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How Hard is it to Conquer Scrabble in Another Language? : Blog Excerpts : Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus
<html xmlns:vcom xmlns:vtcom> <head> <title>How Hard is it to Conquer Scrabble in Another Language? : Blog Excerpts : Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus</title> <meta name="keywords" content="Fun,Language" /> <meta name="description" content="Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus: Blog Excerpts - When English-language Scrabble champ Nigel Richards, who does not speak French, won a French-language Scrabble championship, analysts rushed to analyze how much memorization that actually entailed. Ben Zimmer explains that to get a full understanding of Richards' achievement, a simple counting of words in the dictionary only gives a partial picture." /> <meta name="author" content ="Thinkmap, Inc." /> <meta name="ROBOTS" content="NOARCHIVE" /> <meta name="GOOGLEBOT" content="NOODP,NOARCHIVE" /> <link href="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/css/base-9v1thl.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" > <link href="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/css/subpage-130ykl9.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" > <link href="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/css/print-dao9t3.css" rel="stylesheet" media="print" type="text/css" > <script src="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/js/module-1ypv52v.js" type="text/javascript" ></script> <script>Module.use(['base','vtcom/vtloader/vtloader']);</script> <link href="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/css/story-1dk6xuz.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" > <link href="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/favicon-dos9ku.ico" rel="shortcut icon" > <style type="text/css"> @font-face { font-family: din-regular; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb.eot"); } @font-face { font-family: din-regular; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb.woff") format("woff"); } @font-face { font-family: din-medium; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb-Medium.eot"); } @font-face { font-family: din-medium; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb-Medium.woff") format("woff"); } @font-face { font-family: din-bold; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb-Bold.eot"); } @font-face { font-family: din-bold; src: url("/fonts/DINWeb-Bold.woff") format("woff"); } </style> </head> <body class="subpage article home"> <div id="rootContainer"> <div id="root"> <div id="vtsContainer"></div> <div id="pageHeader"> <div id="headerBar" class="png"> <a href="/"><img src="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/images/common/header/logo-icon-4n9afg.png" width="40" id="vtLogoIcon" class="png" height="40" ></a> <a href="/"><img src="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/images/common/header/logo-npghhk.png" width="202" alt="Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus" id="vtLogo" class="png" height="38" ></a> </div> <div id="headerSpacer"></div> <div id="navTop"><ul> <li class=" selected"><a href="/">HOME</a></li> <li class=""><a href="/howitworks/">HOW IT WORKS</a></li> <li class=""><a href="/store/">SUBSCRIBE</a></li> <li class=""><a href="/praise/">PRAISE</a></li> <li class=""><a href="/sales/">INSTITUTIONAL SALES</a></li> <li class=""><a href="/educators/">EDUCATORS</a></li> <li class="last "><a href="/support/">SUPPORT</a></li> </ul><div class="clearer"></div></div> </div> <div id="pageBody"><table id="mainTable" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0"> <tr> <td id="leftContent"> </td> <td id="centerContent"><div id="pageContent"> <div class="story"> <div class="header"> <a href="/cm/blogexcerpts/"><h2 class="webfont sectionname">Blog Excerpts</h2></a> <h1 class="headline">How Hard is it to Conquer Scrabble in Another Language?</h1> <div class="dateline">August 6, 2015</div> </div> <div class="body"><div class="image"><img src="https://d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/articles/blogexcerpts/how-hard-is-it-to-conquer-scrabble-in-another-language/home.jpg?v=iczqnerp" class=""/></div> <p>The only thing crazier than Scrabble mega-champion <a href="http://www.stuff.co.nz/sunday-star-times/features/3778594/A-way-with-words">Nigel Richards</a>, who competes in English, setting out to win his latest championship in French? The fact that he pulled it off.</p> <p>Richards' achievement stunned language analysts and the entire Scrabble community, who were quick to point out that Richards didn't even begin studying the French Scrabble dictionary until nine weeks before the tournament.</p> <p>Top Scrabble competitor <a href="https://www.facebook.com/notes/10153488502414339/?pnref=story">Andrew Fisher</a> likened Richard's achievement it to “Roger Federer deciding to take up badminton, and then winning the BWF world title a couple of months later," while <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/dear-nigel-richards-please-try-romanian-scrabble/">Five Thirty Eight</a>'s Oliver Roeder compared Scrabble dictionaries across languages to demonstrate that learning all the French Scrabble words (386,000) was even harder than a French player's learning Scrabble words in English (about 200,000); he also pointed out that Romanian and Italian, at 500,000+ words each, would be the hardest of all.