Julia Jones wrote: <<In message Pine.SOL.4.30.0111252326130.21847-100000@kruuna.Helsinki.FI, Kai V Karmanheimo karmanhe@cc.helsinki.fi writes
English-speaking peoples are now in a rather privileged position of living in a linguistically dominant cultures that are giving out the influences rather than digesting them.
Ahem. The latter part of that statement is a load of bollocks, or at least is accurate in the sense that I presume from context you did *not* mean.>> <snip the rest of the message, including a series of hilarious comments that indeed make my above comment look very genital.>
"And for my next trick, I shall swallow my other foot."
Of course English has drawn heavily from numerous languages over the centuries, which is one reason why it has prospered. It is still doing it. I really am slipping...
What I believe I was thinking, was that today English is more the donor of influences to other languages and cultures than the receiver. English is not the world language yet, but in areas like international trade it is quickly become just the thing. Whether it's items of popular culture or science, more is coming out of the English-speaking world than going in, at least in my perception, which I admit is not terribly well-informed. But I would say that the English-speaking countries are today far less dependant on translations of another cultures' texts and have less *need* to draw on foreign influences than many other countries (and I am not suggesting that the cultures of all English-speaking countries are homogenous). Do correct me if I am wrong.
This I was I think my attempt to rationalise Kathryn's comment that lot of native English speakers don't comprehend the untranslatability of puns and the idioms. Bearing in mind that misconceptions about translation and blindness to one's own linguistic idiosyncrasies are a fact of life in just about everywhere, I still find it a hard notion to swallow. Almost as hard as this foot (damn, should've washed me feet first...)
Kai
In message 001c01c176c5$e26fd7e0$56b6d680@8047fr4z0xfs, Kai Karmanheimo karmanhe@cc.helsinki.fi writes
This I was I think my attempt to rationalise Kathryn's comment that lot of native English speakers don't comprehend the untranslatability of puns and the idioms. Bearing in mind that misconceptions about translation and blindness to one's own linguistic idiosyncrasies are a fact of life in just about everywhere, I still find it a hard notion to swallow. Almost as hard as this foot (damn, should've washed me feet first...)
I think it's more to do with the vast numbers of native English speakers who speak only English - and only one dialect of English at that. (Many native speakers have no idea how many words they use everyday were nicked from some other langauge, and not necessarily all that long ago.) The great unstoppable tidal wave that is English (and particularly American English) means that rather more non-English speakers have at least been *exposed* to another language, if only in films that have been dubbed/subtitled in such a way as to be unintentionally amusing.
I've run into this lack of awareness between dialects of English, let alone between languages. The current version is trying to get it across to Californians that I am perfectly serious when I ask for an explanation of what some local idiom means <sigh>.
It's something that can be very noticeable in fanfic. The Americans, not surprisingly, can get a bit upset at rude remarks from British and Australian fans about B7 characters speaking American - they don't understand why it grates so badly, because the language sounds normal to them.
As to whether English is doing more colonising than thieving - I'd say it's still doing a fair amount of thieving, but it's not as obvious because English thieves from *everyone*, whereas your typical language suffering from cultural imperialism is, to the first approximation, being invaded by only *one* language. English steals, other languages are taken over by...
We are English of Borg, your language will be assimilated...
Julia Jones wrote:
It's something that can be very noticeable in fanfic. The Americans, not surprisingly, can get a bit upset at rude remarks from British and Australian fans about B7 characters speaking American - they don't understand why it grates so badly, because the language sounds normal to them.
I'm working on a lot of Vila dialogue and internal monologue right now, and I'm really struggling with this. I know he doesn't speak "American," but any efforts to make him use the right style of language come across as...well...as an American trying to write what she *thinks* British sounds like. He sounds like a bad imitation of a Monty Python skit, full of cliched phrases and forced lines. Especially the indelicate interjections someone like Vila would surely make--I just can't use "bloody," "arse," or "sod" without it sounding desperately stilted. Or like I'm throwing in the little Brit lingo I know to "make it sound real." Either way it jars the scene out of believability for me. Frustrating.
Jen in Japan "I was a late developer." --Blake, "Horizon"
Julia Jones wrote:
It's something that can be very noticeable in fanfic. The Americans, not surprisingly, can get a bit upset at rude remarks from British and Australian fans about B7 characters speaking American - they don't understand why it grates so badly, because the language sounds normal to them.
And the solution is so easy - a good British beta reader. Mind, it works the other way, too - I've seen some dreadful Briticisms in Buffy fic as well.
Mistral
In message 3C0352D6.82480DAD@centurytel.net, Mistral mistral@centurytel.net writes
Julia Jones wrote:
It's something that can be very noticeable in fanfic. The Americans, not surprisingly, can get a bit upset at rude remarks from British and Australian fans about B7 characters speaking American - they don't understand why it grates so badly, because the language sounds normal to them.
And the solution is so easy - a good British beta reader. Mind, it works the other way, too - I've seen some dreadful Briticisms in Buffy fic as well.
