Reading from Eva Hoffman’s excellent book “Lost in Translation: A Life in a New Language”, I came across this passage and had to share it:

"When my friend Penny tells me that she’s envious, or happy, or disappointed, I try laboriously to translate not from English to Polish but from the word back to its source, to the feeling from which it springs. Already, in that moment of strain, spontaneity of response is lost. And anyway, the translation doesn’t work. I don’t know how Penny feels when she talks about envy. The word hangs in a Platonic stratosphere, a vague prototype of all envy, so large, so all-encompassing that it might crush me - as might disappointment or happiness.

I am becoming a living avatar of structuralist wisdom; I cannot help knowing that words are just themselves. But it’s a terrible knowledge, without any of the consolations that wisdom usually brings. It does not mean that I’m free to play with words at my wont; anyway, words in their naked state are surely among the least satisfactory play objects. No, this radical disjoining between word and thing is a desiccating alchemy, draining the world not only of significance but of its colors, striations, nuances - its very existence. It is the loss of a living connection.

The worst losses come at night. As I lie down in a strange bed in a strange house - my mother is a sort of housekeeper here, to the aging Jewish man who has taken us in in return for her services - I wait for that spontaneous flow of inner language which used to be my nighttime talk with myself, my way of informing the ego where the id had been. Nothing comes. Polish, in a short time, has atrophied, shriveled from sheer uselessness. Its words don’t apply to my new experiences; they’re not coeval with any of the objects, or faces, or the very air I breathe in the daytime. In English, words have not penetrated to those layers of my psyche from which a private conversation could proceed. This interval before sleep used to be the time when my mind became both receptive and alert, when images and words rose up to consciousness, reiterating what had happened during the day, adding the day’s experiences to those already stored there, spinning out the thread of my personal story.

Now, this picture-and-word show is gone; the thread has been snapped. I have no interior language, and without it, interior images - those images through which we assimilate the external world, through which we take it in, love it, make it our own - become blurred too. My mother and I met a Canadian family who live down the block today. They were working in their garden and engaged us in a conversation of the the “Nice weather we’re having, isn’t it?” variety, which culminated in their inviting us into their house. They sat stiffly on their couch, smiled in the long pauses between the conversation, and seemed at a loss for what to ask. Now my mind gropes for some description of them, but nothing fits. They’re a different species from anyone I’ve met in Poland, and Polish words slip off of them without sticking. English words don’t hook on to anything. I try, deliberately, to come up with a few. Are these people pleasant or dull? Kindly or silly? The words float in an uncertain space. They come up from a part of my brain in which labels may be manufactured but which has no connection to my instincts, quick reactions, knowledge. Even the simplest adjectives sow confusion in my mind; English kindliness has a whole system of morality behind it, a system that makes “kindness” an entirely positive virtue. Polish kindness has the tiniest element of irony. Besides, I’m beginning to feel the tug of prohibition, in English, against uncharitable words. In Polish, you can call someone an idiot without particularly harsh feelings and with the zest of a strong judgment. Yes, in Polish these people might tend toward “silly” and “dull” - but I force myself toward “kindly” and “pleasant.” The cultural unconscious is beginning to exercise its subliminal influence.

The verbal blur covers these people’s faces, their gestures with a sort of fog. I can’t translate them into my mind’s eye. The small event, instead of being added to the mosaic of consciousness and memory, falls through some black hole, and I fall with it. What has happened to me in this new world? I don’t know. I don’t see what I’ve seen, don’t comprehend what’s in front of me. I’m not filled with language anymore, and I have only a memory of fullness to anguish me with the knowledge that, in this dark and empty state, I don’t really exist."

Lingua Globa: How English Became 'Globish'

mp3 link

American and English

From wordsmith.org:

Recently I visited London to attend a wedding. The bride had graduated from

Oxford, and among the invitees were some of her fellow graduates and a

professor. During the long ceremony, we intermittently chatted about London

weather, Gordon Brown, Queen Lizzie, and language.

Among other things, we talked about the differences between British and

American English. I recalled reading about the inroads American English

is making even in the UK, so I decided to carry out an experiment to find

to what extent American English had "corrupted" English English.

