English: A Useful Tool, but Is It Enough?

English as a second language has become essential in today’s world. But there are times when you would just love to use your own language.

“She is really…” I stop myself mid-sentence, unable to proceed, while glancing at my friends, searching for the perfect adjective. Friendly? Not quite. Nice? Too general. Likeable? Well, she’s also that. Charming, amiable, delightful? Yes, but also… no!

“Simpatica!”

That’s the word. It embodies all of those terms and none of them at the same time. It’s irreplaceable and inimitable, just like she is: no English word could describe exactly what I mean.

More than once I’ve found myself stuck while chatting with my international friends — not because I lacked the English vocabulary, but because no translation could capture the exact nuance and emphasis of my native tongue.

At an event I recently attended, Beppe Severgnini, a famous Italian journalist who has spent much of his career navigating between Italian and English-speaking cultures, argued that “Nowadays, good English isn’t enough. We need excellent English.” ¹ According to him, we should aim for a level of fluency that allows us to express ourselves as effortlessly as we do in our mother tongue — whether for studying, socialising, or joking around.

Listening to his speech, a question that has been puzzling me for several months resurfaced: “But is knowing English really enough?”

At university, surrounded by people from all over the world, I soon realised that I wasn’t the only one facing this struggle. While mastering English is essential, some expressions simply lack a direct equivalent: they  are unique to particular languages. It’s not that they are inherently non-translatable; by using a periphrasis or a whole sentence, you can clarify what you wish to express. However, in this process, the original impact is lost.

Let’s take Italian, for instance. If you are an international student in Italy, you’ve certainly met Italians unable to hide their true nature. Sorry, not sorry: even the best online translator cannot always come to your rescue. There are idioms and terms closely tied to our culture that reflect how we think and act. They are like little treasures, mirroring a precise idea or gesture.

I, for one, tend to overuse “boh“, a versatile interjection accompanied by a little shrug, which comes in handy most of the time. Depending on the tone and context, dictionaries translate it as “I don’t know”, “No idea” or “Who knows?” — but for an Italian, it carries far more expressive weight. To my great astonishment, I found out that this tiny magic word is particularly characteristic of Italian speech, making it meaningless to many foreigners. How is that possible? What a terrible life without it!

Another expression that I love, and that truly reveals the Italian mentality, is “abbiocco”. It indicates the heavy post-lunch drowsiness — the perfect state of body and mind that tempts you to skip your afternoon lecture for a nap on the couch. There is no single English word that captures everything this term conveys. And if someone claims otherwise by proposing “food coma”, they are lying to you.

It’s not only single words that preserve this cultural richness. Entire idioms can show how a community sees the world, too. Language develops alongside a population’s history, and each one is a universe unto itself, taking us on a journey through other places, other lives, other truths.

For example, in English there is a special idiomatic expression to indicate something incomprehensible: “It’s all Greek to me”. Instead of Greek, Italians would say “Arabic” or, sometimes, “Chinese”. Imagine how fascinating it was to discover that numerous countries have a similar idiom, each pointing to a different language: Turks say “Chinese”, Israelis say “Gibberish”, Persians “Japanese”, and so on… An interesting cross-cultural parallel!

Unfortunately, English can’t always be of help when it comes to our deepest feelings either. Going through the pages of  Tutte le Parole del Mondo: Dizionario delle Emozioni Intraducibili (All the Words of the World: Dictionary of the Untranslatable Emotions), written by Iacopo Melio², I caught a glimpse of a landscape of wonderful terms that exist only in some languages. Unusual, rare or highly specific, they describe subtle concepts or sensations that many of us experience but can rarely name.

Among the countless examples that touched my heart, one was μεράκι (meraki), a Greek word of Turkish origin that perfectly represents my feelings when working for this magazine: it means “doing something with soul, creativity and love”, really putting a piece of yourself into it. This term is like a small window onto another culture, and a word-for-word translation falls short of capturing its linguistic deepness.

English is extraordinarily useful as a common language – it allows us to connect with almost everybody across the globe. However, there will be times when being able to switch to this second language may be insufficient.  That’s not to say our command of it isn’t good enough or up to the task. Sometimes, English itself isn’t enough: it can’t cover every semantic field with the same precision, tone, and cultural density.

Each language, in fact, carves up reality in its own way. Perhaps, then, the answer lies in not forcing everything into English. And, why not? Maybe we could enrich our linguistic repertoire by adopting foreign expressions. In this way, by sharing unique words with one another, we could build deeper emotional connections and see the world through new eyes, grasping emotional shades we weren’t previously aware of.

Elisabetta Vittoria Caiazzo

References

1 Beppe Severgnini’s remarks at the 10^th anniversary of Berchet’s Cambridge International School, Liceo Berchet, 23 September 2026.

2 Iacopo Melio, “Tutte le parole del mondo: dizionario delle emozioni intraducibili”, Giunti, 21 Ottobre 2025.