h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Seriously I look at that list of "I am"s and see most of the Engish speaking nationalities listed and German thrown in as well.

You know that original question about whether there is an anti-American culture on h2g2 or does it just seem that way that started the "What's Wrong With Americans" thread???... Well?...

No seriously though I am sure that we citizens of the USA probably do NOT need to point out the obvious when we are there. The Eifel Tower hats and the Hawaiian shirts/ Bermuda shorts/ black socks with tennis shoes and ubiquitous cameras around our necks will translate that for us.

Oops - we really should have provided Je suis Américain(e) - the whole of Paris is full of em!

If you look like the description below, you could still be Germans...

Besides, I'll let you into a little trick - the latest cunning thing to do to avoid the crazed Roquefort growers and other people with a grudge against Uncle Sam is to pretend to be Canadian. Everyone loves Canadians.

sprout

Excuse Me! As a Canuck, I resent having to tell the latest terrorist-fad person that "No, I really AM Canadian!. See, I'm nice.."

Actually, maybe it should say:

I am| Je suis ...
.
.
.
...American | ... canadien(ne).

...Canadian | Non!!! Je SUIS canadien(ne)!!

Of course, the French Canadians you can tell straight away, as they have the most fantastic accent in French... No cheating is possible.

Je vais prendre un breuvage ??? Ah you mean boisson.



sprout

You can tell them by more than their accent:

http://www2.canoe.com/infos/dossiers/archives/2003/07/20030706-110542.html

(There's an English version as well.)

As a survivor of French taught in school in the part of Canada that's as far away from Quebec as you can get, I was disappointed not to see *La plume de ma tante*

Duhrrr

=

Which confuses you, the political link or the reference to old French textbooks?

Yo no comprende toto de este. Yo no hablo francés! ¿Y para la traducción Inglés?... ¿A donde? Si este eran en Inglés, Yo puedo sento, pero si no hablo francés, Yo NO puedo sento.

(A también, Yo sabo que mi Español esta malo. Solamente hablo uno poquito Español.)


TRANSLATION SO AS NOT TO BE YIKESED
:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

"I don't understand any of it. I don't speak French! And as far as the English version?... Where? If it was in English, I could find it myself, but since I don't speak french, I CAN'T find it.

(Also, I know my Spanish is bad. I only speak a little Spanish.)

http://translate.google.com/translate?hl=en&sl=fr&u=http://www2.canoe.com/infos/dossiers/archives/2003/07/20030706-110542.html&prev=/search%3Fq%3Dje%2Bsuis%2Bcanadien%26hl%3Den%26lr%3D%26ie%3DUTF-8%26oe%3DUTF-8

Sorry. I found it to be interesting because it is in *French* French, not Quebecqois and it's about becoming a Canadian. Some people from France actually insist that they can't understand most Quebec dialect. Considering the languages split hundreds of years ago, the influence of American and Canadian English, and the zeal of the Quebecers to fiercly maintain their own culture, it's not that big of a surprise.

::::::: I interupt this thread for my rant on Language Education in the States (Especially Dickinson Independent School District, Galveston County, Texas and Many, Many similar school districts in the United States):::::::

I would have loved to have been able to read that article in French. I would also love to be able to even be partially conversant in Spanish. But I didn't get the chance to actually learn a second language. In my school, and in most of the public schools in the US, second language classes are not even offered until around the eighth year. According to one article I read, children, if not taught a second language early begin to loose their innate ablility to learn a second language around the ages of 10 - 12. I took my first Spanish class in my 9th year (Freshman: age 15)... I took three years total but only the first stuck at all. The first year was taught 'emersively', no English allowed in class. But the next two years were basically grammar lessons. Being taught grammar in a language you BARELY understand, much less speak is inane! From what I read in that article and from what I've witnessed when meeting people from Europe is that when children learn a second language early, they can continue to learn new languages well into adulthood... possibly throughout their lives. But I was never really given a chance. Anyone who has tried to learn their first 'second' language as an adult will know the difficulty of this. Oh, it CAN be done, but only with a lot of repetition and effort.

:::::::Ok... rant over::::::

Hey Count - I know where you're coming from.
Learning grammar is nnot learning a language. It's just another subject.
Like learning the Pythagorean theorem does no good until you find out it's the same as the 3-4-5 triangle wjen you want to square a room.
You'd think we've done thins learning thing long enough, now, to have figured out what works!

If I had taken the first year three times I bet my reading and comprehension skills would have improved enough that I would have instinctively grasped the grammar that I completely failed to learn. 'Present pluperfect'??? Mandatos?

Anyway, back to the point... I see we Americains still don't warrant mentioning. ... Hey, it's not like we'd actually be understood anyway.

Jay Nay See Choir?

I'll see if I can get the powers that be to modify it. Otherwise, people seeing the entry will also see this thread of course.

sprout

Hey, I'm having fun with it. Ok... See how many of the phrases in the article you can translate into "Fraynch". Frinstance:


Par Lee vooze English?
Jah Maple Tex, comment vooze apples vooze?

And of course the ubiquitous: Como tally vooze?

When I did a public presentation in Paris at a Microsoft conference I found an interesting heuristic way of generating French sounding sentences using English words.

Recipe:

Start the Microsoft speech SDK (or any of the Microsoft Agent tools, or the Microsoft Office text-to-speech tools), set it up for English, and start writing

eel nee ack my chi my

(French advertisement "il n'y a que Maille qui m'aille").

This will "read out" the English words, and you can change them until it sounds French enough.

enough ate enough

Jevusenpre.

I've added American to the list. Next time you want a change to an Edited Entry, please click on Feedback, then on Editorial, and then post your message. We usually get changes made within a few minutes.

This was more fun.



(I did start this thread as more of a comment than a demand that the entry be changed. I do use EF now when the need arises. Thanks for all you do Gnomon.)