In a BBC News Magazine article published several months ago, Matthew Engel discusses and laments Americanisms. The article, “Viewpoint: Why Do Some Americanisms Irritate People?,” explores the increasing presence of Americanisms in the British vernacular, and how some Americanisms should be a cause for alarm. As an American, I found Engel’s opinions humorous and a bit trite, but I’d like to offer a brief commentary.

Engel writes, “American culture is ubiquitous in Britain on TV and the web. As our computers talk to us in American, I keep having to agree to a license spelt with an s. I am invited to print something in color without the u. I am told ‘you ghat mail.’ It is, of course, always e-mail – never our own more natural usage, e-post.” Although Engel pointedly attacks the evolution of the English language in the United States, the responses to his article (posted in “Americanisms: 50 of Your Most Noted Examples“) truly made me question the scope of all the language hostility coming from across the pond. Below are a few of my favo(u)rite reader responses:

15. What kind of word is ‘gotten‘? It makes me shudder. Julie Marrs, Warrington

22. Train station. My teeth are on edge every time I hear it. Who started it? Have they been punished? Chris Capewell, Queens Park, London

31. ‘Hike‘ a price. Does that mean people who do that are hikers? No, hikers are ramblers! M Holloway, Accrington

39. My favourite one was where Americans claimed their family were ‘Scotch-Irish‘. This of course it totally inaccurate, as even if it were possible, it would be ‘Scots’ not ‘Scotch’, which as I pointed out is a drink. James, Somerset

42. Period instead of full stop. Stuart Oliver, Sunderland

Personally, I don’t take issue with the hatred of American English. However, I think it is important to examine the accuracy of these complaints. Mark Liberman over at Language Log posted a great response to Engle’s article. Liberman’s rebuttal, “Peeve of the Week: 20% Correct,” notes that only 20% of Engle’s Americanisms actually stem from American English. In hunting down the etymology of “hospitalize”—a word Engle deems “vile” and “ugly and pointless”, Liberman found that the OED’s “first two citations are from the Daily Chronicle (London) in 1901 and 1904, and hospitalized was used in the British scientific publication Nature as early as 1946.”

The elephant in Engle’s room is the question of language identity and authenticity—an argument much debated between British and American linguists. In the end, Engle and other BBC readers’ pet peeves should just give American English users something to chuckle about. As Geoffry Pullum points out in another Language Log entry, American English speakers have nothing to fear when traveling or living in Britain—”I mistakenly ordered a bagel to go yesterday (I should have said ‘to take away’), and nobody snarled.”

Have any Beyond Words‘ readers outside of the United States experienced any hostility toward American English usage? Is this a global (maybe even globish) phenomenon, or is it simply the complaint of a small minority in the UK? Let us know your thoughts!

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Photograph by photoshy

Many roads lead to the education of a populace and the process and approaches to that end have changed, undergone scrutiny, been adapted, ramified, and revisited over mankind’s existence. Many centuries-old techniques, such as the regular memorization of poetry both in one’s native language and in foreign languages, have since fallen out of favor. Today, much of the Western world emphasizes a creative approach, eschewing rote memorization in favor of tailored teaching methods that allow children to develop as individuals and to pinpoint their interests and strengths.

While gentle-touch approaches resonate with many and can garner positive results, there are a host of benefits cast by the wayside in forgoing the lessons of our ancestors. A 2007 book by psychoanalyst Norman Doidge entitled The Brain that Changes Itself: Stories of Personal Triumph from the Frontiers of Brain Science examines how the human mind possesses incredible regenerative properties that can be harnessed through regular mental and even physical exercises. Take for example the technique practiced in America in the past and currently obligatory in much of the world: emphatic attention to handwriting, employed as soon as a child begins to read and write. Beautiful, legible handwriting is not the only result, according to Dr. Doidge’s findings: The very act of learning to write elegantly strengthens motor skills, leading to enhanced fluency in reading and speaking. “Today many of the most learned among us,” writes Dr. Doidge, “prefer the omnipresent PowerPoint presentation – the ultimate compensation for a weak premotor cortex.”

