Headline failure of the week
« previous post | next post »
"Female snipers in challenging filed operation"
Photo essay in China Military (8/30/20).
Below are the captions for the five photographs in the essay. The scary, creepy, bizarre photographs are omitted in this post, but may be seen at this link, where you can also see the headline cited above.
Female snipers wearing Gillie suits look through rifle sights at mock targets during a tactical operation in the woods in mid August. Assigned to a brigade under the PLA 80th Group Army, they are participating in risky subjects including long-distance raid, camouflage reconnaissance, wildness survival and others.
Female soldiers rush to occupy best vantage points against mock enemies in the wood during a jungle tactical operation in mid August. Assigned to a brigade under the PLA 80th Group Army, they are participating in risky subjects including long-distance raid, camouflage reconnaissance, wildness survival and others.
Female snipers wearing Gillie suits wade through shallow creeks as they search mock enemy in the woods during a tactical operation in mid August. Assigned to a brigade under the PLA 80th Group Army, they are participating in risky subjects including long-distance raid, camouflage reconnaissance, wildness survival and others.
Female soldiers cooperate during a log-carrying operation in the woods in mid August. Assigned to a brigade under the PLA 80th Group Army, they are participating in risky subjects including long-distance raid, camouflage reconnaissance, wildness survival and others.
Female soldiers safely accomplish multiple tasks and pose for a group photo with their rifles during a jungle tactical operation in mid August. Assigned to a brigade under the PLA 80th Group Army, they are participating in risky subjects including long-distance raid, camouflage reconnaissance, wildness survival and others.
Andrew Usher said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:02 am
The overall standard of English is of course imperfect as to be expected, but the only thing wrong with the headline itself is the misspelling of 'field', which looks like a simple typo.
k_over_hbarc at yahoo.com
Cervantes said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:03 am
Yeah, not sure why this is interesting, it's just a typo.
Gregory Kusnick said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:08 am
This looks like a simple typo or autocorrect error: "filed" for "field".
jin defang said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:51 am
to me the interesting part was the ghillie suit. Not knowing its Scottish origin, I guessed, wrongly, that it was a corruption of the gilets, vests, that were worn by French protestors,(and always carried in autos in France).
Ghillie (with the "h") moccasins are commonly seen; they have leather fringes. Here the word might have an Amerind origin.
Lex said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:51 am
“The scary, creepy, bizarre photographs are omitted in this post.”
I’m struggling to see which photographs would be even remotely scary, creepy, or bizarre.
ycx said,
August 30, 2020 @ 11:01 am
I agree with Lex above. While the photos are clearly done for a photo-op (observe how clean the uniforms are!) it doesn't seem significantly different from gender-segregated training photos of other militaries, for example the US Marines. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/us/female-marines-boot-camp-training.html
Joshua K. said,
August 30, 2020 @ 11:21 am
I don't understand much in this item. A typo in a headline where the incorrect spelling just doesn't make sense, rather than creating a weird or funny unintended meaning? Pictures of women wearing camouflage clothes being called "scary, creepy, bizarre"?
In fairness, I had heard of a "ghillie suit" before but didn't know what it was, and now I know, so I did learn something.
Athel Cornish-Bowden said,
August 30, 2020 @ 11:36 am
Why are these pictures any more scary, creepy or bizarre than the ones we see every day coming from the USA?
Francois Lang said,
August 30, 2020 @ 11:38 am
Maybe ghillie suits [never heard the term before…thanks Language Log!] are what Peter Mayhew wore when he portrayed Chewbacca?
Not a naive speaker said,
August 30, 2020 @ 1:50 pm
As an avid reader of John Buchan I knew the word gillie and immediately thought of trespassing and game hunting.
Victor Mair said,
August 30, 2020 @ 2:18 pm
@Francois Lang
Nice comment about Chewbacca!
JPL said,
August 30, 2020 @ 4:39 pm
Perhaps people could attend instead to the captions, where, in addition to the expression of an unintended meaning, with "wildness survival" instead of "wilderness", they could puzzle about precisely which element of the meaning of 'subject' makes it inappropriate to use in this context, given what we can guess is the intended meaning (and intended reference). (Just providing the repair is not enough; try to specify just what is the intended meaning and reference.)
Gregory Kusnick said,
August 30, 2020 @ 7:15 pm
JPL: I take "subjects" here to mean "lessons", i.e. subjects in a military school curriculum. I agree that it sounds awkward in this sentence and that "activities" or "exercises" would be preferable.
