Writers' Workshop General Chat Thread

[Beth Pavell]

There's always the Twilight Princess approach - Link doesn't intend to save Hyrule, but defending his village balloons into it

 

[Nitro Indigo]

I meant that I don't know what ther protagonist could see that makes her think, "oh, I should go change this", and where she'd have to go to fix it. Maybe an unnatural chasm?

I saw a Tumblr post today saying that every female character introduced in Cars 3 is a lesbian. Um... source?

I feel like making a jab at lesbian Holley in my Cars 2 re-review, but I'm worried I might regret it later. Like, when I'm talking about the lack of character development, I could put something like this on-screen:
Dear Tumblr: changing Holley's personality to "hates her canon love interest" does not an interesting character make.
(I'm not into shipping, by the way.)

 

[canisaries]

just be careful not to come across as a condescending enlightened fedoralord, no one likes those

 

[AceTrainer14]

Remember to keep all chat around ideas to the Plot Bunny Zoo - it hasn't seen much love lately so send some that-a-way!

Speaking as someone who has been involved in similar fandoms to that, I don't see how making a video like that would be productive. Even if you think that other fans are being silly or flippant with their theories, it is their interpretation and they are entitled to think that way, even if they are a bit misguided. While you shouldn't keep your opinions to yourself simply to placate others, antagonising them would likely only backfire on you. If you made a decent argument against it, that would be a different story.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

It's not the point of the whole video, though.

Also, my laptop has decided to stop recognising all headphones, just like my previous one! While I was trying to record a video!

 

[AceTrainer14]

Exactly, which is why it would be a distraction and likely overshadow the point you would want to make, especially if you are openly targeting a specific site.

 

[Time Breaker]

So... how would y'all answer someone claiming you're pronouncing a particular word incorrectly when you're actually using the correct pronunciation (generally with foreign words, i.e. ninja)? In other words, you say the word correctly, and they call you one thing or another and complain that "you're saying it wrong", all 'cause (at least) the English language butchers these words so much.

This hasn't happened to me, mind you, but I'm just curious.

 

[canisaries]

english speakers pronounce sauna like "saw-na" even though there's no reason for it. the finnish pronunciation is "sau-na" ("sau" rhymes with "ciao" and "ow").

but hey, the germans pronounce europe (europa) as "oy-roh-pa", and it's just part of their language. (though i'm not sure what the actual pronunciation for europe is anyway, my language and english already have different ways of saying it)

 

[Beth Pavell]

So... how would y'all answer someone claiming you're pronouncing a particular word incorrectly when you're actually using the correct pronunciation (generally with foreign words, i.e. ninja)? In other words, you say the word correctly, and they call you one thing or another and complain that "you're saying it wrong", all 'cause (at least) the English language butchers these words so much.

This hasn't happened to me, mind you, but I'm just curious.

Well, it's the difference between using a loanword (E.g: zeitgeist, originally a German word that's now part of the English language) and codeswitching (Switching to speaking a different language, e.g: I can certainly feel a je ne sais quois about this place). Loanwords can be pronounced according to their adoptive language, and this isn't just an English thing. How many times have you heard Japanese voice actors pronounce "cake" without sounding out the e?

Pronunciation isn't at all homogeneous anyway, in any language, because of a little thing called accent. I don't pronounce "Birmingham" the way an Irish person does, nor as a New Yorker does, nor even as a Brummie does, and I only live an hour's bus journey from the city centre

 

[Time Breaker]

Well, it's the difference between using a loanword (E.g: zeitgeist, originally a German word that's now part of the English language) and codeswitching (Switching to speaking a different language, e.g: I can certainly feel a je ne sais quois about this place). Loanwords can be pronounced according to their adoptive language, and this isn't just an English thing. How many times have you heard Japanese voice actors pronounce "cake" without sounding out the e?

I agree, though I should clarify that I'm referring specifically to words that are unaltered from their original spelling (obviously aside from, say, Japanese words being romanized).

 

[canisaries]

i'm never gonna stop correcting people on the pronunciation of schrödinger though. umlauts matter, people. a lot.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

Update: my headphone problems are fixed, but now I'm too tired to sound good when recording. And Audacity has a problem where it keeps saying my USB devices are invalid, so I have to select something else, then select the ones I want to use again, every time I record something.

i'm never gonna stop correcting people on the pronunciation of schrödinger though. umlauts matter, people. a lot.

 

[canisaries]

>pronounce schrödinger with german r and ö
>write it with o

what

 

[Beth Pavell]

I couldn't help but play around with some words this afternoon, after a browse through Robert MacFarlane's Landmarks. Here's some coinages I came up with:

stinglebank, n. - a dense thicket of nettles, usually several feet high and apparently impassible

snipstrip, n. - the band of short-cropped turf and/or weeds created when vegetation is regularly cut back to prevent it from taking over a path

commongreen, n. - a lawn of public or ambiguous ownership

skuddle, n. - a strip of gouged and bare earth caused by tyres regularly churning a lawn in the winter months

vergecopse, n - a line of trees planted by the side of a road, esp. within close proximity to one another

 

[Misfit Angel]

stinglebank, n. - a dense thicket of nettles, usually several feet high and apparently impassible

I like this word, and hopefully I remember to use it when my story takes the characters into the northern swamps once more.

 

[Nitro Indigo]

vergecopse, n - a line of trees planted by the side of a road, esp. within close proximity to one another

There's already a word for that: verge.

 

[canisaries]

when a youtuber shouts you our for making them a cringy fursona

you know it gonna be a GOOD day

 

[Beth Pavell]

There's already a word for that: verge.

From the Oxford English Dictionary: "verge, n. - A narrow grass edging separating a flower border, etc., from a gravel walk. Hence also, an unpaved strip of land, usually planted with grass, separating a pedestrian pavement from a road; a (grass-covered) edging to a road" (sense 15b)

Also, strangely enough, "The male organ; the penis. rare."

So far as I can tell there is no existing word for trees planted by the side of a road. The closest I can think of would be "sound barrier", but that doesn't just mean trees and refers more to function than to form

 

[canisaries]

i swear like 10% of the words in the english language have been used to refer to the male genitalia

 

[Beth Pavell]

And 20% to refer to the female genitalia