InterLanguage Lapses, was Re: Technical terminology

 --- "H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh@...> wrote: > On


...

> But as far as inter-language lapses go... that's
> extremely common in my
> hometown. We speak a mixture of Hokkien, Mandarin,
> Malay, English, and
> possibly a sprinkling of Tamil as well. It's quite
> common to hear people
> switch between languages in the middle of a
> conversation without either
> party even noticing. Sometimes it's a word or two,
> sometimes it's a
> phrase, sometimes it's a complete switchover. And
> other times it's a
> blatantly mangled borrowing. Among some of the
> funnier manglings:
i find it very difficult to lapse into other languages
; partly because i'm not a native bilingual, but
mostly becuase the languages i know to speak ( french
mostly, with some german &c ) have such different
places of articulation. i can manage the switch from
english to french, say, but when i try to switch back
i get in a complete tangle

my boyfriend does something like this as well. he
spent a year or so in brazil, and speaks quite fluent,
if accented, brazilian portugese. when he's speaking
portugese, or talking to portugese speakers, the
english words he uses come out sounding Very Strange .
. . english pronounced with the accent of a brazilian
portugese speaker with an english accent !

anyway, this got me remembering something i read once
which said that every language had its own place of
articulation within the mouth, and that to be able to
pronounce it convincingly first you had to become
comfortable with that place of articulation. i found
this v helpful learning to pronounce french well, and
i think this is why it's so difficult to switch
between languages mid sentence : you're completely
changing the structure of the mouth at the same time
as articulating a sentence. a musical analogy is
switching from playing piano to forte ; to get it
right you often have to practise with a slight pause
between the phrases until the switch seems natural . .
.

anyway, has anyone considered place of articulation
for their conlang ? not sure if i have, but maybe i
should . . .

bn

=====
bnathyuw | landan | arR
stamp the sunshine out | angelfish
your tears came like anaesthesia | phèdre

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