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* "Defenestration" means throwing someone out of a window. That's right. The English language has a word specifically for throwing someone out of a window.
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** Also, as the language of a disenfranchised, largely stateless people, it has been observed that it has very few words relating to political rule and establishment; at the same time, a lot of words describing nuanced social interaction, like ''schmooze''.
* While slavery and then Jim Crow was in effect DownSouth, "Single Drop" laws were passed to establish racial identity; consequently, there arose a disturbingly extensive vocabulary to describe mixed racial heritage, from general terms like ''mulatto'' to the creepily specific, like ''octoroon''.
* While English has any number of terms to describe corruption (bribery, payola, greasing palms, on the take...), German ([[QualifyingEdit or so I heard]]) lacks such vocabulary, as such practices are seen as unremarkable.
* GeorgeCarlin, in his [[SevenDirtyWords trademark routine]], points out that English has more words ''for'' bad language than it has ''actuall'' bad language.
* While slavery and then Jim Crow was in effect DownSouth, "Single Drop" laws were passed to establish racial identity; consequently, there arose a disturbingly extensive vocabulary to describe mixed racial heritage, from general terms like ''mulatto'' to the creepily specific, like ''octoroon''.
* While English has any number of terms to describe corruption (bribery, payola, greasing palms, on the take...), German ([[QualifyingEdit or so I heard]]) lacks such vocabulary, as such practices are seen as unremarkable.
* GeorgeCarlin, in his [[SevenDirtyWords trademark routine]], points out that English has more words ''for'' bad language than it has ''actuall'' bad language.
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** And this differs depending on the region too. There's the "Hamburger Sie", which combines said polite form of "you" with the first name, and the "Münchner Du", which is the opposite - informal "you" plus last name.
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*** Also in Small Gods, we meet a fisherman from a tiny tribe that has no word for "war". When the gods appear and tell everyone (in their own languages) to stop waging war [[spoiler: on Omnia]], it comes across as "remember when Pacha Moj hit his uncle with big rock? Like that, only worse."
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*** Also in Small Gods, we meet a fisherman from a tiny tribe that has no word for "war". When the gods appear and tell everyone (in their own languages) to stop waging war [[spoiler: on Omnia]], it comes across as "remember when Pacha Moj hit his uncle with big rock? Like that, only more worse."
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** In a {{DS9}} episode, Quark mentions that the Ferengi have over 300 words for 'rain' and then states which one would describe current conditions.
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*** The concept of benevolent giving has a negative connotation to you?
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* ''InNomine'' has the Angelic language of Celestial, which cannot be used to tell a lie. (It's uncertain how this is accomplished.) When Lucifer and his followers Fell, they created a bastardised version capable of lies. Incidentally, this means that Demons understand Celestial, but very few Angels understand Demonic.
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* German is notoriously precise and formal. Even in student language, it's not uncommon to hear sentences like "I have already partaken in an event at that particular location" or "I am doing well, and would like to thank you for asking me about my day. How are your own circumstances at this moment?".
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* German is notoriously precise and formal. Even in student language, it's not uncommon to hear sentences like "I have already partaken in an event at that particular location" or "I am doing well, and would like to thank you for asking me about my day. How are your own circumstances at this moment?". The polite form of "you" is used starting around age 17, and even colleagues or classmates who've known each other for years and who are on a first name basis ''still'' use the polite form. As a result, much of German counterculture revolves around slurring words and acting informal on purpose.
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* German is notoriously precise and formal. Even in student language, it's not uncommon to hear sentences like "I have already partaken in an event at that particular location" or "I am doing well, and would like to thank you for asking me about my day. How are your own circumstances at this moment?".
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** Other typical features of Dutch: the words for "just", "like", "erm", "well", etc. are all variations on words meaning "normal". There's a large emphasis in Dutch culture on not standing out unless you're ''fun'' as well. The word for "fun to be around" is "gezellig" (could be translated as "comrade-like"), which can also be applied to situations: "the party was [gezellig]". It's one of the most common ways of expressing happiness about a situation or a person. And then there's the word "lekker", which can mean anything from "delicious" to "healthy" to "sane" to "comfy" to "decadent" to "sexy" to just "happy".
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** Other typical features of Dutch: the words for "just", "like", "erm", "well", etc. are all variations on words meaning "normal". There's Probably because there's a large emphasis in Dutch culture on not standing out out, i.e. being normal, unless you're ''fun'' as well. The word for "fun to be around" is "gezellig" (could be translated as "comrade-like"), which can also be applied to situations: "the party was [gezellig]". It's one of the most common ways of expressing happiness about a situation or a person. And then there's the word "lekker", which can mean anything from "delicious" to "healthy" to "sane" to "comfy" to "decadent" to "sexy" to just "happy".
