PlaneShift
Fan Area => The Hydlaa Plaza => Topic started by: LARAGORN on November 16, 2006, 03:45:11 pm
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I see so many players that apologies for thier bad english all to often, where a vast majority have no reason to. You dont give yourselves enough credit. Learning a new language is not an easy task, but you are doing it and in most cases extremly well. I have no second laguage, so it is hard for me to relate, but i know it cannot be easy, english is not (so i have been told ) the easiest laguage to learn.
\\o// I aplaud all of you who are taking the time and putting in the effort to learn english, you should be very proud of yourselves.
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I agree. Too many unneeded apologies. Though, english is a moderate language. Not the easiest thing. I remember when I had to learn it. Though I think french was harder...but hey, it's worth being able to say, "Hey babe, I can speak the language of loooovvvveee."
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As a non-english player I'm very happy with this thread.
The most difficult for a NEP is to write the right words at the same moment we are thinking the phrase.
I.E. I speak spanish and we have 13 verb tenses to "play" :@#\ ... Then when I want to say something, I realized that I don't know how to write it down, because i get conffused. So that's why all the "sorry for such bad english".
I'm glad this game has not audio chats... surely I would be very very lost ;D
A little trick I have... I keep opened my browser with an online dictionary...so when I want to say something and I don't know how to translate it, I seek the word and write the correct translation.
Sooooo... thank you for your support on NEPs!! Muchas Gracias!
:thumbup: :love: \\o//
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Yes, there are many uneeded apologies from many people who are obviously putting a lot of effort into learning English. Of course, the apologies are more because these people are courteous, which is somewhat of a rarity in the US and UK these days IMHO. But I have no problems with the way most here speak, and most English-native speakers don't do it perfectly anyway. I communicate a lot with people around the world whom I could not speak with on the phone. I do use a lot of online resources, but I like Babelfish (which of course is a Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy reference):
http://babelfish.altavista.com
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I use http://dict.leo.org/, the best online German-English dictionary I know of,
translates slang and everything. :thumbup:
It also supports french and spanish, but I haven't tested those.
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I must say good job everyone. Please stop apologising! I have yet to be in a situation where I didn't understand something said... Assuming that its in English and not German. ;)
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You are so right Eldoth. I have yet to master english, and its my only laguage :-[
/me should have studied spelling more
Being courteous is always a most welcome attribute, of wich many of us should work on a little more.
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It is really great reading this! Like Eagel said translating things into English is not always that easy and I am glad people understand. :D
It is always pleasant speaking to a well spoken person and although I always try translating as accurately as possible I don’t think my language use quite matches that of those with English as first language, especially when talking to a lot of people and responses are needed quickly without time to look up and search for the correct terms.
I think the reason for apologizing is like Eldoth said simply being courteous because you often know that you translated something wrong or incorrectly and there is always the risk of misinterpretation or understanding.
Some words or phrases are just about impossible to translate and English has a very limited use of prefixes or suffixes and so many other little things that just do not correspond with my language (not to mention tenses!). A lot of what I translate is improvised from the original meaning and the richness of the words are often lost along the way leaving the sentences a bit bland. Thus expressing one self properly is hard because you are often limited to the most basic words. :(
I love the online dictionaries and I often use them as well when speaking other languages but I am yet to find any that translate Afrikaans or Xhosa. So for now I will carry on guessing and improvising my way through the English language and hope it gets understood. :P
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I do not usually have such long conversations that this is something I have noticed. I do agree that no apologies should be needed.
I would like to suggest the slightly related idea that there is little need to correct typos eithers as most people will know what you are trying to say anyway. Typing skills could be considered akin to linguistic skills as there is a wide range of proficiency levels and there are conditions such as dyslexia (or in my case chubby fingers, ... ya that's my excuse ;D) that contribute to challenges. So I think that if you say for example "I am going to see Harnguist" there is no need to put "*Harnquist" on the next line. If people do not understand what you mean they will ask.
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well, I think english is turning into be my first language as I've been using it so much in here. I almost haven't used danish... almost. Just here recently when I found the love of my life, I started speaking danish a lot again.
although I agree with most of the points above. Some non-english players are excusing for their bad english. My opinion is that if we can understand it, there's no need for apoligizing.
/me hugs all NEP's and wonders how he suddenly got hugged
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*Matt, with a sleeping little robed man on his shoulder.*
Apologize, or die!
Sorry, you know I had to.
Anyway... I agree that apologies are unnecessary, but I still find them nice since they allow the reader to differentiate between who's trying their best, and someone who just doesn't care. I have little respect for people who don't care. I have great sympathy with people who're trying their best. I spent my whole life in another country speaking a different language, and after fifteen years, my written is still barely a third the quality of my oral, so I know what it's like.
For the record, when I do post grammar/spelling corrections, don't immediately assume that I wrote it with the idea of pointing and laughing at you. It's help, nothing more, nothing less.
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As a non-english player I'm very happy with this thread.
The most difficult for a NEP is to write the right words at the same moment we are thinking the phrase.
I.E. I speak spanish and we have 13 verb tenses to "play" :@#\ ... Then when I want to say something, I realized that I don't know how to write it down, because i get conffused. So that's why all the "sorry for such bad english".
I'm glad this game has not audio chats... surely I would be very very lost ;D
A little trick I have... I keep opened my browser with an online dictionary...so when I want to say something and I don't know how to translate it, I seek the word and write the correct translation.
Sooooo... thank you for your support on NEPs!! Muchas Gracias!
:thumbup: :love: \\o//
Eagle, you have immeasurable respect on my part.
