There’s no such thing as “a training”. You either receive training – a general, uncountable noun – or take a training course.
Tag Archives: dunglish
The prevention of longwindedness
Dutch writers love the structure “the + (verbal noun) + of” where English prefers the gerund: “preventing longwindedness”.
“How to” isn’t a question
The word “hoe” and a verb in the infinitive can be used in Dutch to fomulate a short and snappy question. The same structure in English describes a set of instructions.
The minefield of academic titles
People are naturally very proud of their academic achievements and titles and want them stated in their communications. But it’s not as trivial as it might seem.
Overdoing short sentences
Dutch people like short sentences. More and more often nowadays. Very modern. Makes it impactful. Easy to write, surely?
Joined-up writing
Backoffice. Accountmanager. Two English words glued together, used as a compound in Dutch. Which doesn’t make it correct in English!
…he said (ten lines later).
Open quotes. Someone’s talking. Who? For a while. OK: who? More but from whom? Finally: close quotes at the end of the paragraph and we learn who said it.
Insights… preferably not.
One of the worst offenders in the list of words overused by Dutch authors, because ‘inzicht’ is hugely more common.
Different from what?
If you can answer that, “verschillende” can be translated as “different”. Otherwise, “various” is often the better solution.
Surname prefixes
Dutch surnames often have prefixes (van, van der, de, ter, etc.) and are alphabetized by the remainder, which stops half the phone book being listed under V.
Advanced Dunglish 