# Tom boy or tomboy



## mimitabby

is there such a thing in Italian?
in english, a tomboy is a little girl who likes to play baseball, does not
like to wear dresses, who likes to climb trees, ecc, is more sportiva 
not as feminine, but not necessarily a lesbian, it is more of an innocent thing.


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## Alfry

I think we say maschiaccio

quella ragazza è (si comporta come ) un maschiaccio


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## mimitabby

is it an insult?
here it is not.


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## Alfry

no, but if I were a girl I wouldn't like to be a "maschiaccio".

being a man I can assure you that it's not that bad.


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## danalto

Here I am! A real "maschiaccio" inside...but definitely not on the outside! 

  Er...*moderatori*, this is not chatting, I'm just practising English! 

 (just a little doubt: any difference between PRACTICE and PRACTISE? I usually write _practice_, but this time I wrote practise...)


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## carlafed

mimitabby said:
			
		

> is it an insult?
> here it is not.


As Alfry said, it is not an insult
I think many young girls like to be 'maschiacci', especially if they have an older brother and like to follow him everywhere.
But the 'Italian mothers' often do not like their little girls  to behave as 'maschiacci'


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## leenico

> just a little doubt: any difference between PRACTICE and PRACTISE? I usually write practice, but this time I wrote practise...)


Practice is more common.


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## Silvia

Practice, one of the most mispelled English words!

practice = noun
to practise = verb


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## Silvia

Comunque, l'uso reiterato di 'practice' come verbo penso abbia fatto entrare di diritto questa accezione nel vocabolario.


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## Alfry

allora adesso prendiamo tutti penna e vocabolario e inseriamo il nuovo verbo! 
Ma come fai a sapere tante cose?


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## Silvia

Ecco, questa è una di quelle cose che non ha risposta...


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## Alfry

un po' come il dilemma della quadratura del cerchio, un mio amico dice che tutto è fattibile purchè si usi la giusta quantità di esplosivo.
potrebbe essere anche questa la risposta alla quadratura del cerchio?
sorry, sto divagando


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## mimitabby

leenico said:
			
		

> Practice is more common.



i believe the word practise is british.

practice is correct american english for the verb or the noun.


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## Alfry

I checked on my dictionary and it's so:
to practise  (amer. to practice v.tr.)
esercitare, esercitarsi in, a


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## paolorausch

Practise is British/International English
 Practice is American.

 The reason for this is because British English tries to keep word the origin or words close to their current spelling. Practice comes from Middle English "Practisen", a little useless information per voi.


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## Silvia

Hi paolo, I saw that you typed "Native of: USA, English + Sicilianu" but the correct spelling is siciliano (no caps).


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## paolorausch

Oh I know, però in Siciliano, si chiama "Sicilianu". U Sicilianu è "La Lingua Siciliana".

  Which is correct, "nel Siciliano" or "in"? I was taught "farmer's sicilian" from a very young age, so i am still unlearning :-D

 Thank you for your input, none-the-less!


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## Silvia

Weird, I don't think Sicilians call it sicilianu


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## paolorausch

http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingua_siciliana
 o in Sicilianu, http://scn.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lingua_Siciliana

 Normaly you would not hear Sicilianu, because it would probably be polite to speak in dialect. Nearly everyone now speaks Italiano vero, e Sicilianu, but i grew up in America, so I never got to learn real Italian!


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## Silvia

paolo, think of this: if you speak Italian you'll say siciliano, if you speak Sicilian dialect you won't say sicilianu (which sounds Italian with an accent).

Maybe some Sicilian can help here!

Walnut? 

I know of the word siculo, but I'm not sure. But now I'm curious to know if the proper word in their dialect is sicilianu


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## Alfry

I knew, but I can be wrong, that siculo is not a good word for a Sicilian.

I'm not so sure but I think that it's Sicilianu as paolo told.


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## paolorausch

Siculo is the name of the tribe that inhabited Sicily before the Greeks settled the Island, I believe, although i may be wrong. Check the wikipedia article.

 The big difference is how you look at Sicilian, Now it is a dialect because all the television radio et cetera is from RAI etc. But the Sicilian that was taught to me was before there was such a thing as radio. Sicilian actually is a distinct language with heavy Arabic, Greek and Norman Influence. I only say this because my mother is worse than me, because she learned Sicilian from her grandmother. haha, I own a Sicilian Dictionary. I do not mean to sound full of myself, but I know from experience that I do not speak italian lol, because when i was in rome, I asked a fellow at a Bar "unn'è lu bagnu". and i realised that i did not speak Italian. lol

 sicilian really is a crazy language, for example for coffin we say "tabutu", which is actually an arabic word. and we say "Bresilicò" instead of basilico. which represents the greek word Basilikon. Lordu (lordo) is the only word meaning dirty, my mother had never heard the word sporco until i told it to her, her reply was Sporco? you mean Porcu?

 mi famiglia è il comune di San Biagio Platani, in la Providencia d'Arigento.


