Do you mean 'sniglets'? I was sent this link in a topic I brought up a while back; http://www.alphadictionary.com/fun/sniglets.html If a word is a word when one other person understands it then most families and groups of friends have developed some language that has meaning only within their partic...

While asking around, Vanda , could you also inquire about how that « -sen » in the query you mention above is written ? I suspect the query to be «男人 ?女人 ?» (in pinyin , « nanren ? nüren ?», but don't remember Taiwanese pronouncing «人» as « sen » during my brief visit to the island more than two de...

Hi Henri, I haven't studied Chinese formally, I just lived in Taiwan for three years and picked the language up. I can speak but can't read or write much (yet). There's a difference in the written characters to be sure but in speech it's impossible to tell whether the'ta' in question is male or fema...

Thanks again for all the interesting replies. Henri - Thanks for the welcome, I'm really happy to have found this place. Complicated things all those family connections. I know in Vietnam also they have a squillion and one different names to call all their friends and relations, it seems they've cat...

Thanks, everyone. Interesting bunch of replies to come back to. Garzo - I agree these things are subjective but although it may be possible to translate most everything what I'm interested in are those words which sum up an idea or philosophy which don't exist in a single English word and therefore ...

Hi everyone, may I ply your multilingual minds for a moment? I'm looking for lexical gaps in English; holes that exist in the language because the concept doesn't exist or isn't recognised in an English speaking mind. A simple example is the lack of a 'bon appetit' or encouragement to enjoy a meal i...