The great English language shift
By Leslie Lofranco Berbano, The Philippine Star

May 23, 2011—You have to hand it to the man.

Manny Pacquiao’s English may be far from impeccable but his punches are immensely articulate. In the ring he neither beats the air nor beats around the bush; every jab is a sure shot and every wallop deadly. Despite being linguistically challenged in English, Pacquiao has no trouble communicating his lethal intentions to a global audience. Indeed, by being clear-minded about his goals, he has risen from his origins as a two-bit boxer slugging along in provincial backwaters to become an international celebrity whose athletic prowess ranks among the very best in boxing history.

As a congressman, he’s pitting himself in an arena where the silver tongue wields as much might as the strong arm (of politicians, that is)  a prospect I find intriguing in relation to its repercussions on the English language. Pacquiao chose to deliver his first privilege speech in English, which, in his inimitable style, happens to be heavily accented Bisayâ English. He can, of course, opt to speak in Filipino or Cebuano and thus be freer to express his (many substantial) plans for his constituents, but that might turn him into a serious lawmaker quite inappropriate for Congress (as critics are wont to wisecrack). For now, the novelty of Pacquiao the champion-boxer-turned-Inglisero-congressman runs high as shown by the resounding applause he received from his fellow legislators  they being avid Pacman fans themselves  when he invited them to get “rridi to rrambol!”

Pacquiao has appropriated Michael Buffer’s famous catchphrase and stamped on it a uniquely Filipino trademark with his accent. Will such Pacquiaoisms eventually slide over into Philippine English?

Full story...

Being proud of our own Filipino-English diction
By Rico M. Hizon, The Philippine Star

Manila, May 23, 2011—Every single day for the past 10 years on BBC World News, over 350 million people from all over the world wake up to the sound of my voice.

What I say can make or break their business. How I say it, however, will affect how they will react  whether to stay calm or panic.

Delivery is key. Apart from having complete, accurate, and relevant information, the news must be read clearly to ensure that it is easily understood.

And for that, I am grateful for my education from the Philippines. Tubong Maynila po ako! I was born, raised and educated here in Manila. Hindi po ako nag-aral sa Amerika o sa UK. Hindi po ako nag Cambridge o Harvard.

I learned to speak well and clearly thanks to the patience of my parents, siblings, and my teachers at La Salle Green Hills and De La Salle University. My looks and my diction often leave people wondering about my nationality.

On many occasions, I’ve been asked if I’m a western-educated Chinese, Singaporean, Malaysian, or even Indonesian.

They wonder because of my eyes, skin color, and the way I speak English. I guess you can say it’s Pinoy super power.

We have the gift of languages. But what sets us apart is how, with any language we use, we are able to speak it clearly.

Full story...

Two new bright literary lights
By Butch Dalisay, The Philippine Star

May 16, 2011—On the heels of Miguel Syjuco’s acclaimed Ilustrado comes another important breakthrough for Filipino fiction in the international market. Marivi Soliven Blanco, author of the bestselling Suddenly Stateside expat essays and the Spooky Mo horror stories and who’s now based in San Diego, California with her husband John, has sold her new novel, In the Service of Secrets, to Penguin Books. I’ve often complained about the lack of humor in our novels, despite the fact that we’re a funny people with a wicked comic nerve; well, here’s humor in spades.

When I visited with Marivi and John a couple of years ago, she was working on a novel for Nanowrimo (National Novel Writing Month, an annual global frenzy that’s surprisingly given birth to more than a few decent efforts), and Secrets came out of that initial push. The novel, says Marivi, involves a mail-order bride, but “begins in Manila in the 1960s and follows three generations of a family and its servants all the way through to the mid-’90s in San Francisco and Oakland. It runs along two parallel story tracks, and bounces back and forth between the Duarte-Guerrero clan and the Obejas sisters (their servants).” Pinoy readers should find many of its locales   UP, Malate, the Hotel InterContinental, and Cubao   thoroughly if disconcertingly familiar.

Here’s a brief excerpt from the book—which should come out next year—that Marivi was kind enough to allow me to share with Penman readers:

“Beverly   over here!” The Filipina Sweetheart manager waved from an armchair at the far end of the lobby. She could tell Carmelo was sizing her up as she approached, and wondered if he was ticking off the checklist he called her “pointers for self-improvement”…

Full story...

