Sigh! This woman is about to become an international toast to the stereotype of American stupidity of the world beyond our borders… Quite an amusing exchange — at least the girl keeps her sense of humor about her, even when questioning whether or not Europe “is a country.”

My wife and I enjoy this show (actually, she enjoys it, and I enjoy denigrating the contestants — I’ve only seen one episode thus far that I didn’t know nearly every answer just off the top of my head… Not bragging… Just frustrated that I’m not the one on the show making money), but we didn’t catch this one on the tube, so props go to Allahpundit for bringing it to my attention…

Great article from The Financial Times.  As we’ve talked about here, here, and here, we’re living in unprecedented times.  No language has ever been so widely spoken and studied as is currently the case with English.  The major issues which arise from this are:

1. Is this a simple result of economic imperialism on the part of English-speaking, first-world countries?  Is the world scramble to learn English merely reflective of the global economy being an exclusive “English-only” club? 
2. As English is embraced by speakers of other languages, some mixing is inevitable.  As this mixing evolves into national/regional variants of English, who can claim ownership of the language?  Can we establish rules as to what proper English is?  Should we?
3. As more people learn English, will it fragment into non-mutually-comprehensible regional dialects (think: French, Spanish, Italian, etc. were once Latin)?
4. Is English in danger of being overtaken by another language as a medium of world communication?

Some info for the visually inclined…

Quote: “Two rival groups are out to have fun . . . you know generally indulge in dhamal [a type of dance] and pass time. So, what do they do? Pick on a bechaara bakra [poor goat] who has entered college.” Ummm…  Wow….

Yeah, I know I’ve been remiss on this lately, but the class has hit a solid groove, giving me little to report.  Besides, my head has been elsewhere lately as the end-of-the-semester panic.  Tests and papers galore next week….  Yippee!  Gulp!

Anyway, today I happened to have my first “oral assessment” in Arabic.  Ugggggghhh…  It was pretty painful.  While I don’t think I did awfully, it’s painful trying to do any real amount of conversation at such a beginning level.  I always want to say so much more than my limited vocabulary will allow.  Simply put, there was a lot of “ummmm.. ummm….  ah….” on my side of the conversation.

C’est la vie…

Which is to say, “poorly, yet hillariously, and oddly compelling.”

Apparently, this is from a 1992 show called Eikaiwa Taisō Zuiikin’ English (英会話体操 Zuiikin’ English) , a show that mixes English learning with “gymnastic” exercise.  More clips are available on Youtube, if you are an avid fan of crappily-pronounced English phrases being chanted over bad synth music while girls in leotards bounce hypnotically (hey, who isn’t a fan?).

Strangely enough, the show is actually based upon a pedagogically sound idea.  “Total Physical Response” instructional method theorizes that coupling vocabulary input with movement actually helps to internalize new words and phrases…  Yeah, and leotards don’t hurt either….

Update: Hasta la vista, Baby!

Double Update: By way of explanation of the first clip — Japanese, by and large, seem to be absolutely convinced than they’re going to be shot, robbed, tortured, raped, etc. the moment they set foot off the island (i.e., any sort of travel abroad).  Unfortunately, the world’s criminals seem intent on proving that assumption correct, and sometimes, the terribly, terribly bad simply happens, so learning this type of defensive English is actually quite common in Japan.  It showed up repeatedly in textbooks I used for teaching adults back when I lived there….

Yeah, I’m a couple weeks late with this.  This is not meant to be a political blog, but sometimes the issues just line up with this blog all too well.  In case you missed it, Sen. Lamar Alexander had submitted a bill that would protect employers from federal lawsuits for requiring workers to speak English.  Why do we need a new law to back up what seems to be common sense, you ask?  Because the EEOC has launched numerous lawsuits over exactly that premise — requiring that employees speak the national language while on the job.  Most famously, they have sued the Salvation Army, alleging discrimination.  Click here for legal analysis.

Quote: (Sen. Alexander)”I cannot imagine that the framers of the 1964 Civil Rights Act intended to say that it’s discrimination for a shoe shop owner to say to his or her employee, ‘I want you to be able to speak America’s common language on the job,’ ” he told the Senate last Thursday.

Now, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is moving to kill the ammendment despite wide bi-partisan support because a group of Hispanic Democrats have threatened to block a vote to curtail the Alternative Minimum Tax unless she kills the Alexander bill.  Click here for background.