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** Other typical features of Dutch: the words for "just", "like", "erm", "well", etc. are all variations on words meaning "normal". There's a large emphasis in Dutch culture on not standing out unless you're ''fun'' as well. The word for "fun to be around" is "gezellig" (could be translated as "comrade-like"), which can also be applied to situations: "the party was [gezellig]". It's one of the most common ways of expressing happiness about a situation or a person. And then there's the word "lekker", which can mean anything from "delicious" to "sane" to "comfy" to "decadent" to "sexy" to just "happy".
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** Other typical features of Dutch: the words for "just", "like", "erm", "well", etc. are all variations on words meaning "normal". There's a large emphasis in Dutch culture on not standing out unless you're ''fun'' as well. The word for "fun to be around" is "gezellig" (could be translated as "comrade-like"), which can also be applied to situations: "the party was [gezellig]". It's one of the most common ways of expressing happiness about a situation or a person. And then there's the word "lekker", which can mean anything from "delicious" to "healthy" to "sane" to "comfy" to "decadent" to "sexy" to just "happy".
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** Other typical features of Dutch: the words for "just", "like", "erm", "well", etc. are all variations on words meaning "normal". There's a large emphasis in Dutch culture on not standing out unless you're ''fun'' as well. The word for "fun to be around" is "gezellig" (could be translated as "comrade-like"), which can also be applied to situations: "the party was [gezellig]". It's one of the most common ways of expressing happiness about a situation or a person. And then there's the word "lekker", which can mean anything from "delicious" to "sane" to "comfy" to "decadent" to "sexy" to just "happy".
** Also, virtually ALL swearing in Dutch is done by yelling out diseases. Dutch has slang words for "cancer", "cholera", "tuberculosis", "typhoid fever", "the plague", etc. Calling someone a "cancer sufferer" (or even just "sufferer") is ''the worst insult in the language''. The word for "bullying" is "to plague" ( "pesten"/"plagen"), and calling one's enemy a "boil-sufferer" is quite serious. On the other hand, the words for "cunt", "dick" and "arse" are considered ''mild'' insults. The English words "shit" and "fuck" are seen as pretty much harmless.
** Also, virtually ALL swearing in Dutch is done by yelling out diseases. Dutch has slang words for "cancer", "cholera", "tuberculosis", "typhoid fever", "the plague", etc. Calling someone a "cancer sufferer" (or even just "sufferer") is ''the worst insult in the language''. The word for "bullying" is "to plague" ( "pesten"/"plagen"), and calling one's enemy a "boil-sufferer" is quite serious. On the other hand, the words for "cunt", "dick" and "arse" are considered ''mild'' insults. The English words "shit" and "fuck" are seen as pretty much harmless.
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** The Dutch language actually does have a large number of words for "water", some of which don't exist in other languages. (Examples: "singel" - "small canal in an inhabited area surrounded by sloping grass and large trees, most commonly willows"; "gracht" - "larger narrow canal in a city which spans several blocks"; "polder" - "drained water area on which farmland has been built, of which the fields are separated by small canals"... etc.) Quite a large number of common expressions also have to do with water or seafaring. (Example: "beneden alle peil" - literally "below all water level", usually means "morally low".)
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** The Dutch language actually does have a large number of words for "water", some of which don't exist in other languages. (Examples: "singel" - "small canal in an inhabited area surrounded by sloping grass and large trees, most commonly willows"; "gracht" - "larger narrow canal in a city which spans several blocks"; "polder" - "drained water area on which farmland has been built, of which the fields are separated by small canals"... etc.) Quite a large number of common expressions also have to do with water or seafaring. (Example: "beneden alle peil" - literally "below all water level", usually means "morally low".)
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** This was first posed by Heinlein in his novella ''Gulf'', which featured a one-phoneme-per-concept "Speedtalk". It's extremely interesting and has been written about by tons and tons of linguists. But much like in ''StrangerInAStrangeLand'', it's wedged between a few hundred pages of AuthorTract about the übermensch.
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* If you believe the New Yorkers, anyway, Yiddish appears to have a LOT of words for different types of 'loser' and the situations they get into: shlemiel, schlimazel, nebbish, and klutz are but a few. The reason why is because since Jews have been underdogs since forever, failure has been adapted into the subculture and used as comedy.
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* If you believe the New Yorkers, anyway, Yiddish appears to have a LOT of words for different types of 'loser' and the situations they get into: shlemiel, schlimazel, nebbish, and klutz are but a few. The reason why is because since Jews have been underdogs since forever, failure has been adapted into the subculture and used as comedy. comedy.
