Due to the mounting international indignation over the horribly violent end of the hostage-taking incident in Manila last Monday (August 23), I was initially hesitant to do a grammar critique of the Philippine print media’s news coverage of the incident. As it is, their TV and radio network counterparts are at this very moment still taking a lot of flak for their intrusive live coverage of the standoff between the hostage-taker and the police forces, a coverage that some quarters say might well have contributed to the senseless deaths of eight of the foreign tourists and the hostage-taker himself. I therefore told myself that if the grammar error in their stories were anyway not that “major major”—a now hugely popular phrase because of the semantically faulty way it was used by the Philippine bet to the Miss Universe pageant in Las Vegas also last Monday—I would just close my eyes to them so as not to further exacerbate an already error-laden week dominated by profuse fault-finding.
I would like to share this e-mailed exchange on Bb. Pilipinas Venus Raj’s usage of the phrase “major major” between Forum member Eng and me:Eng:I’m willing to let “major-major” slide. She may have misspoken or she may have meant to use it to emphasize her point. Besides, I’m pretty forgiving when it comes to mistakes in speech. However, when it comes to mistakes in headlines—I totally agree with you.
Me:Thanks for the feedback! Like you, I’m pretty forgiving myself when it comes to mistakes in speech. I think Miss Raj did try her best to express herself properly in English, except that on the world stage, she directly mistranslated into English the mindless Tagalog expression “
sobra-sobra,” which as you know peppers radio and TV shows as well as product commercials in the Philippines these days. But I do find it an aggravation when professional news reporters and editors bungle their English grammar and semantics much too often. As role models for good English, they ought to learn and know English better.
I was wondering though if you’ve read any of my detailed weekly critiques of the Philippine media’s flawed English in Jose Carillo’s English Forum. If not, may I invite you to check out My Media English Watch to get a taste and feel of them?
Again, thanks for the feedback and have a nice day!
Eng:Yes, I have read some of your (very
detailed critiques and I admire your tenacity! I can’t imagine how you can do that every week. Even though I get irked by a lot of what I read, I’ve just about run out of energy to do much about it. I only take action when things are abysmally appalling. I've also checked out your language forum and I believe I've even posted a comment or two.
What bothered me the most about Venus Raj’s answer was that she thanked the judge for his question. I blame that on poor training, I’ve encountered a number of trainers and coaches who teach people strange things like thanking people for no fathomable reason (this is the case with some call center agents). But going back to Ms. Raj, her answer had elements that could have been used to develop a good answer but perhaps she panicked. While people must always strive to better themselves, I do think she did well enough for her to be proud of herself and I hope she continues to work hard. At the very least, she helped lighten our country's very dark mood.
Cheers!
