On Mon, Nov 1, 2010 at 3:00 PM, john gilmore <[email protected]> wrote: <snip>
> In second languages, however, things are very different. There is an > important sense in which the notionally difficult words are the same in > every language. A Russian may, for example, have a small English > vocabulary, but he or she wil know the word 'hegemony' because it figured > heavily in Soviet political talk. Again, an educated native speaker of a > Latin dialect---French, Italian, Portuguese, Romanian, Romansh, or > Spanish--is all but certain to know the putatively difficult English words > that have Latin or Greek etymologies. He or she may not, for example, know > the word 'fish' but will know the word 'piscatorial'. [I he/she has been > taught Grimm's laws fish will not be problematic the second time.] > There are some traps, words having the same etymologies that have different > meanings in different modern languages: 'egregio' does not have the negative > connotations in Italian that 'egregious' has in English. Inevitably, one > learns about these traps, and how to avoid them, early in one's experience > of a new language. > > Concern about the impact of my written vocabulary on participants here > whose English is a second language, whatever the motivation for that > concern, is thus misplaced. > > The mistakes that educated Europeans make in English are of a different > sort. More than once I have had to say to an Italian friend that, yes, > 'evitable' is in the English dictionaries, Shakespeare and Sir Thomas > Browne did use it, etc., etc.; but inferences from the currency of > 'inevitable' to the usability of 'evitable' are problematic unless one is > talking to elaborately educated native English speakers, who will decode it > in a few milliseconds even if they are not familiar with it. (Both > 'evitabile' and 'inevitabile' are current in Italian.) > > <snip> This is correct for those of European decent, education, etc. However, many people of Asian decent or whose native language is not of Romance origin (Hebrew, Arabic, etc.) have none of the context or background mentioned above by you. There are many talented people in their home countries, the US and Europe whose language background is non-Romance. Take it easy on them. They deserve the information as much as everyone else on this list. Sam John Gilmore Ashland, MA 01721-1817 USA > > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- > For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, > send email to [email protected] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO > Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html > ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: GET IBM-MAIN INFO Search the archives at http://bama.ua.edu/archives/ibm-main.html
