[HN Gopher] Native speakers are hard to understand in a lingua f...
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Native speakers are hard to understand in a lingua franca situation
Author : sampo
Score : 98 points
Date : 2021-05-20 13:24 UTC (9 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.com)
| fnord77 wrote:
| is there any hard evidence of this or is this just from
| anecdotes?
|
| I have my own anecdote - my swedish coworkers use more english
| slang and speaking shortcuts than many native speakers I know.
| grawprog wrote:
| >The message, written in English, was sent by a native speaker to
| a colleague for whom English was a second language. Unsure of the
| word, the recipient found two contradictory meanings in his
| dictionary. He acted on the wrong one.
|
| >When such misunderstandings happen, it's usually the native
| speakers who are to blame.
|
| So...somebody got a message they felt was ambiguous and confused
| them, didn't ask for clarification before acting upon it, made a
| huge mistake but it was the person who sent the message
| originally's fault?
|
| Personally, having been in the opposite situation, where i'm one
| of the only native English speakers at a workplace. If i didn't
| understand something somebody wrote or said to me, i made damn
| sure i double checked with them before i actually did anything.
| charlieo88 wrote:
| Agreed. The article is a fluff piece, using the most generic
| and sanitized anecdotes. What WORD was not understood? What was
| the culture of the sender vs receiver? Did I miss where there
| was any statistical information presented in the article? What
| other languages/native speakers were reviewed before
| determining English speakers won the title of world's worst
| communicators?
| david38 wrote:
| This
| phkahler wrote:
| >> but it was the person who sent the message originally's
| fault?
|
| That's not what the article said at all. It seemed to place the
| blame on the word. I'm with you that one person should have
| sought clarification since they knew there were two meanings,
| but that's not actually the root cause. Another person may have
| only been aware of one of those meanings and made the "mistake"
| without ever thinking they needed clarification. The problem
| was the use of ambiguous language.
|
| I find it really amusing to see someone thinking they blamed
| the sender. It seems like another example of how English
| speakers are so used to having to interpret words.
| grawprog wrote:
| I understood they were blaming the word. Words don't appear
| out of nowhere. The word was written by the sender, the
| implication is the sender's choice of words caused the
| problem which could have been avoided by using a different
| word.
|
| I disagree with this premise and believe the problem could
| have been avoided had the receiver taken the self
| responsibility to make sure they fully understood the message
| before acting upon it and if they had doubts, such as when
| they found two contradictory meanings, should have just
| simply asked for clarification.
|
| If you don't understand something, it's on you. I've been
| misunderstood, i've misunderstood other people and the
| easiest thing anyone can do in that situation is say:
|
| 'sorry i didn't quite get that' or 'sorry could you explain
| what you mean'
|
| or something along those lines.
| zackees wrote:
| It's clearly putting the fault at the native english speaker,
| per the title.
|
| In an age of trigger culture and micro aggressions this
| article is a prejudicial sucker punch to native speakers of
| English.
| [deleted]
| hn8788 wrote:
| The article specifically says that native english speakers
| are to blame, not the word.
|
| > When such misunderstandings happen, it's usually the native
| speakers who are to blame. Ironically, they are worse at
| delivering their message than people who speak English as a
| second or third language, according to Chong.
| phkahler wrote:
| >> Months later, senior management investigated why the
| project had flopped, costing hundreds of thousands of
| dollars. "It all traced back to this one word," says Chia
| Suan Chong, a UK-based communications skills and
| intercultural trainer, who didn't reveal the tricky word
| because it is highly industry-specific and possibly
| identifiable. "Things spiralled out of control because both
| parties were thinking the opposite."
|
| Yeah, where does it say that? We could blame the sender for
| choosing an ambiguous word, or we could blame the recipient
| for not getting clarification, but they clearly place it on
| the word without pointing a finger at either human.
|
| The overall article does point a finger at native english
| speakers for being imprecise, but the specific example
| doesn't IMHO.
| unknown_error wrote:
| You're right, it wasn't a very clear article. Kinda fluffy
| actually. But it did have one good point: that native English
| speakers often are not required to learn a second language to
| facilitate business, and so are less aware of the intricacies
| of intercultural communications (whereas everyone else had to
| learn English as a second language, so they're on more or less
| equal footing with each other).
|
| Even in the English-speaking world, we run into similar issues
| communicating across borders, whether that's cultural
| differences across states, urban/rural divides, regional
| accents, or across countries (US/UK/Australia/South
| Africa/India, etc.)
|
| I don't think the article presented enough evidence to support
| the headline that "native English speakers are the worst
| communicators". It's less about English vs any mother tongue
| being worse or better; rather, bilingualism has numerous
| benefits (intercultural communications being one of them), but
| many in the Anglosphere are not bilingual (because they're not
| forced to be, unlike people who have to learn English as a
| second language):
| https://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21428634-000-oh-to-be...
|
| TLDR: Fluffy article, interesting underlying point
| xxs wrote:
| >i made damn sure i double checked with them before i actually
| did anything.
|
| Ahh well, most non-native speakers would be concerned about
| their English proficiency level. For some that would be a
| quality worth mentioning in the hiring process.
|
| My experience would that most people will shut off and don't
| ask for clarification but try and fill the gaps. It's a rather
| common issue.
| lebuffon wrote:
| Two thoughts come to mind.
|
| 1. At one time in human history, not long ago, it was mandatory
| to have some facility in at least a 2nd language to claim you had
| a higher education. Partial mastery of a 2nd language would help
| native English speakers "get" what it's like for the non-native
| people and might help them adjust there speaking style. IMHO we
| have allowed "higher" education in English speaking countries to
| devolve in this regard.
