For English speaker: Are you sure you know every words in English?
This is about ‘essential’ words that we can conventionally use as our daily communication words,not some specific words such as “Narcolepsy”,“Parapodia” or such words. These words are present in our basic dictionary.
So how about you? Are you sure you’ve memorized every single words and their meaning as an English language speaker?
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44 Answers
Sure hope not! Where would be the fun in that?
Nope. The language is constantly evolving and changing. Words that weren’t words 20 years ago are now words and some of the words we were using 20 years ago are rarely used now.
Absolutely not. I don’t know that it is even possible because English is a living fluid language. There are words that are in the English language but no longer in use, do they count? What about new slang meanings common in one region but not yet wide spread? Besides, it is simply too big. Are you talking about American English, British English, etc?
While it is possible to memorize a dictionary, that same dictionary will be updated and revised. And no one dictionary contains the entire language.
Of course not. I consider myself to be functionally literate, perhaps even at an above-average level, but there are far too many words in our language for anyone to be exhaustively fluent.
Gracious, no! This is why I keep a dictionary close at hand and an online dictionary open when using the computer. When I start to use a word and wonder if I would really be using it properly, out comes the dictionary.
Just wondering @Doctor_D , do you know every word in your native language dictionary?
I have a whole collection of really thick dictionaries.
they are good to start fires in the winter
Words? Which words?
I most certainly don’t. I know enough to carry on meaningful English conversations though, and that’s good enough for me. :) (English is my first language, so i know a fair enough amount).
No. I’ve listed thousands of words I don’t know in a notebook and am working my way through learning them. And by the time they’re finished there will be thousands more.
There’s well over 700,000 words in English, not including the latest neologisms, so I’m gonna say no, I don’t. I do have an OED on my iPhone, though.
@Doctor_D did you actually think someones answer was going to be yes?
I read that back in the 1960’s, there were about 625,000 English words, although I guess there are now about 700,000.
According to “Ripley’s Believe It Or Not”, Shakespeare only knew about 25,000 of them.
I only know a few of them, so therefore I don’t expect non-native English users to know that many either.
The abstract to this paper suggests that the average adult ‘base’ vocabulary – that is words that are not derivatives of other words – is about 17,000 items.
As the authors point out: how do you define “word”?
No, but I am working on memorizing all the Greek and Latin root words so that I can better break down I do not already know. It’s incredibly silly to expect someone to memorize every word in the English language (whether they are a native speaker or not.) Besides, I like “discovering” words. Why rob myself of future treasures?
Not even close. I’ve built a nice vocabulary over the years after reading tons of books and I’m quite articulate when I want and need to be but there is no way I’ll ever learn all the words in the English language. Especially considering how many words we actually have in the English language as demonstrated below:
English is arguably the largest language by number of words; the Oxford English Dictionary lists 500,000 words, not including technical and scientific terms.
No. I am learn new words everyday. I love it. I speak good English. Sometimes I don’t spell it all that well.
I’m wondering what your motivation in asking this is.
@JilltheTooth Sorry if I reply too late (got to do something). I dare to say that I know 95% of my language vocabulary. The other 5% are something not everyone will know since Indonesia people are diverse people (e.g. We call “Snail” as “Siput” in Javanese islands but Sumatran people will call it “Bekicot”,both are acceptable and mean the same thing). Our people also adopt their own ‘native’ language beside the national language,and each of the specific language are native to certain people/in certain places. The basic vocabulary of Indonesian language/Bahasa didn’t go through such revitalization/revision like English or other language. Most international words are specific words and the adding of these words to our language are inevitable. I clearly understand my native language and very good at using it for various level.
@daytonamisticrip Who know? I didn’t expect yes or no in my question. I want to hear your personal experience.
@janbb Should I have a motivation for all my question? I want to learn about people here,especially people out there,which are usually more sophisticated than my people about their ability to use their own language,especially English. Although I believe the result could be different from one person to another person.
I don’t think anyone knows all the words.
I’ve never heard anyone make such a claim.
Pretty sure I know essential words for daily communication, yes. She didn’t ask if anyone knew every word.
NO WAY! IM LOST AND DONT quite understand the pre-IB
I know all the words essential for day to day life yes. I would consider myself to have a fairly large vocabulary and sure I dont know all the words but I am quite good at figuring out a words meaning from context clues, but thats not really what this question asks. It just asks if you know the essentials. Which everyone in this thread seems to be missing.
Yeah, i think i know… all the English words .
No indeed, not at all. And I never will.
Most of the large English lexicon consists of specialized vocabulary such as terms in medicine, aeronautics, botany, etc. Most of us don’t know those words unless we have studied or work in those fields.
There are many common and familiar words that I’ve never had occasion to look up because I know what they mean, how to say them, and how to spell them. A lot of reading helps with this. Yet sometimes I do get a surprise when I have occasion to research them: they may have a different shade of meaning from what I thought or have legitimate uses that I believed were wrong.
I add new English words to my vocabulary fairly often. I’ve learned some of them right here. I also like to browse the dictionary just to see what’s there.
@Jeruba : Imagine my embarrassment when I realized that “repudiate” didn’t mean “vomit” many years ago. I’m more diligent now about researching interesting words before I use them in conversation. :-)
@JilltheTooth “Oh my goodness, that fish was so terrible, I had to excuse myself to repudiate.” I LOVE IT!!!
@JilltheTooth, one or two of those experiences do teach a memorable lesson to those who are wary enough. I came home one evening after one of my first working days as a teenager and announced to my mother that I was ravished. She reacted in shock to my news that I had been raped, whereas I just meant to tell her that I had a hearty appetite for supper.
Hehehe, “Oh the big brute famished me!”
@Jeruba: Thanks for that! It would make a good question, no? Others must do this…
I hope you sought help after that brutal hunger pang!
No, it don’t even believe it is possible. However, I always score 100 on “it pays to increase your word power” in the Reader’s Digest Magazine, and I usually score around 60 on Freerice.com before I move on to other games.
@AstroChuck knows all the words that can be known and I know the rest.
The Second Edition of the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary contains full entries for 171,476 words in current use, and 47,156 obsolete words. To this may be added around 9,500 derivative words included as subentries. Over half of these words are nouns, about a quarter adjectives, and about a seventh verbs; the rest is made up of exclamations, conjunctions, prepositions, suffixes, etc. And these figures don’t take account of entries with senses for different word classes (such as noun and adjective).
This suggests that there are, at the very least, a quarter of a million distinct English words, excluding inflections, and words from technical and regional vocabulary not covered by the OED, or words not yet added to the published dictionary, of which perhaps 20 per cent are no longer in current use. If distinct senses were counted, the total would probably approach three quarters of a million.
Source: The fucking amazing Oxford Dictionary. Here, but then, you’ll never read it
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