Dreaming in English
By Danton Remoto, The Philippine Star

May 9, 2011—In her introduction to Stories, Kerima Polotan said: “Life scars the writer but he is not without weapons of vengeance. The art (of writing) is a prism that he can use to refract human experience. That one can write about something gives him courage to endure it; that he has written about it gives him, if not deeper understanding, some kind of peace. In other words, the writer is first a human being before he is anything else, prone, like much of mankind, to fits of joy and pain. What happens to those around him — and yes, to him — is legitimate material, but only if he is able to illumine it with a special insight.”

I enrolled at the Ateneo for a Management degree, but my heart was not in it. Every day, I went to the Rizal Library and sat near the books in PS 9991—Philippine writing in English. I would get the books, read the names of the Ateneo writers who have borrowed them (Gilda Cordero-Fernando, Rolando Tinio, Eman Lacaba, Freddie Salanga), and borrowed the books.

I talked to my father and told him I wanted to shift to Interdisciplinary Studies, so I could choose the English subjects I wanted to take—and have my Management subjects credited as well. He reluctantly agreed. So the next semester I was on a roll. During our first day in Modern Poetry on the third floor of Bellarmine Building, the teacher arrived in a brown jacket, his hair tousled by the wind.

My teacher was Professor Emmanuel Torres, and he taught us how to see. Before his class, I did not like poetry too much, preferring instead to read nonfiction, since I thought that was the real stuff. But Professor Torres introduced to us — in English translations — Baudelaire and Rimbaud, Verlaine and Rilke, Neruda and Garcia Lorca…

Full story...

Language learning helps businesses compete globally
By Michael Schutzler, Forbes.com

May 27, 2011—Thanks to the Internet, even the smallest company can be a multinational. Over two billion people are online and an additional 500 million will connect for the first time this year. Over four billion people have a cell phone with SMS capability and many of them will upgrade to an Internet-enabled smartphone in coming years. Technology has unleashed a global market unconstrained by space, time or travel barriers.

Language is the one material barrier that remains. As technology delivers access to a worldwide arena of talent and customers, effective multilingual communication becomes an essential tool for productivity – and a competitive weapon for those who master it. English is clearly a factor in this evolving business dynamic, but it is not the solution. In fact, broad adoption of English as the language of commerce is the root of the challenge and opportunity looming.

For over 60 years, the United States has reigned as the leading international force in academics, politics, economics and technical innovation. This global influence combined with our stubborn insistence on communicating in English has finished the work begun by Great Britain, elevating our language to primacy around the world. More than one billion people are learning English in the pursuit of economic and social ascension. In China alone there are over 300 million people learning English right now.

It seems reasonable to conclude that English is the only language you need to master, but this complacency breeds catastrophe. English is not replacing other languages; it is merely becoming the most common form of social currency…

Full story...

Language fragments, levels in English
By Harold Raley, Galveston Daily News

May 22, 2011—During one of his visits, a philosopher friend of mine from Europe remarked humorously that one can almost speak other languages, especially Spanish, without ever getting out of English.

In this case, he was referring to the many Spanish words he noticed in Southwest English.

He mentioned the Santa Fe Railroad that ran through the city where he was staying, the Coronado hotel where he was lodged, the names of restaurants, streets, plazas, paseos and expressions, such as nada, adios, cerveza, rodeo, rancho, the names of trucks and automobiles, and dozens of other words and slang that one commonly hears and understands as a part of everyday English in the Southwest.

In a subtler and more basic way, Latin and French expressions are sprinkled throughout legal English and we speak them all the time.

For example, a reader of these columns asked me a couple of days ago to explain the meaning of Force Majeure, which appears in many commercial contracts.

The expression is French and simply means “superior force,” which though more understandable is, ironically, also remotely French in origin but borrowed in an earlier age and therefore more anglicized.

Full story...

Can language influence your sex personality?
By Dr. Yvonne K. Fulbright, The Huffington Post

HONG KONG—Could speaking a foreign language change the way you engage your partner sexually? While recent research out of The Hong Kong Polytechnic University doesn't answer this question directly, it does highlight the influence one's linguistic efforts have on a social context.

