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What is your favourite word? (feddit.org)

submitted 1 day ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

39 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Any language, explain what it means if it's not English.

For example (as a non-native speaker) I've always liked the English word 'unprecedented', mostly in the context of fiction. Especially if it paints some entity to be really mystical or wondrous or it's own never before seen order of magnitude in any way.

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[–] [email protected] 24 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Epäjärjestelmällistyttämättömyydelläänsäkäänköhän.

It's the longest word you can make in Finnish without using compounds, which can be infinite length.

It means, very loosely translated "I wonder if the outcome was a result of their lack of ability to cause others to be disorganized. "

I know, Finnish is an enviable language.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Am I understanding that Finnish has a way to combine words without being considered to be a compound? My very limited exposure to compound words (through German) was the very idea of mashing the words together made them compound.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

We have a concept of word inflection, which can be used to replace a lot of words that English would use to denote something being a question, ownership markers, causes and effects etc.

Compounds are fun too, since you can do chaining:

Viskibassokitaravahvistinpiiri

Whisky base guitar amplifier circuit

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

We have a concept of word inflection, which can be used to replace a lot of words that English would use to denote something being a question, ownership markers, causes and effects etc.

I don't speak Finnish, but I believe a good example for such an inflection is how in English you can glue an -s to words to make them plural. In some other languages, you say "many word" instead, because they don't have such an inflection.