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docoflove1974

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  7. Viggen

    Posted

    I don't know about those Italians still living in the boot, but many of the ones here in the States that I know of and have read about don't honestly make the connection. Like, they know that the Romans lived in Rome, and that they covered the peninsula, etc....but can't necessarily connect with their subculture (Italian) with the historical culture (Roman). And I find this odd, not only as an Italian-American, but as a history afficionada. There are just too many parallels, both linguistically and culturally, to ignore it, or to forget about it. I don't think you'd ever hear a Greek (particularly from near one of the great city-states) neglect to recall about the connection with their current culture and the one from the past.

     

    Maybe the answer has to do with the fact that the people now are so focused on the present, and maybe to a lesser extent the recent past, that anything more than a few hundred years ago is too far to connect with. And that may not necessarily be a bad thing, nor an abnormal thing. It could be that, unless it is ingrained in the person or culture from the get-go, humans don't necessarily make strong connections with the cultures of the distant past.

  9. Moonlapse

    Posted

    That is awesome! The Mark Twain translation is the one I read just now, and that was hella cool. Funnily enough, there's a lengthy diatribe by the venerable Mr. Clemens regarding German:

     

    Every noun has a gender, and there is no sense or system in the distribution; so the gender of each must be learned separately and by heart. There is no other way. To do this one has to have a memory like a memorandum-book. In German, a young lady has no sex, while a turnip has. Think what overwrought reverence that shows for the turnip, and what callous disrespect for the girl. See how it looks in print--I translate this from a conversation in one of the best of the German Sunday-school books:

     

    Gretchen. 'Wilhelm, where is the turnip?'

    Wilhelm. 'She has gone to the kitchen.'

    Gretchen. 'Where is the accomplished and beautiful English maiden?'

    Wilhelm. 'It has gone to the opera.'

     

    To continue with the German genders: a tree is male, its buds are female, its leaves are neuter; horses are sexless, dogs are male, cats are female--tomcats included, of course; a person's mouth, neck, bosom, elbows, fingers, nails, feet, and body are of the male sex, and his head is male or neuter according to the word selected to signify it, and NOT according to the sex of the individual who wears it--for in Germany all women have either male heads or sexless ones; a person's nose, lips, shoulders, breast, hands, and toes are of the female sex; and his hair, ears, eyes, chin, legs, knees, heart, and conscience haven't any sex at all. The inventor of the language probably got what he knew about a conscience from hearsay.

     

    Now, by the above dissection, the reader will see that in Germany a man may THINK he is a man, but when he comes to look into the matter closely, he is bound to have his doubts; he finds that in sober truth he is a most ridiculous mixture; and if he ends by trying to comfort himself with the thought that he can at least depend on a third of this mess as being manly and masculine, the humiliating second thought will quickly remind him that in this respect he is no better off than any woman or cow in the land.

     

    In the German it is true that by some oversight of the inventor of the language, a Woman is a female; but a Wife (Weib) is not--which is unfortunate. A Wife, here, has no sex; she is neuter; so, according to the grammar, a fish is HE, his scales are SHE, but a fishwife is neither. To describe a wife as sexless may be called under-description; that is bad enough, but over-description is worse. A German speaks of an Englishman as the ENGL

  15. docoflove1974

    Posted

    *ahem*

     

    *Doc walks in...casual-like...and then...*

    I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!! I PASSED!!!!

     

    I do have plenty of corrections and recommendations to do in the next 6 weeks, so I'll be busy. But still...a massive weight is off. I am:

     

    Dr. Sarah E. Harmon, PhD, KIA*

     

    *Know-It-All

     

    (Ok, the KIA* isn't going to be on the business cards...)

  20. docoflove1974

    Posted

    I have signed up for numerous of these sites and each one only tells only European genealogy. Ancestry.com only for Europeans. My parents came from Egypt when they were young so I don't have much to work with. How were you able to get information? Did you get help from sites?

     

    Help from Geneology.com, yes, but much of it was basic resource gathering. I don't know about Egypt, but many European countries are similar to the US, where the provincial or municipal 'capital' has archival records of births, marriages and deaths...and in the case of Europe, often the local cathedral has many of the records, particularly of christenings and marriages. Also, go to whatever major library is closest to you--university libraries are great for this, but even major municipal libraries--and ask for help. There's always someone around who either knows what databases to use, or who knows the people and organizations to ask.

     

    For the Italian documents, we wrote to the Milan and Genoa archives and asked for help. Since my grandfather's parents were from Genoa, we could get the data from them, but for my grandmother's parents, because they were from towns outside of Milan, the Milanese archive directed us to the individual archives for those towns--yes, we got lucky.

     

    I have no idea how my uncle got the data on my father's side...other than census records, and going from there.

     

    Hope that helps!

  21. docoflove1974

    Posted

    That's when you start hitting the internet and geneology/historical society sites. We were lucky in that we still have the passports that my great-grandparents used when they came over, but we poked around until we could find a central agency to get us a copy of their birth and marriage certificates. Once we did that, we can get any information on our family tree.

     

    As for my paternal side, ironically enough, that's harder. Because so much of the family is 1) poor; which leads to 2) born without certificates, they're harder to trace. But my paternal grandmother's side has been traced back to 1640 (my uncle did that), and my aunt is working on the paternal grandfather's side. It's been a tough rode, and one had to constantly ask questions. If your family doesn't want to answer, just say it's so that the family legacy can continue. If that still doesn't work...well, try other routes! Write letters and emails to the central agencies (town halls, archives, etc.) from where your family is from, and someone can probably help you. If you want to know, there's always a way!

  22. docoflove1974

    Posted

    I don't remember anything past my great grand parents. ;)

     

    Well start asking about them! I did! My great-grandparents were all dead by 1953, and my grandfathers both died when my parents were teenagers. My paternal grandmother died when I was 8 months old. I know about them, and other members of my family, because I asked questions, wanting to know more abou them, their lives, and why they made the choices that they did. Know more about your past, and you will appreciate your present and your future.

  23. Gaius Paulinus Maximus

    Posted

    I felt the same way as I passed through the halls of El Escorial, the palace outside of Madrid that Felipe II built in the 1500s...and when I walked through old Toledo, as well as the Alhambra. So much history comes alive all at once! I'm drooling to go back to Europe and see more, as well as visit these 'old friends'. Glad to hear you enjoyed your trip...can't wait to hear the rest!

  25. docoflove1974

    Posted

    SO, soon we will be calling you DOCTOR ________?

    Another question:

    How many pages is your thesis by the way?[Though I'm pretty sure you've met the requirement] I believe one of my Latin teacher got his thesis to round 130 pages.(on some unheard of classical person) and my other Latin teacher got his Ph.D. on a 300 page book about taxes(how horrifyingly boring).

     

    "Doc" works just fine...so does "hey you" :(

     

    Currently mine is ~150 pages, not counting the back material; if included, it's almost 200. I don't know that there's a 'requirement' for a page count...just that you get the work done.

     

    Although...when I did my masters' thesis, I wrote 35 pages...and was told that it had to be at least 50. Man, I've never stretched sentences, re-worded, and just played verbal shennanigans so much in my life!

     

    It's really not hard to come up with the pages, once you get your 'formula' down, all of your literature review in, and the other fun parts. In fact, I think I've cut a few pages out of mine.

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