Researchers found that native Chinese students who were fluent in English took on traits regarded as more 'typical' of English versus Cantonese speakers in speaking English. According to both self-reports and behavioral observations, these participants became more extroverted, assertive and open to new experiences when speaking their second (vs. native) language.

This link became even more marked when participants spoke English to a Chinese versus Caucasian interviewer, with their "English-speaking" personality traits more prominent with the latter. Thus, the article, published in Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, concluded that there appears to be a link between one's personality traits and language, given "perceived cultural norms, language priming, and interlocutor ethnicity on various personality dimensions."

While researchers didn't go anywhere near one's sex personality specifically, as someone who recently released Sultry Sex Talk to Seduce Any Lover, which offers simple lines of erotic talk in foreign languages, it's natural for the sexually-inclined to wonder if one's sexy state of mind changes, too, given linguistic efforts.

Full story...

English has real staying power as a world language
By Harold Raley, Galveston News

May 8, 2011—As I pointed out in a previous column, English has become, for all practical purposes, the lingua franca of the entire modern world, nudging out French, which on a smaller scale held that role in the 18th and 19th centuries.

Other examples of international or intercultural languages in earlier times were Latin during the European Middle Ages and Greek in the early Christian era.

Curiously enough, Latin, which prevailed in the Western Mediterranean and parts of Europe, never was the universal language of the Roman Empire.

In the eastern provinces, including Palestine, Greek was the predominant language, although the local Jewish population spoke Aramaic, which had replaced the original Hebrew.

In part, the later division between the Latin-speaking Western, or Catholic Church, and the Greek-speaking, or Orthodox Church was also a linguistic divide between the two predominant languages of the Classical world.

In the foreseeable future, English probably will continue to be the lingua franca of modern times.

For a few decades, Russian made a bid for world prominence, but the collapse of the Soviet Union dealt it a lethal blow.

Full story...

In praise of learning grammar—and not conversation
By Mike Guest, The Daily Yomiuri

May 23, 2011—My 2-year-old daughter is learning the past perfect these days. Yes, that scourge of ESL students the world over is being learned by a toddler. She is gradually understanding that the "had + verb" pattern is akin to a retrospective past tense. She can't express this of course--that will take at least six more months--but she is starting to understand this aspect (and she does sense it as aspectual, rather than as a tense) of English.

My Japanese neighbors think that I must teach her English. Of course, I don't. Her main teacher is George. You probably know him as Curious George (or O-saru no Joji in Japanese), the monkey of children's book fame.

George's curiosity leads him into adventures and dilemmas that any small child can understand. George flies a kite. George rides a bike. George gets a job. And George uses the past perfect. A lot. In fact, in George Rides a Bike, the past perfect is used 27 times in 46 pages (with each page containing on average only two sentences). How can toddlers understand George's adventures when the text is loaded with this tricky, elusive form?

George's regrets and past experiences inform his current dilemma, hence the use of the past perfect. Children who are engaged by George's predicaments absorb this. So, as I read George's stories (regularly), my daughter builds up an association between this odd "had" word and the notion of retrospective--before the before--past…

Full story...

Why English is tough in Japan
By Hiroki Ogawa, TheDiplomat.com

May 13, 2011—In accordance with changes in Ministry of Education standards made back in 2008, Japanese students in the fifth and sixth grade last month began mandatory weekly English lessons. The objective of the programme, dubbed Gaikokugo Katsudo or Foreign Language Activities, is to foster an interest in other languages and cultures generally, although English remains the priority.

But the programme is also a response to international and domestic factors. For one, there's TOEFL score data from 2004-2005, which placed Japan second to last in Asia in terms of English language skills with 191 points—only one point higher than North Korea. There's also the fact that other countries in the region have introduced mandatory English lessons in their elementary schools, and Japan is therefore keen not to be left behind. The programme even has the support of top business federation Nippon Keidanren, which sees it as a means of increasing the competitiveness of future Japanese knowledge workers internationally.

Yet looking at the specifics of the programme, and some of the critiques it has received, the effort strikes me as a little superficial, and gives the impression that the Ministry is treating learning English as an end in itself.

The reality is that raw English ability alone is unlikely to produce any significant change, even assuming that Japanese students go on to have basic conversational skills in English (which is often not the case anyway)…

Full story...

