> masticate
I haven't heard this word since my SAT-prep classes. It means "chew". In case there are English-2nd language people here.
I haven't heard this word since my SAT-prep classes. It means "chew". In case there are English-2nd language people here.
There's an interesting -- understandable but very wrong -- viewpoint that the right way to form sentences that a second-language speaker can understand is to talk in the way you might talk to a toddler.
Reality is pretty much the opposite. A toddler has perfect grasp of their language's grammar and is likely to know common words, less likely to know uncommon words. For best results, you'd communicate with a toddler using complex sentences and "easy" vocabulary.
A foreign learner has a much shakier grasp of the grammar and may have a pretty spotty vocabulary. But they're also likely to have a dictionary. And uncommon words are much easier to understand, given a dictionary, than common words are. The fact that they're uncommon means they don't have the wide variety of meanings and usages[1] that common words do. For best results, you'd communicate with a foreigner using simple sentences and "difficult" vocabulary.
[1] For reference, here are the ABC dictionary glosses for the very common Mandarin word 做:
1. make; produce
2. cook; prepare (food)
3. do; act; engage in
4. be; become
5. write; compose
6. celebrate
7. be used as
8. form/contract a relationship
9. pretend; feign
10. (slang) make love
11. play tricks to punish somebody
> It's the usual way you would explain the action to someone else.
How exactly are you contrasting these? Which words do you think toddlers are likely to know?
For example, "hi, how are you?" Is something you could say to an adult or a child. It's not "speaking to someone like they are a child" though.
Does that make sense?
> For example, "hi, how are you?" Is something you could say to an adult or a child. It's not "speaking to someone like they are a child" though.
The example we have here is more along these lines:
A: Salutations!
A: Oh, I'm sorry -- I meant, "how are you?"
This is an example of speaking to someone like they are a child. You come out with a natural (for you)[1] word choice, and then pre-emptively decide your interlocutor can't handle it, so you adjust to something you believe is simpler. You are speaking differently than you would normally.
[1] http://www.basicinstructions.net/basic-instructions/2009/1/2...
A somewhat related phenomenon is that many fancy words in European languages have Latin or Greek roots, so foreign language speakers can correlate with a similar word in their own language, or, for those of us who wasted some of our youth on this, may even be familiar with the word in the original language.
1. 玩儿；做游戏
2. 扮演；表演
3. 演奏
4. 开玩笑；玩弄
5. 上映；上演
6. 放音
7. 闪动；飘动
8. 发生影响
9. 赌博
"Mastigar" => To chew in pt-br