The example I usually quote to explain to Americans what it sounds like is to ask if they've read any Trek fic where Kirk's British. That usually gets the point across:-)
I get a British reader to beta read anything other than quick fluffs, to make sure it sounds like RADA English rather than my own rather odd melange. Of course, nowadays I usually manage to clean out things like "gotten" and "whiskey" before it gets to the beta-reader.
About Americanisms/Briticisms: surely the Federation, as the repository of everything that is truly vile and life-denying, would have adopted some of the less pleasant aspects of US culture as well?
-(Y)
BTW, I had Kasabi (back when she was teaching at Servalan's boarding school...well, you had to be there) pour herself a drink. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be "whisky" or "whiskey" so I went back and changed it to "gin."
In message 008001c17797$411448e0$4589590c@dshilling, Dana Shilling dshilling@worldnet.att.net writes
BTW, I had Kasabi (back when she was teaching at Servalan's boarding school...well, you had to be there) pour herself a drink. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be "whisky" or "whiskey" so I went back and changed it to "gin."
One small corner of the UK spells it whiskey. The rest spells it the Scottish way, even though *we* have the world's oldest licensed distillery, not the Scots.
Julia wrote:
In message 008001c17797$411448e0$4589590c@dshilling, Dana Shilling dshilling@worldnet.att.net writes
BTW, I had Kasabi (back when she was teaching at Servalan's boarding school...well, you had to be there) pour herself a drink. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be "whisky" or "whiskey" so I went back and changed it to "gin."
One small corner of the UK spells it whiskey. The rest spells it the Scottish way, even though *we* have the world's oldest licensed distillery, not the Scots.
I always thought the spellings were a distinction between Scottish whisky and Irish whiskey.
Una
On Wed, 28 Nov 2001, Una McCormack wrote:
I always thought the spellings were a distinction between Scottish whisky and Irish whiskey.
Close. In fact, the distinction is between the true Water of Life and that stuff those poor bastards in Ireland get stuck with.
Iain
In message 023101c177ea$15276340$0c00a8c0@codex, Una McCormack una@qresearch.org.uk writes
One small corner of the UK spells it whiskey. The rest spells it the Scottish way, even though *we* have the world's oldest licensed distillery, not the Scots.
I always thought the spellings were a distinction between Scottish whisky and Irish whiskey.
These days, between Scottish whisky and everything else. But the oldest licensed distillery in the world is Bushmills, in the town (bloody tiny village, actually) of the same name in Northern Ireland, UK. Triple-distilled in the Irish style, providing both blends of varying minimum ages and a single malt, all of which have 'whiskey' on the label. I would cheerfully wind up Iain at this point by declaring even the cheapest Bushmills to be superior to any of that stuff they come up with across the water, but he's probably well aware that all alcohol tastes the same to me anyway.
Dana wrote:
BTW, I had Kasabi (back when she was teaching at Servalan's boarding school...well, you had to be there) pour herself a drink. I couldn't remember if it was supposed to be "whisky" or "whiskey" so I went back and changed it to "gin."
Oh no! Kasabi would never drink anything so vile as gin! (This is partly the awful smell, and partly that I really am in a time warp on drinks. I still think of gin as "mother's ruin", and thus very downmarket, even though I know it's supposed to be the preferred tipple of Tory colonels.) Kasabi's definitely a whisky-drinker. Or even whiskey, if she has Irish antecedents. (You could also avoid the problem by saying "Scotch", which would be interpreted as whisky in most British pubs, unless you were in the north-east where it appears to be some sort of beer.)
Harriet Monkhouse wrote:
(You could also avoid the problem by saying "Scotch", which would be interpreted as whisky in most British pubs, unless you were in the north-east where it appears to be some sort of beer.)
Certainly is. It horrified my Mum the first time she came to visit me at university and I asked for a pint of Scotch at the bar. (But that's another thread. :-) )
Maybe Kasabi would drink Pimms which is gin-based?
Kat W
Kat wrote:
Maybe Kasabi would drink Pimms which is gin-based?
Pimms is OK, because there's enough thrown into it (chiefly the fruit salad) to disguise the original vile taste, but I can't really see the Earth rebels mixing it while on the run. At the Academy, perhaps... I do think of it as a donnish sort of drink.
Dana wrote:
However, is there Scotland in the Second Calendar (there is certainly Jarriere)--if no Scotland, no Scotch. And if no Ireland, then no whiskey/whisky distinction.
Um, well, there are rather a lot of things in the Executrix universe which I didn't really expect to have survived.
Harriet said, re Kasabi's drinking habits:
Pimms is OK, because there's enough thrown into it (chiefly the fruit salad) to disguise the original vile taste, but I can't really see the Earth rebels mixing it while on the run. At the Academy, perhaps... I do think of it as a donnish sort of drink.
At that point in time, she's a teacher in a fancy boarding school, not a rebel on the run.
Um, well, there are rather a lot of things in the Executrix universe which I didn't really expect to have survived.
I figure that, although they may not be As We Know Them, Jim, but there will be objects that serve similar functions to, e.g., trams, chips, and cigarettes so they might as well be called that.
-(Y)
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Dana Shilling -
Harriet Monkhouse -
Iain Coleman -
Jen McGee -
Julia Jones -
Kai Karmanheimo -
Katharine Woods -
Mistral -
Una McCormack