Loss of a language
By Ira Pande, TheHindu.com

May 25, 2011—I remember a particular dialogue from Mahmood Farooqui's play “Dastangoi”. “If I speak in fluent Urdu, Bengali, Hindi or Malayalam, you wouldn't understand because we are so used to broken pieces of different languages,” Farooqui said in chaste Hindi. That stayed with me. Many months later, Brinda S. Narayanan, author of “Bangalore Calling” spoke of the same issue. “Over 190 languages are extinct due to the desire of most Indians to speak English. We are losing our language cover. It's as important an issue as losing our green cover; we are losing a different kind of green.”

And then I meet Ira Pande who put the above analysis into perspective. Ira began her career as a lecturer at the University of Punjab in Chandigarh. She later worked briefly as a journalist and then had a successful stint as editor for various journals and publications, including Seminar, Biblio, Dorling Kindersley, Roli Books etc. Ira further distinguished herself as a translator of Manohar Shyam Joshi's novella “T-ta Professor”, which was awarded both the Crossword-Vodaphone award and the Sahitya Akademi award for the best translated work into English in 2010. Her latest book Shivani's “Apradhini: Women without men” is a translation of her mother's writings on women.

When I ask her what she considers a good translation, Ira Pande's articulate answer sets the tone for the interview. “Translations are either competent or inspired. Some translators are good with words but they fail to bring out the essence of a piece…

Full story...

Found in translation
By Gopinath Mavinkurve, Times of India

May 23, 2011—It's that time of the year again when people will soon exclaim, "Rain is falling!" as they always do when the monsoons approach and the first showers soothe city dwellers. The words are so commonly heard that few find anything wrong with them—although a stickler for good spoken language may butt in with, "Just say, 'It's raining!'" But how many people around do care for 'correct English', if there is such a thing at all? Not many, right? So we get an opportunity to listen to such amusingly wonderful expressions as, "Fun came at our last night's dinner party!" and "Problem became at the picnic", in conversations around us.

Although most Indians do aspire to learn to read, write and speak in the language which our colonial rulers brought to our shores, we have taken it forward to have our own regional versions such as 'Hinglish' and 'Bonglish' to suit our tongues and minds! Our native tongues ruled our minds - we continue to think in our own language and then translate our thoughts to English - and voila, we have our own dialectic concoction to serve the patient listener who can devour it all with great amusement. So we have our relatives yelling at wedding ceremonies, asking people to assemble so that they can "remove photos"! All you can really do when you hear that is get together and laugh for the picture - and perhaps thank your stars the person did not outdo your friend in school who announced he wished to do some "photo-take-out-ing"!

Full story...

Language, Aaj and Kal
By Lindsay Pereira, Mid-dayOnline.com

MUMBAI, May 11, 2011—Is Hinglish -- that curious mix of English, Hindi, Urdu and Punjabi-- fast becoming the language of choice in urban India? A recent book release, the intriguingly named Chutnefying English: The Phenomenon of Hinglish, proves that the hybrid is very, very, hip.     

At least two men, both named Salman, would agree. The first, last name Rushdie, once claimed it was his linguistic agenda and practice to 'chutnefy English.' The second, last name Khan, used the line, 'Tu kya mujhe henpecked samajhta hai?' with much sincerity in a film titled, Biwi No 1. Both were born and brought up in what was once called Bombay, before people with an unusual concern for language and its subversive power went on a renaming spree.

Today, in Mumbai and other Indian metros, the hybrid dialect called 'Hinglish' -- as a sub-form of languages mutually comprehensible by their speakers -- is now favoured by a significant number of people.

These numbers have propelled it into everything from advertisement tag-lines (hungry kya?) to cinema (Dil Maange More), music (rain is falling chamacham cham) and the colloquial language of youth (where's the party, yaar?). It also explains the ubiquitous presence of massive campaigns like Coke's 'Life ho toh aisi' and McDonald's 'What your bahana is?'

Full story...

Weekend English classes: make it a must-pass subject
By Samuel Yesuiah, letter to The New Straits Times

May 22, 2011—The Education Ministry has never neglected the teaching of English.

The subject has been a vital part of the curriculum for all types of schools, be they primary or secondary. English is taught daily by qualified teachers in all schools.