Rote memorization – a term sure to horrify the more progressive Western educators – can actually account for strengthened brain function. For centuries, students were required to memorize and recite poetry. In his book, Dr. Doidge maintains that the auditory memories of students emerging from that educational model are superior to those of us whose educations lacked that component. Elocution, pronunciation, an enriched vocabulary, and the ability to perform in front of an audience are all benefits that stem from a component of education deemed obsolete in much of the Western world. And the beauty and wisdom gained from the finest poets and authors does not just dissipate from students’ minds as they grow older. In my own experience, I have heard adults educated according to older models answer questions with quotes from classical literature, respond to laments with recitations of poetry, and dole out advice from Plato, Pushkin, and Shakespeare. As educational approaches continue to shift and develop, we would all be well-advised to differentiate between the obsolete and the essential in education, preserving the wisdom of our forefathers.

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Illustration via brain_blogger

We’ve all experienced the occasional verbal slip-up, whether we’re nervous or the words just don’t come out right. In casual speech between friends, a faux pas is usually laughed off and moved on from as quickly as it appeared. However, in business meetings and professional speeches, they’re a little harder to overlook. A major source of faux pas encountered in interpretation work is the tricky element of language known as register. It’s the difference between walking up to a colleague and saying, “What’s up?” instead of “How are you doing?”

Spoken language takes on different levels of formality depending on the social situation and the relationships between those involved. Register is the form that language takes in different circumstances, and “code switching” is the ability to go from one register to another guided by context. Register is an essential social skill that provides flexibility and demonstrates competence in speech and appropriate social norms.

Even for experienced interpreters, register is difficult to master, as it relies not only on the language itself, but also on social customs, culture, and even personal preferences. As a relationship progresses between individuals, the register they use may evolve to be more informal. Unlike words and grammatical structures, register follows its own set of rules, and it’s hard to hit the mark on it exactly. In most cases, close enough is usually sufficient.

There are two basic forms of register: informal and formal. Contexts where one might use the informal register are with friends, family, and meeting people at casual venues, like a bar. The formal register is reserved for professional settings, like classrooms, the workplace, and interviews. Place isn’t the only determinant of register: Factors like how long the people have known each other, their previous relationship, if any, and their purpose in speaking to each other affect how formal or informal the speech will be. Speaking with parents and teachers would require less formal speech than at a company networking event, but more formal speech than a peer group. Linguists have actually determined that there are five different levels of formality in every language (see the examples for English, shown below).

With the first language learned, register eventually becomes intuitive, while formality in a second language requires more thought. Most children start developing a strong understanding of register and code switching at around the age of 5 through exposure to a variety of social situations. However, lower income and education levels are associated with a poor grasp of nuanced speech. Research in the Journal of Children and Poverty shows that children living at or below the poverty level usually only master the casual register. Students in this income bracket were observed using the same register with their peers on the way to school as they do in the classroom with teachers. Such behavior can result in miscommunication, ultimately leading to negative social consequences like disciplinary action.

Interpreters can be more effective by looking at the background of the individuals speaking and receiving their interpretations. Take, for example, a farm worker explaining a work accident to a doctor, speaking in a register inappropriate for exchanges between professionals and clients. To make the transaction go more smoothly, the interpreter could code-switch for the farm worker. If it were two farm workers speaking to each other for the joy of conversation, an interpretation of register wouldn’t be necessary. Register touches on the personal experience of using language, and its use (or misuse) can determine the outcome of a social interaction.

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Photograph by zizzybaloobah

The process of second-language acquisition in children is a brilliantly whimsical foray into how the mind superimposes available rules onto new terrain. Young students do not have to contend with the fears and hang-ups that adult language-learners struggle with, and most will bravely guess at phraseology rather than keep quiet. The lessons I’ve gleaned from teaching ESL have demonstrated just how much intuition dictates to children as they learn a new language.