This is an insane move in terms of popular opinion.  How would you like to be moving into a major election year by spitting into the face of the 77% of Americans who are just fine with requiring English on the job.  The pouty legislators (Reps. Charles Gonzalez and Joe Baca, amongst others, for those who like to name names) are engaging in some shameless grandstanding…

While some will call this a free speech issue, employment is never actually coupled with absolute free speech.  If I were the receptionist for a company, I would be rightly fired if I answered the phone repeatedly by badmouthing the company, its customers, etc.  Employment is always conditioned upon both implied and explicitly stated codes of behavior.  In this case employees were told that company policy was to speak in English at the workplace, and they were given time in which to learn the language.  The employees signed contracts of employment, thereby giving their consent to those conditions.  The two women who kicked off the Salvation Army suit were in breach of their contracts by not learning English. 

Is it reasonable to have language requirements for employment when language does not directly impact job performance or employee safety?  That’s the heart of the suit.  I would say yes.  While emotions will always run high in issues of what language you can/can’t speak, one must acknowledge that the language used in the workplace has reprecussions far beyond basic communication:

Quote: (Captain Ed)Americans understand discrimination as refusal to hire or promote people on the basis of their origins or beliefs, but not on the basis of their actions. Employers have a legitimate interest in having a single language spoken in many situations, and not just for safety. When employees clique off through language barriers, it creates morale and process issues that are entirely avoidable. Employees who do not like those rules can find another job that allows them to speak whatever language they like..What will happen as a result? Employers will probably shy away from hiring Spanish-speaking employees. The EEOC’s actions will make that more expensive to small business, and small business will react in a manner which recognizes the costs. The lawsuits will create more discrimination than they ever could address.

The TV shows.  Hands down the best televised practical jokes ever!  Hat tip to Allah Pundit from Hotair.  I just about choked when I saw this, and my wife had tears streaming down her face. 

Recipe for television gold:

1. Cool inventions:   Check
2. Physical comedy:   Check
3. Massive doses of humiliation that one can still laugh about with one’s buddies within about 15 min. (or at least once you warm up):   Check
4. Tasteful nudity:   Check

Click the video to watch.  Don’t worry if you don’t understand Japanese.  Just bear with it and it’ll all become abundantly clear after about a minute.

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Un-freaking-believable…  (though, mind you, not the first time we’ve seen this type of mentality..)

Chula Vista Elementary, San Ysidro and Sweetwater Union High school districts have joined six others suing the state to stop English-only testing. They are asking for the option to give the test in Spanish to students…  just as at least three other states allow…. To make their case, the districts cite the law that requires the testing – the federal No Child Left Behind Act, the 670 pages of rules that govern public education.

It’s all about the money…  Despite the tired claims of doing this “for the kids,” or “testing what kids actually know as opposed to testing their language skills,” this is all about No Child Left Behind Funding.  Period.

Here’s the reasoning: No Child Left Behind mandates annual math and reading tests. Schools are under pressure to achieve minimum pass rates or face big changes, such as providing transportation for students to attend other schools, replacing staff members or even turning over management to a private company or the state. Many schools have responded by decreasing time spent on other subjects such as science, social studies, music and art.

Simply put, low-English proficiency students hurt schools NCLB scores big-time, and they want to test the kids in Spanish to try to raise those scores.  This completely ignores the very purpose of this type of testing, which is to determine whether students are actually acquiring the academic skills they will need to compete after graduation.  Testing they in Spanish merely kicks the tin-can down the road.  Sure some students may actually know this material in Spanish, and thus score much better, but 1) that can only be assumed for students that are placed in lower grades after immigrating or if the teacher is providing the majority of instruction in Spanish (which isn’t even legal in many areas); and 2) even if the students know the material in Spanish, this doesn’t help them so much in the long run towards getting jobs, continuing education, and generally contributing towards society in a meaningful way beyond custodial/service industries.  English proficiency across all domains (listening, speaking, reading, writing) MUSTbe the highest priority of immigrant children if they aspire to any sort of decent life (I will add an exception if they plan to return to their country of origin in the near future).  Native language instruction is a powerful medium for assisting L2 instruction — I’m not saying to ban all Spanish from the classroom — but we do a mighty disservice to children when we flippantly delay their language acquisition in a painfully misguided quest to assuage their egos about some test scores. 

