Ursäkta språket… Oh sorry! I meant, excuse the language…

I got inspired when reading Chiini’s blog post. Language is such a big part of how we, as humans, express ourselves. A big part of it is, of course, what words we use: swearing, simple vocabulary, advanced vocabulary, relaxed, posh, tone, you name it and it is definitely a factor in how we present ourselves. But another factor is which language we speak: English, Swedish, Dutch, Chinese, Polish, or really any language at all.

All of these things factor into how others perceive us when we speak, people constantly look at these factors to interpret what is happening around them. Do I understand the language? What vocabulary are they using? What tone?

For people that communicate in a language that is not their native tongue, there is also the factor of forgetting words, stuttering while looking for a word or an expression, and directly translating something that then makes no sense in the language it is translated to.

I am thinking that it would be interesting to play around with these things to see if an AI or a robot would be perceived as more human-like if it has varied tones, different types of vocabulary depending on topic, or if it has an accent and tends to forget or mix up words as someone who is bilingual often does.