Even my youngest Russian students know that, while English grammar can be treacherously irregular, vocabulary can be guessed at with surprising accuracy due to the fact that a great number of words share Latin roots. If students do not know how to say something in English, they simply say the Russian word with English pronunciation. This is a rather logical assessment: If you take a Russian word, drawl out the “r”, round out the “o”, and clip sibilant “s’s” into “z’s”, you pretty much have English. Unfortunately, it isn’t always that easy, but the kids do succeed in making whatever words they produce sound English, even if those words don’t actually exist in the language.

Syntax is another arena in which one language vividly shows itself in another. Russian tends to place prepositional phrases before main clauses, and following this template, my students render such sentences as: “To me comes my grandmother” and, because they come from some of the most affluent families of Moscow, “To my happy birthday goes Vladimir Putin.” Eventually, through years of drills and rote memorization, they are weaned off this sort of transposition and grow accustomed to a different set of syntactical rules.

But certain things persist:
Thanks to outdated textbooks, children will say, “I like to dance. That makes me very gay.”
When I tell them to write a rhyming poem, I get: “Budent is a student.”
And, without fail, when they have to label a person’s outfit, on his feet he wears “cocks.”

Occasionally, though, the two languages will coincide with bewildering precision. I once asked a second-grader why she drew price tags in her notebook and why the numbers on them were so outrageously high. “What do you want,” she replied, “It’s Moscow!”

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Photography courtesy of the Museum of Hartlepool

If you had told a linguist five years ago that text messaging would help save an endangered language, he or she probably would have laughed in your face. But it’s true, according to Samuel Herrera of the linguistics laboratory at the Institute of Anthropological Research in Mexico City. He found that young Chileans are “producing hip-hop videos and posting them on YouTube using Huilliche, a language on the brink of extinction.” Outside of Chile, teenagers in Mexico and in the Philippines have been sending text messages in Kapampangan and Huave. While text messaging has often been lamented as the end of language with its shorthand of “LOL” and using “2″ for the word “to” or “too,” it appears that in certain cultures, it’s accessibility is a means to preserve faltering languages.

But why these regional languages with rare usage? Because they are exclusive—the adults in villages and towns no longer use the regional vernacular, so teenagers have picked it up as a means to speak around their parents. It’s like the “No Parents Allowed” sign American teens often post on their bedroom doors. Herrera and other researchers are obviously excited about the “discovery.”

In fact, according to Dr. Gregory Anderson, young people need to be the ones reviving a dying language. The director of the Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages in Salem, Oregon, says that somewhere between the ages of six and 25, people make a definitive decision whether or not to say to stay or break with a language.

Through peer usage, rare languages are being preserved and perpetuated throughout communities.

Beyond the already stated languages, Luke Lindemann on his blog Bhasha Beguine, brings forth another great example of texting and language in Nepal. He writes:

Reading the article reminded me of texting in Nepal. From what I’ve seen in Nepal there is a lot of code-switching between Nepali and English, which also acts a shibboleth… Nepali is by necessity written with a Roman script. The Nepali version of “What’s up?” is “के छ ?” – “ke chha?”(‘What is?’) But in text messages this is often written: “k 6?”

So why the “6″ if it’s supposed to represent the word “chha?” Lindemann gives the first nine Devanagari numbers:

Notice that the Nepali word for 6 is ‘chha.’ The word for six is a homonym for to be (third person singular). Also, the Devanagari character is almost the same: ६. When written as a word, the character has a bar across the top (छ). In other words, chha means both six and is. So the Arabic numeral (6) stands in for the Devanagari numeral (६), which stands in for the Devanagari word (छ).

All in all, this is a nifty representation of language use and reuse in Nepalese culture.

Does the future of language rest in the hand that holds a cell phone? Only time will tell, but it does seem that with the move towards all digital archives, texting will inevitably have to play a role in the bigger picture.

