Wolfgang Schwanke

[email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote in
news:[email protected]:

    > Wolfgang Schwanke <[email protected]> wrote:
    >> I just tried a quick count the words of the last ~4000 articles in
    >> rte. I sloppily attempted to strip headers, URLs, and numbers
    >> beforehand. I did not remove MSGids and e-mail addresses,
    >> misspellings, grammatical variations of the same word, personal and
    >> place names, and non-English words even though all of these should
    >> not be counted. The figure should give a rough estimate of the
    >> combined active vocabulary of all members of this NG. The figure I
    >> got was 21.400. Allowing for the above errors, I think we can safely
    >> assume 15.000 to be closer to the truth. And remember it's the
    >> _combined_ vocabulary of all writers, not that of any individual.
    >> The individual vocabulary of any given member is probably far less.
    >
    > I think the foreign words are not going to help my case much, but
    > those aside, I don't think it's fair to say that "The individual
    > vocabulary of any given member is probably far less." Do you really
    > think that each person (or any significant proportion of the posters)
    > brings a substantial set of idiosyncratic words that nobody else uses?

Well, the lists starts with "aaaargh", "aaargh", "aargh", "argh"
(really), and in the Z region there are words like "Zionazi" and "Zews"
from one of the hate flame wars. A good part of the list is cluttered up
by such "junk" words which were probably only used once, and could be
argued if they should count as English words at all. A more meaningful
statistic should have involved frequency count, and eliminated those
below a certain threshold. But I wasn't planning to write a thesis about
the subject :).

Regards


--
Muss ich eigentlich jedesmal, wenn ich sauge oder saugblase,
vorher den Schlauchstecker in die Schlauchnut schieben?

http://www.wschwanke.de/ usenet_20031215 (AT) wschwanke (DOT) de

Mika

[email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote in message news:<[email protected]>...
    > Mika <[email protected]> wrote:
    > > [email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote:
    > >> Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:
    > >>> Miguel Cruz writes:
    > >>>> Again I would be surprised. 2000 words is really not very many at all.
    > >>>
    > >>> It's more words than were used in all the combined works of Shakespeare.
    >
    > By the way, I see here that a number of Shakespeare's works were analyzed
    > and used between 2800 and 4800 unique words:
    >
    > http://www.mta75.org/curriculum/engl...es/indexx.html
    >
    > So I am not sure how the combined works could use less than 2000.
    >
    > >> So what? The combined works of Shakespeare don't cover much ground at all.
    > >> And the language has grown tremendously since his time.
    > >>
    > >> A newspaper (the context that you snipped) touches on a wide variety of
    > >> subject areas, each with its own terminology familiar to laypeople.
    > >
    > > Just checked the book shelf. My Webster's boast 160,000 entries. I
    > > seriously doubt that anyone alive has half as many words in his active
    > > vocabulary.
    >
    > Well, what is meant by "active vocabulary"? Words that someone uses every
    > day in speech? In writing? In a typical year? In their lifetime? Words that
    > they know the meaning of? Could puzzle the meaning of from context?

"Active vocabulary" is what I consider words that I might use in
speech and in writing. Not necessarily every day.

Words that I know the meaning of, but would not ordinarily use belong
in the 'passive vocabulary'. 'Could puzzle out' is in neither
category, because it probably depends on other languages you know.

Active < passive always applies, obviously. If learning a new
language, active is much smaller than passive.

M

Mika

Deep Frayed Morgues <deepfreudmoors@eITmISaACTUALLYiREAL!l.nu> wrote in message news:<[email protected]>. ..
    > On 8 Nov 2004 19:48:32 -0800, [email protected] (Bigben)
    > wrote:
    >
    > >Most people also appreciate you making the attempt to communicate with
    > >them in their native tongue. I believe that you should always learn
    > >survival phrases before you travel. While you are indulging yourself
    > >in your beer at the local pub, take the effort to emerge yourself in
    > >the local language and talk with a local or two.
    >
    > I agree wholeheartedly, but don't always practice it. In The
    > Netherlands I don't usually bother, and also in Scandinavia and the
    > German parts of Switzerland. Anywhere that english is not extensively
    > spoken, a few basic words are very useful to have.

In the Netherlands I usually pretend to be an American! I don't know
enough about Canada to pretend otherwise ;). And my accent is
definitely not anywhere close to English.