|
| 2. We might be entering an era where English begins to morph into
| new dialects as did Latin when it was the "Lingua Franca" of the
| time. The 2nd language population will overwhelm the native
| English speakers and so control the language.
|
| ( "Lingua Franca" is probably one of those terms that one should
| not use internationally, unless you are in Italy, Spain, France,
| Portugal or Romania) :)
| jogjayr wrote:
| Until today I thought "Lingua Franca" just meant "French
| language" and the usage of the phrase signified how commonplace
| French was in international diplomacy. Glad to learn something
| new.
| xdennis wrote:
| > "Lingua Franca" is probably one of those terms that one
| should not use internationally, unless you are in Italy, Spain,
| France, Portugal or Romania
|
| I'm not sure what you mean. Are you perhaps confusing lingua
| franca with romance language?
| User23 wrote:
| "Lingua franca" is English[1].
|
| [1] https://www.dictionary.com/browse/lingua-franca
| not_knuth wrote:
| Regarding your second point, this might be of interest to you:
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English-based_pidgins
| NikolaeVarius wrote:
| This is a terrible title and a terrible article.
|
| The claims made here are tied to the fact that English is more or
| less the primary language of international business. Its well
| known that people who learn secondary languages tend to know the
| "rules" around the language and tend to be more specific when
| using secondary languages.
|
| Its pretty weird for the article to conflate using
| slang/abbreviations/language tied to cultural norms from a
| primary speaker as being unable to communicate.
|
| Other languages have built in cultural connotations that pretty
| much only matter within their specific culture that doesn't
| really make sense outside of it.
|
| Sure when knowingly speaking to a multicultural audience, its
| probably for the best to not use idioms and such, but the
| failures of communication is not tied to the fact that English is
| being used.
| teekert wrote:
| I wonder where you are from, I for one really recognize this.
| N=1 but my native speaking colleague indeed dominates meetings.
| Of course personality is also a factor, but she also talks at
| incredible speeds in fancy ways that are almost hypnotic. It
| has made her our fall back when talking needs to be done. But
| in fact I sometimes feel that I should have conveyed a message
| myself because she gets the point I wanted to make slightly
| wrong in worrying ways.
|
| On a different note, we always jokingly use Dutch saying in
| English:
|
| * Stop stabbing the dragon with me!
|
| * Ah there comes the monkey out of the sleeve!
|
| Ah, well, the more cultures, the merrier!
| Gravityloss wrote:
| You're missing the point of the article. If you're Scottish,
| it's probably hard to not use local flavor when talking, and
| thus it's hard for an international audience to understand.
| Even if you know the audience is international. It's just the
| way you talk.
|
| If you're from Portugal, and you speak English, you're mostly
| not using some local flavor Portuguese words or expressions or
| jokes because they wouldn't make sense in English. So you speak
| simply and you're easy to understand.
| fartcannon wrote:
| Yeah, it gives the language ambiguity and nuance. It's pretty
| flipping valuable for the day to day poetry of the language. I
| personally derive a lot of humour from the ambiguity of the
| language.
|
| I do recall a colleague of mine who was trying to learn
| English. He said I was one of the more difficult english
| speakers he'd ever met. It was fun to try to reel that in to be
| more clear. Eventually I just directed him to the urban
| dictionary.
| Gauge_Irrahphe wrote:
| I think the problem is that the way English phrases things is
| often completely bizarre compared to virtually any other
| language, which is confusing, as a seemingly straightforward
| sentence may imply something completely unexpected.
|
| I think it might be because of its lack of real grammatical
| topic, which is otherwise ubiquitous and often more important
| than the subject.
| ajford wrote:
| I think a lot of this odd structuring is due to English
| leaning heavily on borrowed forms and rules that really have
| no ties to the underlying language.
|
| Not that I'm blaming the language, just think it's curious at
| how many conflicting and skewed rules have just become a part
| of the language over hundreds of years.
| kodah wrote:
| > Other languages have built in cultural connotations that
| pretty much only matter within their specific culture that
| doesn't really make sense outside of it.
|
| I once was trying to contact an engineer that had worked on a
| project before me. Their last name in git was just "R". After
| some searching and asking another colleague I found out that
| this is a special last name that is abbreviated that way.
| anon43534908 wrote:
| I lived in France for 9 years and worked extensively with non-
| native speakers in English. My accent and word choice definitely
| shifted to a more international, neutral English at work. However
| if I started chatting 1:1 with a native speaker at lunch my speed
| and word choice would immediately shift and the other coworkers
| couldn't follow a damn thing.
| ajford wrote:
| This article blames English specifically for what is ultimately a
| cultural difference. This goes for a native speaker in any
| language.
|
| I speak passable Spanish, and have encountered the same "cultural
| dissonance" when dealing with a native speaker in a room full of
| non-native speakers. When you grow up embedded in a language and
| culture, you don't realize when you slip into colloquialisms and
| culture references that don't translate well.
|
| That whole business deal the article opens with is a joke. It's
| not the native speaker's fault, nor the word's fault. It was the
| recipient who picked randomly when faced with an unclear choice.
| If you're unclear, as for clarification. I worked with an
| international collaboration of scientists during college and that
| was one of things you learned quickly. No one has the same frame
| of reference you do, so make sure you're all on the same page.
| Hell, simply rephrasing your understanding in a reply before you
| take action can clear this up in a single message. "So you wanted
| us to X? Got it!". Then the other party has the opportunity to
| step in and say, "No, do Y".