The establishment of the English Language Teaching Centre to develop courses, curriculum and training to improve English language teachers' proficiency and pedagogy shows the commitment of the ministry towards the teaching of English in this country.

The effort of the ministry in bringing in 300 tutors from the United Kingdom, the United States and Canada to teach English in low-performing schools is commendable.

The re-employment of retired English teachers at schools where there is a lack of qualified English teachers is also a positive move.

Though the ministry has done everything possible, it needs to put more pressure on the government to make English a compulsory subject in the Ujian Pencapaian Sekolah Rendah, Penilaian Menengah Rendah and Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia examinations.

Full story...

Speaking the same language
Opinion, NEXT.com

May 24, 2011—Philip Hensher once wrote how "the apparently arbitrary and complicated orthography of the English language holds back children in acquiring writing skills, and costs the economy countless billions a year." We wonder what the fulminating novelist would have to say on the state of things in Nigeria, with its hundreds of orthographically challenged languages.

The orthography of a language specifies a standardised way of using a specific writing system (also known as script) to write the language. Though "orthography" is often used as a synonym for spelling, spelling is only part of orthography. Other elements are hyphenation, capitalisation, word breaks, emphasis, and punctuation.

The Centre for Black and African Arts and Civilisation (CBAAC) and the South Africa-based Centre for Advanced Studies of African Society (CASAS) presented harmonised orthographies for Igbo, Ijo, Hausa and Yoruba, in the Nigerian capital, Abuja recently. The process of harmonising and standardising the four indigenous language clusters had begun in October 2010 when CBAAC and CASAS organised and funded a two-day international workshop. Two more workshops (in Port Harcourt, Nigeria, and Johannesburg, South Africa) followed before the documents were finally ready.

While it is true what Kwesi Prah, the director of CASAS, said, "the more languages you talk, the more the different worlds [you have] to bridge," it takes more than standardising orthographies to make this happen.

While the initiative is laudable, we are a bit worried about its implementation.

Full story...

Little gain in lazy English mangling
By Julian Fernando, The Sydney Morning Herald

May 18, 201—Yes, our language is changing. I have—as someone who tends to use words such as ''imposition'' in text messages—come grudgingly to admit that the ''rules'' are not ever set. Even the oldest of us do not speak Old English, and that's probably a good thing; but is all change the same, and is all change for the better? Is our language evolving or devolving?

Rob Forbes argued on this page last week that ''the future of our language is brighter than ever''; I tend to disagree. He cites the historical changes to the English language, such as the incorporation of many Norse and French words, as evidence that the fluid nature of language serves to enrich it. But are the changes that are happening now of the same kind? Changes such as ''u'', ''da'' and ''LOL'' seem to consist almost entirely in abbreviation (or misspelling) and not in developing new words that describe new concepts, or that have subtly different meanings to existing words.

Forbes says these abbreviations are ''efficient and make perfect sense'', and therefore serve to streamline our language. Where he sees efficiency, however, I see laziness (at the risk of getting into a ''one man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter'' type argument).

Full story...

Don't listen to the purism pedants, English is doing just fine
By Rob Forbes, The Sydney Morning Herald

May 13, 2011—Everyone enjoys criticizing the language use of others. Complaints about the language of politicians and media personalities are a perennial of the letters section of a newspaper; many fear more generally that our language is heading downhill fast.

Julia Gillard has copped flak in particular for her broad Australian accent. One letter writer expresses her disgust at Gillard saying ''ledders'' instead of letters. Vocal coach Dean Frenkel has criticised her for her heavy ''twang'' and encourages her to articulate her vowels in a ''far more understated way''.

Some critics even notice where media presenters place stress on certain words. One pointed out a ''disturbing'' trend towards saying ''reesearch'' instead of research.

Others express fear that new forms of communication are wreaking havoc on the English language and will leave it impoverished and simplistic: author and journalist John Humphrys has warned that texters are ''pillaging our punctuation; savaging our sentences; raping our vocabulary''.

But these commentators are just the latest in a long tradition of linguistic doomsayers, and they are as wrong as they have always been about declining language standards.

Full story...

