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Compras Nikon Bluetooth

1 An indespensible tool to studying the dialect
RubŽn Cobos' short but monumental "Dictionary of New Mexico and Southern Colorado Spanish" (1983) was a classic the day it was printed. If you have any interest in the Spanish-speaking cultures of northern New Mexico and southern Colorado, this book is a great way to learn something about the dialect without plunging into a difficult linguistic study.

Like Samuel Johnson's dictionary, Cobos's is a book you can sit down and read enjoyably. The entries are not just translations of Spanish words into English. Cobos traces their origin and (in most cases) illustrates their meaning by including them in sample sentences. For instance, "murre" (in standard Spanish, "muy"): "Esta muchita es murre gente" ('This child is very friendly'). Additionally, many words are also explained by the use of proverbs and folk-poems.

Cobos also explains the cultural signficance of about a third of the words in the dictionary. For example, "pitarrilla": "Pitarrilla, f. [Obviously, the dictionary has great value not only (nor even primarily) for the linguist, but for the anthropologist and historian, as well. It is completely free of technical linguistic terminology and accessible to anyone with a basic knowledge of standard Spanish. (I might emphasize that the book is a guide to local usage only and does not include standard Spanish words.) Although the pronunciation of the New Mexico/southern Colorado dialect is relatively standard, Cobos has taken care to indicate divergences where they exist (e.g., "raices" is pronounced "r‡i-ces", not "ra-’ces"). He includes a short historical and linguistic introduction, tracing the four-hundred year evolution of the dialect. Finally, for a kick, at the start of each alphabetical section you'll find a short proverb -- "P. 'Pa pendejo no se necesita mestro' (To be a fool one needs no school)."

A valuable book that sells for a good price. Five stars.

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• The Place Names of New Mexico

All theoretical chemistry is really physics; and all theoretical chemists 

know it.

		-- Richard P. Feynman





FORTUNE'S GUIDE TO DEALING WITH REAL-LIFE SCIENCE FICTION: #2

What to do...

    if you get a phone call from Mars:

	Speak slowly and be sure to enunciate your words properly.  Limit

	your vocabulary to simple words.  Try to determine if you are

	speaking to someone in a leadership capacity, or an ordinary citizen.



    if he, she or it doesn't speak English?

	Hang up.  There's no sense in trying to learn Martian over the phone.

	If your Martian really had something important to say to you, he, she

	or it would have taken the trouble to learn the language before

	calling.



    if you get a phone call from Jupiter?

	Explain to your caller, politely but firmly, that being from Jupiter,

	he, she or it is not "life as we know it".  Try to terminate the

	conversation as soon as possible.  It will not profit you, and the

	charges may have been reversed.