| MaxBarraclough wrote:
| > Native English speakers are the world's worst communicators
|
| The article makes this claim, but doesn't substantiate it. The
| content of the article has nothing to do with a comparative study
| on communication. Always disappointing to see clickbait from the
| BBC.
|
| I suggest the title be changed to something like _Native English
| speaker are generally bad at tuning into language variation_.
|
| _edit_ I see NikolaeVarius beat me to it.
| jessaustin wrote:
| Perhaps TFA was written by a native English speaker?
| jfengel wrote:
| I'd suggest "People are generally bad at tuning into language
| variation." I'm not sure that native English speakers have any
| particular lock on that.
|
| They may get more opportunities to make that mistake, since (a)
| they're often monolingual, and (b) they're more likely to be
| speaking to a non-native speaker (what with English being the
| international language these days). But it's not inherent to
| either the language or the speakers.
| buescher wrote:
| Ah yes, less fluency makes for better communication, and more
| fluency makes for worse communication, but only for English
| speakers. There has got to be a meme in here somewhere.
| phkahler wrote:
| This explains a lot. I only speak English, but I've been working
| on communicating more clearly. I used to provide a lot of
| backstory/context when talking because I wanted people to know
| how to interpret what I was about to say. It turns out the real
| problem was me not speaking plainly and simply. When you use the
| right words people are more likely to take what you say at face
| value (that's probably a phrase I shouldn't use) rather than
| assume some interpretation of it.
|
| English is a very flexible and expressive language, but those
| features aren't what you want to use for precise communication.
| vixen99 wrote:
| Insofar as efficiency equates with precision (kind of, I would
| have thought), here's some data that doesn't take your view.
| English comes out top out of seven popular languages but only
| just.
|
| https://www.realclearscience.com/blog/2015/06/whats_the_most...
|
| I wonder which you think is a more precise language than
| English? As a monoglot, I can't comment.
| laurieg wrote:
| I think the article touches on a few interesting points, but only
| at a fairly shallow.
|
| What I have noticed working with various levels of bilinguals is
| that native vs non-native often have _different_
| misunderstandings.
|
| A native person firing something off to another native will make
| too many assumptions. "I understand what 'it' is. No need to
| elaborate" is the feeling.
|
| Non-natives tend to lean on a smaller set of vocabulary and
| grammar. This tends to serve them well in slower, written
| communication but can give them trouble in speaking when there is
| a miscommunication and they don't have the skills to correct it.
| Over- or under-applying a rule past it's breaking point. They
| also have to contend with false friends(words to be related
| across languages but actually have different meanings), which can
| sometimes cause very hard to spot miscommunications as both
| speaker and listener have separate but consistent ideas in their
| heads.
|
| When it comes to accents, in general it can be considered rude to
| ask someone to modify their accent. I know that if I affect a
| general American accent I will be understood better, but should
| I?
| okareaman wrote:
| As an older person who probably needs a hearing aid, I have the
| most problem with native English speakers not enunciating words.
| They go fast and run words together or mumble like Noam Chomsky.
| I have sympathy for ESL people trying to parse it. I always turn
| on subtitles if available. Also, a Brazilian friend says the
| don't use much sarcasm, so it gets difficult understand when
| English speakers use it so much to mean the opposite of what they
| say.
| _delirium wrote:
| I definitely have had this issue. I'm a native English speaker
| and taught in Europe for a few years, where a subset of
| students had trouble understanding me, mostly because I would
| just drop too many consonants and run words together. E.g. if
| speaking quickly, I tend to pronounce "because" as one
| syllable, something like "biz". I've moved towards much more
| consciously enunciating words in mixed-nationality settings.
| Americans now sometimes think I sound foreign though!
| okareaman wrote:
| All of us with hearing loss in the human speech frequency
| range appreciate your efforts!
| wirrbel wrote:
| MTV Europe used non-native speakers in the 90ies, they would be
| understood across Europe. Native speakers pronounced 'better'
| but less pronounced.
| incrudible wrote:
| The gist here is that English needs to be dumbed down and
| stripped of any cultural references in order to be intelligible
| to an international business audience. No surprises there.
|
| To say that "native English speakers are the world's worst
| communicators" is quite a bold claim. Personally, I'd give that
| title to native French speakers.
| snmx999 wrote:
| The statement "native English speakers are the world's worst
| communicators" is true because of the large number of English
| speakers in an international context, even when the average
| "badness" of an English speaker is no worse than of a French
| speaker.
| toyg wrote:
| I was going to follow up with a similar quip, but I think we're
| falling into old crypto-nationalistic stereotypes and maybe we
| should all try to be better, so...
|
| "Personally, I'd give that title to middlemanagers who were
| promoted beyond their abilities."
| Timpy wrote:
| I agree, it drives me nuts when I see bad hot takes on the
| English language by Anglophones. Articles in English about
| English are more often than not egocentric and short sighted.
|
| I heard an Englishman quip that English is the only language
| where you can tell a person's class by their accent. Or a lot
| of people think English is the hardest language to learn
| because of its irregularities or terrible spelling rules. Or
| that our slang is somehow exceptional. Most of these people
| don't have enough experience in other languages to have any
| idea how they compare to English.
| rjsw wrote:
| > To say that "native English speakers are the world's worst
| communicators" is quite a bold claim. Personally, I'd give that
| title to native French speakers.
|
| I'm a native English speaker with French as my second language.
| In my experience "Business French" doesn't have nearly as many
| problems as English.
| vbezhenar wrote:
| My weird anecdote. English is a not native language for me
| (Russian is my native language) and I have issues listening to
| native English persons, but I have almost no issues listening to
| English with Russian accent. So, I guess, that depends on a
| receiving side.
