Pythonistas? <- Re: OT: Perl programmers?

[Tim Hammerquist]

phil hunt <philh at comuno.freeserve.co.uk> graced us by uttering:
> Gustavo Cordova <gcordova at hebmex.com> wrote:
>>> >"-ist" - an individual professionally or avocationally 
>>> occupied with the
>>> >idea or activity defined by the root [1].
>>> 
>>> >Of course, in either Spanish or Esperanto it would more commonly be
>>> >"Pythonisto" anyway, so who knows.
>>
>>Kinda wrong for Spanish though.
>>
>>A follower of Zapata ("Emiliano Zapata", perhaps?) would be "Zapatista",
>>be it a male or female. "Zapatisto" is a gross error, and it's funny
>>also :-)
>>
>>It's common for little children to mistakenly use "-isto" as well as
>>"-ista" when talking about boys or girls, that's why it's funny, because
>>it's an infantile mistake.
> 
> Is -ista always feminine? E.g. is it always _la dentista_ not _el dentista_?

Nope. -ista nouns end in -a regardless of gender. If you're
referring to a female dentist, you say "la dentista".  For a male
dentist, "el dentista".  Likewise, a male follower of Zapata: "un
Zapatista". Female: "una Zapatista".

This is one of the more standard exceptions in Spanish.  A very
confusing one regards words coming from Greek. For example:

    "una problema"      # WRONG
    "un problemo"       # WRONG
    "un problema"       # Correct
    "un tema"           # Correct
    "un programa"       # Correct

Tim Hammerquist
-- 
Anyone who thinks that the act of programming is worth
less than $50/hr should leave the industry.
    -- Randal L. Schwartz (clpm, 27 Jul 2000)