3. “Octopuses” sounds like what a child or English as Second Language speaker would say. Not sure what is stilted about being a novice to the language.
And a child or ESL speaker will often use constructions that sound stilted. I'm not sure what you're trying to say here.
"Stilted" is a bit of a judgy word, but it's not a value judgment of anyone else's intelligence. Some English speech sounds stilted. So it goes. That's why I don't prefer that pluralization in my own speech.
Lord knows I sound weird enough at times; I'm not here to throw stones from glass houses.
"Stilted" is a bit of a judgy word, but it's not a value judgment of anyone else's intelligence. Some English speech sounds stilted. So it goes. That's why I don't prefer that pluralization in my own speech.
Lord knows I sound weird enough at times; I'm not here to throw stones from glass houses.