11 ms·

I disagree with several claims from this article. "Meyer suspects one of the factors leading to this divide can be found in the numbers: according to her book,

by Iv 7y ago

I disagree with several claims from this article. "Meyer suspects one of the factors leading to this divide can be found in the numbers: according to her book, there are 500,000 words in the English language, but only 70,000 in French. This means that Anglophones are more likely to have the exact word to say what they want, whereas Francophones must often string together a series of words to communicate their message." If true (I suspect a methodology shenanigan there) I really doubt this is a factor. Very few French or English speaker will have a mastery of 70,000 words, to say nothing of 500,000. According to one source [1] adult English speakers are typically in the 30 000 - 50 000 range. [1] https://wordcounter.io/blog/how-many-words-does-the-average-person-know/ https://wordcounter.io/blog/how-many-words-does-the-average-... Total vocabulary of the language is certainly not a limiting factor. "Countries like the US and Australia are low-context cultures where people generally say what they mean and mean what they say. However, France, like Russia and Japan, tends to be a high-context culture, where “good communication is sophisticated, nuanced and layered." I (and many of my French expat friends) have the opposite experience with US: shallow enthusiasm, shallow friendships, fake excitement. Feels like Americans present a simple layer that is actually a mask, whereas French actually show their inner feelings more easily (which ends up being a bit messy, like I suspect everyone is). I was told several time (and experienced) that Americans love to say yes, and not follow through, which is a pretty rude thing in France. "Why don't we have lunch one day?" "you should come to my house!" "Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US. In France they are. That's why being able to say no is far more important. Etymologically, "French" comes from "Franks" the name of the germanic/celtic tribe that lived there. It also gave the word "frankness". I never thought much of it but after working with several foreign colleagues, I really think there is a reason why this tribe and this trait got mixed together. In France we value frankness and we don't find it commendable to hide your feelings or your opinions. If you promise something you have to follow through. You are going to receive a lot of "non" because of that, because "oui" really means "oui".