In Austria or Switzerland I'm out of luck. In Spain they cannot really
tell, where I'm from, but don't really care.

But I always notice a definite change in attitude in Latin America. By
looks I'm a gringo and get addressed in English a lot or with 'habla
espanol'. Once I open my mouth, I can literally see them mellow and
become more friendly.

M

Markku Grönroos

"Miguel Cruz" <[email protected]> kirjoitti viestissä
news:[email protected]...
    > Well, what is meant by "active vocabulary"? Words that someone uses every
    > day in speech? In writing? In a typical year? In their lifetime? Words
that
    > they know the meaning of? Could puzzle the meaning of from context?
see the definition provided by the online Encarta

http://encarta.msn.com/dictionary_18...ocabulary.html

I suppose it is about the equal with "working vocabulary".

Devil

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 02:06:31 -0600, Miguel Cruz wrote:


    > At 4000 words? Was English only used by cavemen at that time?

Probably true?

Devil

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 12:57:36 +0000, Padraig Breathnach wrote:

    > Mxsmanic <[email protected]> wrote:
    >
    >>Icono Clast writes:
    >>> Knowing our readers in this forum are not necessarily natural
    >>> speakers of English, do we not limit our vocabulary, even if
    >>> unconsciously, to words that are likely to be understood by all, or
    >>> most, here?
    >>I don't.
    >
    > <gasp of astonishment>

???

Deep Frayed Morgues

On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 18:35:10 +0100, B Vaughan<[email protected]> wrote:

    >On Sat, 13 Nov 2004 13:24:14 GMT, "Luigi Donatello Asero"
    >>But now it is going much better, isn´t it?
    >>Ti piace l´italiano?
    >Si, molto, e adesso sono capace anche di parlare col meccanico.

Io vorrei parlare di piu Italiano qui per esercitare. Dopo quatro mesi
in nel bellpaese, posso parlare piuttosto bene, peró quando devo
scrivere, é difficile ancora.

Un bicchiere o due di vino puó aiutarmi di solito...

*hic*
---
DFM

B Vaughan

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 02:06:31 -0600, [email protected] (Miguel Cruz)
wrote:

    >B Vaughan <[email protected]> wrote:
    >> [email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote:
    >>> Wolfgang Schwanke <[email protected]> wrote:
    >>>> [email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote in
    >>>>> So what? The combined works of Shakespeare don't cover much ground at
    >>>>> all.
    >>>> Shakespeare is renowned for being extremely creative with language.
    >>> Mainly for creative twists of phrase with common words.
    >> No, many words still used today were first used in writing by
    >> Shakespeare. His vocabulary was larger than that of any other writer
    >> in English.
    >At 4000 words? Was English only used by cavemen at that time?
    >miguel

--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

B Vaughan

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 02:06:31 -0600, [email protected] (Miguel Cruz)
wrote:

    >B Vaughan <[email protected]> wrote:
    >> [email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote:
    >>> Wolfgang Schwanke <[email protected]> wrote:
    >>>> [email protected] (Miguel Cruz) wrote in
    >>>>> So what? The combined works of Shakespeare don't cover much ground at
    >>>>> all.
    >>>> Shakespeare is renowned for being extremely creative with language.
    >>> Mainly for creative twists of phrase with common words.
    >> No, many words still used today were first used in writing by
    >> Shakespeare. His vocabulary was larger than that of any other writer
    >> in English.
    >At 4000 words? Was English only used by cavemen at that time?

4000 words? Whoever said that? I've seen estimates of the number of
words used by Shakespeare in his known works that range from 18,000 to
20,000. Over 7,000 of these were used only once in all these known
works. The difference in estimates derives from different definitions
of what is a word. The lower estimate excludes inflected or derived
forms of a basic lemma. For instance, it would exclude "runner" if
"run" is also counted. The higher end excludes inflected forms, but
not derived forms. The words found in his printed works are certainly
an underestimate of his total active vocabulary. He certainly never
named in his written works all the plants, animals, household tools,
or types of clothing and food he knew.


