Libre and gratis. I do not understand how it can be so hard to explain this concept to english speakers, and I think it is to do with the lack of the distinction in english. Orwell was right that the words available in a language set limits on the potential debates.
Which word from another language do you need in your language?
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Precise Dutch uses "volle neef" or "volle nicht" (volle is full) for a cousin.
But we Dutch are indeed often really lazy in practical language. My father knew it all precise and I had to listen just like with spelling precision I had to do proper.
Josu
Emperor
The spanish world Ojalá cames from an arab expresion which means god willing
Deadly Dog
Prince
Indeed I was always amused by this fact and that I heard it used by people who were secular, Roman Catholic, or even among quichua speaking indigenous people who had syncretized there beliefs with Catholicism . In a large sense Inshallah has the same meaning but using that term creates an expectation that you are of Muslim faith/culture. Ojalá doesn't seem to have that connotation to it, and is used beautifully to express hopes/desires/fears in a context where the world just might have other plans for you.
I tend to use "plural 'you'" or "general 'you'" when I want to make it absolutely clear that I don't only mean the person whose post I'm replying to.
I suppose the French words would work, for those who are familiar with them, but then you (general 'you'
) get the added confusion of whether to use the familiar or formal word.Do they have any words that break it down further into step-relatives?
It profoundly annoyed me that when my mother married husband #2, I was expected to suddenly consider his family as also being my family. She'd yap on about "Auntie ____, Uncle _______, or Grandma ______or Grandpa ______" and the fact is that I did not consider any of those people to be any relation to me whatsoever. My mother married into that family. I did not. I had the full slate of grandparents, thankyouverymuch, and my mom's blood siblings and their spouses were my aunts and uncles and their children are my cousins. Her new in-laws were nothing to me (though there were two of them I liked a bit, I still didn't consider them family).
Oh, yeah, definitely. English can take our German words, "übermorgen" ("morgen" = tomorrow", "über" = beyond/above) and "vorgestern" ("gestern" = yesterday, "vor" = before).
What's the Russion word for tonight?
What's the Russion word for tonight?
Same in Russian, we use words which sound like "aftermorrow" or "befosterday" too.
"Сегодня вечером", which means "today evening" or "today night", kind of oxymoron.
Gori the Grey
The Poster
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One can often also make "one" work to this effect.
Making English appear simple!I like the word "Jein" very much and use it quite a lot with people who understand it.
During my work I was often together with people speaking English, Dutch and German, the German colleagues from the bordering NRW could often understand Dutch quite well, though we mostly did speak in English but showered with German words (or German technical terms). Jein among them.
One of the things I learned in Selling trainings was to distinguish between "Maloma" and "Takete" words.
"Ja" somewhat, but especially "Nein" are "Takete" words. Sharp consonants, the first one most important.
Just exaggerate a bit speaking out Takete and Maloma and look in a mirror. No wonder a baby likes Maloma soothing, comforting words, whereby the word mama is clearly more Maloma than papa.
If you need a price increase from a customer, you should not use the Takete word "increase", but the Maloma version "adapt" the price.
And "Jein" (that yes&no word) is a Maloma word, softening that you cannot give the (desired?) "yes". The J in Ja (yes) also more explosive than the J in Jein. Besides Jein also enabling to put more variations of intonation while speaking it.
In that vein: instead of saying yes to a question to do something I like "mach mal" (sure.. do it) making the Ja (yes) much more Maloma with the two words starting with the Maloma m.
OK is also a Takete word. When you say "Okido" the k of ok is already softened. But okido not always appropiate because it assumes a more closer relation.
I was in order to evade the word "ok" really fond of the Polish "dobra" (meaning ok and good) and the Turkish "taman" also nice. Bot much more Maloma.
But yeah, there are a lot of words missing in some languages where you then have to fall back on descrtiptions.
Putting aside the new technical words like PC or smartphone etc, also putting aside lingual purism like using "wentelwiek" in Flemish instead of the Dutch "helicopter" which is too French for true Flemish. and "chopper" imo the best word.... Really interesting from the societal-cultural perspective WHY some languages miss those words, or why a seemingly "the same word" has another meaning or a clearly other flavour.
No word for Hofnungstraeger in English (or Dutch) and El Savador (Latin) or Verlosser (Dutch) go too far.
The good leader gives Verlass (reliable-responsible), is a Hofnungstraeger (there is a better future) and is Gerecht (is just) How does that translate in English ?