For me, English CEGEP opens doors
By Jean-François Garneau, The Gazette

MONTREAL, May 17, 2011—I am sitting in the main cafeteria of Dawson College, chatting with some friends about our incredible number of assignments, but mostly about my birthday party, which is taking place in a few days. Sitting around the table are Josiane, Maëlle, Ethan and Kate. We could talk until the sun goes down, but it is almost 10 a.m. “C’est l’heure,” says Josiane, putting her books into her schoolbag. “I’ve gotta go, see you later!” shouts Ethan, turning his back to go to class.

Before I came to Dawson, all of my education had been in French. To me, a francophone, Bill 101 is a symbol of the force and pride of French-Canadian culture.

However, I also believe one should have the right to choose the language in which one studies at the college level. On April 26, during the Parti Québécois’s convention, delegates voted in favour of extending Bill 101 to CEGEPs. Apparently the supporters of this policy are concerned that francophone students would become anglicized by the English education system. When I hear someone argue that, I take it very personally. Listening to the PQ discourse, I feel attacked, as if they are saying that I have lost my culture and have disowned it by attending an English school.

Spending 23 hours a week at an English institution will not make me lose my French identity. Even if I only spoke English at school, which is not the case, I would still use French to talk to my parents and my high-school friends.

Full story...

Women affected most by English language funding cuts
By Keith Moore, BBC.uk.co

LONDON, May 8, 2011—Five years ago, Layla Abdi Nur and her family fled the bullets and bloodshed in Somalia to come to London.

The single mother of four could not speak any English when she arrived from Mogadishu.

Now, after two years of full-time language lessons at the College of North West London, Miss Abdi Nur, 27, can make herself understood, but is still far from fluent.

"Now it is much better when I started to learn at this college," she said. "But when I meet the GP it is difficult to say what I need to ask them."

Because of the planned cuts in government funding for English language learners, she fears her chance of speaking the language well enough to one day become a nurse, come off benefits and support her family may be dashed.

Full story...

Your very own English discovery

May 16, 2011—With approximately 375 million people speaking English as their first language it comes as no surprise that it is often referred to as a “world language.” If you are in a position where learning or improving your English could help you progress (whether this be with your chosen career, your current studies, or even in travelling the world), then why not book yourself onto one of the many English Language courses and unlock the door to your very own English discovery?

So, what benefits are there to be had in learning English?

Firstly, the fact that it is the chosen language of international communication means that it can provide you with an advantage over non-English speakers when it comes to employment.

Learning English also gives you the opportunity to travel, and the chance to immerse yourself in the culture and language of other countries. As the majority of travel and tourism around the world is carried out in English, if you’re going on holiday or on a travelling adventure you will probably need to speak the language at some point. With this in mind, you can travel confidently almost anywhere and not have to worry about being totally misunderstood when you visit a new place or country.

Furthermore, English is the language that is most commonly used on websites. Therefore, being able to read and understand it will put you ahead for purposes such as research and communication.

Full story...

Swap the management-speak for plain English
By Simon Caulkin, Financial Times

May 9, 2011—When the inquest into London’s 7/7 suicide bombings started in October last year, the coroner became increasingly exasperated. On the final day of evidence, she snapped. “All you senior people [of the emergency services] are allowing yourselves to be taken over by management jargon,” Lady Justice Hallett said. “You people at the top need to say, ‘We have to communicate with people in plain English.’”

There is much to mock in management-speak. In the Financial Times, Lucy Kellaway is brilliant at pricking the inanities and pomposities of corporate communication. Yet the idea that, in Lady Hallett’s words, “the use of plain English ... would make everybody just that little bit more effective” is so obvious that it leaves big questions in its wake. Why is the language of management so contorted? Why does so much of it seem to be about concealing meaning, rather than revealing it?

The answer, surely, is that the language faithfully reflects the insecurities and uncertainties within. As the financial crash has revealed, almost everything we thought we knew about organisations and their management principles was misleading or plain wrong…

Full story...

Mind your English language
The Guardian

May 12, 2011—While most people accept that language will change with use and time, Sarah Churchwell appears to justify the increasing Americanisation of British English (A neologism thang, innit, 10 May). Noah Webster may have produced the language that should be known as "American", but that should not be a reason, as Churchwell seems to imply, for British English to be altered to the American version. American is characterised by a plethora of "z"s and a paucity of "u"s, which doesn't even reflect the way we pronounce many of the affected words. Churchwell seems to view the French influence on our language as in need of purging. This has no justification. The French influence is part of the Latin history of English, as is the impact of Spanish and Italian.

