[The Nameless Composer]

This is something I recently thought of. I learned a word in German, 'fernweh' (so I'm told) that means a 'nostalgia/longing for a place you've never been to.' Which made me wonder, why English often lacks terms like these. I mean this is EXACTLY the feeling I feel a lot. Like I felt that way about say rural England for the longest time before I visited, maybe because it was the setting for so much literature.etc. Anyway, it seems English is sort of an ISTJ language, sort of fitting for the country of England or the UK, which is sort of an ISTJ language. It doesn't lend itself to poetic expression or romanticism or sentimentality as much as other languages, I feel. Interesting to think about anyway.

 

[Windblownhair]

I don't feel that English is limited. Its quick to utilize loanwords, and in terms of sheer number of words, and average working vocabulary, English tends to outstrip the Romance languages.

As far as particular words that don't translate, its true that there are some beautiful ones that don't translate exactly. However this is true of every language - Greek has multiple words for love, Yupiq for snow, etc. But English, with is ability to create adjectives using both Romance and Germanic suffixes, has plenty of words whose shades of meaning don't translate precisely into other languages.

Ultimately, I see language as more of a tool. We can choose to wield it in any manner we see fit. A good speaker or writer can always make poetry from prose.

If you're interested in the topic, you might want to research linguistic relativity or linguistic determinism. There's some fascinating research out there.

 

[Moya]

Go read some e e cummings and then come back to me.

 

[StunnedFox]

I wouldn't say the English language really leans any particular way that could be said to correlate to personality types, but - and not to hijack the thread with this notion - I'd be interested to know if there is any correlation between the primary language a person uses and personality type: I wouldn't expect much, but there'd be perhaps a slight skew towards, say, F over T in one language, or S over N in another. Would be interesting to example, even if it led to nothing.

On the notion of these untranslatable abstract terms, the Welsh word "hiraeth" apparently describes a sort of wistful and nostalgic sense of loss, particularly in the sense of homesickness when away from home or a longing for a no-longer-reachable past. Such words are definitely interesting to observe, and interesting to try and think what they might say about the culture they arose from...