jccalhoun 7y ago
Some of what you are talking about is really more about politeness than high and low context cultures. There is certainly a connection but high context has more emphasis on the sort of "it isn't what you say but how you say it" kind of meaning. High and low context are just extremes and most cultures are somewhere in between. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context_cultures https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context...
- Iv 7y ago
  I am really suspicious that this English speaker found out other English-speaking and Germanic countries to be low-context. I suspect there is a strong bias in what you assume to be the baseline among humans and that you will integrate a huge chunk of your own culture into it. I am curious of his methodology when it comes to sort cultures like that.
  - squiggleblaz 7y ago
    To be fair, the article identifies Ireland and the American South to be high context regions. But yeah, there's a pretty strong overlap between "high context" and "Germanic speaking" in that article. (Ireland is of course Celtic, but America and Australia aren't really "Germanic" in a non-linguistic sense.)
    - wil421 7y ago
      Was English high or low around the 1700s/early 1800s? A lot of Southern mannerisms and formalities are based on English traditions around the time of the colonies. Especially the rural south.
ekianjo 7y ago
> I was told several time (and experienced) that Americans love to say yes, and not follow through, which is a pretty rude thing in France. "Why don't we have lunch one day?" "you should come to my house!" "Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US. In France they are. That's why being able to say no is far more important. Agree, and this is not unique to the US. Casual proposals to do stuff together in the future without follow-up happens pretty much everywhere - it being something more like a commitment is rather an exception than the rule.
- mytailorisrich 7y ago
  I don't know typical these examples are, but "you should come to my house" would be regarded as quite committal in France because people don't invite people to their house lightly. It suggests intimity between the persons. If you have a work colleague that you get along very well with and get close to then perhaps after a couple of years you could extend such invitation.
  - heavenlyblue 7y ago
    Nah, the reason it's committal in France in non-committal in America is because France is much more of a homogeneous culture than America. Having one meaning for a single phrase is much easier when you know exactly how your words are going to be perceived. Trying to say shallow in this situation is more of a case that you, as a French person - don't really want to accept the fact that other cultures may have a different opinion on why they are acting the way they are acting.
    - mytailorisrich 7y ago
      If you read my previous comment you'll notice that I am only describing the culture. I am not refusing to accept anything.
      - heavenlyblue 7y ago
        You are refusing to accept that speaking of your feelings openly may be perceived as shallow as not speaking about them. It’s just that you somehow assume that French do it better.
p1esk 7y ago
Historically people in America arrived from all over the world, from different cultures and traditions, so it has probably been safer to interact politely rather than sincerely.
- squiggleblaz 7y ago
  Surely there's no contradiction between polite and sincere. How can someone be polite and not sincere? The American tendency towards excessive but superficial politeness strikes me, from another immigrant country, as being quite rude. I would rather you be honest. How else can I know what you mean? Indeed, this seems to be required of a person in a low context culture where everyone comes from somewhere else.
  - mamon 7y ago
    >> How can someone be polite and not sincere? "Does this dress make me look fat?" "No, of course not, my dear"
    - necovek 7y ago
      One could argue that there's no insincerity there: "your body makes you look fat, not this dress" ;-) Though one could argue that withholding the truth is insincere as well. Anyway, I agree you can be polite and not sincere: on ocassion, it's required (especially if your opinion is not based on enough evidence).
rihegher 7y ago
´In France we value frankness and we don't find it commendable to hide your feelings or your opinions. If you promise something you have to follow through. You are going to receive a lot of "non" because of that, because "oui" really means "oui".´ The more south you are in France the less this is true, I would even argue the same is generaly true for europe a part for the UK.
- reallydontask 7y ago
  > I would even argue the same is generaly true for europe a part for the UK. I guess you meant: and part of the UK I tickled me no end though. The thought of Europe being a part of the UK, what would Farage do? :)
marmaduke 7y ago
> US: shallow enthusiasm, shallow friendships, fake excitement I'm an American living in France for 10 years; the capacity for smoothing over awkward situations with heaps of bullshit is ubiquitous in France as well. > Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US As is the 'non' in French/France.
cm2187 7y ago
I suspect the 500,000 words claim comes from the Oxford dictionary, which I understand includes old english, whereas as far as I am aware the most famous french dictionaries (Larousse, Robert) typically don’t include old french. But it feels inconsistent with my experience of those two languages. I feel French is more expressive, largely down to tricks that are valid french like being able to use any adjective as a verb (like he le gros, tu viens?), effectively creating words on the fly.
- bsaul 7y ago
  i also think this original statement as complete BS. French has much more grammatical rules than english due to its latin roots (but less than other eastern european language), which is what makes a language precise and unambiguous.