| jokethrowaway wrote:
| Accent is another sore point, I find understanding non-native
| speakers' accent to be way easier than understanding what some
| native speakers say.
|
| Probably if you're a native speaker you've been exposed in your
| life to the different dialects and accents - as a non-native
| speaker the chances of you knowing how the different dialects
| influence words and pronunciation are much slimmer.
| nottorp wrote:
| Article seems to be selling the Globbish thing mentioned in the
| middle?
|
| IMO if you get an ambiguous phrase in any language, ask for
| clarification. Especially if it's work related.
|
| What's more annoying is the cultural differences, mainly anglo
| saxons always being in a hurry and almost never considering the
| long term consequences.
| b0b0b0b wrote:
| Was the word "inflammable"?
| sime2009 wrote:
| I'm guessing "infamous". You know, when someone becomes more
| than just famous, then become "infamous".
| tomcooks wrote:
| How would that lead to the industry the company works in?
| jessaustin wrote:
| I'm guessing "penultimate". Non-native speakers look up the
| dictionary definition, while the average American knows it
| means "really awesome".
| blunte wrote:
| This is clickbait. Much of what is presented as evidence of how
| bad native English speakers are would apply to people of other
| languages if they were the natives and English speakers were the
| guests.
|
| But with respect to the one word financial loss, it sounds like
| the receiver is ultimately to blame because they chose to act
| without confirming the meaning of the original message.
|
| Sure, the writer could have considered the ambiguity and been
| more specific or explicit, but the receiver made a choice and ran
| with it.
| js2 wrote:
| I think some commenters are taking issue with this article for
| singling out English. Yes, the larger issue is native vs non-
| native speakers in any language. But this article is specifically
| addressed to native English speakers because English often serves
| as the common language in a room of mixed-language speakers.
|
| I'm a native English speaker. I don't find the article offensive,
| and I appreciate it pointing out how I can be a more effective
| communicator.
| II2II wrote:
| > I'm a native English speaker. I don't find the article
| offensive, and I appreciate it pointing out how I can be a more
| effective communicator.
|
| If you want people to communicate more effectively, then you
| state how to communicate more effectively. It is best to avoid
| criticism since the recipient is liable to take it poorly.
| Trying to be provocative will only result in the intent of the
| message being ignored.
| efaref wrote:
| For an article about communicating clearly, it was pretty
| poor at communicating clearly.
| lazide wrote:
| Unless they're German or Eastern European, in which case if
| you don't point out exactly where they personally are wrong
| they might think you're complimenting them, seeking help in
| figuring out who IS doing something wrong, or don't have any
| actual issues, and everything is ok.
|
| Speaking of cultural differences.
| Kreotiko wrote:
| In other languages it wouldn't happen at the same scale due to
| people also speaking a second language and realise these
| dynamics. Do you know many native English speakers speaking a
| second language fluently? I have been living in the U.K. for
| over 10 years and can count them on a hand.
| freeflight wrote:
| Reminds me about how the EU has kinda created its own version of
| English loaning from the other European languages; Euro English
| [0]
|
| [0] https://www.euronews.com/2020/04/23/world-language-day-do-
| yo...
| bogle wrote:
| You can learn how to be better understood as a native speaker
| without having to go abroad or even speak to a lot of people
| using English as a second language. In the UK, live in a city
| like Birmingham, for instance, with a strong local accent and
| even, in some parts like the Black Country, a unique syntax, e.g.
| "How am ya?". Now go live for a while in, for the sake of
| argument, Glasgow, with their own particular patois and accent.
|
| Why does this article make me think the problem is perhaps mainly
| with those native English speakers who haven't been exposed much
| to their own language as it's spoken in the regions?
| leoedin wrote:
| Conversely, I lived for a while with a Glaswegian who had moved
| to the South of England, having lived his whole life in
| Glasgow. It was interesting watching him realise that he had to
| moderate his speech, otherwise so much of what he said was
| lost. Over time, he stopped using some of the specifically
| regional stuff that nobody understood.
| ARandomerDude wrote:
| Even easier: pick up an introductory Greek or Latin textbook. I
| didn't know English grammar until I bought a Greek book and
| worked through it on my own.
| riffraff wrote:
| Many years ago I had the chance to work in a research institute
| in Ireland.
|
| A common line for newcomers who worried about their ability to
| speak was that we had 25 or 35 different nationalities, and the
| Irish were the only ones having problems communicating in
| English.
|
| It is pretty obvious if you think about it, and not specific to
| any language: native speakers of X have to make an effort to
| speak "international basic X" and they are generally not used to
| do that.
| tomcooks wrote:
| The Anglosphere covers more than half of the world, being used
| to deal with other cultures and adapting to that should be
| taken for granted.
| [deleted]
| IshKebab wrote:
| So what was the word?? This is like those articles about photos
| that don't actually include the photo.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| It's probably not this, but a native English speaker saying
| "That's the shit!" probably means "That thing is great" but
| someone who's not very fluent might think the speaker doesn't
| like the thing.
| gus_massa wrote:
| I guess it happens in all languages. Here in Argentina
| sometimes you can use some insults as a great compliment to a
| friend. [It's tricky to know when you can use them, which
| one, and have the correct intonation and body posture, so
| don't try it.]
|
| And you can use a compliment like " _Muy bien. Te
| feliciiito._ " (" _Very good. I congratulate you._ " But with
| a long ee sound in the middle of the last word) And it means
| something like " _You are an idiot_ " / " _You made a big
| mistake_ ".