And how do you translate "de Rechtstaat, Rechtsstaatlichkeit" in English ? With "Rule of Law" ? It means so much more than just rule of law. And trying to explain with that laws were in the HRE (incl North Italy) the most cohesive factor and followed by Kant a typical central continental European product (not french or Spanish or English with their more centralistic and monarchy topdown history) (not the UK offsprings as well ofc).
Many traditional leftish and christian political ideologies of the end 19th and 20th century are much more based on the absolute centralistic history of England, France, Spain than the relative freeroom in a Rechtsstaat law framework.
With technical words I love new words from other languages wherever they are at least one word or shorter words.
The habit to use abbreviations as words (a US invention ?), like PC, NASA, etc one of the better inventions in language
Y'all is perfectly acceptable in many places in the US: Maryland to Florida and west to Texas and Oklahoma.,
warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
English is my 3rd language, so naturally I am going to use English as the example here. i.e. words that exist in other languages, but not in English
In Polish we have a word for "The day after tomorrow". I've been told that English used to have such a word (overmorrow), but y'all threw it away. Why? What's wrong with you?
In the same vein, "The day before yesterday". There is no English word for this as far as I know (but correct me if I'm wrong).
In Polish it's also possible to say "the day after the day after tomorrow" in one word. Nobody in English would say "the day after the day after tomorrow" cause it's so wordy. Makes more sense to just say "Saturday" or whatever. In Polish we can name the day (i.e. Saturday) or say "the day after the day after tomorrow" in one word. Options!
These are not super important, but it does seem a bit weird that English doesn't have words in use for the first 2 examples at least.
English also doesn't seem to have a word for "Enjoy yo meal!". The French use "Bon appetit" of course, and we have "Smacznego" in Polish, but in English.. there doesn't seem to be a word for this. People are forced to use words from other languages for this purpose. How barbaric
In Polish we also have the word "Kolega" which seems to translate to "friend". However, "przyjaciel" is the proper word for friend and implies a closer sort of friendship. "Kolega" is sort of in between friend and acquaintance, although it seems to have the same linguistic root as colleague. This one's useful because "kolega" almost implies a sort of informal friendship. So if you call somebody your "kolega" and somebody else your "przyjaciel", people will understand that you are closer to the latter person without you having to say anything else. Whereas in English, the word "friend" seems so all-encompassing, including your best friends, close friends, informal friends, facebook friends, etc. In Polish we also have "Znajomy", which basically translates to "somebody you know"...
English also doesn't seem to have a word for "the 24 hours from midnight to midnight". In Polish we call that a "doba".
In Polish we also have this word "kombinowac" which means something like "to scheme/hack", but not quite. It's almost like.. if you are scheming something, or trying to figure something out. "McGyvering it" is the closest translation I can think of, although that's not quite right either. This word almost literally means "to try different combinations", to give you more context on the meaning.
I should add that in Polish the words for Home and House are the same. Which isn't really that annoying, as it always seems blatantly obvious which one is meant w/ the proper context in place. We also only have 1 word for fingers and toes. You'd think that'd get confusing, but it actually leads to exactly 0 problems.
In Polish we have a word for "The day after tomorrow". I've been told that English used to have such a word (overmorrow), but y'all threw it away. Why? What's wrong with you?
In the same vein, "The day before yesterday". There is no English word for this as far as I know (but correct me if I'm wrong).
In Polish it's also possible to say "the day after the day after tomorrow" in one word. Nobody in English would say "the day after the day after tomorrow" cause it's so wordy. Makes more sense to just say "Saturday" or whatever. In Polish we can name the day (i.e. Saturday) or say "the day after the day after tomorrow" in one word. Options!
These are not super important, but it does seem a bit weird that English doesn't have words in use for the first 2 examples at least.
English also doesn't seem to have a word for "Enjoy yo meal!". The French use "Bon appetit" of course, and we have "Smacznego" in Polish, but in English.. there doesn't seem to be a word for this. People are forced to use words from other languages for this purpose. How barbaric
In Polish we also have the word "Kolega" which seems to translate to "friend". However, "przyjaciel" is the proper word for friend and implies a closer sort of friendship. "Kolega" is sort of in between friend and acquaintance, although it seems to have the same linguistic root as colleague. This one's useful because "kolega" almost implies a sort of informal friendship. So if you call somebody your "kolega" and somebody else your "przyjaciel", people will understand that you are closer to the latter person without you having to say anything else. Whereas in English, the word "friend" seems so all-encompassing, including your best friends, close friends, informal friends, facebook friends, etc. In Polish we also have "Znajomy", which basically translates to "somebody you know"...
English also doesn't seem to have a word for "the 24 hours from midnight to midnight". In Polish we call that a "doba".
