51吃瓜 of the Day
laisser-aller
noun
unchecked freedom or ease; unrestraint; looseness.
More about laisser-aller
Laisser-aller 鈥渦nchecked freedom or ease鈥� is a direct borrowing from French, in which the phrase means 鈥渢o allow to go.鈥� Laisser 鈥渢o let, allow鈥� ultimately comes from Latin laxus 鈥渓oose,鈥� which is the source of English relax, release, and relish and is a distant cognate of English slack 鈥渘ot tight.鈥� The story of aller 鈥渢o go鈥� is a bit more complicated. Aller is a suppletive verb, which means that several of its inflected forms originated as borrowings from other words; while the infinitive form aller may derive either from a Celtic source or from Latin 补尘产耻濒腻谤别 鈥渢o walk,鈥� the present and future forms vais 鈥淚 go鈥� and irai 鈥淚 will go鈥� come from Latin 惫腻诲别谤别 and 墨谤别, respectively, both of which mean 鈥渢o go.鈥� In English, one common suppletive verb is go (with its past tense form, went, borrowed from wend 鈥渢o proceed鈥�), and suppletion is found as well with the adjectives good and bad (with comparative forms better and worse and superlative forms best and worst derived from different roots). Laisser-aller was first recorded in English in the early 19th century.
how is laisser-aller used?
Zoom dressing is 鈥渟omething the French worry about,鈥� said Manon Renault, an expert in the sociology of fashion. 鈥淓specially Parisians, who feel they represent elegance.鈥� And while a certain laisser-aller recently had the conservative weekly Madame Figaro fretting about whether home-wear habits would drag fashion 鈥渋nto a tailspin,鈥� interviews with a range of Parisians suggest a compromise of sorts had been reached.
Alvanley had a delightful recklessness and laisser aller in everything. His manner of putting out his light at night was not a very pleasant one for his host for the time being. He always read in bed, and when he wanted to go to sleep he either extinguished his candle by throwing it on the floor in the middle of the room, and taking a shot at it with the pillow, or else quietly placed it, when still lighted, under the bolster.
laisser-aller
More about ichnite
Ichnite 鈥渁 fossil footprint鈥� is a compound of the combining form ichno- 鈥渢rack, footstep鈥� and the suffix -ite, which is often found in terms for minerals and fossils. Ichno- derives from Ancient Greek 铆肠丑苍辞蝉 鈥渢rack,鈥� which is of uncertain origin, though hypotheses that lack wide acceptance include connections to Ancient Greek 辞铆办丑辞尘补颈 鈥渢o go away, leave, disappear,鈥� to various Slavic words related to bodily wounds and cavities, and to Ancient Greek 补颈办丑尘岣� 鈥渟pear point.鈥� Perhaps the best-known derivation of 铆肠丑苍辞蝉, for those of you with a passion for Ancient Greek literature, is Ichneutae, the name of a play by Sophocles that is also known variously as Searchers or Trackers in English. Ichnite was first recorded in English in the early 1850s.
how is ichnite used?
In most cases, a fossil footprint, also known as an ichnite, represents evidence that has not moved over time while a bone or tooth could have been transported to the site under study and therefore be out of context .鈥� A footprint or ichnite can reflect the basic shape of the dinosaur鈥檚 foot, the number of toes, and to some extent, the mechanics of how the dinosaur carried its weight.
Just as trackways consisting of true footprints in many cases may end in a particular ichnite for reasons that are not obvious, … they may be so faint that the researcher has difficulties drawing accurate print outlines …. The basic features of the ichnites in La Rioja are simple. Tetrapod footprints made by turtles, pterosaurs, crocodiles, and dinosaurs have been found.
ichnite
pinyin
noun
a system for transliterating Chinese into the Latin alphabet: introduced in 1958 and adopted as the official system of romanization by the People's Republic of China in 1979.
More about pinyin
Pinyin 鈥渁 system for transliterating Chinese into the Latin alphabet鈥� is a borrowing from Mandarin Chinese 辫墨苍测墨苍, a compound of 辫墨苍 鈥渢o arrange, classify鈥� and 测墨苍 鈥渟ound, pronunciation.鈥� Because Chinese uses a writing system that is logographic (using symbols to indicate words) there are numerous methods that linguists have developed to romanize Chinese, that is, to transliterate the language into the Roman alphabet. While pinyin is the most popular today, the Wade鈥揋iles and Yale systems were widespread in China throughout the 20th century. With place names specifically, the so-called 鈥減ostal spellings鈥� were used to render names such as Peking and Nanking into English. After pinyin鈥檚 adoption as the official standard of romanization in 1979, a wave of transliteration swept through China, and the most recognizable effects were the changes in place names, such as the switch from Peking and Nanking to their pinyin versions 叠臎颈箩墨苍驳 and 狈谩苍箩墨苍驳. Pinyin was first recorded in English in the mid-20th century.
how is pinyin used?
Pinyin, which was adopted by China in 1958, gave readers unfamiliar with Chinese characters a crucial tool to understand how to pronounce them. These characters do not readily disclose information on how to say them aloud鈥攂ut with such a system as Pinyin, those characters more easily and clearly yield their meaning when converted into languages like English and Spanish, which use the Roman alphabet. While it was not the first system to Romanize Chinese, Pinyin has become the most widely accepted.
As Beijing welcomed 2022, residents in the Chinese capital noticed a subtle shift taking place in the city’s subway: on signs, the English word “station” has been replaced with “Zhan,” the pinyin, or romanized version, of the Chinese character. And in some cases, English station names such as Olympic Park and Terminal 2 of the Beijing airport have become “Aolinpike Gongyuan” and “2 Hao Hangzhanlou”鈥攖hough the English translations are still displayed in brackets underneath.
pinyin