Re: CHAT: silly names, prepositions
From: | Tristan McLeay <zsau@...> |
Date: | Monday, March 19, 2001, 6:16 |
> Hm
>
> If were speaking of how we speak, I have to mention that sometimes I'll
> produce ridiculous utterances like, /wEm briNn ju mi: DbVk/ (D = voiced
> interdental fricative, V, flip it over and make it small), meaning "when
> bringing you me the book".
I have no trouble understanding that. On a side note, I went to the
school libry, and picked out a book entitled 'Classic Scottish Short
Stories'. Given that it was in the English section (as opposed to a
small section with ten picture books in French, German, Japanese and
Indonesion), one would expect it to be in English, but of all the people
whom* I asked, (about ten of my friends), I was the only one who could
understand it, although a friend of mine read it in a pretty convincing
Scottish accent. This might mean that my understanding of that is unusual.
*m to avoid thingy... like the r in 'data is'
> I do this fairly often, most usually when I'm
> on sleep deprivation or otherwise incapacitated. I think at such times,
> being Hungarian is my first language, I'll say English words with
> Hungarian syntax, usually everybody listening not understanding. Though I
> even grew up speaking English (outside the home anyway), I still have
> difficulties occasionally trying to construct sentences which are rather
> complicated, and usuall either a) say it in Hungarian, to everyone not
> understanding, or b) say it in English with Hungarian syntax, to the same
> result.
>
> Now that makes me curious...does anybody else apply the syntactical rules
> of their mother tongue to others they speak at an almost mother tongue
> level? (I mean like, someone who is Canadian or American born but whose
> first language is not English or French).
As a fair number of the people who know me would guess I'd mention: NOT
ALL ENGLISH SPEAKERS ARE AMERICAN. And I don't care whether or not you
meant to say that, or even imply that. I don't like it when people make
it way to easy for me to inferr it.
Apologies for the anger...
And interestingly enough, I spend enough time around ESL people that I
have the occasional ESL-type thing coming through in my speech, like
using 'isn't it?' to make questions, when normally one wouldn't.
>
> Also: a curiosity thing, anyone want to type an approximation of the way
> they would articulate a little text? Just to see how we all pronounce...
> what would be a good little text? /a:j @m rE:D@ kj.oe.rj@s/ (ug... .oe. is
> oe ligature like eu in French eux)
>
Yeah, sure, why not? /aim ra:D@ kj@u:ri@s t@u:/.
Tristan.
_________________________________________________________
Do You Yahoo!?
Get your free @yahoo.com address at http://mail.yahoo.com
Replies