On the other hand, "risky subjects including Defense Against the Dark Arts" sounds fine to me.
Andrew Usher said,
August 30, 2020 @ 10:51 pm
As I said, the English is not perfect – 'risky subjects' and 'wildness survival' being examples – though the meaning is quite intelligible. I think 'training for risky activities' would be the best possible retaining the word 'risky', for which we'd probably use a synonym also.
Adrian said,
August 31, 2020 @ 3:46 am
re the Wikipedia entry. Ghillie is not a misspelling, it's an anglicisation.
Alexander Browne said,
August 31, 2020 @ 9:12 am
@ Adrian
That reminds me of Ghent, which is Gent in Dutch.
George said,
September 2, 2020 @ 3:36 pm
@Alexander Browne.
The 'h' isn't the issue. That's just lenition.
Andrew Usher said,
September 2, 2020 @ 7:08 pm
Lenition in what language? Certainly English doesn't have it, and I'm pretty sure 'ghillie' is pronounced the same way 'gillie' would be. I'm not sure why the 'gh' there, I wouldn't take it as a _regular_ anglicisation.
But in the case of Ghent, someone may have been attempting to represent the Dutch fricative sound.
Also, I can't think of any situation in which I'd use the phrase "risky subjects".
ajay said,
September 3, 2020 @ 4:36 am
Gille is a Scots Gaelic word for a young man or older boy who works as an outdoor servant. "Ghillie" is a mis-spelling. The term "ghillie suit" may be a reference to Gille Dubh the "Dark Lad" or "Black Lad", an Earth spirit who is clothed in leaves and moss in Scottish mythology.
This sounds highly dubious in two ways.
First, "ghillie" is not a mis-spelling. That's the way that the (admittedly rare) English word is spelled; I've never seen any other spelling.
Second, "gille" in Gaelic simply means a male servant – originally it was an informal term for "young man" – with no "outdoor" connotation. (It's included in surnames like Gilchrist, Gilmartin).
But "ghillie" nowadays, and since at least the late 19th century in English, means specifically a hunting guide; your ghillie accompanies you when you go stalking, advises you on the approach, helps carry scope and gun and so forth. In the Great War Lord Lovat recruited the Lovat Scouts as what we would now call a sniper-scout unit; they were mostly ghillies and estate workers in civilian life, and were the first to build and wear ghillie suits. The link seems pretty obvious without having to invent fanciful connections to Celtic folklore.
(Earlier in the 19th century "ghillie" meant simply a servant in general, see Aytoun, "The Massacre of M'Pherson":
Here’s Mhic-Mac-Methusaleh
Coming wi’ his fassals,
Gillies seventy-three,
And sixty Dhuinéwassails!”)
ajay said,
September 3, 2020 @ 4:39 am
I'm pretty sure 'ghillie' is pronounced the same way 'gillie' would be.
Not necessarily. G can be soft if followed by an i; gin, gipsy, gibber, gist, Gillian Anderson.
George said,
September 3, 2020 @ 4:42 am
@Andrew Usher
I should have been clearer. All I meant is that if the English word derives from 'ghille' rather than from 'gille', then the presence of the 'h' isn't necessarily something that occurred in the process of anglicisation.
Rodger C said,
September 3, 2020 @ 6:56 am
Not necessarily. G can be soft if followed by an i; gin, gipsy, gibber, gist, Gillian Anderson.
And "gill" meaning four ounces, a word much more common once upon a time than now, which is probably the motivation for the spelling "ghillie."
All I meant is that if the English word derives from 'ghille' rather than from 'gille', then the presence of the 'h' isn't necessarily something that occurred in the process of anglicisation.
Then why isn't it pronounced "yillie"?
George said,
September 3, 2020 @ 9:00 am
@Rodger C
Fair point on the pronunciation. I was thinking in Irish.
Frans said,
September 3, 2020 @ 2:19 pm
@Alexander Browne @Andrew Usher
While that someone could be independent speakers of Old/Middle English, I think the easiest explanation is that those people were speakers of Old/Middle Dutch. Ghent is just an old spelling, retained in English. That's not uncommon.
Andrew Usher said,
September 6, 2020 @ 10:05 pm
Yes, I'd accept that. I was just wanting the contradict the dubious idea that the unpronunced h in 'Ghent' had anything to do with that in 'ghillie'.