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Photo by Meena Kadri

Spring break is upon us. Do you know where your documents are? One of the biggest hassles for international travelers is gathering all manner of necessary forms and applications to make their dream vacations a reality. Despite rising fuel prices and tightening airport security measures, millions of Americans are expected to zigzag the globe in the coming weeks. For the globetrotters out there, here are a few etymologies that may come in handy:

You can’t start your adventures abroad without a passport, a document that countries have been issuing to their citizens – albeit under different titles – since ancient times. While these thin booklets containing a traveler’s basic personal and national information acquired the name “passport” from the Old French only in the 1500s, the appearance of similar documents has been recorded in several Turkish and Persian scripts from the 5th century BC. The “port” of “passport” is unlikely to have been a sea port, but rather more akin to the French porte, meaning “door” or “gate,” and referring to the city wall gates that travelers were permitted to enter with necessary document in hand. A fun bit of trivia about passports is that, before the advent of photography, detailed descriptions of the passport-holder’s appearance were used to identify each traveler.

In addition to a valid passport, some countries also require visitors to obtain a visa prior to entry. Visas grant their holders official authorization to enter a country for a specified amount of time and with an expressed purpose. The practice of requiring visas came into general use in the beginning of the 19th century in Europe and drew from the Latin charta visa, meaning “paper that has been seen.” One of the most common types of visas is the Schengen, created in 1985 as the result of a treaty signed in Schengen, Luxembourg. Obtaining this type of visa allows a traveler to move freely about the Schengen Area, which consists of 25 European countries. Similar visas exist in South America and Africa, granting their holders access to multiple countries under one document.

Enjoy your Spring Break! We hope you have a safe and relaxing time!

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Photograph by Michael Philip Manheim: Airplane Coming in for a Landing Over Neptune Road Homes, 1973

Pinker subsequently hit the speech/presentation circuit, and he’s elaborated on the themes and content of his talk. Below you’ll find footage of his original 17-minute TED talk, an hour presentation at The Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce (RSA), and an abbreviated animation made from the RSA lecture. Don’t miss the excellent animation! (Thanks to Patrick Appel at the Daily Dish for pointing us to it.)

Notice: These video contains very strong language and might not be considered suitable for young viewers.

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I’m happy to announce that ALTA Language Services has been sold to its employees through a leveraged ESOP. In December, the company closed the transaction that acquired 100% of the company’s stock from the departing owners, Abe Revitch and Rosine Sauvage. In discussing the decision with Abe and Rosine, both felt strongly about preserving the culture and team atmosphere that everyone at the company had worked so hard to build. Through the years Abe and Rosine always encouraged participative management, so this transition strategy was a natural fit.

We’re all excited about the company’s future and the energy and enthusiasm an ownership mindset will bring to everything we do.

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We test nearly 100 languages, but just as our top translation services provide an interesting glimpse at language trends for business and government, the top languages we test reflect much about current political and economic conditions, and the importance of valid and reliable language skill verification for business, health care, and national security. Here is the data on the top languages we tested in 2011:

Top 10 Languages Tested (2011)

The Top 10 Languages Tested by ALTA Language Services in 2011: English, Spanish, Pashto, Arabic, Dari, Japanese, French, Farsi, Korean, and Russian.

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After providing translation services for more than three decades, ALTA Language Services has developed a rigorous approach to ensuring translation quality. In 2011, we took our commitment to quality to the next level and applied for ISO 9001:2008 certification for our translation quality management system. ALTA passed the compliance audit with zero nonconformities, a feat achieved by fewer than 5% of the companies that pass their initial registration.

ALTA’s Translation Quality Management System outlines a clear path to quality translation work, beginning the moment a document is received for a quote up to completion of the project. The TQMS requires ongoing commitment from translators, project managers, and upper management.

As part of this process, we are constantly looking for ways to improve ourselves. We strive for high-quality translations, quick turnaround times, and a high level of customer service. ALTA’s translation team holds regular project audits to review our performance in all of these areas. We place tight restrictions on translator selection and continuously monitor translator performance. Through this process we have developed a robust team of some of the most skilled translators in their fields, many of whom have been working with ALTA for more than a decade.

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