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So quite often I find it difficult to articulate my thoughts. I suspect the reason is that I have an intuition of what I want to ask but not the vocabulary. For example or see the comments or previous versions of this.

(Can give other examples but a lot of my questions get deleted).

Can someone recommend me writing excercise that can help me articulate me thoughts?

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  • I get the impression that English is not your mother tongue and that your difficulties in expressing yourself stem from your lack of fluency. Is this correct? If so, then you don't need a writing exercise but to improve your language proficiency, especially your active vocabulary. Commented Aug 28, 2023 at 10:36
  • @user482877 wel I'm indian. India was colonized and English is prevalent for the middle class. English was spoken in my home more frequently than Hindi. Now, I'm not sure if this would be subpar to the English learned in a western society. Also I've studied physics in the uk. Either way feel free to recommend an excercise that would help? Commented Aug 28, 2023 at 10:46
  • My impression comes from the errors you make. This sentence is ungrammatical: "Are there any civilizations of written language being recorded and then the word "God" entering later in language?" Probably you wanted to ask: "Are there civilizations where the word 'God' has entered the language later than the oldest documents?" You seem to use more complicated constructions than necessary, as if you were writing around a lack of words, and sometimes your grammar is wrong. I don't know about Indian English and don't want to judge your linguistic proficiency, but that is my impression. Commented Aug 28, 2023 at 12:06
  • And no, I cannot recommend any exercises for improving linguistic skill. Maybe ask at English Language Learners, if you think that you might want to improve your English. Commented Aug 28, 2023 at 12:08

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I don't see a problem with your vocabulary.

In your two examples, you aren't clear.

In the "God" question, you don't mean "God", you mean a word for a deity. Why not just ask if all languages have a native word for a deity, or if there are any known examples of native languages that were well established before adding a word for a deity?

(Indeed, asking that, I imagine any introduced word would be derivative of the deity word in the contacted language. Just like many borrowed words for recent inventions like the computer.)

In the music question, you ask if you can transpose a piece on the piano into "noise". Shouldn't it be obvious that you cannot? Wouldn't noise be random notes played on the piano?

Nothing faithfully transposed and playable on the piano is going to be random notes. Logic should tell you that.

You need to be able to read what you write analytically. The only exercise I know for that is reading the works of others analytically, looking for alternative words or phrases that would get their point across more faithfully and more concisely.

That is mostly a reading exercise. Read professional, best selling authors, but intentionally NOT for entertainment, NOT to get immersed, but analytically, to understand how they get their points across concisely and accurately.

Readers should not have to work to understand what you are writing.

It is possible to be too concise, or too verbose. But think about your word choices. It is possible to be too vague, too imprecise, and if you are reaching for broad general words like "noise" or "sad" or "happy" or "pretty", you could probably be more precise in describing what you mean.

You need professional help. Specifically, professional authors, and the works they have written!

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  • You are contradicting yourself in your first few sentences. You say you don't see a problem with OP's vocabulary, and then you tell him the word he uses isn't the right one to convey his meaning. That seems like a problem with vocabulary to me? Commented Aug 29, 2023 at 9:11
  • @user482877 There is no contradiction. A careless word choice is not necessarily a result of a lack of vocabulary, It can just be carelessness, and not paying attention to or caring about being more precise. It can be a result of bias, like perhaps in this case, carelessly using "God" instead of "Deity" because their singular "God" is the only deity the writer believes in. Commented Aug 29, 2023 at 13:59

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