3 ms·
It's an interesting article and I can certainly get behind the sentiment of making software more accessible to non-english speakers. That said, if another langu
by chroma 12y ago
It's an interesting article and I can certainly get behind the sentiment of making software more accessible to non-english speakers. That said, if another language already has a word with the desired meaning, why not use it instead of inventing a new one?
This is a two-way street. Much of the english vocabulary comes from other languages: trek, pundit, taboo, gauntlet, moped, etc. And many languages use english loanwords for technical terms. Just try translating "internet" to other languages. Even Japanese is "インターネット" (intaanetto)[1].
1. https://translate.google.com/#en/ja/internet https://translate.google.com/#en/ja/internet
- Dewie 12y ago> That said, if another language already has a word with the desired meaning, why not use it instead of inventing a new one? To maintain consistency? I think there is value trying to keep a language somewhat internally consistent. I'm guessing that it makes the language easier to learn, at least in the future - less loanwords (or bastardized loanwords) might for example mean less grammatical exceptions. Of course, it's not like one has to come up with a completely unique word for something, to make it not-like English. But one might want to adapt it to the language by for example translating the words that went into it (like "mouse" as in "computer mouse"). > This is a two-way street. Much of the english vocabulary comes from other languages: English is also kind of a nightmare when it comes to phonetics, which last I read was due to all the different major languages that has been influenced by. But I guess it wouldn't be a problem if the spelling of the language was more consistent, and originally foreign words can be Anglicised to fit in, so I guess that isn't a problem because of old loanwords, really.