Re: Going to the bathroom

[cbmvax!uunet!PRC.Unisys.COM!dave]

> I would be surprised if there was even one culture in which it would
> be polite to say to a stranger (the literal translation of) "I want to
> excrete". The problem is that different cultures will use different
> euphemisms. Possibilities include:

Actually, I wouldn't walk up to a stranger and say "I want to eat,"
either.  The usual form is something more like "Could you tell me
where to find a restaurant?"

Certainly the form of questions we use is culturally biased.  My own
bias is that the child who tells his mother "I want a cookie" is
either a spoiled brat who only has to express his needs to have them
fulfilled, or too young to have gotten any farther from the "Cookie?"
stage than this.

Similarly, if someone came up to me and said "I want to eat," with
good pronunciation, I'd probably say "Try that way," pointing in the
direction opposite to that in which I was headed, and I'd try to get
away from the weirdo as soon as possible.  After all, it's not *my*
problem.  Adults (in any reasonable culture) are expected to figure
out for themselves how to acquire food (i.e. go to a restaurant, go to
a grocery store, find a vending machine, go home, whatever), and while
I am quite willing to help a stranger with details such as finding a
restaurant, I am not willing to take the responsibility of seeing that
they get fed.

If the statement was heavily accented, however, I would assume a
competent adult with a language barrier, assume that they simply
didn't know words such as "restaurant", and treat it like a normal
request to find a restaurant (or whatever was the obvious solution
under the circumstances).

If someone came up to me and said "I want to shit," I would react in
the same ways, depending on my assessment of the person's ability to
use English (with the obvious substitutions).

So I would contend that, in Lojban, one ought not say "I want to
shit," but rather, "Where is the room_in_which_to_excrete?" where
"room_in_which_to_excrete" should be a word or easily-formed idiom.

Americans use "bathroom" or "restroom" for "room_in_which_to_excrete."
Australians believe it is unsanitary to have the excretion facilities
in the same room as the bathing facilities, and use "bathroom" for the
latter.  While the American word "bathroom" may be a euphemism, there
does not exist any more explicit word, and you simply have to accept
that American English and Australian English are different languages
in this respect.

The more general question is whether Lojban should have names for
rooms.  It will be awkward to use if it does not; however, it is
impossible to have such names and be culturally unbiased.  For
example, I have lived were cooking facilities were in a separate room;
where they were in the main living area; where they were in the
sleeping area; where cooking was done for us in a room we never saw;
where cooking was done outside, and not in a room at all.  "One word
to fit them all/One word to bind them...."

My personal opinion is that the goal of being culturally unbiased is a
will-o'-the-wisp.  As soon as you start introducing words like
"table," "chair," "pencil," you've already blown it.  And without
words for common cultural artifacts, the language is useless.  (Yes,
yes, I know that Lojban's real goal is to be culturally unbiased
across half-a-dozen cultures, chosen in a completely unbiased fashion
as being the only important ones.)

So I'd say introduce a word meaning room-in-which-to-excrete (with
modifiers for sex or function if necessary), and be done with it.
Also introduce a word for room-in-which-to-wash, and use the two words
interchangably in cultures for which this is the same room.


-- Dave Matuszek (dave@prc.unisys.com)  I don't speak for my employer. --
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