Do we count “run” the verb and “run” the noun as one word or two? What about “run” as in the long run of a play on Broadway? According to a recent NPR article, “run” has at least 645 different meanings! The simplest problem in comparing the size of different languages is inflection.ĭo we count “run”, “runs” and “ran” as three separate words? Another problem is multiple meanings. Steven Frank, the author of The Pen Commandments claims that English has 500,000 words with German having about 135,000 and French having fewer than 100,000.Ī blog post for The Economist agrees that English is rich in vocabulary, but comparisons with other languages can’t be made for several reasons. Have you heard language experts say that English has more words than other languages? The claim is made but it’s practically impossible to verify.
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