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Well, it's all fine and well that I learn that here now, but many other non-native English speakers will not realize/understand/feel the same thing and will nev
by Confusion 11y ago
Well, it's all fine and well that I learn that here now, but many other non-native English speakers will not realize/understand/feel the same thing and will never learn about it. Complaining that they are insensitive isn't going to change that and is, in fact, culturally insensitive in itself.
It doesn't really make sense to me that a regular phrase like 'final solution', which has been used as a rather awkward translation of 'endlösung', would have gotten the same connotation as the word itself. I must have said "so we end up with a final solution of ..." countless times and I've never noticed a thing.
- mikeash 11y agoI'm just trying to help, here. If you use that phrase you are quite likely to make people in your audience think of the Holocaust, and if that is not your intent then you probably don't want to use that phrase. If you want to be upset about this, feel free, but it won't change the facts in any way. Language is basically a crappy form of telepathy. You're essentially implanting thoughts in other people's minds. It's crappy because it's really imprecise and error-prone and the minds you're attempting to influence might end up thinking things other than what you're trying to make them think, often because the specific words or phrasing you used brought up associations existing within the target mind. Sometimes it's impossible to avoid because the association is a personal thing. But sometimes it's widespread. In that case, it's really useful to be aware of them. I've certainly made my share of bad phrasing in languages I don't speak natively. No reasonable person is going to be offended if you did it because of ignorance, but once pointed out, it's ridiculous to get defensive. Make a note of it and use this knowledge to improve.