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## Alfry

paolorausch said:
			
		

> Siculo is the name of the tribe that inhabited Sicily before the Greeks settled the Island, I believe, although i may be wrong. Check the wikipedia article.
> 
> The big difference is how you look at Sicilian, Now it is a dialect because all the television radio et cetera is from RAI etc. But the Sicilian that was taught to me was before there was such a thing as radio. Sicilian actually is a distinct language with heavy Arabic, Greek and Norman Influence. I only say this because my mother is worse than me, because she learned Sicilian from her grandmother. haha, I own a Sicilian Dictionary. I do not mean to sound full of myself, but I know from experience that I do not speak italian lol, because when i was in rome, I asked a fellow at a Bar "unn'è lu bagnu". and i realised that i did not speak Italian. lol
> 
> sicilian really is a crazy language, for example for coffin we say "tabutu", which is actually an arabic word. and we say "Bresilicò" instead of basilico. which represents the greek word Basilikon. Lordu (lordo) is the only word meaning dirty, my mother had never heard the word sporco until i told it to her, her reply was Sporco? you mean Porcu?
> 
> mi famiglia è il comune di San Biagio Platani, in la Providencia d'Arigento.


well I can understand it very well: "unn'è lu bagnu" - "dov'è il bagno?".

I think that a Sicilian dictionary is really fantastic. it's the fist time I hear something like that. Really amazing.


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## danalto

> mi famiglia è il comune di San Biagio Platani, in la Providencia d'Arigento.


 Ciao, Paolo!

  Dunque: la mia famiglia è (originaria) del comune di San Biagio Platani, in provincia di Agrigento. 

 Anni fa, quando ancora lavoravo come accompagnatrice turistica, capitavano gruppi di persone che, come te, avevano imparato solo il dialetto.
 E ti assicuro che era faticosissimo per me! Perché erano (a differenza tua, che sei consapevole di non conoscere l'italiano, ma solo il siciliano) sicuri di parlarmi nella mia lingua!
  Che fatica!

  In bocca al lupo con l'_italiano vero_!


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## Alfry

paolorausch said:
			
		

> http://www.linguasiciliana.org/


oh boys, really interesting
thanks so much Paolo


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## mimitabby

alfry said:
			
		

> oh boys, really interesting
> thanks so much Paolo


i think you would really say "OH BOY!  really interesting" 
unless you thought BOYS were really interesting, and i didn't
get that impression from you 
m


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## paolorausch

grazie per il correzione!

   In bocca al lupo con l'_italiano vero_!
  Has been and always will be my favourite Italian phrase!

  una cosa interesante, in Siciliano, non esiste un coniugazione del Futuro.

  Dici solo, Che vuoi fare, e quando lo fai.

  Italiano:
  lo faccerò domani... giusto?
  Siciliano:
  Lu facciu dumani.

  But, in time, e spero che mio itialiano non è troppo male!

 Yes and "Oh Boy" is a somewhat old expression, i rarely hear anyone using it seriously. but It makes sense how you used it!


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## mimitabby

paolorausch said:
			
		

> grazie per il correzione!
> 
> In bocca al lupo con l'_italiano vero_!
> Has been and always will be my favourite Italian phrase!
> 
> una cosa interesante, in Siciliano, non esiste un coniugazione del Futuro.
> 
> Dici solo, Che vuoi fare, e quando lo fai.
> 
> Italiano:
> lo faccerò domani... giusto?
> Siciliano:
> Lu facciu dumani.
> 
> But, in time, e spero che mio itialiano non è troppo male!



this is very important information! NO FUTURE!! ties in well with Il Gattopardo!


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## Alfry

thanks...
it was oh boy...

wowwww, an "s" could have ruined my reputation.
you just saved mine, tks.


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## paolorausch

Il Gattopardo? What is Gattopardo, if you do not mind me asking?


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## Silvia

paolorausch, I deleted the link you posted in one of your previous posts. Please be cautious when you post links, the Administrator doesn't allow links that are potentially competing with the WR site or have commercial purposes. I left the other link about Sicilian dialect.

Thank you


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## Silvia

paolo, do you really think of the Sicilian dialect as a unique entity? Because there are differences from city to city, your Sicilian will be different from the one in Messina or Palermo. I'm not an expert of course, but usually it's the same for every dialect and the region where it is spoken. Any tightly-knit world has its own dialect. Take your family for example. Living in the US, their language will develop differently if compared to the language spoken in Sicily.