- willyt 7y ago
  Not really to do with old english, it comes from the fact that there are loads of borrowed French words in English (and loads of words from other languages). For example the french word for 'appointment' -> 'rendezvous' is used in English to mean a specific kind of meeting 'I heard Mary's husband had a rendezvous with that woman in accounts' to allude to an illicit meeting with sexy connotations or 'meet at the rendezvous for extract at 1830 hours' in a military context. There are also many cases where we use a French word which has a specific meaning in English to sound educated rather than string together a combination of simpler english words which predate the Norman conquest. e.g. 'He ascended the stairs' without the Norman influence would be 'He went up the stairs'. I speak terrible French, but if I find myself in a situation where I don't know the right word I think of the english word and if it ends in ion, end, able, there is a good chance it is a French word and dropping it into my sentence while pronouncing it in a 'ello 'ello accent will often vaguely help things along. Other interesting examples 'chit' from Hindi, 'galore' from Gaelic.
simias 7y ago
I'm not a linguist but I do enjoy linguistics and language learning as a hobby so I suppose I've gained a certain perspective that I feel most monolinguals lack. Basically here's my rule of thumb: any linguistic claim coming from a mainstream source which seems to imply the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis[1] or other kind of objective criteria to compare languages is a huge red flag and extremely likely to be entirely bullshit. Out of those claims the "language X is more precise/able to express more nuance than Y" is probably the reddest flag of them all. I think generalities about languages ("French like to say no") fall in the same category as horoscopes: if they're vague and general enough you'll probably recognize yourself in them to some extent. People like to feel special, they like to feel special for speaking a given language so they'll gladly accept any claim that sets them apart. >If true (I suspect a methodology shenanigan there) I really doubt this is a factor. Very few French or English speaker will have a mastery of 70,000 words, to say nothing of 500,000. Yeah, this claim alone shows that the author really stayed at surface level. I suspect the main reason for these numbers is that English, traditionally less prescriptive than French, considers basically any word once used in an English text to be an English word while French curates more heavily. The average English speaker definitely doesn't draw from a reservoir of 500k words, probably closer to a tenth of that. Maybe somebody could link this website to the author: http://testyourvocab.com/ http://testyourvocab.com/ [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
- hef19898 7y ago
  Surface level. Sums up the book pretty well if you ask me. Started not too bad with some anecdotes, yet didn't build up on that on any depth. Maybe helpful, or with some bad luck quite the opposite, for people without any intercultural experience themselves. For people with some experience it is just common sense. One other point the book misses is the complexity of all of that. Only hinted at are the effect personality has. Let alone the overlaying patterns of culture, personality and organizational culture. And yes, the theoretical basis is almost totally absent.
- jerf 7y ago
  "Out of those claims the "language X is more precise/able to express more nuance than Y" is probably the reddest flag of them all." It seems like there are plenty of cases where some language is able to express some nuance another is not. It's just that there will be some tradeoff in return because there isn't a language that has all the details. The real problem is the implication that because some language is nominally superior in some particular dimension ("more precise", "more nuanced", "more deeply integrated into the grammar") in the vast set of dimensions languages have then it must be somehow "better", or that we can assume this relationship will be shown in all possible dimensions of comparison. But I agree it gets oversold. English can't properly express the concept of schadenfreude... except I just did, because we imported it because we liked it, and it's an English word now too.
wycy 7y ago
> I was told several time (and experienced) that Americans love to say yes, and not follow through, which is a pretty rude thing in France. "Why don't we have lunch one day?" "you should come to my house!" "Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US. In France they are. That's why being able to say no is far more important. I wonder if the French are better at reading body language and social contextual clues so as to not make such offers either too early in a developing relationship or to someone who would really never be interested in the first place. In my experience these offers tend to overwhelmingly come from people who are oblivious to the fact that they and I are not particularly socially compatible.
bluGill 7y ago
There are many different cultures in the US. "you should come to my house!" is an expression in some parts - an expression that has gotten trouble for people in other parts who take the expression literally and show up when they were not wanted.
- sadness2 7y ago
  Interesting! Which part(s) of the US do not mean this literally? What does it mean in that context?
  - bluGill 7y ago
    In the midwest if someone invites your over to their house they are hoping you come visit. In other parts (the south, but I'm not sure where, maybe North Carolina?) it is an expression that just means nice to see you. Note because it is an expression in some parts you hear it often from those people. People from the other parts don't invite people over often so they rarely say it. Thus the impression that it is universally used, when it is only a small region that says it often.

