism - cherishing various symbols and practices - was something that was much bigger than ideological nationalism - identifying with a country or cultural identity - before the Fall. And afterwards ideological nationalism became even less tenable. In fact, it might be seen as slightly disruptive on Titan where the rational thing to do is to be "nationalist" about the Commonwealth. And, I think, this is the ultimate Scandinavian-style thinking: actually picking apart your nationalism into sociological modules, discuss which ones are efficient to keep, and then updating it. It drives people with traditional patriotic views crazy.

On this I slightly disagree. The nordics are really quick to change to a language most likely to be understood by the other participant. This would most likely be English or Chinese, depending on which language would be the most common for the Titanian receivers to pick up from Sunward. At least in Finland, and I believe in all the nordic countries (based on my experience at work where I work with a rotating team of 7-18 people all from different coutries), a rapidly increasing number of people are associating themselves more like "netizens" rather that their countries' citizens (though not denying their citizenship): They support open borders and free movement, define themselves at least to some degree by the www-services they tend to visit (imgurians, youtubers, etc.) and generally feel more at home online than in social situations IRL. It is likely Titanians would think themselves as Titanians over, say, transhuman simply because the other planets, and their societies, are so far away. That said, I wouldn't rule out the possibility of some cliques existing that over-romantisize other cultures: There could be, for example, a group of Oligarhov that go really otaku over Mars' "American Dream".

Fri, 2013-07-26 20:40

#18

cbdurietz

I don't think the Danish

I don't think the Danish language will form the base of Skandinaviska.

Danish Language Council, in a study concluded that the Danes have become increasingly less able to spell during the last 30 years, writes SVT News.
And they think it depends on social media.
- Today it is expected that the Danes should be able to master a very wide range of different types of communication and media. While it is felt that some of the new media creates limitations - for example, in terms of number of characters or keyboards that are designed in a special way, says Sabine Kirchmeier-Andersen Language Council to DR, according to SVT.

Differences in speech and writing
"Nonsense" says her Norwegian language research colleague Kjell Lars Berge, professor of Scandinavian languages at the University of Oslo.
- It is absurd to claim that social media destroys the written language. Danes should instead focus on what is probably a more important cause of the problem, namely, the large gap between spoken Danish and Danish written language. This gap has become so large that it is difficult for people to know how words are spelled, he says according to SVT.

Difficulty with neighboring languages
On the whole, understand each other Scandinavians worse.
- Norwegians understand Swedish, but has a hard time with oral Danish. Swedes understand Norwegian, but has major problems with Danish. Danish has difficulty with both languages, but most especially with the Swedish, says Pål Maeland, one of the creators of a survey on the topic, according to the Bergen Tidene SVT.

Source: http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/article17195522.ab (translated for your conveniance)

And for some laugther, this skit from Norwegian television is quite telling:
Danish language (youtube)

Fri, 2013-07-26 20:54

#19

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

Frak! Someone beat me to

Frak! Someone beat me to linking to the kamelåså sketch! :)

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Sat, 2013-07-27 05:39

#20

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

More entertainment!

Introducing *drum roll* "Mastering Swedish"! Mastering Swedish: Lesson 1 - Homonyms: http://youtu.be/GQx3ACpbXhk Mastering Swedish: Lesson 2 - Inflections: http://youtu.be/JdkmncnQwow Mastering Swedish: Lesson 3 - Sk, Sj, Sch, Sh: http://youtu.be/I3OxCRTg8iE Mastering Swedish: Lesson 4 - Letter Pronounciation: http://youtu.be/MR1REjaJrww Mastering Swedish: Lesson 5 - Alliterations: http://youtu.be/x-dooJZntbE 10 Funny Swedish Words: http://youtu.be/6ZadWAm9vwE Swedish Reporter: http://youtu.be/b4-ek0ZTDg8 Note: In the last clip it is actually the REAL Primeminister who plays himself!

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Mon, 2013-07-29 16:57

#21

Holy

I thought this kind of

I thought this kind of belongs here: Swedish police officer being filmed.

Tue, 2013-07-30 07:12

#22

Lorsa

I think if a scandinavian

I think if a scandinavian language was about to be formed it would go something like this: The swedes would create a committee that would investigate all the different languages, look at the root of all words, which ones are easiest to pronounce for everyone and try to form the "perfect" scandinavian language that would be a blend of all of them. The danes would get extremely impatient with this project, tell them they are going to keep speaking danish so just get with the program you swedes. The swedes would then say they have an easier time speaking english (that they already know) than danish so why don't they all speak that instead? In reply to that the danes would probably agree that fine, we can learn to speak swedish then you idionts (and think of themselves superior for it). The norweigans would probably go with whatever solution the swedes and danes came up with but talk norweigan with eachother. Noone would listen to the icelanders (except probably the first swedish committee that the danes canceled) and in the end they would form something in the line of bookclubs where they kept their language alive. To be perfectly honest though, if scandinavians moved out in space in about 200 years, they'd speak whatever is most prevalent in the solar system. Even with eachother.

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Tue, 2013-07-30 09:15

#23

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

Yup. Forming committees is in

Yup. Forming committees is in the Swedish blood. We can do it in our sleep... (I kid you not, tonight I dreamed I was organizing the weird creatures of my dream, worrying about getting the approval process on schedule.)

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Tue, 2013-08-06 22:04

#24

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

For those curious on the

For those curious on the outcome, I went with Aremontanus' version (despite the seductive appeal of the Danish soft 'D'). The appeal of the A's with rings to my graphic designer brain won out over my Norwegian ancestry, the left field possibilities of just saying "fuck it" and going with Finnish, and the seductive oddness of the Danish soft "D". Thanks for all of your input! (And there's nothing super-canonical about the TAU log, so I might go with a different linguistic pattern next time I'm setting it...)

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Tue, 2013-08-06 22:15

#25

jackgraham jackgraham's picture

Oh, yeah, the output (partial

Oh, yeah, the output (partial; sneakyawesomepart withheld for now...): https://twitter.com/jackgraham/status/364932315832541184

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J A C K G R A H A M :: Hooray for Earth! http://eclipsephase.com :: twitter @jackgraham @faketsr :: Google+Jack Graham

Wed, 2013-08-07 04:58

#26

Arenamontanus Arenamontanus's picture

Looks great!

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Wed, 2013-08-07 05:44

#27

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

NICE!

Looks nice, and I am going to use it in my signature. :)

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Wed, 2013-08-07 05:51

#28

Gnothi_Sauton Gnothi_Sauton's picture

There...

Had the wrong tag, but now it works like a charm :D

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Wed, 2013-08-07 10:35

#29

Lorsa

Looks great for sure. And I

Looks great for sure. And I do think there's a fair chance swedish would be the language of choice in the end. Definitely not finnish. :)

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Wed, 2013-08-07 11:59

#30

cbdurietz

The design is really cool -

The design is really cool - awesome, to be frank. But - and this is a big one: By switching the order of the words, the 'narrative' of the motto gets all messed up. The original "Onward. Upward. Outward!" kind of ends with crescendo-like "look beyond" them, while the translation "Framåt, Utåt. Uppåt!" stresses the "rise" part of the drama. In the original, I could feel a direction (Take a step, go for the skies, travel the stars), in flipping the two last words, that sense of directional movement is lost.

Sat, 2013-08-10 14:29

#31

TheRawrnstuff TheRawrnstuff's picture

Lorsa wrote:...Definitely not

Lorsa wrote:
...Definitely not finnish. :)

I don't know about that. It would definitely not be a motto intended for everyone to understand. But neither is latin, which I see quite often used in mottoes. But I understand what you mean.