Timeline for Can we be nicer to folks whose English isn't that great?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
9 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 11, 2020 at 13:03 | comment | added | M H | For purposes of accuracy, understandability, & readability being of most importance, and with specific factual writing of questions, answers, & instructions tending to be terse, editing mildly, to enhance understandability & readability, seems generally reasonable & helpful: eg, where appropriate, typographical adjustments, minor punctuation & capitalisation adjustments, & correction of misspelled words etc, seems adequate. | |
| Mar 29, 2018 at 6:47 | comment | added | Konerak | As a non-native speaker, I've learned a lot from people editing my questions & answers on this site. More than often I've thought "aha, that's a more elegant way to put it" or "oh, so that's how formatting works". Please just edit away, it's like free tutoring, it's helping! | |
| Mar 25, 2018 at 2:32 | comment | added | Steve Rindsberg | Sometimes I'll reply along the lines of "Let me make sure I understand the question. I think you mean {blah blah blah restating the question in better English blah blah blah}. Is that correct, or have I misunderstood you?" | |
| Mar 21, 2018 at 11:05 | comment | added | Journeyman Geek Mod | I've gone "I've had trouble parsing your post - could you {improve thing}" most recently and it went well :). | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 9:59 | comment | added | fixer1234 | @Scott, "I don't understand" doesn't say anything explicit about the poster, only yourself. "Your writing is hard to understand" is a statement about the poster that could potentially be taken defensively. Looks like somebody has been skipping PC (political correctness) training. :-) Flip side: I've seen comments saying "I don't understand...", to which the poster replied "Are you stupid? It's perfectly clear to anyone with a brain". But at least you've taken the high ground. | |
| Mar 20, 2018 at 4:21 | comment | added | Scott - Слава Україні | I guess I get frustrated by hard-to-understand posts, and I’m not sure whether I’m handling them well. I’m not clear what line you’re drawing in your last (fourth) bullet. It’s OK to say that I don’t understand what they’ve written, but not to say that their writing is hard to understand? I have suggested that people get help from a friend who knows English better than they do, or that they use Google Translate. I believe that such suggestions are constructive; are they too “aggressive”? | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 15:33 | comment | added | music2myear | Applying the Social-Media advice of "just keep scrolling" here. Nice. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 12:48 | comment | added | Journeyman Geek Mod | Yup, but if they don't flagging comments that are snippy would be nice. Also, the comments are on posts - and these are things that could/were edited. | |
| Mar 19, 2018 at 12:46 | history | answered | allquixotic | CC BY-SA 3.0 |