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Your English is very good based on this comment. It sounds formal, but that formality reads as coming from your personality rather than writing textbook English
by FroshKiller 6y ago
Your English is very good based on this comment. It sounds formal, but that formality reads as coming from your personality rather than writing textbook English.
- frutiger 6y agoThere may have been a typo though, I think "with all its quirks" would be more correct.
- FroshKiller 6y agoI quibble with you there. "With all quirks and complexity" is grammatically correct and understandable as it is. I agree that "with all its quirks and complexity" is more idiomatic, though. For what it's worth, I read it as "with all its quirks and complexity" because my brain just filled in the "its" I expected, which it might not have done if the English had been worse.
- lykahb 6y agoThank you. I had a lot of early influence from the old English textbooks from the 80s that have more formal style and reading technical documentation. Until I started watching movies without dub, all English I studied was quite far from the real-life use of language. My peers who did more listening than reading have a more natural style.
- ketzo 6y agoI wonder -- would you say that you write more formally than you speak (on average, context aside)? I'm always super curious about how someone's method of learning a second language impacts the way they use that language. My casual hypothesis is that what you read while learning impacted how you write, while what you listened to affected how you speak -- do you find that to be true?
- lykahb 6y agoMy writing is much more formal than speaking. If one writes much enough in a certain style, they get used to it. Same thing about speaking - politicians, actors, and other public figures have a certain effect on their everyday demeanor. Once I heard that writing and talking involve different areas of the brain.