What's wrong with "savory"? Or, hell, what's wrong with just stealing "umami"?

Just please don't say "unctuous."

Fuck that word and fuck me for posting it.

Wait.

No.  Nevermind.

I don't fucking know, what the fuck difference does it make at this fucking point?

That fucking fucker fucked the fucking diversity example right fucking proper, and you fucking fuckwits fucked it all the fuck up fucking around.  Fuck!

Trolling is a art.

You maybe need to do two things:

1) Look at why English is so prevalent around the world. My own experience, after 10 years trying to perfect my French led to the conclusion that at a given point, my French was as good as the English of, let's call them "person X". We both had a reasonable grasp of vocabulary and basic grammar. However, Person X could hold conversations with other English people, and they would understand him, and he them. Whereas I would mostly get blank looks. The reason is that you can throw together a bit of English with the words in the sentence in the wrong order, using wrong tenses and really crappy pronunciation and still be understood. With French, the grammar has to be close to perfect, tense is very important and pronunciation is the difference between a blank look and the the person walking away from this obviously mentally deficient person as quickly as possible.

With English, there is a somewhat linear relationship between comprehension, your vocabulary and your grasp of grammar.
With French comprehension trundles along at practically zero until you hit a tipping point where suddenly everyone understands you. But that needs you to be ~90% of the way up the learning curve.

I am told that other languages vary. Some are very tolerant of  errors, others not so much, but English wins practically every time.

2) Without wanting to seem rude, buy a thesaurus and dictionary. I hate to say this to you, because you are one of the better writers on here - I assume your spoken word is as good. But recognize that in general, American English is very restricted in its vocabulary and grammar ... well ... (this, coming from someone that always got "could do better" from his English teachers at school should speak volumes).

Also, English has never been really resistant to incorporating words from other languages when there isn't a good English one. Perhaps the most commonly used (and misused in the US) one being voilá. Often written and pronounced as "wolla" in the USA - because of the lousy English education here more than real ignorance. It does exactly what you describe, encapsulates what it would take a sentence to say otherwise. Not an English word, but widely enough adopted that virtually everyone understands it.

English is a live language - feel free to help it grow. If people have to google a word to understand it, good for them. They just expanded their vocabulary too.

What’s worse is that roughly 50% of the population is limited to about 13% of available vocabulary.

‘Savory’ and ‘umami’ aren’t exactly the same… oh, there’s some of that nuance that ‘crude’ English isn’t supposed to have…

42342 posts since 2014, none of which have any consequence.  You work on Kia autos.  How old are you?  You derive some satisfaction from polluting Arfcom with your nonsense?

nihongonese fetish thread

LP is a weird fucking dude, but he’s a site treasure, in spite of the nonsensical drama.

Was just about to post the same

Savory.

Viola!

Ancient Sumerian has a word that means really not happy so you don't have to say really not happy.

Do we really know any ancient Sumerian words, or just guesses based on cuneiform translation?

It's called shit happens

Or in Italian, "eh" with a shrugging motion.

understanding? yes

pronunciation? no.

An, Enlil, Enki and Ninma? have decided its fate to overturn the divine powers of Sumer, to lock up the favorable reign in its home, to destroy the city, to destroy the house, to destroy the cattle-pen, to level the sheepfold; that the cattle should not stand in the pen, that the sheep should not multiply in the fold, that watercourses should carry brackish water, that weeds should grow in the fertile fields, that mourning plants should grow in the open country,

since the big translation revolution in the 1980s with the aid of computers many dead languages are understood now

I cannot fathom being this unhappy all the fucking time, the only person I know IRL as miserable is a 50 something angry at the world lesbian.

Fubar

But we don’t know the actual phonetics of the words… just what they looked like in written form, right?  The phoenyms are all based on extrapolation and educated guesses.

Note: I have a translation of the Epic of Gilgamesh under the seat of my truck right now…

The English language is fine. It is not the fault of the language that its speakers have such limited vocabulary.

