Yes, a word if I can in whatever language you have to offer. I stand all amazed by people who can speak multiple languages with ease. I do not understand how they can keep them apart, or how they can even remember all the vocabulary, grammar, conjugations and accents. I speak a bit of Spanish and even less French and that is the most my little brain can handle. I recall a teacher I had in high school who was a linguist. He taught English and French, but he was fluent in dozens of languages; not only fluent in grammar and vocabulary, but fluent in their accents. What he was doing teaching high school I don‘t know. He had a PHD in something or other, I just recall he went by the title Dr. He was a very likable guy, but it seemed to me he belonged in a university setting and other teachers, as I recall, felt the same way. Perhaps they had other motives for him changing venues, but I digress.
We had arranged a trip across Canada so parents, teachers and students had gathered for a planning meeting. A good friend of mine was Italian and his father was speaking with the good doctor in his native language. My friend’s father was certain the doctor was from Venice because of his distinct accent, so the teacher changed his accent to match that of my friend’s father who was from Sicily. The latter was stunned. The doctor could speak German, Russian, Spanish, Serbian, and so much more; if put on the spot, I could not even name all of the Japanese car manufacturers, never mind pronounce their names properly.
I have never understood how to change my accent. When I try to sound British, it comes off as Indian, when I try Russian, I get a accused of speaking Klingon. We have all endured movies where actors try to speak with a different accent than their own and listening to it is insufferably painful, but then there are those actors who we just assume are Americans only to discover that they come from Australia, England or South Carolina. Ok, stupid joke, but you get the idea. People who can do this have a keen sense of sound and perhaps a unique ability to shape their mouths that require most people a lifetime to accomplish. I have often wondered what I sound like to a Spanish speaker as I feebly attempt to speak their language with my jarring Pacific Northwest accent.
Words Ever Changing
What is even more remarkable about language is that of the 7,000 known languages that exist today, nearly half are on the brink of extinction. Languages are constantly evolving and changing. My father-in-law gets quite bothered when words are pronounced differently, or given different definitions than what he is accustomed to, but what he forgets is that the pronunciation and definitions that he is used to are not the same as those of his grandparents. There is no language police at the U.N. that ensure the eternal consistency of the spoken word. This evolution is referred to as semantic shift or drift. The word `awful` which my father-in-law defines as `extremely bad` used to mean ‘worthy of awe’ as in ‘the awful majesty of God’. Naughty comes from naught or nothing. It evolved into being evil until my father–in-law who defines it as simply badly behaved.
Not only are old words changing, but new words appear all the time. 100 years ago there was no such word as ‘racism’ in English. It wasn’t until the end of the 19th century, when anthropologist Franz Boaz concluded that behavioral traits were based on culture and language and not genetics, that we started to consider that the color of your skin does not determine the potential of your I.Q. 100 years later we are finally starting to realize that all cultures have value and that it is archaic to refer to some cultures as primitive and others as advanced. There is no continuum of social development with Australian aboriginals at the bottom and the English aristocracy at the top. Instead, we are learning that different cultures simply have different ways of looking at the world. Others are different, not wrong. This new enlightenment brought a change in our language and thus evolved the world ‘racism’ as we learned that we are all pretty much equal genetically, it is our upbringing that makes us different.
Words Ever Missing
Here is another curiosity. Despite the English language having the largest vocabulary of any other language, there are many words we do not have so we have to use awkward combinations of other words to get the idea across. We ‘run out of’ milk for example. The picture that comes to mind is a swimming pool full of milk and me running to get out of it. To me it should mean I have too much milk, so much so that I am running to get away from it. Then there is the Spanish word trasnochar which translates as ‘to stay up all night’. Why didn’t such a word evolve in English? If you have any Latin American friends, or for that matter if you are from anywhere south of the Rio Grande, you will know why.
I recall being invited to two New Year`s Eve parties, one by folks of western European descent, the others from people of South American descent. We were invited to the English party first so we felt obligated to attend it. We sat about chatting, playing board games, and discussing politics. Midnight arrived and we wished each other happy new year and found our way to our cars to drive home. The family from Peru told us to drop by any time so we drove by their home at 12:30 am and I was surprised the police had not been called out. Music was blaring, people were dancing, children were playing, and food was overflowing. We partied with them until the sun came up and only went home because we were worn out. They party all night. The English do not.
Words Ever After
Words evolved as our culture demands, and our behavior is guided by the words we use. This may also be why they have the word betellon – a group of people, typically in their early 20’s, drinking out in the open. This just does not occur enough to warrant a word in English, and when it does occur we call the police so that they can be charged with drunk and disorderly conduct. Oh the English. We are so boring.
Speech is a wonderful gift, but each language delivers this gift in a different way. It shapes so much of our culture and our beliefs in ways that we do not realize. We are told that, when in Rome, we must do as the Romans do; but in order to understand what to do and why, we must also speak as the Romans do. Every culture has something to say and different way of interpreting the world. I suspect that if we learned the native tongue of the aboriginals of Australia, we would come to see all that is wonderful and enlightened about their way of life.
For now, I bid adieu.