American terms and spelling are imposed on us via the internet, but television and lazy journalism are also to blame. Not only is it "new" words, but creating verbs from nouns is common. Witness her own example "hierarchize". American versions of words are too common, as in "bathroom" or "rest room" for toilet, "airplane" for aeroplane, and "stroller" for buggy. Our English is a rich and varied language – it needs a strong defence.—John Edwards, Linlithgow, West Lothian

There's no need for Sarah Churchwell to come back to these shores and feel the underdog, just because she's an ex-colonial speaker of English…

Full story...

Perspective: The English language – “innit wonderful”
By John Adams, TheComet.net
 
May 12, 2011—Personally, I prefer to sit down to the challenge of a cryptic crossword, but I can see the attraction of Scrabble.

Anything involving words interests me. I love English being a living language which grows and changes, but sometimes I am appalled by what is spawned.

This week I gave a little involuntary shudder when I learned that a horrible new word much favoured by the youth of today has been included in the bible for Scrabble players.

“Innit” is among nearly 3,000 additions to the Collins Official Scrabble Words compilation, the tome used to settle many an argument among players of the game.

This example of street slang is particularly grating to my ears but at least I have, unhappily, heard of it. Others, including “thang” and “grrl” are complete mysteries to me.

Words from the internet, such as “Wiki” and “MySpace”, have also joined the quarter of a million already in the reference work, along with examples from Indian cookery, including keema, alu or aloo, and gobi.

Teaching English at primary level no threat to local culture
By Ali al-Khabti, ArabNews.com

AL-WATAN, May 20, 2011—The significance of teaching children English at an early age has been highlighted by several studies.

Even European countries that are deeply passionate about their local languages and cultures have realized the need to teach English to their children at primary schools.

Studies have also proved that learning English at an early age helps students grasp their mother tongue better, simultaneously enabling them to acquire remarkable proficiency in their second language.

Currently, 98 percent of Internet content is in English while other languages are relegated to a mere two percent. Besides, English is the language employed in most of the studies, research papers, details of inventions and innovations and represents the official language for the majority of institutes, universities and research centers.

The implementation of English teaching in primary school may also become a useful means for the younger generation to promulgate a deeper knowledge of the Islamic religion and culture in the world.

France and Germany are the most sensitive and proud nations about their languages…

Full story...

Certificates of the poor state of our educational system
By Abdul Rahman Muhammad al-Sultan, ArabNews.com

May 14, 2011—The decision of the Council of Ministers to teach English from the Grade IV reflects the keenness of our leadership to develop education and find a solution to our education deficiencies. Regardless of the importance of this move, it will not be a solution to the low English-language standards of the graduates of public schools. In fact, the standard of these graduates in science and mathematics, which are taught from the first year, is no better than students' grasp of the English language. The important question is: Why do students study English for six years without achieving good results?

The biggest problem facing our educational system is that our methods have not changed. We never solved these problems. We are like a sick man without a proper diagnosis. And based on the wrong diagnosis, the doctor prescribes the wrong medicine. The doctor doesn't try to re-diagnose and the patient doesn't seeks a second opinion.

Therefore the problem of education in our country is not in the few years the student spend studying a certain subject but rather the low grasp of what he or she has learned due to many factors, including the low standard of teachers…

Full story...

Universities teaching in English without thinking
By Hanne Leth Andersen, CPHPost.dk

May 12, 2011—The quality of Danish degree programmes suffers when we increasingly use English as a teaching language.

Mikkel Zeuthen, the chairman of the National Union of Students, recently described the “toe-curling” experience it can be to take a course taught in English by a Danish instructor. Universities cannot ignore the situation, but change requires an awareness of why it is suddenly necessary to expand English instruction so greatly.

A 2010 study by the Danish Evaluation Institute (EVA) concluded that the quality of instruction in programmes taught in English was generally good, though there were sporadic shortcomings. The truly toe-curling mistakes were relatively few, but the impact of poor language is enormous when it comes to education.