| secondcoming wrote:
| There are parts of the English speaking world where 'cunt'
| is used as term of endearment.
| scbrg wrote:
| I had a chuckle a while back when here on HN, one poster
| replied to another with the words: _Oh, fuck off!_ The next
| sentence was _That 's amazing!_ Turns out that they were
| quite happy about the information in the parent post.
| Something like "I wish I had known _that_ five years ago. "
|
| I thought to myself, _that_ has _to be a Brit,_ but
| admittedly I 'm not familiar enough with the way various
| native speakers of English use the language to know for
| sure. To us furriners, it can sure be a bit confusing some
| times :)
| Apeliotes wrote:
| Off the top of my head was it the Citibank Revlon issue? I seem
| to remember there being a break down in communication between
| Indian Staff and the US staff.
| bellyfullofbac wrote:
| No, that was just a super shitty software UI:
| https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/02/citibank-just-
| go...
| incrudible wrote:
| We're looking for a word that is:
|
| - highly industry-specific
|
| - has two contradictory definitions in some dictionary
|
| - possibly identifying a multinational company
| exceptione wrote:
| Shell
| gryfft wrote:
| I work with teams across the globe and I can say this has been
| true in my experience. The experience of communicating with
| others for whom English is not only a second language, but a
| lingua franca used to communicate across _other_ language
| boundaries, is distinctly not one where I am the advantaged
| communicator, because I am the less versed speaker of the lingua
| franca version of the dialect. (Imagine switching from a BSD to
| Ubuntu with no Linux experience. Lots rhymes and sounds the same,
| but might trip up an experienced user who has built up years of
| expectations.)
|
| My wife has been showing me Twogether, a show about two
| celebrities from different countries whose only common language
| is English, and who are made to travel and perform tasks together
| in countries whose languages they don't speak.
|
| It's fascinating to hear the version of English they speak to
| each other. It's not US or UK English, it's a combination of
| English, Korean, Chinese, intonation, facial expression, and
| gesture to communicate what they need in a given moment. It was
| odd for me to that they were actually able to use English to
| communicate with each other better than I, a native English
| speaker, could use to communicate with either of them. Built up
| context and the tendency of language to take the shape of its
| container resulted in a patois better suited to their purposes
| than the language I use every day, and in a business context,
| pretending this _doesn 't_ happen is a recipe for failure, I
| believe.
| pbourke wrote:
| > The non-native speakers, it turns out, speak more purposefully
| and carefully, typical of someone speaking a second or third
| language. Anglophones, on the other hand, often talk too fast for
| others to follow, and use jokes, slang and references specific to
| their own culture, says Chong
|
| Isn't this a description of native vs non-native speakers in many
| languages?
| sampo wrote:
| > Isn't this a description of native vs non-native speakers in
| many languages?
|
| I'd venture to guess, that only with English you can find
| businesses that run in English but native speakers are a
| minority in the company.
| sime2009 wrote:
| > Isn't this a description of native vs non-native speakers in
| many languages?
|
| Not necessarily. The key idea from the article in the phrase
| "specific to their own culture". There isn't one English in the
| world. There are now many versions which are bound to cultures
| and differ in the idioms and sayings used. Think about all of
| the sports based sayings and metaphors you are used to. Many of
| them won't mean much to English speakers in other countries.
|
| Either way, communicating with people from other cultures, even
| when using the same language, remains a sticky wicket.
| silicon2401 wrote:
| Yes. This is just another article trying to attack English by
| singling it out for scenarios that occur in every language.
| It's part of human communication and behavior, not a flaw
| inherent to English. Otherwise, what's the implication, that
| non-English speakers universally speak slowly and without any
| kind of idioms or color? That's disproven within a year of
| learning any new language
| Gauge_Irrahphe wrote:
| I'd say that most languages go into a much deeper level of
| detail than English does, by default.
| tomcooks wrote:
| ?
|
| Which languages and in which contexts?
| freeflight wrote:
| Gendered articles and honorifics come to mind, that's where
| for example German has more "details" that afaik don't
| really exist in a comparable version in English, like duzen
| vs siezen.
| pbourke wrote:
| What do you mean by level of detail? That concepts are
| spelled out more explicitly?
|
| I think most languages and cultures have conceptual
| shortcuts. Every culture/language has their "Shaka, when the
| walls fell" from Star Trek (here I go with the conceptual
| shortcuts).
| Gauge_Irrahphe wrote:
| I mean more like they seem to prefer spelling out the exact
| problem, instead of using a generic phrase, like "this
| solution has proven inadequate".
| domano wrote:
| I see this happening regurarily and i have to say that it heavily
| depends on the native speakers nationality.
|
| Americans (at least if they don't speak some thick dialect) are
| easy to understand due to movies etc.
|
| Brits are ok enough, but some dialects get tricky.
|
| Irish and scottish usually are not understood by the absolute
| majority of participants. I pride myself in my ability to
| understand spoken english (relative to my peers here in germany
| at least) but even for me it is nearly impossible to understand
| an irishman talking over zoom etc. with some random headset.
| [deleted]
| shkkmo wrote:
| I think there is a fundemental misattribution where the author
| talks about monolingual speakers.
|
| Speaking to non-native speakers in a language is a seperate skill
| that can be learned without proficiency in a second language. It
| takes skill and care to keep your sentence structure simple and
| independent of semantic nuance or idiom.
|
| People for whom English is a lingua franca have almost
| exclusively used English to speak to other non-native speakers
| and have lots of practice doing this.
| dang wrote:
| All: please let's not react to the title, and certainly not just
| with an indignant reflex [1]. There's more interesting material
| here.
