Tournesol 🌻 (@tournesol)

Tournesol 🌻 @tournesol@peculiar.florist

daily reminder that the english word for "connection" is written using a french syntax whereas the french word for it, "connexion", is using an english syntax.

In my next talk, we'll see why I hate "langage" and "language".

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Çağatay Yiğit Şahin @cagatayy@mastodon.social

@tournesol I checked the top two links on this list of French word frequency lists and only words that end with “-xion” there are “réflexion” and “connexion,” both of which come from a Latin root that is spelled with “x.” I don’t know if there are words that are similarly derived from a root that is spelled with “x” but are spelled with “ct,” but I suspect that the distinction may be the construction: Some words end with “c” and take a “-tion” suffix, …

Çağatay Yiğit Şahin @cagatayy@mastodon.social

@tournesol … and some have a “x” and take a “-ion” suffix. They happen to sound the same but the spelling is not modified because of this.
I don’t know French so I may be very wrong and I am sorry for messing with a casual complaint :) It got me curious and I thought others may be interested too.
By the way, I think this is a matter of orthography rather than syntax.

Tournesol 🌻 @tournesol@peculiar.florist

@cagatayy yeah it's just a casual thing that frustrate me and make me laugh but I'm really glad it sparked interest cause I'm quite curious of this kind of things

by memory there's a bit more use of -xion in french (flexion, complexion, …) but the general use of X is so rare and specific to certain words that it's usually have a sort of english ring to it to bilingual speakers. It's use don't follow any common grammatical or orthographic rule of french.

from what I've quickly read about it, X is was incorporated in latin by greek words and just stuck, by tradition I guess

and yeah you're completely right it's an orthography case rather than syntax, just sounded better on the moment for my non-linguistic brain :neocat_blush_hide:

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Freja @freja@freja.zone

@tournesol and for the word "toilet", english took the french spelling and changed the pronunciation to fit english, while swedish took the french pronunciation and changed the spelling to fit swedish

0gust1 @0gust1@merveilles.town

@tournesol I’m soon 45, I still have to think explicitly about it when writing

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Haelwenn /элвэн/ :triskell: @lanodan@queer.hacktivis.me

@tournesol Great, now I'm confused which one is supposed to be french…

Tournesol 🌻 @tournesol@peculiar.florist

@lanodan my rule is "I write connection, wait this word shouldn't make sense so it's -xion"

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