Re: META: "Chinese whispers"

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From: "Mark J. Reed" <markjreed@...>
Sent: Saturday, February 28, 2009 2:26 AM
To: <CONLANG@...>
Subject: META: "Chinese whispers"

> Sorry, but am I the only one a bit bothered by the subject of the
> other thread?  I don't know the history of the term but it has the
> terribly politically incorrect flavor of terms like "Indian giving",
> "going Dutch", "Chinese fire drill", and so on, and I'm kind of
> surprised it passed unremarked.  Maybe the name is purely a linguistic
> reference, to people passing along messages in a language they don't
> speak, or something?
>
> --
> Sent from my mobile device
>
> Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>

No,- it's a children's game - they all sit in a circle and the first child
whispers something to the next, and it gets passed on around the circle.
When it gets back to the beginining it's compared to the original.

I'm surprised you've not heard of it! Maybe its just a British thing, or
perhaps we're different ages?

It's quite commonplace - I can't imagine it's in anyway a pejorative term,
although to be fair I suppose you would have to ask a Chinese person's
opinion.


P.

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