|
| We've edited the title now to be more neutral and accurate, using
| representative language from the article.
|
| [1]
| https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...
| elmerfud wrote:
| I agree with this totally and I am a native English speaker.
| English often has many confusing and ambiguous terms that can
| only be known by having a very well developed sense of context.
|
| Have many non-native English speaking friends, I understand their
| difficulty with the language. When communicating with my friends
| I try and choose appropriate words to avoid misunderstanding
| until I can grasp the level at which they understand English. It
| bothers me when I see other people communicate to non-english
| speakers and they either get irritated or they don't understand
| how what they said could be misunderstood. It is as if they've
| never evaluated the difficulty of their own language.
|
| Then it gets even worse because in casual conversation people
| will throw in all kinds of slang and just totally made up words.
| As native English speakers you can pick them apart and get an
| idea of what's happening even if you don't know the specific
| slang. A non-native speaker has no hope at all.
|
| With all communication it's important to know your audience and
| address them in a way they can understand.
| narag wrote:
| One thing that I haven't seen mentioned in any language-related
| discussion is that understanding is often a matter of
| discarding possible "neighbouring" meanings. To do that, you
| need to have a comprehensive knowledge of the language.
|
| In English it's particularly bad because of the proximity
| between some vowels. In many cases a monosyllabic word is one
| of six or seven almost identical. And that's for basic
| vocabulary. Think bird, bear, beard, bore, bar, boar, beer,
| birth, born, burn, bier... when someone is whispering the words
| or talking over a noisy medium.
| refactor_master wrote:
| I've experienced this problem for native and non-native
| speakers alike, where perfectly capable English speakers
| almost freeze up when they mishear a word, rather than try to
| help the conversation along. I'd usually ask the other party
| to spell it out, whereas some simply drop the conversation
| dead and awkward silence ensues.
| teachingassist wrote:
| > perfectly capable English speakers almost freeze up when
| they mishear a word, rather than try to help the
| conversation along.
|
| As a person who speaks a second language I learned as an
| adult, I find this situation _incredibly difficult_ to
| negotiate.
|
| In my first language, I can get through almost any such
| situation by using humour. In my second language, at best,
| I can manage 'just one more time?' with a frowny face.
|
| I often think - why wasn't I taught this skill in any
| language school I attended?
| david38 wrote:
| Have you ever been to France and tried speaking French after a
| few years of study? Have you ever had to deal with someone
| there who speaks far better English than you, but refuses to
| because of snobbery?
|
| This article is trash
| teekert wrote:
| Have you ever spoken to a French person while imitating their
| accent and found that they understand you much better?
| crucialfelix wrote:
| Yes, I thought I was being funny with my exaggerated french
| accent. They just found it clearer. Unfortunately this
| makes them think I have better french than I actually do
| and they speak to fast.
| [deleted]
| AnssiH wrote:
| That isn't really relevant to the article. The article is
| only comparing native English speakers to non-native English
| speakers, not other languages.
| lsaferite wrote:
| The comment you are replying to is exhibiting the result of
| the article's poor communication style. The way it was
| written comes across as too confrontational and sets people
| up to be defensive.
| sampo wrote:
| Here is another BBC article, from which I learned that this
| international insurance company has organized training for
| native speakers to speak in a more understandable manner:
|
| > After taking an in-company e-learning course to help native
| English speakers communicate better with non-native speakers,
| Barron slowed down his pace of speaking and edited his
| "American speak" to avoid jargon and idioms that don't
| translate globally.
|
| https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20161215-you-need-to-go...
| mwcampbell wrote:
| Thanks for linking to this article. Can anyone recommend a
| place to get this kind of training for those of us who don't
| work at a company that offers it? I'm a monoglot American
| living in a midwestern city where I'm mostly surrounded by
| other such Americans, but I want to raise my awareness of how
| I might be a bad communicator.
| open-source-ux wrote:
| In the UK, there is a campaigning organisation called the
| 'Plain English Campaign' which promotes clear, easy-to-
| understand written English suitable for any industry or
| profession.
|
| Although, the organisation is based in the UK, their advice
| is relevant for anyone who writes or reads English.
|
| Here is their clear, simple and short guide on _How to
| write in plain English_ [PDF]:
|
| http://www.plainenglish.co.uk/files/howto.pdf
| dynm wrote:
| I'm interested in the minimal "Globish" subset of English this
| article mentions. It would be an interesting idea to have a
| variant of hemmingwayapp or grammarly that tries to automatically
| test if a bit of text conforms to it. This doesn't seem all that
| technically difficult, and would be the kind of thing some
| organizations would pay for if there's proof that it makes a bit
| of writing harder to misinterpret.
| kingsuper20 wrote:
| This probably should be rewritten as "Native language speakers
| are the world's worst communicators".
| Kreotiko wrote:
| It doesn't help that native English speakers are less inclined to
| learn another language and don't get to understand the experience
| of being at the other end
| corpMaverick wrote:
| As a non native speaker I struggle with this. I work with some
| native speakers which are more articulate, use a more complex
| sentence structure, speak faster and speak a lot longer. I often
| loose track of what they are saying and it is very hard to argue
| against them. I feel like a three year old.
| jmercouris wrote:
| I have the same problem when arguing in foreign languages. It
| is very frustrating. You feel powerless.
| labster wrote:
| You've managed to confuse "loose" and "lose" exactly like a
| native speaker!
|
| The goal of communication is understanding. The native speakers
| you speak with need to work harder, the same as you do.
| jakub_g wrote:
| On the subject: I highly recommend "The culture map" book.