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## paolorausch

you are absolutely right, silviap, my family also speaks the Greek Flavour. This is why the Sicilian Language movement cannot gather movement and why i believe it will be gone in the next generation. Although somethings through Sicily are the same, there is a lot of difference based on Region. As an interesting fact, Sicilian has a vocabulary of 250,000, matched by no other language in europe than English. I know the Sicilian I learned to be its own language, but Sicilian will not be in 40 years. I have a neighbour from Palermo, and he talks like we do, although he uses more Real Italian words because he is from the City.

  Thank you for taking care of that for me!, I am new here! Although the one on Yahoo is just a Conversation Group.

 Also, here in America, we actually say to the family off the boat, "ccà parramu sicilianu-americanu", Here we speak sicilian american. Example, instead of Bagnu they say "Baccausu", "Back-House". But in America, the Sicilian Dialect is very well developed. It is seriously almost like the entire Comune del San Biagio Platani lived in Chicago.

 I would say the difference between Italian and Sicilian is the same as Catalan and Spanish. Very similar, yet different. but I am fairly certain that it will disappear soon which i think is a catastrophe because it is a very beautiful language with many quirks. 

 read the wikipedia article! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicilian_language 
 it is in Italian too (look on la sinestra)


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## Silvia

Paolo, I hear you're very proud of your dialect and this is mainly due to the fact that that's your inheritage language. Please know that Italy is full of other dialects, some of them are real languages, unlike Sicilian (I'm talking about Sardinian for example). I see you can't be objective about that, after all it's the language you know, the language your family taught you. I live in the North of Italy and here we have other dialects even tending to French or Spanish. I guess you don't know about that, so I thought it might have been interesting for you. And all the other people having other dialects are more or less as proud as you.


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## mimitabby

paolorausch said:
			
		

> Il Gattopardo? What is Gattopardo, if you do not mind me asking?


Hi Paolo
Il Gattopardo, the leopard, is one of the most famous books in italian
written about Sicily.

by Tomasi Lampadusa.


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## Silvia

Gattopardo = serval, ocelot


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## mimitabby

silviap said:
			
		

> Gattopardo = serval, ocelot


that's funny, the book and movie in english is called "the leopard."
a much bigger cat


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## mimitabby

Silvia, thank you for bringing this to my attention.
I guess when they translated the book, they thought servals
or ocelots were not impressive enough (big and ferocious enough)
so they used the word leopard instead!!

!!


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## lsp

Just one more thought on the tomboy subject. 

If you took this to the cultural forum I bet you'd find people who no longer think it's OK to use the term. Without taking a side, I did have this conversation recently and heard the point of view that girls who are not interested in the traditional little girl interests (dolls and such) are behaving appropriately for girls _oggi come oggi_, and that it is a step backward to label them at all, _figuiamoci_ calling them anything having to do with boys! Another example of America's PC obsession, no doubt.


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## Ducklings

I'm a tomboy, I'm a girl btw and anyway being a tomboy don't mean ur a lesbian! it just means that u like to play sport instead of faffin around all day trying to impress the boys, when the tomboy's impress them without even trying!


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## Kleine Hexe

Silvia said:
			
		

> paolo, think of this: if you speak Italian you'll say siciliano, if you speak Sicilian dialect you won't say sicilianu (which sounds Italian with an accent).
> 
> Maybe some Sicilian can help here!
> 
> Walnut?
> 
> I know of the word siculo, but I'm not sure. But now I'm curious to know if the proper word in their dialect is sicilianu


 
Hi!

When we speak Italian we say "siciliano", while when we speak Sicilian dialect we say "sicilianu"!

for example -
 dialect - Sicilianu sugnu! 
 Italian - Siciliano sono! (= Sono siciliano)
 English  - I am Sicilian!


Ciao    

Sabina


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## lsp

Ducklings said:
			
		

> I'm a tomboy, I'm a girl btw and anyway being a tomboy don't mean ur a lesbian! it just means that u like to play sport instead of faffin around all day trying to impress the boys, when the tomboy's impress them without even trying!


Welcome, Ducklings. My point, if you were commenting on my post, had nothing to do with sexual preference, and everything to do with the fact that the term tomboy suggests girls acting like boys, being athletic or likeing sports (or cars or trains or being a cop or a firefighter or preseident, even) are no longer considered acting like boys. I wondered if using the term was frowned upon by the same people who thought it necessary to change the genderless term _chairman_ to the even more genderless _chairperson_, for example.


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