The distinction these school systems seem not to be getting is that of assessment vs. aptitude tests.  Assessment tests measure what you expect students to have learned in a given period, measured against a defined standard; and in this case, if they are expected to know the information in English, so be it.  That will be the expectation for them in life.  You can’t go to a job interview and respond to the boss’s questions by saying, “Well, I  do know how to do all this, but I can’t actually demonstrate that to you unless you let me do it in my own language…”  You’d get laughed out of the office.  The knowledge of English is simply an implied requirement for 99% of the jobs out there…  Aptitude tests, on the other hand, are measures of what the student already knows or potential for learning something.  Think IQ tests.  To get an accurate assessment of that, you do have to take language out of the picture.  No one would take an IQ test score seriously if it were delivered in another language.  While my IQ is *ahem* highish, I’m willing to bet that I would register as severely retarded if I had to take the test in, say, Polish.  Thus, this all depends on what type of test we’re talking about, but NCLB is quite clearly in the former category.

Video:Mary Katharine Ham (conservative-cutie-managing editor of Townhall.com) discussing this issue on Fox.  She gets mega-brownie points with the Language Doctor for pointing out what I’ve said for years — namely, that affluent people in the U.S. shell out big $$$ for immersion experience in order to learn foreign languages, so why are we so scared to give immigrant children the same opportunity, at no cost to them (or their parents)?

Update:  This thought always annoys me to no end….  Other groups (Chinese, Koreans, Arabs, etc.) do not usually have access to bilingual education, and in other ways simply don’t get the fawning educational attention as Hispanic kids do, yet they seem to be doing fine.  Why do you suppose that is?  Immersion seems to work just fine for them…  Are bilingual militants implying that Hispanics are somehow less capable?  I’ve got some Mexican colleagues in my PhD program who would kick your rear for the mere suggestion……

I give thanks for all ways God has blessed me…  I’ve got a fantastic, lovely wife, a cool dog, a nice place to live, and I love what I do.  Being a student, I’m as poor as they come, but still compared to most of the world, I’m rich beyond measure.  I’ve seen first hand areas where the $30 — which my wife and I would drop in a heartbeat on a good meal — amounts to a months salary or more.  I’ve never wanted for food, clothing, and the like.  We have it incredibly well in this country!  We will always have the poor amongst us, but we have poor with refrigerators and DVD players!  So, instead of whinging about the things we want but don’t have, let’s thank God for the things we do have!

Have a blessed holiday!

Update:  I couldn’t resist…

Life and death…  It can make the difference.  All school principals and the like who reflexively try to cut costs by eliminating foreign language programs, take note!

Richardson, an Iraq War veteran who escaped death because he knew enough Arabic to avoid a booby-trapped vehicle, said having foreign language skills can be a difference maker in military operations. “A word can save a life,” he said.

Follow the link.  It’s a cool article about a cool group of soldiers preparing for a humanitarian mission to Djibouti.  Goodluck and Godspeed to them!

It’s not just the land of Lord of the Rings…

Good thoughts on how languages build barriers between people.  It’s interesting that author recounts being yelled at for not immediately approaching the saleswoman in Mandarin… 

I found the woman struggling with her answer in English. Having earlier heard her speak with another customer in Chinese, I repeated the question again in Mandarin.  But instead of an easy answer, what I had to face next was a telling off by the salesperson for not using Mandarin despite knowing it. The woman, who said she was from Beijing, equated it to my lack of pride in being Chinese.

All too common, really, and not just Chinese people.  Being a heritage speaker, or even someone of similar ethnic extraction as the TL community who learned the TL as a second language seems fraught with this type of peril.  Life becomes a guessing game of sorts, trying to figure out which language to approach each person in in order to avoid minimize offense.  I had an Asian-American friend in Japan who had roughly the same level of Japanese as me (advanced, communicative, but still not gonna pass as a native very often).  Despite our similar speaking levels, the reactions we provoked, however, were very different.  While my Japanese was met with constant astonishment and praise because noone expected someone who looks like me(read: “honky”) to speak Japanese, my friend was often treated like an idiot because she wasn’t immediately recognizable as a foreigner. 

Our identities are in no small way tied up in the language(s) we speak, and this can cause confusion all around when the “sound and picture are out of sync,” so to speak.  While this may seem strange to people from multi-ethnic communities, to most of the world, native language and ethnicity are still virtually synonymous.