Quote:
Originally Posted by rousseau
The distinction between oatmeal (the ground oats) and porridge (said ground oats boiled for breakfast) is in the same category as what the Chinese have for rice. If it's not cooked, i.e. you're going out to the supermarket to get some, it's mi (米), but if it has been cooked it's fan or bai fan ("rice" or "white rice"; 飯 or 白飯).
If you ask for some mi at a Chinese restaurant you'll get confusion. Which is exactly what I experience when porridge is referred to as "oatmeal." It doesn't seem to make logical sense, because while rice is only ever boiled to make it soft (therefore just the one name for both cooked and pre-coaked rice in English), oatmeal can be both boiled into porridge and used in other foods.
So if you were to ask me if I want "oatmeal" for breakfast I'd wonder if you meant you were going to sprinkle it on top of something. Like muesli. Or toast. Or something.
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Good example, and interesting... but I can't help but notice that rice in English is rice, regardless of the state of the grains. Logically, oatmeal should be treated the same by the language...
Plus, is oatmeal really as central to Anglo culture as rice is to Chinese culture? Inuit languages apparently have several words for snow... while more southern languages only have one.
Rice to Chinese and snow to Inuits are in a very special category of things -- I have my doubts that
oatmeal really makes the cut to Anglo-Saxons.
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