Talk:-t

Despite the entry note reading "the form with -t is generally considered more formal", there is no agains or whils (phonetically there's whiles) though --Backinstadiums (talk) 17:02, 31 January 2020 (UTC)Reply

Loss of final doble consonant as in blest from bless? --Backinstadiums (talk) 12:33, 28 October 2020 (UTC)Reply

From lemma egotism the interfix -t- redirects here, but I cannot find it. Thank you ‑‑Sarri.greek ^♫ | 17:23, 21 November 2020 (UTC)Reply

At least in the case of etymologies of Damietta, people seem to be treating 𓊖 as a t or -t enclitic. — LlywelynII 10:50, 18 February 2024 (UTC)Reply

@LlywelynII: Hello! Forgive my directness, but who is ‘people’, and what source is this coming from? 𓊖 is a determinative (or sometimes a logogram), and does not represent t or -t in any sense, nor can one find mention of any such Egyptian enclitic in any scholarly works – it doesn’t exist. In the sequence of glyphs that seems to be in question, the contributes the phonetic value t, while has no such value and is purely a determinative.

The etymology given at Damietta seems to be straightforwardly mistaken, so I must ask what the source is. The sometimes-proposed Egyptian etymon of Damietta is dmjt (“town, harbor”, feminine of dmj), which we do not yet have an entry for; see the corresponding entry at the Thesaurus Linguae Aegyptiae. In this case the final -t is simply a feminine suffix. A sign 𓊖 could be added to the written word to represent that the word dmjt is being used as a toponym, but this would not correspond to any feature in the spoken language, so it would not have any phonological value or transcription, and would not represent a clitic; the use of determinatives is a purely graphical phenomenon of the written langauge.

Tangentially, the suggestion that Damietta (or Coptic ⲧⲁⲙⲓⲁϯ (tamiati)) comes directly from a term such as Egyptian dmjt itself seems unlikely to begin with, since we know from other Coptic words that Egyptian syllable-final t was no longer pronounced by Coptic times. Some strong evidence would be needed to demonstrate that the t was retained in this particular word and explain why this exception to the sound change laws occurred. A scholarly source to that effect is absolutely crucial if we want to present this etymology as plausible. Otherwise, it could possibly, however, be the descendant of some form derived from dmj or dmjt, rather than of those terms themselves; Peust notes this possibility in his 2010 paper, for instance. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 14:33, 19 February 2024 (UTC)Reply

@Vorziblix: Forgive my directness, but reread your own source. We can provide both alternatives and put them in Peust's order since he does seem to be the most respected authority here, but he does provide this as an alternative derivation with the note that his first idea is rare. You can rephrase his uncontested "usually" however you'd like ("usually", "probably", "often") and then provide the alternatives. Similarly, the usual kludge with the issue you're talking about (direct derivation or not) is to throw in an "ultimately" in the middle.

That said, the snark-in-kind reply above is based on the online version. If Peust has revised this somewhere behind a scholarly paywall, yeah, defer to his more recent work. Similarly if someone has pointed out problems with his work and become a more acknowledged authority, at least w/r/t Damietta.

As far as the entry here, I wasn't sure which is why I put it on the talk page. Yeah, it seems like your understanding is better: he regards it as either a feminine ending or weird that it would be pronounced in this context, which means it shouldn't go in as a default item on this page. — LlywelynII 15:20, 19 February 2024 (UTC)Reply

@LlywelynII: Ok, thanks, that clears things up; I was mostly confused/skeptical as to where the notion of the glyph as an enclitic was coming from. To clarify further, since I was unclear above, the part of the etymology I regard as ‘straightforwardly mistaken’ is the labelling of the suffix -t as meaning ‘town’.

