Montag, August 21, 2006

 

english

I found out today that there is not much difference between squeal and squeak. If I missed some essential differences, please inform me. I learned the word vile, which together with minging and rancid gives me the perfect ability to describe things I never wanted to see. As non-native it is still difficult to figure out if there are significant differences between vile, minging and rancid, but maybe someone of you out there can help.
And last but not least we had a very technical discussion about rug, carpet, fur and fleece. So hair on the animal is fur, taken off and worn or carried around is fleece and put on the floor is rug. I always thought English is a very simplistic language, where you miss a lot of words. There are so many things where in languages like German, Spanish or French you would have 3-5 words to describe different stages or slight differences. And then there is this carpet, rug, fleece, fur thing where English starts to be precise. Really funny odd.

Comments:
I also keep missing words in English that we do have in my native Dutch. Though no, it is not true that Dutch has 100 different words for weed. (I think:)

Then again, English has perfect words we do not have, like "esemplastic" (to mold different ideas and concepts into unity) and today I learned this word "pollicitation" (puh-lis-i-TAY-shuhn) which is a promise or an offer made but not yet accepted. I love learning words that you can never use as not even the natives will understand them.
 
Squeal: aaaaaaah or eeeeeeh.
Squeak: Eeeeeeek!!
Onomatopoeia - the formation of a word from a sound associated with what it is named, such as click. Squeak, and squeal to an extent, is much like that. Subtle yet distinct difference.
 
squeak is more high pitched than squeal. A mouse squeaks, but a dog might squeal if you tread on its tail.
 
Vile and minging are two of my favourite words!!

The others have explained the differences between squeak and squeal better than I ever could!
 
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