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Formality in discussion with others, seems to be very common in other languages, and is very hard for a native North American speaker to use correctly. The whol
by pomian 3y ago
Formality in discussion with others, seems to be very common in other languages, and is very hard for a native North American speaker to use correctly. The whole concept sounds like contrite begging for us. Please sir, sir I could I sir ask you sir, to possibly pass the cheese, sir.
So, of course we over correct and throw in more sirs(or ma'ams) willy nilly.
- dragonwriter 3y ago> Formality in discussion with others, seems to be very common in other languages, and is very hard for a native North American speaker to use correctly. The whole concept sounds like contrite begging for us. Kind of ironic, in that English lost the ability to make formality distinctions because its speakers were so consistently formal to each other that the language lost its informal second person singular pronoun and associated conjugations.
- dkjaudyeqooe 3y agoLiving proof of this is the that when translating from English to my local Slavic language Google Translate strips out all instances of "please". I felt like it sounded rude but it actually stops me from sounding overly pleading and a little pathetic.
- pomian 3y agoMy solution for good interaction, since I'm fluent, is to state to the person i'm talking to, is right up front and say; I'm not a native, so forgive me if I sound informal. Usually that's enough for the person to be forgiving, and possibly impressed, sometimes I just get a confused or rude look.