I told them that sometimes the British write certain numerals (e.g. 1 and 7)

differently from how they're written in the US, and asked them to write a

short sentence so I could see if there were other differences in the script.

I quickly thought of a sentence for them to write:

"Her favorite flavors were in the gray catalog, she realized."

I said it aloud and the five Oxonians and the Oxford don kindly wrote it down

on their napkins (serviettes). I collected the napkins and then told them about

the experiment ‑‑ it had nothing to do with handwriting. In reality, that

sentence had five words that could be written with American or British

spellings (favorite/favourite, flavor/flavour, gray/grey, catalog/catalogue

realize/realise).

Of the six people who participated in the experiment, three spelled (spelt)

everything the British way. The other three had one or more words spelled in

American English.

What does this experiment prove? Not much, according to my 12‑year‑old

daughter, "Your sample size is too small."

Language, by its very definition, is a vehicle of exchange. A language means

nothing in a vacuum. When two people share, they give and take, though the

movement is not always equal in both directions. The US export of movies,

television, music, books, technology, etc. includes something that travels

under the radar: Language.

Will American English take over the other Englishes? Probably not. Will the

English language diverge into distinct languages just as Latin turned into

French, Spanish, Italian, and other languages? Hope not.

But who knows? Only time can tell, but in the meantime, let's celebrate the

diversity of languages by learning words English has borrowed from some of

the less‑known languages: Hungarian, Hebrew, Nootka, Afrikaans, and Persian.

Even though they're not as well‑known to most of us, they are still spoken

by thousands or millions of people.

goulash (GOO‑lahsh, ‑lash) noun

1. A mixture of disparate elements; hodgepodge.

2. A stew of meat and vegetables, seasoned with paprika.

3. In the game of bridge, a round played with hands produced

by a rearrangement of previously dealt cards.

[From Hungarian gulyás, short for gulyáshús (herdsman's meat),

from gulya (herdsman) + hús (meat).]

Linguistic Change: Identity crisis or opportunity?

KUER's RadioWest
8/13/08: The Prodigal Tongue
Doug Fabrizio

SALT LAKE CITY, UT (2008-08-13) Journalist and writer Mark Abley predicts that by 2015 half the world's population will be speaking - or at least learning - English. But as the language sweeps the globe, it's not just changing those it encounters - it's changing too. New words are being added at a "break-neck" rate from other languages, from hip-hop lyrics, from the blogosphere. Abley joins Doug Wednesday to talk about the journey English is taking and what the future of the language sounds like.




After our discussion about language and identity I remembered a program I heard on KUER earlier this month about the evolution of the English language. It now seems silly that I hadn't thought of the fierce debate between prescriptive and descriptive linguists in context of identity before. Perhaps I hadn't given enough weight to the influence of identity on even a language scholar in his or her approach to language until I realized that scholars are not the only ones speaking out about linguistic change. This program brought to light the fact that this debate about English is going on outside of academia as much as it is inside. Linguists who hold a prescriptive view of the English language assert that English is slipping away from us - that younger generations are changing the language so much that it is falling apart. If we do not adhere to the traditional prescribed rules of English it is doomed. On the other side of the debate are the descriptivists who propose that English is a dynamic and flexible language that will change and evolve naturally - and that this should not be threatening. But this is not a debate that oridnary American people are distanced from. Language is a part of everyday life and thus very close to each of us. It seems everyone I talk to has some kind of position on the matter. But what exactly is it that determines which side of the debate we're on? And why is this debate so intense and often personal?

Thinking more about how language speaks us, would it be safe to say that because the way we use language is tied so completely to our identity that our strong reactions to changes are our way of stabilizing ourselves and our position in society? If our language evolves, does our identity evolve with it? Deep down are we really arguing about new made-up words and meanings or are we concerned with how those words affect the way we think about ourselves and others? I think a large portion of the anxiety that is felt regarding changes in English has to do with the generational gap. Young people identify themselves as apart from their elders in many ways, and language is no exception. Because of the elasticity of language we are able to mold it into whatever we want it to be and however we want it to represent us. It is as useful as any art form in forging new ideas and new ways of thinking about the world.