** And a lot of words for penis.
* For a real example, many languages conflate siblings of the same sex. This can indicate marriage of cousins (so long as their fathers aren't brothers or their mothers aren't sisters) or levirate and sororate.
** And a lot of words for penis.
* For a real example, many languages conflate siblings of the same sex. This can indicate marriage of cousins (so long as their fathers aren't brothers or their mothers aren't sisters) or levirate and sororate.
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**** But even so, they're spelled 兄弟 and 姉妹, respectively - using the kanji and the[[AlternateCharacterReading on'yomi readings]] of the kanji for "older brother" and "younger brother" together in the first word, and for "older sister" and "younger sister" together in the second.
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** Understanding the different meanings of different Biblical words for love can reveal some previously-unnoticed subtext. When Jesus asks Peter "Do you love me?" he uses 'agape', the kind of powerful, volitional love Jesus himself has for his people. Peter replies with "You know that I love you," but uses 'philia', possibly indicating that he views his own love for Christ as more '[[HeterosexualLifePartners brotherly]]' than anything else.
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* Old Solar in CS Lewis's SpaceTrilogy has no words for 'bad' or 'evil' or 'sin' or 'war' or... pretty much anything else that doesn't exist in the MarySueTopia society of the aliens. In the first book, Ransom tries to translate the villain Weston's speech into Old Solar and has to take [[CrowningMomentOfFunny an entire sentence for almost every word of Weston's.]]
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*** While there don't seem to be any singular nouns, Japanese does at least have a word for "siblings" (kyodai) and "sisters" (shimai).
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[[AC:{{FanFic}}]]
* Inverted in The Basalt City Chronicles, a race known as the Deltharians have no word for sound. This is because around 98% of the population has a genetic condition that renders them entirely deaf.
* Inverted in The Basalt City Chronicles, a race known as the Deltharians have no word for sound. This is because around 98% of the population has a genetic condition that renders them entirely deaf.
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** Played straight with the D'regs, who have the same word for 'stranger' and 'target'. Many Native American languages—Navajo and Apache, for instance—use the same word for 'foreigner' and 'enemy', so that's not that much of a stretch. 'D'reg' wasn't even their original name, it was just the word used by all their neighbours for 'enemy'.
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** Played straight with the D'regs, who have the same word for 'stranger' and 'target'. Many Native American languages—Navajo and Apache, for instance—use the same word for 'foreigner' and 'enemy', so that's not that much of a stretch. 'D'reg' wasn't even their original name, it was just the word used by all their neighbours neighbors for 'enemy'.'enemy'. They adopted the name out of pride.
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* In {{Homestuck}}, the Troll language word for 'friend' is the same as the word for 'enemy.' [[WithFriendsLikeThese considering the general nature of Troll relationships]], this is quite fitting.
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* In {{Homestuck}}, the Troll language word for 'friend' is the same as the word for 'enemy.' [[WithFriendsLikeThese considering Considering the general nature of Troll relationships]], this is quite fitting.
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** This works also with sex. Any noun in the right context can refer to genitalia, and any verb to the sexual act. Can also be done by ending a sentence with "In my pants".
** [[WhoseLineIsItAnyway I'll help you fluff your Garfield,]] IfYouKnowWhatIMean...
** [[WhoseLineIsItAnyway I'll help you fluff your Garfield,]] IfYouKnowWhatIMean...
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** This works also with sex. Any noun in the right context can refer to genitalia, and any verb to the sexual act. Can also be done by ending a You can end any sentence with "In "in my pants".
**pants" and it can automatically be interpreted as sexual.
*** [[WhoseLineIsItAnyway I'll help you fluff your Garfield,]] IfYouKnowWhatIMean...
**
*** [[WhoseLineIsItAnyway I'll help you fluff your Garfield,]] IfYouKnowWhatIMean...
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"shlemiel schlimazel" needs its own trope, btw.
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* Michael [=McIntyre=] suggests that in British English, ''any'' word can be used to mean "drunk" and will be correctly understood in context. Try it - it works.
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* Michael [=McIntyre=] suggests that in British English, ''any'' word can be used to mean "drunk" and will be correctly understood in context. Try it - it works.
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** This works also with sex. Any noun in the right context can refer to genitalia, and any verb to the sexual act.
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** This works also with sex. Any noun in the right context can refer to genitalia, and any verb to the sexual act. Can also be done by ending a sentence with "In my pants".
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* If you believe the New Yorkers, anyway, Yiddish appears to have a LOT of words for 'loser'.
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* If you believe the New Yorkers, anyway, Yiddish appears to have a LOT of words for 'loser'.different types of 'loser' and the situations they get into: shlemiel, schlimazel, nebbish, and klutz are but a few. The reason why is because since Jews have been underdogs since forever, failure has been adapted into the subculture and used as comedy.
