| >> English is concise and prone to imagery, which means new concepts can often get accurate one-word descriptions which are more likely to stick than a three-word French equivalent. English is English. Not everyobody is a native English speaker. For example, I'm a Greek speaker and very sorry that I've spoken mostly English in the last 15 years of my life while studying, living and working in the UK. I miss Greek. I like English, I speak it fluently (as I speak French fluently and Italian er, not fluently) but my language is Greek and there will never be a language that is mine, other than Greek. So I want to speak about my work and about my studies and my interests in Greek to my Greek friends and my Greek family, when I go back home for the holidays etc. I hate it that everyone asks me what I do (I study for a PhD) and I have to struggle to translate the things I study from English to Greek, when there are no real Greek terms for what I'm trying to say and when all the translations feel wooden and artificial on my tongue. While the list in the article is (mostly, apparently) a joke, while translating English terms of trade and science to other languages often yields ridiculous results, it is a slap in the face to be told that "English is a better language for this kind of thing than your languages". My language is mine, dammit. When I speak it, it sounds better than yours. But maybe English sounds better than Greek when you speak it? Well, I wouldn't take either observation as evidence that one language is better than the other- not for describing new concepts concisely, not for anything. That's just a misunderstanding of how human languages work. And anyway, this bit: "English is concise and prone to imagery" is the hubris of someone who was never, as a child, subjected to the horror of reading Balzac. You want imagery? Try Le Rouge et Le Noir. Or maybe don't try it. I'm not a fan. But don't say such extremely tone deaf things with such self-assurance, please. Edit: Or do say them. I'm not trying to tell you what to say. I'm just protesting. Because this is the internets. |