|
| It provides a dozen of dimensions on communication and compares
| on real world examples how American, German, French, Chinese,
| Japanese and several other nationalities approach certain
| situations, and summarizes each dimension with a scale and puts
| each country in the left/middle/right.
|
| https://erinmeyer.com/books/the-culture-map/
|
| It talks things like "why X are so aggressive and direct" and
| "why Y are so $adjective".
| dvh wrote:
| In one episode of Black Books, main character Manny finds out he
| can play piano. Other character Bernard wants to use it to
| impress a woman, so he forces Manny to hide inside the piano and
| play using spoons. Manny does it but later refuses to do it
| again. To convince him to do it one more time, Bernard offers him
| one whole week of vacation. Manny looks at Bernard, then extend
| his arms forwards, palms open up, and says: "spoon me".
|
| In my native language we use declension everywhere. I could
| awkwardly say the same in my language, something like "olyzicujte
| ma" (o=equip/cover, lyzica=spoon, ujte=keep doing something,
| me=ma) - it is technically correct, but english didn't need to
| change any of those words, it just worked. English can convey the
| same meaning without unnecessary complexity.
|
| I like this simplicity in language, it feels somehow superior.
| Simpler is better.
| klodolph wrote:
| I think what you are talking about is really analytic vs
| synthetic languages. English is more analytic than most
| European languages, but there are other languages which are
| also analytic, like Mandarin, Swedish, and Maori.
|
| https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Analytic_language
|
| In analytic languages, speakers use word order and additional
| words to convey relationships. However, this does not mean that
| analytic languages are simpler, it just means that the
| complexity is different.
|
| For example, English usually requires that you use the correct
| word order, correct articles, and correct prepositions. "A
| customer is angry about the movie." You cannot change word
| order. You must use the correct article ("a" customer, "the"
| movie), and correct preposition ("angry about", not "angry
| at"). In some other languages, these details like "a" / "the"
| are not important.
|
| Sentences like "Spoon me" or "beer me" rely on the fact that
| English uses word order instead of declension. The sentence
| must have a verb, and "me" is not a verb, so the word before
| "me" is treated as a verb. The words are simple and flexible,
| but the word order is very strict.
| tmp538394722 wrote:
| If someone without context had walked into the room and heard
| him say "spoon me", they'd likely think something very
| different were going on.
|
| "Spoon" as a verb usually means something like "cuddle me" - as
| in "let's be like spoons and fit all our curves really close
| together".
|
| It seems like the "o" in "olyzicujte ma" clarified that you're
| talking about equipping.
|
| I haven't seen the show, but that double entendre on "spoon"
| might have been one layer of the joke.
| tuxie_ wrote:
| Now I'm curious what the old title was.
| bernardv wrote:
| Yes, I can definitely relate to this. English is not my native
| tongue. I'm acutely aware of the presence of other non-native
| speakers in the room and instinctively switch to simple terms and
| avoid the use of colloquialisms. Native speakers generally do not
| have that instinct.
| franciscop wrote:
| When English is your second or third language in the beginning
| the difficult bits are the pronunciation, and then all the
| cultural differences. For example, university debt or debt in
| general is just not a topic in most of EU for those under-25.
| Hospital runs or calling an ambulance are also a no-brainer
| because that's free.
|
| One of the major shocks for me was when I heard the story of
| someone who broke a leg, and stopped a friend from calling an
| ambulance because it'd be too expensive and instead called a taxi
| to get to the hospital. A combination of me being younger and
| naive, and not knowing the US so well back then, so I literally
| thought they were joking while they were telling it.
| throwaway-8c93 wrote:
| The article echoes what General Jim Mattis commented on the topic
| of leadership in one of his interviews - (paraphrasing) decisions
| take an hour to make, the rest of the day is spent crafting the
| message to ensure there's no room for ambiguity or
| misunderstanding.
| MereInterest wrote:
| I think the point of avoiding acronyms and abbreviations isn't
| strong enough, because it doesn't explain how much they can creep
| into most conversation. As an example, here's how something can
| become gradually less specific, and gradually shortened. (I have
| an American Midwest accent, so not all of these shortenings will
| be applicable to all accents.)
|
| > I'm hungry. Would you like to get lunch and continue discussing
| this as we eat?
|
| Good clear statement, motivation, question, and proposed action.
| But there's some repetition. If I'm the one suggesting lunch, it
| can be assumed that I am hungry, so that doesn't need to be
| mentioned.
|
| > Would you like to get lunch and continue discussing this as we
| eat?
|
| Now we add in some cultural context, that people generally eat
| lunch around noon, and that it is generally a social affair.
| Asking if somebody wants to get lunch implicitly includes the
| question of having lunch as a group.
|
| > Would you like to get lunch?
|
| In the same manner, rather than asking about the intended action
| of "having lunch", one can instead ask about previous actions,
| with the assumption that somebody will join in on a social
| activity.
|
| > Have you eaten yet?
|
| Depending on the level of formality, both the choice of words and
| the level of diction can be chosen to progressively shorten the
| phrase.
|
| > Did you eat yet?
|
| > Didja eat yet?
|
| > Djeet yet?
|
| The last one, when spoken and in the context of a co-worker
| asking shortly before noon, is understandable as a social request
| by a native speaker with a similar accent, even though it's
| missing over half of the syllables needed to even be
| grammatically correct.
| solatic wrote:
| To be fair, "Did you eat yet?" in this context seems to be
| universal across languages and cultures for office workers. The
| "Djeet yet?" will naturally be different depending on language
| and accent, but my point is that this is not exclusive to the
| English language. Someone who is familiar with the practice of
| asking if a coworker has eaten their midday meal in their
| native tongue will recognize the same nuance if they know the
| literal English translation.