--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

B Vaughan

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 09:48:08 +0100, Wolfgang Schwanke <[email protected]>
wrote:

    >I just tried a quick count the words of the last ~4000 articles in rte. I
    >sloppily attempted to strip headers, URLs, and numbers beforehand. I did
    >not remove MSGids and e-mail addresses, misspellings, grammatical
    >variations of the same word, personal and place names, and non-English
    >words even though all of these should not be counted. The figure should
    >give a rough estimate of the combined active vocabulary of all members of
    >this NG. The figure I got was 21.400. Allowing for the above errors, I
    >think we can safely assume 15.000 to be closer to the truth. And remember
    >it's the _combined_ vocabulary of all writers, not that of any
    >individual. The individual vocabulary of any given member is probably far
    >less.

No, I would say that none of us uses more than a fraction of our total
active vocabularies in the newsgroup. I have never (until now) had
occasion to use the word "pliers" in this newsgroup, nor most of the
words I use in my work, nor have I named most of the items in my
household, nor in my garden. Nor have I used names of various
relatives (mother-in-law, etc.), nor literary terms, nor most of the
vegetables and fruits I know.

Someone here in Italy once told me that the average Italian peasant
has a vocabulary of only about 1000 words. I would like that person to
take a walk in the fields with an average Italian peasant to see how
many things he can name that the peasant has a name for. Maybe the two
of them have 1000 words in common, but both have active vocabularies
that the other doesn't know.
--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

B Vaughan

On Sun, 14 Nov 2004 14:49:18 +0100, Wolfgang Schwanke <[email protected]>
wrote:

    >Real word, affordable, single volume dictionaries have a 5-digit figure
    >of entries (10,000 - 50,000 range or so). They don't claim to be
    >complete. Instead they focus on what people really need. Of course with
    >these "small" word lists the percentage of what common people know gets
    >better. If you can define (passive vocabulary) about half of all the
    >entries of such a dict you're probably good. But if you look at what
    >portion of these you actually use in speech or writing (active
    >vocabulary), the percentage will be much smaller.

I once saw a suggestion for a test of your vocabulary size. Open a
good desk dictionary at random. Take every word on the first four
pages that follow the page you opened and see how many of them you can
define fairly accurately. (Get some one else to test you if you're
tempted to cheat.) Count the number of total words on the four pages
and see what percent of them you knew. Then multiply that percent by
the number of words in the dictionary.

--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

B Vaughan

On 14 Nov 2004 10:34:12 GMT, [email protected] (bogus address)
wrote:

    >> many words still used today were first used in writing by Shakespeare.
    >> His vocabulary was larger than that of any other writer in English.
    >I suspect this belief just survives by the power of frequent repetition.
    >Can you point to a study that compares Shakespeare and Gibbon (or Carlyle,
    >or Browne, or T.E. Lawrence) head-on by the same criteria?

Yes I have seen counts, but I can't remember where. I believe Milton
was a distant second.
--
Barbara Vaughan
My email address is my first initial followed by my surname at libero dot it
I answer travel questions only in the newsgroup

Icono Clast

Padraig Breathnach wrote:
    > Icono Clast <[email protected]> wrote:
    >>[Uploaded this yesterday but it disappeared - 11/13/04 @ 02:33]
    >>Padraig Breathnach wrote:
    >>>We have no words for "***** off".
    >>No "Yes", no "No", and no "**** off"? How'n'ell d'y communicate?
    >
    > There is irony in the fact that your posting regarding communication
    > disappeared.

Indeed there is! But it's just one of several that suffered the same
fate.

    > To answer your question: I find that I am often misunderstood.

No surprise.
__________________________________________________ __________
Un San Francisqueño en San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

Icono Clast

Mika wrote:
    > By looks I'm a gringo

I cannot tell you why, but I seem to be regarded as a native by
locals and tourists in all of the countries I've visited except for
the predominantly Black (I'm not) Caribbean. I don't know about Asia
where I've not been.

I've often been addressed in the local, as distinct from the
national, language. I have no idea why.

It's nice to apparently be so acceptable when a foreigner.
__________________________________________________ __________
One of (as of 2003) 751,682 residents of San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net

Icono Clast

B Vaughan wrote:
    > Shakespeare . . . He certainly never named in his written works
    > all the plants, animals, household tools, or types of clothing and
    > food he knew.

There is a "Shakespeare Garden" in Golden Gate park that has plants
he mentioned.
__________________________________________________ __________
A San Franciscan in (where else?) San Francisco
http://geocities.com/dancefest/ http://geocities.com/iconoc/
ICQ: http://wwp.mirabilis.com/19098103 IClast at SFbay Net