In addition, many instructors feel that they are neither effective nor have as much personality when they need to use a foreign language to express themselves or to discuss complicated and complex topics with students. Likewise, studies and general observation show that students are less active when they need to interact using a foreign language.

We lack a basic discussion of the reason why English-language programmes are being offered and what their goals are. Why are more programmes being offered in English?

Full story...

A conscientious objector in the war on words
By Andrew Biggs, Bangkok Post

May 8, 2011—Two weeks ago, I found myself in the middle of a major security breach at Sydney airport. Security scanners went on the blink, resulting in more cancellations than a Kajagoogoo reunion tour.

Those of us lucky enough not to have our flights cancelled ended up being delayed for at least three hours.

You would have been proud of me, dear reader. I never once stamped my foot nor shouted ''Do you know who I am?'' while waving an Andrew Biggs doll in the faces of airline staff. Instead I took a more Buddhist approach to the situation by donning my iPod earphones and flicking on a self-created playlist entitled ''Aural Prozac'' (Yanni, Susan Boyle, Ronan Keating, etc).

When I did finally get on my flight the captain made a short announcement.

''We apologise for the delay,'' he crooned. ''The scanners had some problems and there were a lot of planes that were sequencing at Sydney airport.''

Wait a minute. The scanners I understand. But the planes were what?

Full story...

Blame yourself for killing your own language
By Lwando Norman, TimesLive.co.za

ZAMBIA, May 8, 2011—Mondli Makhanya's "Will this nation allow its languages to die out - from sheer neglect?" (May 1) resonates with me. But I am convinced that we, as blacks, are guilty of decimating our own languages.

Apartheid and colonialism taught us to hate everything about ourselves: the colour of our skins, our hair and even our languages. Speaking English is seen as being progressive and educated. We have internalised the lie that we have to master the language if we are to prosper economically.

The Japanese, the Germans, the French and many other nations hardly speak any English, yet their inventions and innovations form part of our daily lives.

I am always appalled when I hear black people proudly tell you that their children can speak only English. In shopping malls, we make sure anyone within earshot can hear how clever our kids are as they show off their Model C accents.

In black families nowadays, the first words children learn are English!

How can we expect others to respect our languages when we don't respect them? The initiative by the former minister of education, Naledi Pandor, to introduce an additional African language in provinceswas resisted by - wait for it - black parents!

Full story...

Madame Pourquoi
By Temitayo Olofinlua, 234next.com

May 8, 2011—Learning a new language is like entering a desert with blindfolds. You have no knowledge of what to expect. There are sand blasts and wind gusts from every side, yet you keep trudging along. That is a mild description of my road to learning French. The only tool I took with me was fun. I wanted to have fun on the journey. Fun here translates into: ask questions.

Why did I decide to learn French?

First, it was the desire to have a mastery of another language. Well, learn something different from the known. Having spoken English, Yoruba and a bit of Pidgin for a great part of my life; it is a bit boring, don’t you think? A part of me thought: wouldn’t it be great to gossip in another language? Wouldn’t it be absolutely interesting to maneuver two world languages well, to hit their heads together as if in a duel?

Yoruba and English are languages that just stumbled on me, or was it I who stumbled on them?

Bottom line is, I do not really understand or appreciate the process of learning them. For Yoruba, I grew up in a Yoruba-speaking environment, my parents speak my native Ijare dialect at home; and yes, I studied Yoruba as a subject in school…

Full story...

Select right candidates for teaching courses
By YY Tam, TheStar.com.my
 
May 8, 2011—A friend of mine had recently requested that I help an English Language undergraduate write reports for two projects.

It came as a surprise as I couldn’t understand the undergraduate’s reluctance in writing the reports since she was a qualified teacher who was now pursuing a degree programme in English.

It was only later that I found out that she could not write the report as she was not competent in English.

Needless to say, there are many questions that need to be answered. On what basis is the selection of English Language teachers done? What sort of training do they go through?

How is supervision and assessment carried out during the course? Are they closely monitored? What remedial programmes are provided for them?

Even more worrying is the fact that the undergraduate and many more like her will soon become English Language teachers. For them to be language teachers, they must have an adequate grasp of the language to be effective whether they are posted to primary or secondary schools, or rural or urban schools after graduation.

Full story...