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Why use 25 words when one will do
mickfinn
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1-4-2008 8:54 AM
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linguistics
mickfinn
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Why use 25 words when one will do
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<div style="margin: 12px 0px; font-family: arial; color: #333333; background: #ffffff; border: solid 4px #e5e5e5; width: 100%; clear: left;"><div class="CM_CTB_Content_Wrap" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;background-color: #ffffff;"><div style="border-bottom: solid 1px #dcdcdc; white-space: nowrap; margin-bottom: 8px; background-color: #eeeeee ;background-image: url(http://clipmarks.com/images/source-bg.gif); background-repeat: repeat-x; height: 24px; line-height: 24px; vertical-align: middle; padding-bottom: 4px; color: #666666; font-size: 10px;" ><a href="http://clipmarks.com/clip-to-blog/" title="see clips that are hot right now"><img src="http://content.clipmarks.com/blog_embed/6d05c97a-ccd1-4fb4-b84c-41825666deea/F65C0069-BFB1-417B-9A61-4412551CE7AC/" alt="" width="19" height="19" border="0" style="vertical-align: middle; margin: 0px 4px; display: inline; border: none; float:none;" /></a>clipped from <a title="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mamihlapinatapai&oldid=182062060" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mamihlapinatapai&oldid=182062060" style="font-size: 11px;">en.wikipedia.org</a></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mamihlapinatapai&oldid=182062060"><P><I><B>Mamihlapinatapai</B></I> (sometimes misspelled <I>mamihlapinatap<B>e</B>i</I>) is a word from the <A title="Yaghan language" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yaghan_language">Yaghan language</A> of <A title="Tierra del Fuego" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tierra_del_Fuego">Tierra del Fuego</A>, listed in <I><A title="The Guinness Book of World Records" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Guinness_Book_of_World_Records">The Guinness Book of World Records</A></I> as the "most succinct word", and is considered one of the <A title="Words hardest to translate" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Words_hardest_to_translate">hardest words to translate</A>. It describes <I>a look shared by two people with each wishing that the other will initiate something that both desire but which neither one wants to start</I>. This could perhaps be translated more succinctly as "eye-contact implying 'after you...'". A more literal approximation is "ending up mutually at a loss as to what to do about each other".</P></blockquote><div style="height: 2px; font-size: 2px; background: #dcdcdc; border-bottom: solid 1px #f5f5f5; margin: 2px 4px;"></div><blockquote style="text-align: left; padding: 0px 8px; margin: 4px 0px 8px 0px; background: transparent; border: none;" cite="http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mamihlapinatapai&oldid=182062060"><P>The word consists of prefix ma(m)- reflexive/passive (second m before roots beginning with a vowel), root ihlapi (hl pronounced as <SPAN class="IPA" title="Representation in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA)">/ɬ/</SPAN>, though in Yahgan it has also been described as similar to sl) which means to be at a loss as to what to do next, followed by stative suffix -n- and achievement suffix -at(a), and finally dual -apai, which in composition with ma(m)- has a reciprocal sense.</P></blockquote></div><div style="margin: 0px 6px 6px 4px;"><table style="font-size: 11px;border-spacing: 0px;padding: 0px;" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" width="100%"><tr><td style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;"> </td><td align="right" style="background:transparent;border-width:0px;padding:0px;width:107px" width="107"><a href="http://clipmarks.com/share/F65C0069-BFB1-417B-9A61-4412551CE7AC/blog/" title="blog or email this clip"><img src="http://content7.clipmarks.com/images/c2b-foot.png" border="0" alt="blog it" width="107" height="17" style="border-width:0px;padding:0px;margin:0px;" /></a></td></tr></table></div></div>
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