Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2016 November 28

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November 28[edit]

Is there a generic reciprocal of "client" in English?[edit]

Like the pairs "father - son", "left - right", "good - evil", "doctor - patient", is there a word that is the reciprocal of "client". If I am your client, you are my <something>, that is not a designation of any specific occupation such as "lawyer", "accountant", "plumber", etc. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 12:36, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

In computer science, the word "server" is used as a reciprocal of "client". In the case of human relationships, however, I'm not sure there is a single word. Maybe fiduciary, but that's not a common word and has a narrow legal definition. --Jayron32 12:48, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
A term like "service provider" can be understood in general terms. Ghmyrtle (talk) 12:50, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
I think "service provider" is as close as we're going to get. Roger (Dodger67) (talk) 07:05, 29 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
In some contexts, it may be a patron. In others, the patron is the client. — Kpalion(talk) 15:12, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
A bartender may find fewer patrons patronize his bar if he serves Patrón with a patronizing attitude ("Sure you can handle that, li'l fella ?".) StuRat (talk) 17:15, 29 November 2016 (UTC) [reply]
Vendor can also be used as a generic antonym of client in some contexts. 130.188.198.39 (talk) 13:03, 29 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
From the origin, "patron" works.[1]Baseball Bugs What's up, Doc? carrots→ 13:26, 29 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]
Contractor often would be appropriate. Blythwood (talk) 17:48, 30 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

Sources for online linguistics courses, with videos[edit]

What are some good linguistics courses which have lecture videos available online? I just could find a few open MIT (without videos) and even fewer through Coursera. Most courses I find online are teaching a language, or related to linguistics, but not a part of it (for example, NLP, statistics, programming). --Llaanngg (talk) 17:48, 28 November 2016 (UTC)[reply]

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