[wisty]

If Vietnamese is much like Chinese, I wouldn't be surprised. Chinese speakers don't specify much. They tend to hollar low-context imperatives at each other, and hope that everyone already knows their job. Linguists call this a "high context" language, because if you don't have a good idea of the existing context you won't figure much out.

I suspect it's related to the extremely strict and ridged hierarchies in China, and the extremely flexible and implicit social networks. Your boss doesn't ask you to do a favor. They order you. In contrast, you don't ask your neighbour if you can borrow a cup or sugar, you just take it, and pay back the favor some other time. If they don't let you (and don't have a good reason), you just never talk to them again (or if that's too severe, silently downgrade your relationship with them).

Funnily, "let" and "make" are the same word in Chinese. i.e. "My mother made me do my homework, then she made me watch TV".

[CWuestefeld]

Funnily, "let" and "make" are the same word in Chinese.

In Mandarin, the words for "buy" and "sell" are the same phoneme with different intonation. To my untrained ear, they both sound like "my" -- but they mean opposites.

[mc32]

Chinese and English are remarkable in how they address ideas. In Chinese, for the most part, there are only basic words -with little available in the way of synonyms for supplying nuance.'

So you ask someone how do you say big. How do you say gigantic, how do you say long, how do you say capacious, etc. It's all "da" ”大“。

So when people come to me in English and say something like you know, capricious is not exactly the same as whimsical, I can say, that's only because you think it can't be. But it can be. It only is because we've integrated words from French, Latin, Scandinavian, etc. which give us the breadth of choice. But it's kind of artificial anyway and if you force yourself to think about basic meanings -there is little difference. (Law excluded).

[makthrow]

What word is this? Learning Chinese now, curious. Thanks.

[alderz]

You can figure it out with google translate. Traduce "made me" and "let me" from english to chinese.

I think it is 让.

[shard]

Google Translate notwithstanding, I don't really feel like 讓 means 'make'. It feels much closer to 'allow, give permission, let'. 逼 seems closer to 'make' then 讓.

[makthrow]

Yea, I asked because I don't know of any word in Chinese that met his description.

[wisty]

It's 让. I think 逼 is vicerally forceful, also meaning "press" (physically or metaphorically). I think you use 让 in most circumstances.