The Breakfast Club

This past weekend, my friends and I had a little bit of an eighties movies marathon. One of the movies that we watched was The Breakfast Club. Its about 5 kids from 5 totally different high school clicks each serving a Saturday detention. Seeing as how they have to spend 9 hours together, they eventually turn to each other for conversation, even though none of them have ever talked to each other, and never would have talked to each other during a normal school day. They don't exactly get along with one another, but at least they have someone to talk to. Most of the time is spent figuring out why each person does what they do and hangs out with who they do. At one point, the bad-ass, I don't care what I do, you don't tell me what to do character says to the Prom Queen/princess/daddy's little girl character, "You don't know me. We don't even speak the same language." Obviously he didn't mean that they both don't speak English. He meant that the types of lives that they lead and the types of people that they hang out with are so vastly different, that it can be difficult for them to communicate. Phrases can be translated differently amongst social clicks, and often not at all. Different ideas are thought and shared. There are completely different ways of thinking. These differences can be so large that it seems as though people from different social clicks are practically speaking different languages.

I had a similar experience myself in high school. It was the first or second day of the school year and a few of my friends and I were sitting at lunch. At the other half of the table were a few 'gansta' kids. Even visually there was quite a contrast between the 'gansta' kids and my friends and I. Then one of the 'gansta' kids said something. My friend Emily and I had absolutely no idea what he had just said and just started laughing. We continued to listen to them talk, not understanding, but still laughing at the fact that they were communicating to their friends and that their friends actually understood, which to us sounded like gibberish. It really is amazing how different the language between high school clicks and groups can actually be. Sometimes it is so extreme that there is a complete lack of understanding.

What did your dad say?

I was thinking about the story we read about Richard Rodriguez's childhood. At one point he was talking about how Spanish for him was his family's language. It was a special way for his family members to communicated with each other. It was something that they all had in common, something that bonded them together, something to belong to. This made me start thinking about my family. We speak English, and this obviously is not anything special that just our family does. I speak English with pretty much everyone that I know. My friends, classmates, and even strangers: I speak English to all of them. But there is still a certain uniqueness to the way that my family speaks. I realized this when I was on the phone with my dad last night. We were just talking about the most random things. The way that my dad says things is often quite different from the way most people would say them. About half the time when he tries to use a cliche of some kind, he mixes one or two together, and it comes out as some obscure phrase that no one has ever hear in his life. But, just because he is my dad and we are family, I understand perfectly what he is trying to communicate to me. It is part of our family language to know what these phrases mean. My dad also makes up words. Well, not completely makes up new words, he just changes words. Instead of saying, "Let's have some chips," my dad calls them chippies. If it's a hot summer day out and we are all going to go swimming in the lake, my dad will say, "Let's put our swimmies on." If I have a friend over and they hear this, they just look at me with this puzzled look on her face. Once I translate this family language to my friend the confused face is gone, but I can still tell that it is weird for her. It is just something different for my friends, just because they do not speak my family's special language.

A Standard American?

Last class, we talked a little about if the United States should declare English (and possibly other languages) as official languages. We read two different articles about the different pros and cons about such an action, and if it was actually necessary, and if we should require all new US citizens to learn English. As of now, it is possible to function and live in this country without actually being able to speak English. The written test for getting a drivers license can be taken in other languages. In some places, voting ballots are available in a variety of different languages. But this country has not always been so accommodating to immigrants who speak different languages. This country used to make new comers conform much more than they do now. I remember in elementary school when we learned about all the immigrants who came in through Ellis Inland and the like. Often new immigrants were forced to change their last names so that they would be easier to spell and seem more American. This was partly to make their lives easier with a more American name, but also because foreign names are almost impossible to spell. In the past we forced immigrants to conform to American ways. So, when and why did this change so drastically?

What defines us?

I just read a blurb from one of my RA's. It was about identity and what he actually considers himself. He is of Indian heritage, but when he goes over to India to visit his family, he does not actually fell Indian. This (and the two things I am reading for class today) got me to thinking about what I consider myself. I have always said that I was Dutch, as both of my parents were born in The Netherlands. I, on the other hand, was born in the United States. But I still considered myself to be Dutch. But the more I think about this, the less I think I actually should consider myself Dutch. I do not speak Dutch. Since speaking a language is such a big part of identity, I guess I should consider my American because I speak English. Although my heritage is Dutch, I am not truly Dutch. I am an American.

From Way Down South

This weekend, I spent a two days in Boston with some of my friends. One of my friends brought her roommate with her. Her roommate is from the South, originally from Louisiana and currently living in Mississippi (well, when she is not at college). She was really fun, not only to be around, but to listen too. It is interesting how different our perceptions of certain people can actually be from reality. I have always though that a southern accent would drive me absolutely crazy because of both the different accent and the drawl, the way people from the South tend to speak slower. When my friend told me that her roommate was from Mississippi, I was a little reluctant to actually meet her. But, what I thought she would be like and what she was actually like, accent and speaking wise, were drastically different. She did have the southern accent, but it was not overbearing at all. In fact, it was really adorable. And the southern drawl that I was afraid of, was completely non-existent. We all have different ideas of how people from different regions sound. And these perceptions are not completely ridiculous because there are certainly people from the region who actually speak that way. But for each person who does fit the perception (and it is these people that the perceptions are based on) there is another person who does not fit. These are the people who make the language in this country so interesting to listen to, no matter what part of the country you happen to be in.

Where are you from?

Yesterday, I was walking back from the football game with a few people. The conversation turned towards where we each were from. One girl was from Long Island. She then proceeded to explain to us how some people from Long Island pronounce Long Island. (I would try to explain it here, but I have no idea how I would explain it, or even exactly how it sounds when a native speaker pronounces it in this particular way.) A few of us then tried to imitate this particular pronunciation. To our ears, our pronunciation sounded exactly the same as when the Long Island native pronounced it, but this girl could tell that we were not saying it correctly. This is what I found interesting: that we can only hear certain differences in pronunciation when we are actually from that specific area that happens to pronounce certain words differently. If our ears are not used to hearing words pronounced a certain way, we can not tell if we are actually mimicking the pronunciation or not. Only when we have lived in that particular area for a long time can we tell a real speaker from a fake.

What??? (in writing)

Walking around campus, I always see different things written in chalk on the sidewalks. It makes a lot of sense to tell others about events or almost anything this way because all of the students spend a lot of time walking around from class to class. One that I saw recently said "Google Ron Paul." This one was obviously trying to get people to find out more about the candidate Ron Paul, and hopefully, by getting people more interested in him, have more people vote for him. What was really interesting about this particular chalk writing was that not too far away, facing the other direction is a chalk writing that says "Who is Ron Paul?" What I found interesting about this one is that I, as the reader, do not know if this is supposed to be a question and that this chalk writing is hoping to have a similar effect as the first one. By asking a question, the writers of this chalk writing may be hoping to start some curiosity in the readers. But this chalk writing could also mean something completely different. It could be mocking the first chalk writing. As the reader of this chalk writing, I do not know what this second chalk writing is supposed to mean. In written language rather than in spoken language, it can be much harder to grasp the meaning of words. When someone is speaking, as the listener, it is easy to tell what they mean because you can hear emphasis and tone. But when something is written, these things can be much harder to find and know, thus making the meaning of such language much harder to understand.