I have no problems with Peust’s work, but at least to my reading of the paper, he is not saying that dmjt is likely the etymology, but rather just that it’s the usually proposed derivation, without necessarily giving any judgement on its correctness or that of the alternatives he cites afterwards (well, he does judge against dmj on the basis of vocalization). Do you read it differently? I think the responsible thing to do would be to list the proposals as Peust does, without endorsing any particular one of them. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 15:55, 19 February 2024 (UTC)Reply

@LlywelynII: To add to this, though he doesn’t say so explicitly, my reading is that Peust is not satisfied with any of the proposed derivations. In the other entries he is much more direct when he agrees with an etymology (as opposed to here, where he writes in the passive voice), and towards the end in this case he writes ‘Ein weiterer unbefriedigender Vorschlag…’ with the implication that the proposals he has cited previously are similarly unsatisfying. — Vorziblix (talk · contribs) 16:13, 19 February 2024 (UTC)Reply

@Ioaxxere A while ago you added a sense associated with African American English that you described as an "intensifier" as well as form of pronunciation spelling representing a change "from /d/ to /t/". As far as I can tell, this is contrast to the only (AFAIK) academic description of this suffix in Taylor Jones' Tweets as Graffiti.

In that article, Jones does describe how -t can be used to represent devoiced final /d/, but describes this use as "usually the past -ed". This is contrast to the examples and quotes currently at the entry such goodt, periodt, sadt, etc. For terms like these, Jones instead describes them as part of separate usage of -t that represents secondary glottalization instead of devoicing. Finally, for both these uses, rather than a general "intensifier", Jones gives a "broad stroke" description of the sound changes and spelling as "indexing southern, church-going identity" and the spelling in particular as "serv to construct identity" and sometimes as part of a "degree of stylization and play" involving a representation of speech "different than 'natural' ".

With all of this said, I'm not sure that -t can be really meet our criteria for inclusion. It is definitely well attested, in my mind, and definitely is something a reader might run across, but in contrast to more clear cut suffixes like -ist, it doesn't seem to me like -t carries any semantic meaning that might qualify it under our "conveying meaning" clause. Instead, I think information about -t, or more properly in my opinion, <-dt>, along with <-gk> and the more distantly related <mn>, <tn>, and other details about the norms of innovative (not exactly the right word) African American orthographies are better suited to an appendix page a la Appendix:Early Modern English spellings. That is getting more into Beer Parlour territory though so depednign on your thoughts it might be more worthwhile to have this discussion there.

Anyway, interested to hear your thoughts on this entry, Jones' article, and next steps more broadly. Take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 19:12, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

@The Editor's Apprentice well, I feel like the suffix has some kind of intensifying force. When Saweetie sings "Bitch, you look goodt, with a T at the end / I'ma hype her every time, that my mothafuckin' friend", it seems like we're meant to understand that she thinks Doja looks really good. But I'll defer to more knowledgeable individuals in this case. Ioaxxere (talk) 19:45, 13 March 2024 (UTC)Reply

@Ioaxxere Apologies for the delayed response. I definitely agree that that in the context of the Doja Cat/Saweetie song's "Best Friend" the reference to <-dt> is meant to augment the meaning of good, but I personally don't feel I have a good enough intuitive understanding of its significance nor that the song provides enough explicit evidence for me to feel confidence saying how the refence to <-dt> is meant to augment the meaning/if it is meant to specifically intensify the meaning. Given that you said you'll defer to more knowledgeable individuals in this case, do you feel good about me deleting what is currently the "Etymology 5" section as well as editing the "Etymology" sections of goodt and periodt to reflect and cite Jones' writing on the subject? Thanks and take care. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 22:43, 4 April 2024 (UTC)Reply

@The Editor's Apprentice Alright, but take it through RFDE just in case anyone else has something to add. Ioaxxere (talk) 23:03, 4 April 2024 (UTC)Reply

@Ioaxxere That makes sense, I've gone ahead and created Wiktionary:Requests for deletion/English#-t. —The Editor's Apprentice (talk) 23:23, 4 April 2024 (UTC)Reply