In Polish we also have this word "kombinowac" which means something like "to scheme/hack", but not quite. It's almost like.. if you are scheming something, or trying to figure something out. "McGyvering it" is the closest translation I can think of, although that's not quite right either. This word almost literally means "to try different combinations", to give you more context on the meaning.
I should add that in Polish the words for Home and House are the same. Which isn't really that annoying, as it always seems blatantly obvious which one is meant w/ the proper context in place. We also only have 1 word for fingers and toes. You'd think that'd get confusing, but it actually leads to exactly 0 problems.
If you look at the English food, you'll understand that they simply don't really have a use for such a word.
(last time I was in England the food was quite good)
Does this not end up being an acquaintance?
How's that different from a day?
Gori the Grey
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warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
It's closer to friend on the stranger-bff scale. When you're a kid and you're going outside to play with your friend, you tell your parents that you are going outside to play with your kolega. But if you are giving a best man speech at a wedding, you refer to the groom as your przyjaciel. When referring to the audience, you would probably call them znajomi (acquaintances/people you know)
On the other hand, an colleague from work would be called a kolega z pracy (friend from work)
Przyjaciel is also sometimes used to mean best friend and koleżanka (female friend) to sometimes mean girlfriend.
In Polish we have a word for day (dzień) and another word for the 24 hour time period (doba). So "have a good day" is dzień but "I partied for 24 hours" would be doba. In English you are forced to say "I partied for 24 hours" instead of saying "I partied the whole day", because if you said that people would think that you stopped partying when it got dark.
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One has tried this, but one found out that it can get really awkward.
I've heard that in Washington state, as in the time when a friend and I went to Spokane for a Doctor Who fan event at the KSPS PBS studio and the station manager said to us, "You gals 're from Calgary? There's four fellas here from Edmonton. Maybe y'all know each other!"Making English appear simple!
Y'all is perfectly acceptable in many places in the US: Maryland to Florida and west to Texas and Oklahoma.,
Um, yeah. Right. My friend started fuming, but I told her, "We might know them if they go to the conventions, too" (NonCon at Thanksgiving and Con-Version in July, the two regular SF conventions in Alberta back in the '80s).
But nope. They were four total strangers. We did hang out with them later, though - it was Saturday, which meant a full 90-minute Doctor Who story would be on TV that night. We took a room at the motel where they were staying, and spent the evening with pizza, American coke, and watching Doctor Who.
Then they and my friend got into an argument over which city was better - Edmonton or Calgary. I told them that since I'm from Red Deer, I was staying out of the argument.
I had no idea we ever had such a word. Interesting... depending on when it was last used, it might be something I could use in a story.
Of course there are a number of French words and phrases and spellings that have become part of English here in Canada, that people use without even thinking about it. Even before French immersion became something that most cities have in their school systems here, we've had francophone communities in Alberta. A lot of Eastern Canadians seem to think that no French is spoken west of the Ontario/Manitoba border, but that's not true. There's a lot of antipathy politically, yes. But people here use and understand more French than they realize - not like it's a conversation, and there are people who go ballistic if the French side is turned out when the stock clerks put stuff on the shelves, but it's just something that happens without even really noticing.
That "French side out" had my dad thinking he was buying canned bananas one time when we were both doing the grocery shopping. I had to tell him to take a good look at the picture on the can before he would believe me that it was really a can of pineapple.
We call that a "day".The expression used around here is "to flange up" as in "flange up a solution" or "flange something up".
Zardnaar
Deity
A few Maori words that are being used here semi regularly.
Morena=morning
Kai= food
Puku= belly
Morena=morning
Kai= food
Puku= belly
The word "Day" also means time of day (along with morning, evening and night).
We have a separate word for calendar day too, though I don't think it's much needed in English.
tjs282
Stone \ Cold / Fish
That sounds like the British-English verb, "to bodge" — as in "I bodged a repair for now, but it probably won't hold for long."
Josu
Emperor
Kia Ora is a very nice Maori expression, I like it because it can be used both to say hello and goodbye, but if I recall properly means something like be healthy.
warpus
Sommerswerd asked me to change this
Yeah, in English the word day is used to describe 2 concepts, depending on the context. It's either sunrise to sundown or the 24 hour long period. i.e. "You did nothing all day long!" is referring to the former concept, but "There are 7 days in a week" is referring to the latter.
There's little confusion since context is usually clear, I agree, but nevertheless this is an example of a word that doesn't exist in English that exists in others. I admit the point of the thread is supposed to highlight the words we need. This one isn't needed, but neither are any of the others I listed really. Overmorrow seems like an oversight, but nobody seems to care
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