I congradulate you in every way possible.
And your english seems excellent to me, Congrats on that, and I admire your dedication.
It is very inspiring.
~~Datruth
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English is most definitely the hardest language out there if you don't start learning how to speak from the time you are born. This is because of all the irregular verbs and little rules of order and singular/plural and all this crazy stuff we have developed over many a century... All the Romance languages are fairly filled with patterns, Tonal languages are a bit complex, and English is wierd. So I must say that for those who are not native speakers of English, but can speak it as well as Eagel, for instance, you are deeply appreciated.
El Ingléz es el idoma mas difícil que se aprende si no se empieza aprenderlo desde el nacimiento. <- That's my best shot :)
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Eagle, you have immeasurable respect on my part.
I congradulate you in every way possible.
And your english seems excellent to me, Congrats on that, and I admire your dedication.
It is very inspiring.
~~Datruth
Wooaah!! ::| :woot:
That's very nice support!! Thank you Datruth...
I must to say that I never thought that my Roleplay could improve my RealLife, but now I have more practice on english and I can write or read more fluently.
And I'm assuming that this quote from Datruth is not only for me, but all the people that make their effort to speak english.
@Laris: Good shot... (there're some mistakes but I don't care :sweatdrop: ... I understand you very well :thumbup:)
Thank you all people! \\o//
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I'm a Non-English player too. :) I rarely apologize for bad spelling because I'm usually not aware of the errors I make and it's quite silly to mention it in every single post I made. I've put down my location so people can see I'm not a native speaker anyway. I usually use a spelling checker too. Spelling is not my worst problem though. Vocabulary is. Especially while roleplaying when you don't have enough time to look everything up.
It's funny to see how opinions differ about whether or not English is an easy language to master. It all depends on your native language of course. If you speak a Germanic language, like German, Dutch or a Scandinavian language, it's easier to learn English because English belongs to the same language group. Besides that, people from countries with 'smaller languages' tend to speak better English because they come across English more often, for example in study books or in the media. In the Netherlands, about one third or maybe even half of the programs broadcasted on TV is in English (with subtitles).
I think if you speak French or Spanish, it's easier to learn English than it is to learn German or Dutch, because English has more Latin based words.
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I have a questions for Non English Speakers here.
Sometimes I correct my typos, sometimes I don't. It largely depends on whether or not I'm addressing a person who I know doesn't speak English as a first language, or if the error makes the meaning of my message ambiguous. Speaking German only minimally myself, I would probably be at a complete loss if confronted with mis-spelled words, typos, etc. But then, my German is hardly adequate enough to allow me to participate in a game in which only German is spoken without the use of an aid like babelfish. So I'm wondering, how do typos and mis-spelled words affect your understanding of what a person is saying?
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Personally, I've not much problems with typo's of others. Most often my English is good enough to recognize a typo as a typo, so it won't confuse me too much. At the beginning abbreviations were more confusing. It takes some time to relate "sup?" to the "What are you up to?" we learned at school. To a lesser extend this also goes for slang. But normally I can understand others good enough. If there's confusion, it's most often caused by me. :)
If you notice that somebody's English skills are not good enough to understand you, simply chose a simpler wording.
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I'm happy this game isn't finnish. If you have a closer look at that language you would find out that it's a vulcans nightmare :P
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In the Netherlands, about one third or maybe even half of the programs broadcasted on TV is in English (with subtitles).
i have two friends from teh netherlands...their english vocabulary rivals my own.
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Thank you for this thread!
I am not English. My mother tongue is one of the most @#$%& in the world... I am currently leraning German, after learning Finnish, so I keep messing everything up... Thank you to all the native speakers that have enough patience to endure my bad english days...
*goes read some book before loosing completly her own mother tongue*
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Most of the time, I can guess what people mean or are trying to say. But, it's pretty tough if the word is nowhere close to what it's supposed to mean.
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English is easy because many people in the world needed to learn it. So a small set of the English language has been isolated and developed, which is just enough to let you express yourself and have people understand you. This minimal English has somehow a simple grammar and a small set of words you need to learn. No such a thing exists for Italian, say, so Italian looks harder to learn.
English is hard because taking the next step is a neverending task: no one may claim to have a perfect and complete knowledge of the English language.
The biggest problem I have is lack of language style. When you use plain English people understand you but you sound, well, plain. Also my English tends to be very technical oriented. It's much easier for me to teach you how a filesystem works than to tell you the recipe for some sauce for pasta.
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I wished Esperanto was a global language.
Why?
1) Its neutral and independent of who is the superpower for now(In ancient times, Latin was the global language because of Roman Empire, in 18th and 19th century French and English because of the British Empire, now its English because of the US, hope the next won't be China or our future generations - not the case if Dubya decides to launch a nuclear war: cockroaches won't be able to learn languages - will have to lick the boots of the chinese "communist" party and learn that complicated language X-/ )
2) It was designed mixing elements of all languages. This way it may be easier for everyone to learn.
3) Avoid stuff like "american posers" and cultural imperialism, like for example those third world guys with U.S flag T-shirts that speak few words of English, goes to Halloweens and hear only U.S. musics, and still dare to think they are leet.
4) Shows that no one has the right to impose his language to others just because they think they will "rule" the world forever. Empires rise and fall, mankind continues(And the more the citizens of the existing superpower are conscious of that, less will be the impact of the inevitable decline of the superpower, sooner or later, on their lives)
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In my opinion, English is not a very difficult language to learn, compared to German or French, for example.
Its main difficulty resides mainly in the ambiguous meaning of certain words, that have multiple translations with different meanings on other languages.