</p> <p>Now, our own <a href="/cm/contributors/10">Ben Zimmer</a>, writing for <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/lexicon_valley/2015/08/05/international_scrabble_the_size_of_the_dictionary_depends_on_how_words_get.html">Slate</a>, adds to Roeder's analysis, explaining that "while these foreign-language Scrabble dictionaries may indeed have larger totals of playable words compared to English, they only reach those gaudy numbers because of how basic 'root' words get inflected in those languages." </p> <blockquote> <p>Let’s first consider English. On the linguistic spectrum from “analytic” to “synthetic,” English is more analytic than many other European languages, meaning that its morphology isn’t as reliant on inflection. We can make a noun plural, typically by adding “-s.” We can mark the tense of a verb by adding “-s,” “-ed,” or “-ing” (except for irregular verbs, where the inflection is trickier). And some adjectives (mostly consisting of one or two syllables) have comparative and superlative forms marked with “-er” and “-est” respectively.</p> <p>That’s about it when it comes to English inflection, though. (We also form adverbs out of adjectives by adding “-ly,” but linguists treat that as morphological derivation instead of inflection, since it changes the word’s part of speech, unlike how we mark nouns for number or verbs for tense.)</p> <p>When Nigel Richards was conquering the French Scrabble dictionary, he had to pay a lot more attention to inflection.</p> </blockquote> <p>Find out how the role of inflection would affect would-be Scrabble champions around the world <a href="http://www.slate.com/blogs/lexicon_valley/2015/08/05/international_scrabble_the_size_of_the_dictionary_depends_on_how_words_get.html">here</a>.</p> </div> </div> <div class="topics"> <h5 class="webfont related">Article Topics:</h5> <div> <a href="/topics/Fun/" title="Read other articles about Fun">Fun,</a> <a href="/topics/Language/" title="Read other articles about Language">Language</a> </div> </div> <a class="otherarticles" href="/cm/blogexcerpts/">Click here to read more articles from Blog Excerpts.</a> <div class="hr"><hr/></div> </div></td> <td id="rightContent"><img src="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/images/sectionheads/blogexcerpts-1q6drf3.jpg" class="pagehead" > <div class="module picks"> <h5 class="webfont related">Editor's Picks:</h5> <div> <div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/wordroutes/a-heart-stopping-finish-in-2015-crossword-showdown/">A Heart-Stopping Finish in the 2015 Crossword Showdown</a> <div> <span class="dateline">March 30, 2015</span> </div> </div> <div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/dogeared/in-dictionary-battle-scrabblers-become-squabblers/">In Dictionary Battle, Scrabblers Become Squabblers</a> <div> <span class="dateline">September 15, 2011</span> </div> </div> <div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/dogeared/how-a-carpenter-set-a-scrabble-record-or-did-he/">How a Carpenter Set a Scrabble Record (Or Did He?)</a> <div> <span class="dateline">September 13, 2011</span> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="module topics"> <h5 class="webfont related">Other articles about:</h5> <div> <div class="topic"> <h6><a href="/topics/Fun/">Fun:</a></h6> <div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/evasive/predictive-human-balderdash-and-other-managed-malarkey/">Predictive Human Balderdash and Other Managed Malarkey</a> <div> <span class="dateline">May 12, 2022</span> </div> </div><div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/evasive/very-spatial-and-capable-lethal-aid/">Very Spatial and Capable Lethal Aid</a> <div> <span class="dateline">February 10, 2022</span> </div> </div> </div> <div class="topic"> <h6><a href="/topics/Language/">Language:</a></h6> <div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/ll/metaphors-we-live-by-updated/">Metaphors We Live By (Updated)</a> <div> <span class="dateline">March 3, 2022</span> </div> </div><div class="shortlisting"> <a class="articleLink" href="/cm/candlepwr/brand-names-of-the-year-for-2021/">Brand Names of the Year for 2021</a> <div> <span class="dateline">December 16, 2021</span> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div></td> </tr> </table></div> <div id="pageFooter"> <a target="_blank" href="http://www.thinkmap.com" class="thinkmapButton" ><img src="//d1r3b8xpnlyvar.cloudfront.net/images/common/thinkmapfooter-ceqlbg.gif" width="95" height="35" ></a> <div class="bottomNav"> <a href="/aboutus/">About Us</a> <a href="/affiliates/">Become an Affiliate</a> <a href="/licensing/">Technology Licensing</a> <a href="/contributors/">Contributors</a> <a href="/support/contactus/">Contact Us</a> <span class="copyright">Copyright ©1998-2024 Thinkmap, Inc. 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