fakewookie Wrote:

gombost Wrote:In my experience, there are topics where English, German and Hungarian have much more words than the other two (and probably the same is true for Japanese but I have only learnt some 2000 words so far).

What are some examples of topics in which one of English, German or Hungarian has more words than the other two?

As for Japanese: Buddhism

Sorry, maybe topic wasn't the right word. I meant the same as pudding cat:

pudding cat Wrote:It's not really a topic, but English has a lot of collective nouns. I don't speak German or Hungarian but I did try out whether they have a similar number and I haven't been able to find anything. I'm pretty sure Japanese doesn't have them.

This is a very good example. Hungarian and German are not even close.

Hungarian has more words for expressing movement than any other language I know:
araszol. avázik. baktat. ballag. bandukol. battyog. caplat. csámpázik. csoszog. dzsal. dzsalózik. flangál. grasszál. húz. jár. járkál. kacsázik. korzózik. kullog. lépdel. lépked. lézeng. mászkál. megy. omol. poroszkál. sasszézik. sétál. slattyog. slisszol. surran. szambázik. tekereg. tipeg. tiplizik. trappol. totyog. ámbolyog. barangol. biceg. bódorog. bóklászik. bolyog. bolyong. botladozik. botorkál. cabol. csabrakol. csámborog. csámbókol. csángál. császkál. csatangol. cselleng. kalandozik. kavarog. kerengél. kóborol. kódorog. kóricál. koslat. kószál. kóvályog. lófrál. lopódzik. lõdörög. nyestet. nyüslet. oldalog. oson. ólálkodik. ődöng. őgyeleg. sertepertél. somfordál. sündörög. támolyog. téblábol. ténfereg. tévelyeg. tilinkózik. topog. toporog. vándorol. cammog. kutyagol. vánszorog. lopakodik. settenkedik. sompolyog.
These words mean to go or move around but each has a different manner and mood. And there are more.

And for example Japanese has far more onomatopoeia than English, German or Hungarian. じろじろ, きらきら, ぎらぎら, どきどき (edit: this is actually 擬音語, sorry), ぺらぺら, ぐずぐず, ぴょんぴょん, うつらうつら and these are only a few examples of 擬態語, there are much much more and there are also 擬音語.

I think the problem with trying to compare the amount of words a language has, especially in English, is when words are borrowed from other languages. Look at the word "tsunami" Japanese in origin, but I hear it far more often that tidalwave. It's even in the dictionary. Does that make it an English word?

Besides, words are words and the more you know the better. There is no such thing as too many words.

...I think all this has been said really...

If you wanted to exclude loanwords, English would have very few words indeed. Pretty much just the original stuff of Germanic origin (which makes up less than 20% of common vocab iirc).

Jarvik7 Wrote:If you wanted to exclude loanwords, English would have very few words indeed. Pretty much just the original stuff of Germanic origin (which makes up less than 20% of common vocab iirc).

I think considering loan words to not be part of the language is misguided. Is マンション not a japanese word because it's derived from the english word mansion? Really? Even though its meaning doesn't even match the english word?

There's a difference between someone using words from another language in the middle of an english sentence (we do this all the time at work) and someone using an english word derived from a word in another language. That difference is whether or not a speaker not familiar with the language the word was borrowed from knows the word. I knew the word tsunami when i was a kid, before i knew any japanese, before i even knew it was *from* japanese. My dictionary says it's been in the language for over 100 years. To claim it's not an english word is just silly.

My criteria is always that if you can find it in a 国語 dictionary it's a word in that language. So "tsunami", "sushi", and "kimono" are English words whereas "zarusoba" is not -- although with food items and such the line is harder to draw because if someone wanted to talk about zarusoba in English, they would probably use that term even if they didn't know Japanese beyond food.