Track my speech

You can take the Wisconsin boy out of Wisconsin but you can’t take Wisconsin out of the boy. This New York Times dialect quiz guesses which part of the country you’re from based on your preferences for certain words (e.g. “sneakers” vs. “tennis shoes” or “dinner” vs. “supper”).

It correctly shows I’m from the Midwest, but I think it gave too much credit to my answer on what you call the night before Halloween (I said “Devil’s Night”, which is only used in the Detroit area, and I know it only from watching the news. Other parts of the country have no word for that night).

Let's call it Burma

The United States government (as well as the UK and most other European democracies) officially refers to it as “Burma”, a perfectly fine name for the country.  Unlike India, whose democratically-elected government deliberately renamed many of its place names in a nationalist effort to assert independence from its British-ruled past, the name “Burma” is simply an anglicized word the locals have always used to refer to the majority ethnic group and the language of the inhabitants. They still refer to their country as “Burma” in verbal conversations.

The name “Myanmar” was arbitrarily hoisted on the country in 1989 by a whim of the repressive military junta that still runs the place.  Linguistically, Burmese uses different sounds for the written versus spoken forms of some proper nouns, and “Myanmar” is the sound of the written, formal version of the country name.  So why did they change the name we foreigners are supposed to use?  Perhaps the ruling junta wanted us to treat their government with more respect.

It’s not an entirely bad name change. Unlike names like “Stalingrad” or “Soviet Union”, which were brand new terms specifically intended to force a new political agenda, there is some logic in asking English speakers to use the pronounced form of the written names. The change is applied consistently to all place names including the (long-time) capitol city Rangoon (Yangon) and the main river, Irrawaddy (Ayeyarwady).

But that is a decision that should be up to the people, not the military.  Perhaps someday the citizens of a newly-free Burma will elect representatives who will themselves choose to call their country “Myanmar”, at which point I’m sure the United States and other countries will recognize the change. Until then, I’m going to call it by the name the people used the last time they were free.

Tea and Taiko at Sponge

Want to expose your kids to a foreign language while they're very young -- the best time for their young brains to soak up the sounds and grammar of Chinese, Spanish, French, Japanese?  Bring them to the Sponge School, run by my good friend, Jackie Friedman Mighdoll.   I first met Jackie more than 10 years ago, in Japan, where she moved after college because she loves languages so much.  A few years ago, when she had her first baby, she set up a school to help small children get started with languages.  Classes are 55 minutes long, full of games, music, and play designed for 0-4 year olds. 

Sunday, January 13th is a good time to learn more about Sponge.  Jackie's hosting a tea party, featuring a Japanese taiko drum performance by YushinDaiko.  It's free, and your toddler will thank you (in some other language, no doubt).

Where: 3107 S Day Street, Seattle
When: Sunday, January 13th 3-5pm
RSVP (not required): events@spongeschool.com

 

Blue State Blue Streak

When I'm online, whether sending emails or posting content, I know that my kids may be reading, so just as in real life I think it's important to be civil. That's why for example, I don't use foul language either offline or online.

So why is it that most, if not all left-leaning blogs seem to overflow with the kinds of words that would have my mother reaching for the soap dish? Right-wing blogs, by contrast, rarely if ever use profanity.

Even the name of my favorite local liberal blog is not a word I'd want to hear coming from my five-year-old. And the progressive bloggers' obsession with potty talk is not just something I'm imagining. Somebody did an unscientific study of that shows filthy language is 41 times more common on liberal blogs than on conservative ones.

I've been reading Steven Pinker's latest book, The Stuff of Thought, where he explains how naughty words are a window into emotion, which of course explains why angry liberals are profane, but why don't conservatives dish it back?