| [deleted]
| jjgreen wrote:
| In French: _a la soupe !_
| hnedeotes wrote:
| Is this another case of worse is better? Dammit.
|
| (also funny that the title is native speakers are hard to
| understand in an honest language situation, I would say it's
| natural)
| Agingcoder wrote:
| There is another aspect beyond raw vocabulary and grammar, and
| that's unspoken cultural assumptions :not abbreviations and
| slang, but real misunderstandings caused by different
| understandings of what seems to be a set of perfectly obvious
| sentences to both sides .
|
| A branch of my company went through a merger with another branch
| in a different country, and with a different language. Needless
| to say, it was difficult, and people didn't all take it well. The
| interesting part was that both sides thought the other side was
| being actively hostile, and were brandishing emails as 'proof'.
|
| I was eventually asked to do something to reconcile both sides of
| the new merged team, since I am a native speaker of both
| languages and understand both cultures. I read the emails, and
| was flabbergasted. Side A could read email from B as hostile, but
| side B had genuinely sent something they thought was perfectly
| ok, and I could see why. The other way round was the same. To be
| more specific, some cultures are far more direct than others, and
| what seems offensive to one is perfectly acceptable to the other.
| The other way round would be saying something 'forcefully' but
| very indirectly, and the other side understanding it as 'no' when
| it meant 'yes'.
|
| I ended up solving the problem by organizing a very nice lunch,
| where everyone realized the 'others' were actually nice and
| friendly human beings, and that email was not always the best way
| to communicate.
| jakub_g wrote:
| Meeting in person and regularly is extremely underrated.
|
| This can happen also within a single culture. When two
| companies do some business together but instead of meeting
| often and talking directly (or zoom), spend weeks to carefully
| craft emails and never talk face to face.
| ezoe wrote:
| It is exploited.
|
| There are so many evil politicians who order to murder people
| or made the laws which restrict human rights. But if you meet
| them in person, you will definitely feel they are nice
| person.
| ksec wrote:
| >but real misunderstandings caused by different understandings
| of what seems to be a set of perfectly obvious sentences to
| both sides.
|
| Yes. Especially true when it happens between an American and a
| Brit.
|
| Also true between Germans and Brits, when the Germans are so
| good with their English, the _precision_ with their wordings
| which tends to trigger some Brits.
| cruano wrote:
| I think tribalism goes beyond language, I joined a company with
| two offices in different countries and while there was some
| rock-throwing and mistrust of each other, it all went away when
| we got acquired. Somehow belonging to the "old" company was a
| stronger bond that speaking the same language, so all this
| negative feelings got shifted towards the parent company
|
| Damn monkey brains
| sidlls wrote:
| I'm a native English speaker and I find the use of
| colloquialisms, abbreviations, and the like frustrating as well.
| There is no good reason to not take care in the choice of words
| when communicating in a professional setting, regardless of the
| language used or the native language(s) audience receiving the
| communication.
| senthil_rajasek wrote:
| I grew up in India. I live in the U.S. now. I am a hostage to
| this situation and I am suffering from Stockholm syndrome.
| shoto_io wrote:
| Try to get an Australian passport. It helps I hear.
| senthil_rajasek wrote:
| Ha ha, I am learning to say mate with every sentence. Thanks
| Mate.
| shoto_io wrote:
| No worries!
| lebuffon wrote:
| Amusing anecdote.
|
| I was in a class with a Japanese instructor. I had a great deal
| of trouble understanding him. A hand was raised and a person
| began talking with a very different accent (Finnish) and I
| understood very little of that. The Japanese instructor
| understood the question and replied. I however understood almost
| nothing of the entire exchange. This may be the future for native
| English language speakers or perhaps is already the norm in some
| parts of the world.
| softwaredoug wrote:
| I try to work really hard on not using too many idioms and
| sayings in slack. Same goes for memes specific to American
| culture. Or if I use one accidentally, define the meaning.
|
| OTOH sometimes other native English speakers get frustrated with
| this, and I'll hear feedback like "YES WE KNOW WHAT THAT MEANS"
| when in reality this person is just speaking for themselves...
|
| It's a tricky balance because if I know someone has a shared
| cultural context, idioms, etc can make the communication more
| fluid, efficient etc. So I find it's a constant calibration.
| secondcoming wrote:
| Misused English words and expressions in EU publications [0]
|
| > Over the years, the European institutions have developed a
| vocabulary that differs from that of any recognised form of
| English. It includes words that do not exist or are relatively
| unknown to native English speakers outside the EU institutions
| and often even to standard spellcheckers/grammar checkers
| ('planification', 'to precise' or 'telematics' for example) and
| words that are used with a meaning, often derived from other
| languages, that is not usually found in English dictionaries
| ('coherent' being a case in point).
|
| [0]
| https://www.eca.europa.eu/Other%20publications/EN_TERMINOLOG...
| hodgesrm wrote:
| Misunderstandings like the "one word" issue cited at the
| beginning of the article are common among native speakers. I'm
| sure everyone has been to meetings where parties walked out the
| door having agreed to diametrically opposite things.
|
| It is not necessarily a matter of English vs. non-English
| speakers but whether you have empathy with your audience. (Plus a
| bit of project management to ensure everyone understands
| decisions.)
| lazide wrote:
| Also everyone dancing around discussing/bringing up concrete
| objective milestones because it's hard! Hah.
|
| If the details never come up and need to be agreed up
| (including dates or hard deliveries), it's easy to not realize
| you don't agree at all.
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