Comic From Language Log

Ladle Red Rotten Hut

Can you guess what the title of this post means? Think well-known children's stories...

Enough suspense. It's Little Red Riding Hood, and at Exploratorium you can find an entire version of the story written in common English words that are near-homophones of the normal words. Here is the first paragraph:

Wants pawn term, dare worsted ladle gull hoe lift wetter murder inner ladle cordage, honor itch offer lodge dock florist. Disk ladle gull orphan worry ladle cluck wetter putty ladle rat hut, an fur disk raisin pimple colder Ladle Rat Rotten Hut.

The translation of this would, of course, be "Once upon a time, there was a little girl..." and so forth. It's amazing how difficult it really is to interpret when you think too much about it. Much of this, of course, is because the words they use don't maintain the word boundaries of normal English. You have to sit back and sound the thing out to yourself. Fortunately, the website has a link to listen to the story in (the antiquated) RealPlayer format, too.

Here's a great line: "A nervous sausage bag ice!" (= "I never saw such big eyes!")

According to Exploratorium, this version of Little Red Riding Hood was written in 1940 by one H. L. Chace, a professor of French. He "wanted to show his students that intonation - that is, the melody of a language - is an integral part of its meaning."

So what do you think? Did he succeed?

[Addendum: This type of English has cleverly been termed "Anguish", and you can find more examples of Anguish in Chace's 1956 book "Anguish Languish" (i.e. English Language), the full text of which is here.]

English campaigners against senseless signs

Linked from http://www.funniez.net/funnynews/1-latest-news/76-CampaignAgainstSigns:

On September, 2007. London campaigners who fight for the effective use of English attacked a growing tendency for obvious and senseless public information posters and instructions, such as a police sign: "Don't Commit Crime."
"They assume a lack of intelligence on the part of the reader - says their spokeswoman. 'Do not commit crime. Pay for your fuel' is hardly a deterrent to a criminal who has every intention of driving off without paying."
The Plain English Campaign cited other examples including:
"Warning: Platform ends here" on the end of rail station platforms,
"May cause drowsiness" on sleeping pills,
"Warning: contains nuts" labeled on packets of nuts,
"Caution: water on road during rain"
"May irritate eyes" on a can of self-defense pepper spray,
"Do not open door while airborne except in emergency" on emergency exit doors in planes,
"Removing the wheel can influence the performance of the bicycle" from a Dutch bicycle manual,
"Do not iron clothes on body" from packaging on a steam iron,
Supermarket Tesco - which also warns shoppers that cream contains milk and that salted butter contains milk and salt - defended itself, saying it gave customers "all the possible information they should need."
The Plain English Campaign said politicians were also guilty of the trend.
"Politicians declaring 'We are taking the terrorist threat very seriously', or 'We are committed to improving the health service' is just rhetoric," he said.
He added: "Our advice would be say what you need to plainly and simply then stop. If nothing needs to be said, say nothing."

English is Tough Stuff

I stumbled upon this poem today at: http://www.docflash.com/say_this.txt

ENGLISH IS TOUGH STUFF
  ======================

Dearest creature in creation,
Study English pronunciation.
I will teach you in my verse
Sounds like corpse, corps, horse, and worse.
I will keep you, Suzy, busy,
Make your head with heat grow dizzy.
Tear in eye, your dress will tear.
So shall I!  Oh hear my prayer.

Just compare heart, beard, and heard,
Dies and diet, lord and word,
Sword and sward, retain and Britain.
(Mind the latter, how it's written.)
Now I surely will not plague you
With such words as plaque and ague.
But be careful how you speak:
Say break and steak, but bleak and streak;
Cloven, oven, how and low,
Script, receipt, show, poem, and toe.

Hear me say, devoid of trickery,
Daughter, laughter, and Terpsichore,
Typhoid, measles, topsails, aisles,
Exiles, similes, and reviles;
Scholar, vicar, and cigar,
Solar, mica, war and far;
One, anemone, Balmoral,
Kitchen, lichen, laundry, laurel;
Gertrude, German, wind and mind,
Scene, Melpomene, mankind.