That said, I will fight people in defense of koselig

English has only recently become good with slang.

Example, Russian slang in Israel. Best one is Propeil, which means “I was paid on Friday, and blew it all drinking, it’s Monday now and I’m broke the rest of the week.”

We need more words like this.

Chinga tu madre whey

They never disappoint

anata no ? kara suna wo fukitobashi ? shojo ni koudou suru

Also, English is the perfect universal language. Our only native form of poetry is Limericks. nuff said.

So was DJ for a while. Eventually they get attention that they weren't looking for.

Bless his heart Little Pony does get things stirred up upon occasion.

I have to say I am really enjoying this thread as it develops.

I personally don't get very offended over criticisms like this as it is out of ignorance and a misunderstanding of the contextual complexity possible in the English language.

Bless his heart:  This can be an insult, an expression of pity/sympathy, or even a compliment, depending on the context. As an insult, it can mean a variety of things, ranging from "what an idiot" to "f*** you". In a more sympathetic way, it can mean something to the effect of "I feel bad for you/so-and-so" or "what a shame". As a compliment, it can actually mean "what a sweetheart" or "how cute/sweet". In that sense, it's typically referring to someone's innocence or as a term of endearment.

Direct translations from any language to another is always problematic. It doesn’t matter which languages you pick or which way the translation goes.  This doesn’t make either language “crude” or “ethereal”, unless you’re injecting your own personal bias.  Different languages all have different nuances, and some languages are better (or, in some cases, just different) at describing certain concepts.

Listen to a technical conversation in Mandarin or Korean… every 7th or 8th word has to be in English.  Similarly, listen to a discussion of Mathematics.  Most Asian languages just aren’t good for either.

Modern languages (like American English) emphasize non ambiguity. That’s why people who can’t spell or distinguish between homophones are so annoying. “If you can decipher my gibberish, then we’re communicating, so stop being a grammar nazi,” just leads to increasing (rather than decreasing) ambiguity in language.

American English (being something of a polyglot) is actually among one of the most flexible languages around, largely because it easily absorbs “foreign” words.

Different languages express things in different ways, and the language you grow up speaking actually changes the way your brain processes information.  Once you get older, most people’s brains get more hard wired in this area, which makes it harder to learn more languages, but also harder to visualize concepts that don’t express themselves well in your native language.  This is why (personal bias here) kids that grow up in multilingual environments tend to be more creative than those that grow up in strictly monolingual environments.

Maybe because for some people, 'umami' sounds too much like 'yo momma' - which could lead to outbreaks of violence...

OP is learning his first foreign language.

English: Adding nuoc mam to my fajitas gives them a certain je ne sais quoi, don’t you think?

Response: fuckin’ a, bubba

But can we grok them or do we just "understand" them?

Attached File


20% is 20%

This thread cannot be helped.

i love how it's all on the doors

basically fuckin' everywhere

It cannot be helped? How about fucked? Screwed? Damned? It cannot be helped? Inevitable demise?

It’s not the language, it’s how you use it.

Shikata ga nai, dude.

Shit be that way.

Lol this.

WTF is OP talking about.

English has lots of sayings. The OP is chasing an untamed Ornithoid without cause

Nothing gets the point across like a fucking F bomb.  

Versatile word and is known in other languages.  

Perhaps i am

Considering that they wrote an absolute fuckton, I mean they were basically super bureaucrats, with enough time and effort you definitely could

Gotcha!

If they were super bureaucrats, then even the people of their own time wouldn't be able to understand them.  

Yeah, it’s clear English isn’t your cup of tea. But that’s not English’s fault.

Rubbish! The guilt is written all over the punch-worthy faces of the multitudinous perpetrators of English lexicological crimes, and bleeds forth such as to risk rendering the whole of the bounding main incarnadine! Now, why don't get with the program? Why don't you jump on the team and come on in for the big win?