I wasn't thinking about the reader understanding languages the POV character doesn't, though now that you mention it, I'm wondering. Like, if we read English dialogue or the character is reading something in English, and they're like "wtf"? idk. My gut instinct is that it kind of feels like cheating, unless you're writing 3rd person omniscient, but it is not a strong gut instinct. My mind's open.
When my brother was a kid, he couldn't tell the difference between Indonesian, Sundanese, and Tagalog. He thought they were all Indonesian. Now he has a better sense for Tagalog, but still can't tell the difference between Sundanese and Indonesian, and I'm thinking now how this kind of thing goes down in a locker room, the dugout, the bench, y'know? Koji and Taz hanging out in the bullpen, and every other language kinda blurs around them, stuff like that. I think what might be one of the more interesting things of writing "stranger in a strange land" stories is that maybe we can't rely on dialogue as a storytelling tool as much, so the writer is challenged to convey information in other ways, so now I'm at the part where I'm wondering what other ways.
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When my brother was a kid, he couldn't tell the difference between Indonesian, Sundanese, and Tagalog. He thought they were all Indonesian. Now he has a better sense for Tagalog, but still can't tell the difference between Sundanese and Indonesian, and I'm thinking now how this kind of thing goes down in a locker room, the dugout, the bench, y'know? Koji and Taz hanging out in the bullpen, and every other language kinda blurs around them, stuff like that. I think what might be one of the more interesting things of writing "stranger in a strange land" stories is that maybe we can't rely on dialogue as a storytelling tool as much, so the writer is challenged to convey information in other ways, so now I'm at the part where I'm wondering what other ways.