|
![](/i/fill.gif) |
And lo On Mon, 19 Jan 2009 19:08:51 -0000, Orchid XP v8 <voi### [at] dev null>
did spake thusly:
> Darren New wrote:
>> Invisible wrote:
>>> Already seen it. (Why do you think I picked that example?) I'm still
>>> wondering just how large a typical vocabulary is. I'm guessing tens of
>>> thousands of words, roughly.
>> Probably.
>> An easier measure is "how many different words show up in a large
>> newspaper over the course of a year". The answer there, I've heard, is
>> around 8000-10000 words.
>> Counting words in a dictionary seems the wrong way to go.
>
> I did do an experiment where I picked a random page from the dictionary
> and read the first word off it. It took a *loooong* time before I came
> across a word I didn't already clearly recognise.
And perhaps that's a good way of measuring vocabulary, or relative
vocabulary at least - give a disparately educated group a book written for
a particular age bracket and ask them to make a note of each word they
didn't understand. That would eliminate the climb, climbs, climbing count
and distinguish the unpossible from the igneous.
--
Phil Cook
--
I once tried to be apathetic, but I just couldn't be bothered
http://flipc.blogspot.com
Post a reply to this message
|
![](/i/fill.gif) |