https://nitter.net/pegobry/status/1568153391058112512?t=UELMbGVCMH7ULa1jzW-ztQ&s=19

  • MaoTheLawn [any, any]
    ·
    edit-2
    2 years ago

    I know I'm preaching to the choir here, but it's a very silly thing to say since I would say English can sometimes be one of the least efficient languages for expressing very very particular concepts.

    You see em all the time in other languages and in lots of different forms. Germans are great at mishmashing strange words together into a single word, like luftschloss (castle in the sky - a lofty idea). There's other totally foreign conceptual words that connect to cultures which were colonised. Words like Hiraeth in Welsh, meaning a longing for Wales and it's old traditions (roughly, but it's quite abstract so it depends who you ask).

    I know I've just given two European examples, but that's cos I'm a European who happens to only be able to remember those two right now. There are of course many many many in languages that I don't speak a smidgeon of.

    English on the other hand is usually a bastardisation of Greek and french words with a mix of medieval German connected by rigid Latin prefixes and suffixes, and so on.

    Using an example from earlier - Hiraeth sums up an entire abstract cultural concept that you could write an entire essay trying to define in English words.

    Luftschloss would because A castle IN THE sky rather than the direct translation skycastle. Capitalised are all the French's and Latin addons.