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** [[CompletelyMissingThePoint Which doesn't make sense as English is a Germanic language]]. Germans ''do'' have a word for "fluffy": ''flaumig''.
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there is indeed no etymological relationship between "good" and "God". Just one of those coincidences...
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* If one were to attempt to disprove Sapir-Whorf, or at least weaken it, one could do worse than to start with English. For instance, the phrase used to address someone who is leaving is "goodbye." If the hypothesis were to be taken as directly as some writers take it, then the "good" in "goodbye" would force English speakers to regard all partings as good (and would make the song "There Ain't no Good Goodbye" impossible to write.)
** If you know the [[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/goodbye etymology of the word]], that wouldn't make much sense. In particular, it comes from the phrase "God be with you," which, said quickly, sounds like "Goodbye." So it's more similar to "farewell" than it is "good riddance" and not pertaining to "good" in any way, but rather, God. Of course, then you could argue saying it requires they be theist...
** Well, is there no etymological relationship between "God" and "Good"? Even if we take it at face value, though, the word "goodbye" does not indicate that English speakers believe every parting to be good, but that they ''wish'' every parting to be good.
** If you know the [[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/goodbye etymology of the word]], that wouldn't make much sense. In particular, it comes from the phrase "God be with you," which, said quickly, sounds like "Goodbye." So it's more similar to "farewell" than it is "good riddance" and not pertaining to "good" in any way, but rather, God. Of course, then you could argue saying it requires they be theist...
** Well, is there no etymological relationship between "God" and "Good"? Even if we take it at face value, though, the word "goodbye" does not indicate that English speakers believe every parting to be good, but that they ''wish'' every parting to be good.
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* In ''{{Amistad}}'', the translator is having trouble explaining the phrase "I should not have done that", because the tribe doesn't have a word equivalent to the English modal verb "should". The translator's explanation: "You either do something or you don't". So it ends up being translated as something like "I will fix this; I will do something", giving the Africans false hope.
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** If you know the [[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/goodbye etymology of the word]], that wouldn't make much sense. In particular, it comes from the phrase "God be with you," which, said quickly, sounds like "Goodbye." So it's more similar to "farewell" than it is "good riddance" and not pertaining to "good" in any way, but rather, God. Of course, then you could argue saying it requires they [[SoYeah be theist]]...
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** If you know the [[http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/goodbye etymology of the word]], that wouldn't make much sense. In particular, it comes from the phrase "God be with you," which, said quickly, sounds like "Goodbye." So it's more similar to "farewell" than it is "good riddance" and not pertaining to "good" in any way, but rather, God. Of course, then you could argue saying it requires they [[SoYeah be theist]]...theist...
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* C J Cherryh's 'Foreigner' sequence is this trope in spades. The Atevi have a language with a numerical basis, the idea of 'felicitous numbers', so every sentence has to be constructed to reflect not only the actual numbers of people you are talking to, but amended so as not to insult. This makes the introduction of computers etc exciting, since some Atevi think they are being cursed by infelicitous numbers. They also have a different emotional structure, stated to be hardwired biology - they have no exact word for 'friend', but it is a lot more complicated than that. The biggest problem is that they so nearly look like people, and a big part of the problem is that humans still think that one day they'll 'get' human concepts and loosen up. Despite the fact that this precise misunderstanding nearly led to an extinction event once before...
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* C J Cherryh's 'Foreigner' sequence is this trope in spades. The Atevi have a language with a numerical basis, the idea of 'felicitous numbers', so every sentence has to be constructed to reflect not only the actual numbers of people you are talking to, but amended so as not to insult. This makes the introduction of computers etc exciting, since some Atevi think they are being cursed by infelicitous numbers. They also have a different emotional structure, stated to be hardwired biology - they have no exact word for 'friend', but it is a lot more complicated than that. The biggest problem is that they so nearly look like people, and a big part of the problem issue is that humans still think that one day they'll 'get' human concepts and loosen up. Despite the fact that this precise misunderstanding nearly led to an extinction event once before...
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* C J Cherryh's 'Foreigner' sequence is this trope in spades. The Atevi have a language with a numerical basis, the idea of 'felicitous numbers', so every sentence has to be constructed to reflect not only the actual numbers of people you are talking to, but amended so as not to insult. This makes the introduction of computers etc exciting, since some Atevi think they are being cursed by infelicitous numbers. They also have a different emotional structure, stated to be hardwired biology - they have no exact word for 'friend', but it is a lot more complicated than that. The biggest problem is that they so nearly look like people, and a big part of the problem is that humans still think that one day they'll 'get' human concepts and loosen up. Despite the fact that this precise misunderstanding nearly led to an extinction event once before...
