Is English restrictive?

[Deleted member 68927]

Continuing different writing discussions. This time, the topic is mostly directed towards people for whom English is the second, non-native language.

The theme is self-explanatory from the title of the thread. Do you find English language restricting when you write? How often do you need to change whatever you wanted to write because there is no English translation for a word or an idiom?

Personally, my vocabulary is small when it comes to Englsih. So I understand that partialy restrictions stem from my own lack of knowledge. I have to use dictionaries a lot. However, even though I use more than one, sometimes I just can't find the translation or a synonym for a word. Moreover in my native language I like rare, hard to translate words, and I like to use them a lot. So I do feel that English restricts me a bit. What about you?

No, English was not restrictive for me. My dyslexia was, still is, actually, but that is why editing is so important. In German, I used ChatGPT in the beginning to get a big enough vocabulary, with which I could work with. I would write the word in English, and ChatGPT would translate it. But now I use Wordhippo to get new words. It is mind-boggling how we repeat the same 2k or 3k or so words for most of our speaking needs, isn't it?
The trick is to start thinking in the language. Then you won't get annoyed when you need to look up a word because then you will be in the flow.
I hope that helps!

 

[RepresentingWrath]

Everyone, thank you for replying. It was interesting to read how different people feel about this.

 

[kaisei]

I disagree with this statement strongly. I actually think English is one of the less restrictive languages precisely because of the volume of words that it has at its disposal. I don't know who said it, but there was an author that once said something to the effect that once you have an understanding and knowledge of enough English words, you start to realize that English doesn't have any synonyms.

I don't necessarily agree with that fully, but I like the sentiment of it. English is flexible because it has a pretty voluminous word economy, and while it's true English can't communicate certain concepts that other languages can that's more of a culture specific problem and I'm sure there are issues where languages can't express things that English can!

 

[FrankieCheng]

English is my first language, but I grew up with a lot of exposure to other languages. There are times when I will borrow words from those other languages even in just everyday conversation, because there is no way to succinctly express the idea in English.
So when I write, I like to use non-English words and phrases, and throw in attempts at translation in the footnotes.

 

[ThrillingHuman]

There are some interesting ways to say things that I can only say in my language (not Ancient Greek). Doesn't mean that it's only possible in my language, but still. But it takes a lot less effort to write something without sounding like an uncultured swine in English than in my language.

 

[melchi]

Other languages have more stuff, some have less.

Like once I heard that when atta turk was in power they made a big push to get non Turkish words out of the language.

English is a mish-mash of a bunch of different languages. So it is fundamentally another latin-based languages with lots of borrowing from others.

 

[MintiLime]

Quick note to all the people here, I’m a native English speaker and I could understand everyone beautifully. Also, I for one wouldn’t mind and would actually enjoy if you used native words, as long as there was a little explanation of their rough meaning under glossary.

 

[Kamelingil]

English is not my first language but I do know how to speak English, the grammar is a problem though. But I just let ChatGPT to fix it