by Iv 7y ago

jccalhoun 7y ago

Some of what you are talking about is really more about politeness than high and low context cultures. There is certainly a connection but high context has more emphasis on the sort of "it isn't what you say but how you say it" kind of meaning. High and low context are just extremes and most cultures are somewhere in between. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context_cultures https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/High-context_and_low-context...

Iv 7y ago
I am really suspicious that this English speaker found out other English-speaking and Germanic countries to be low-context. I suspect there is a strong bias in what you assume to be the baseline among humans and that you will integrate a huge chunk of your own culture into it. I am curious of his methodology when it comes to sort cultures like that.
- squiggleblaz 7y ago
  To be fair, the article identifies Ireland and the American South to be high context regions. But yeah, there's a pretty strong overlap between "high context" and "Germanic speaking" in that article. (Ireland is of course Celtic, but America and Australia aren't really "Germanic" in a non-linguistic sense.)
  - wil421 7y ago
    Was English high or low around the 1700s/early 1800s? A lot of Southern mannerisms and formalities are based on English traditions around the time of the colonies. Especially the rural south.

ekianjo 7y ago

> I was told several time (and experienced) that Americans love to say yes, and not follow through, which is a pretty rude thing in France. "Why don't we have lunch one day?" "you should come to my house!" "Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US. In France they are. That's why being able to say no is far more important. Agree, and this is not unique to the US. Casual proposals to do stuff together in the future without follow-up happens pretty much everywhere - it being something more like a commitment is rather an exception than the rule.

mytailorisrich 7y ago
I don't know typical these examples are, but "you should come to my house" would be regarded as quite committal in France because people don't invite people to their house lightly. It suggests intimity between the persons. If you have a work colleague that you get along very well with and get close to then perhaps after a couple of years you could extend such invitation.
- heavenlyblue 7y ago
  Nah, the reason it's committal in France in non-committal in America is because France is much more of a homogeneous culture than America. Having one meaning for a single phrase is much easier when you know exactly how your words are going to be perceived. Trying to say shallow in this situation is more of a case that you, as a French person - don't really want to accept the fact that other cultures may have a different opinion on why they are acting the way they are acting.
  - mytailorisrich 7y ago
    If you read my previous comment you'll notice that I am only describing the culture. I am not refusing to accept anything.
    - heavenlyblue 7y ago
      You are refusing to accept that speaking of your feelings openly may be perceived as shallow as not speaking about them. It’s just that you somehow assume that French do it better.

p1esk 7y ago

Historically people in America arrived from all over the world, from different cultures and traditions, so it has probably been safer to interact politely rather than sincerely.

squiggleblaz 7y ago
Surely there's no contradiction between polite and sincere. How can someone be polite and not sincere? The American tendency towards excessive but superficial politeness strikes me, from another immigrant country, as being quite rude. I would rather you be honest. How else can I know what you mean? Indeed, this seems to be required of a person in a low context culture where everyone comes from somewhere else.
- mamon 7y ago
  >> How can someone be polite and not sincere? "Does this dress make me look fat?" "No, of course not, my dear"
  - necovek 7y ago
    One could argue that there's no insincerity there: "your body makes you look fat, not this dress" ;-) Though one could argue that withholding the truth is insincere as well. Anyway, I agree you can be polite and not sincere: on ocassion, it's required (especially if your opinion is not based on enough evidence).

rihegher 7y ago

´In France we value frankness and we don't find it commendable to hide your feelings or your opinions. If you promise something you have to follow through. You are going to receive a lot of "non" because of that, because "oui" really means "oui".´ The more south you are in France the less this is true, I would even argue the same is generaly true for europe a part for the UK.

reallydontask 7y ago
> I would even argue the same is generaly true for europe a part for the UK. I guess you meant: and part of the UK I tickled me no end though. The thought of Europe being a part of the UK, what would Farage do? :)

marmaduke 7y ago

> US: shallow enthusiasm, shallow friendships, fake excitement I'm an American living in France for 10 years; the capacity for smoothing over awkward situations with heaps of bullshit is ubiquitous in France as well. > Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US As is the 'non' in French/France.

cm2187 7y ago

I suspect the 500,000 words claim comes from the Oxford dictionary, which I understand includes old english, whereas as far as I am aware the most famous french dictionaries (Larousse, Robert) typically don’t include old french. But it feels inconsistent with my experience of those two languages. I feel French is more expressive, largely down to tricks that are valid french like being able to use any adjective as a verb (like he le gros, tu viens?), effectively creating words on the fly.

bsaul 7y ago
i also think this original statement as complete BS. French has much more grammatical rules than english due to its latin roots (but less than other eastern european language), which is what makes a language precise and unambiguous.
willyt 7y ago
Not really to do with old english, it comes from the fact that there are loads of borrowed French words in English (and loads of words from other languages). For example the french word for 'appointment' -> 'rendezvous' is used in English to mean a specific kind of meeting 'I heard Mary's husband had a rendezvous with that woman in accounts' to allude to an illicit meeting with sexy connotations or 'meet at the rendezvous for extract at 1830 hours' in a military context. There are also many cases where we use a French word which has a specific meaning in English to sound educated rather than string together a combination of simpler english words which predate the Norman conquest. e.g. 'He ascended the stairs' without the Norman influence would be 'He went up the stairs'. I speak terrible French, but if I find myself in a situation where I don't know the right word I think of the english word and if it ends in ion, end, able, there is a good chance it is a French word and dropping it into my sentence while pronouncing it in a 'ello 'ello accent will often vaguely help things along. Other interesting examples 'chit' from Hindi, 'galore' from Gaelic.