Billet does not rhyme with ballet,
Bouquet, wallet, mallet, chalet.
Blood and flood are not like food,
Nor is mould like should and would.
Viscous, viscount, load and broad,
Toward, to forward, to reward.
And your pronunciation's OK
When you correctly say croquet,
Rounded, wounded, grieve and sieve,
Friend and fiend, alive and live.

Ivy, privy, famous; clamour
And enamour rhyme with hammer.
River, rival, tomb, bomb, comb,
Doll and roll and some and home.
Stranger does not rhyme with anger,
Neither does devour with clangour.
Souls but foul, haunt but aunt,
Font, front, wont, want, grand, and grant,
Shoes, goes, does.  Now first say finger,
And then singer, ginger, linger,
Real, zeal, mauve, gauze, gouge and gauge,
Marriage, foliage, mirage, and age.

Query does not rhyme with very,
Nor does fury sound like bury.
Dost, lost, post and doth, cloth, loth.
Job, nob, bosom, transom, oath.
Though the differences seem little,
We say actual but victual.
Refer does not rhyme with deafer.
Foeffer does, and zephyr, heifer.
Mint, pint, senate and sedate;
Dull, bull, and George ate late.
Scenic, Arabic, Pacific,
Science, conscience, scientific.

Liberty, library, heave and heaven,
Rachel, ache, moustache, eleven.
We say hallowed, but allowed,
People, leopard, towed, but vowed.
Mark the differences, moreover,
Between mover, cover, clover;
Leeches, breeches, wise, precise,
Chalice, but police and lice;
Camel, constable, unstable,
Principle, disciple, label.

Petal, panel, and canal,
Wait, surprise, plait, promise, pal.
Worm and storm, chaise, chaos, chair,
Senator, spectator, mayor.
Tour, but our and succour, four.
Gas, alas, and Arkansas.
Sea, idea, Korea, area,
Psalm, Maria, but malaria.
Youth, south, southern, cleanse and clean.
Doctrine, turpentine, marine.

Compare alien with Italian,
Dandelion and battalion.
Sally with ally, yea, ye,
Eye, I, ay, aye, whey, and key.
Say aver, but ever, fever,
Neither, leisure, skein, deceiver.
Heron, granary, canary.
Crevice and device and aerie.

Face, but preface, not efface.
Phlegm, phlegmatic, ass, glass, bass.
Large, but target, gin, give, verging,
Ought, out, joust and scour, scourging.
Ear, but earn and wear and tear
Do not rhyme with here but ere.
Seven is right, but so is even,
Hyphen, roughen, nephew Stephen,
Monkey, donkey, Turk and jerk,
Ask, grasp, wasp, and cork and work.

Pronunciation -- think of Psyche!
Is a paling stout and spikey?
Won't it make you lose your wits,
Writing groats and saying grits?
It's a dark abyss or tunnel:
Strewn with stones, stowed, solace, gunwale,
Islington and Isle of Wight,
Housewife, verdict and indict.

Finally, which rhymes with enough --
Though, through, plough, or dough, or cough?
Hiccough has the sound of cup.
My advice is to give up!!!

    -- Author unknown

The Question of Usage

Is a couple a couple or is a couple a few? Are the two phrases synonymous? What say you?

Jolyn (my wife) and I have this ongoing debate over the meaning of the phrase, a couple. I believe that the phrases, a couple and a few, are synonymous. Why? One word: usage. I guess I'm just a usage kind of guy. To me, it doesn't really matter what a dictionary says. Language is created by culture and usage. People (including me) say a couple all the time when they are clearly speaking of a number larger than two. Jolyn claims that a couple means two and that a few means more than two. I disagree with her because her definition comes from the dictionary. The true meaning of a word is defined by how it is used, not by Mr. Webster. However, I do realize that my definition must include Jolyn's as well because she uses the phrases differently than me. Therefore, in terms of usage, a couple can mean two or more than two, depending on who's doing the talking.

Although the usage issue is more complex than my petty argument with Jolyn, our little debate is fun and interesting.

I just thought I should open this up for discussion.