simias 7y ago

I'm not a linguist but I do enjoy linguistics and language learning as a hobby so I suppose I've gained a certain perspective that I feel most monolinguals lack. Basically here's my rule of thumb: any linguistic claim coming from a mainstream source which seems to imply the Sapir–Whorf hypothesis[1] or other kind of objective criteria to compare languages is a huge red flag and extremely likely to be entirely bullshit. Out of those claims the "language X is more precise/able to express more nuance than Y" is probably the reddest flag of them all. I think generalities about languages ("French like to say no") fall in the same category as horoscopes: if they're vague and general enough you'll probably recognize yourself in them to some extent. People like to feel special, they like to feel special for speaking a given language so they'll gladly accept any claim that sets them apart. >If true (I suspect a methodology shenanigan there) I really doubt this is a factor. Very few French or English speaker will have a mastery of 70,000 words, to say nothing of 500,000. Yeah, this claim alone shows that the author really stayed at surface level. I suspect the main reason for these numbers is that English, traditionally less prescriptive than French, considers basically any word once used in an English text to be an English word while French curates more heavily. The average English speaker definitely doesn't draw from a reservoir of 500k words, probably closer to a tenth of that. Maybe somebody could link this website to the author: http://testyourvocab.com/ http://testyourvocab.com/ [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity

hef19898 7y ago
Surface level. Sums up the book pretty well if you ask me. Started not too bad with some anecdotes, yet didn't build up on that on any depth. Maybe helpful, or with some bad luck quite the opposite, for people without any intercultural experience themselves. For people with some experience it is just common sense. One other point the book misses is the complexity of all of that. Only hinted at are the effect personality has. Let alone the overlaying patterns of culture, personality and organizational culture. And yes, the theoretical basis is almost totally absent.
jerf 7y ago
"Out of those claims the "language X is more precise/able to express more nuance than Y" is probably the reddest flag of them all." It seems like there are plenty of cases where some language is able to express some nuance another is not. It's just that there will be some tradeoff in return because there isn't a language that has all the details. The real problem is the implication that because some language is nominally superior in some particular dimension ("more precise", "more nuanced", "more deeply integrated into the grammar") in the vast set of dimensions languages have then it must be somehow "better", or that we can assume this relationship will be shown in all possible dimensions of comparison. But I agree it gets oversold. English can't properly express the concept of schadenfreude... except I just did, because we imported it because we liked it, and it's an English word now too.

wycy 7y ago

> I was told several time (and experienced) that Americans love to say yes, and not follow through, which is a pretty rude thing in France. "Why don't we have lunch one day?" "you should come to my house!" "Let's make something together" Apparently these are non-committal statement in US. In France they are. That's why being able to say no is far more important. I wonder if the French are better at reading body language and social contextual clues so as to not make such offers either too early in a developing relationship or to someone who would really never be interested in the first place. In my experience these offers tend to overwhelmingly come from people who are oblivious to the fact that they and I are not particularly socially compatible.

bluGill 7y ago

There are many different cultures in the US. "you should come to my house!" is an expression in some parts - an expression that has gotten trouble for people in other parts who take the expression literally and show up when they were not wanted.

sadness2 7y ago
Interesting! Which part(s) of the US do not mean this literally? What does it mean in that context?
- bluGill 7y ago
  In the midwest if someone invites your over to their house they are hoping you come visit. In other parts (the south, but I'm not sure where, maybe North Carolina?) it is an expression that just means nice to see you. Note because it is an expression in some parts you hear it often from those people. People from the other parts don't invite people over often so they rarely say it. Thus the impression that it is universally used, when it is only a small region that says it often.