Comparing and contrasting the articles to our class work

Yorkshire named top twang as Brummie brogue comes bottom:

This was a article published by the guardian, talking about how different accents are associated with the degree of intelligence and education of an individual. In this article, the Yorkshire was compared to other accents or dialects such as the Birmingham accent. In this survey, it was found that no accents which were tested made someone more attractive or less attractive, however, the type of accent a person spoke had a “significant impact on whether or not a particular model was seen as intelligent.” By doing a survey, Dr. Lance Workman was able to see that the Yorkshire accent had the highest average intelligence rating (6.71/10), while the Birmingham accent had the lowest average intelligence (5.6/10) out of the accents that were tested. Dr. Lance Workman went on to say that this is due to “regional stereotypes”. He said: "Surveys have shown that a lot of people associate Birmingham with criminal activity, and they associate criminal activity with low intelligence.” This links to our class work as we discussed how different English dialects are perceived. This is also seen in the passage from “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, as her mother’s “broken” english is seen as less intelligent, like the Birmingham accent in this survey.

You Say Up, I Say Yesterday:

In this article, the author illustrates the differences between languages as well as how certain languages have words for things that other languages do not have a word for. For example, there are several german words which cannot be translated into english in one word (Backpfeifengesicht in german would roughly translate to a face that cries out for a fist in it). This links  in to our class discussion where we talked about the different words in languages other than English which have not direct translation to English. The author the goes on to state the structural differences between languages such as Spanish, English, Russian, etc. One example would be how in Spanish or Japanese, intent matters. This is not the case in English, as the intent does not matter. For example, this is seen when in English when someone “knock[s] this cup off the table, even accidentally, you would likely say, ‘She[/He] Broke the Cup’”. This is however not the case in other languages where the intent matters. 

Bilingual Mind: Understanding how the Brain Speaks Two Languages:

In this article, the author Jeffrey Kluger discusses the benefits of being bilingual and how the brain is able to speak two languages. The article goes on to say that by being multilingual, people tend to be smarter and quicker at completing tasks. This is seen by the Stroop test, in which people who were bilingual speakers were able to react much faster. This article links to our class discussions and poems that we read in class as they are also about bilingualism. Some poems encouraged the use of using both languages, while the rest of the poems were against the simultaneous use of languages. Overall I believe that the benefits of being bilingual/multilingual heavily outweigh the negatives aspects as the different languages allow us to communicate better and in more ways,as well as help us understand other cultures.

Mother Tongue Stereotypes

In “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, Stereotypes play a big role as the author and her mother are heavily influenced by it. As they are Chinese and live in America, many people have preconceptions of them as they tend to generalise Asians. This is clearly seen in the text as people believe in the stereotype that all Asians are good in math and science.  Due to this Amy Tan was unable to “override the opinion that [her] true abilities lay in math and science”. Being German, I receive stereotypical comments as well, which range from loving football, drinking beer to hating Jews due to the Nazism ideology which used to rule Germany. And No, I don't think Hitler was a good man (I get asked that question from time to time). Even though some stereotypes might be correct, such as loving football, most of the stereotypes are incorrect, such as hating Jews, and are brought upon Germans due to the media as well as due to the German History (Nazism Ideology). Stereotypes are often imposed on people due to the media, which often are not true. In “Mother Tongue”, Amy Tan writes about the stereotypes of non-native English speaker. I personally believe that we should not have a pre-assumption of what a person is like by only knowing their nationality or the way they look like by using stereotypes. Furthermore, these stereotypes are often incorrect like I stated earlier, for example, not all French people love wine and baguette. The issue of stereotypes greatly effects Amy Tan as well as her mother. This is seen when Mrs. Tan is not been treated correctly when the hospital lost her CAT scan of her Brain tumor, and were not willing to provide a justification or explanation of how they lost, let alone a apology. This is because the hospital thought less of her as she was unable to communicate effectively with the staff at the hospital. This however is changed when the doctor, who speaks perfect english, calls Mrs. Tan’s daughter, Amy Tan, due to her requesting it as Amy Tan is able to speak english better which is not ”broken english”, unlike Mrs. Tan’s English. The doctor called Amy Tan, and assured her that the CAT scans would be found, promising that they would have a conference call on Monday, as well as apologising for any suffering that her mother had had to go through. This is a perfect example of how people think less of others if they are not able to fly speak their language. If Mrs. Tan would have been able to speak “perfect English”, she would have gotten most definitely apology, like Amy Tan got when she talked to the Doctor. Due to this, I believe that people should stop making assumptions based on stereotypes. 

Good English and Bad

The author Bill Bryson says that there are many standards of usage which shift over time. This shift is seen by many different words and phrases, which to us now, would sound odd. An example of this is when we are referring to one person. In the eighteenth century, it was correct to say "you was", which now sounds odd due to the shift in the english standards. This is also seen by "I'm hurrying, are I not?", which nowadays sound odd and is grammatically incorrect. The English language has now shifted to make the phrase "I'm hurrying, aren't I?", which in the English Language today would be perfect English. When Bill Bryson talk about "Bad English", he refers to the simple grammatical mistakes which are easily made. This can often happen, especially if English is not your mother tongue, as one will sometimes use their Mother tongue grammatical style and apply it to the English language. This will most likely cause the grammatical structure to be incorrect, resulting in "broken English", which will be hard to understand as seen by Mrs. Tan's broken English in "Mother Tongue" by Amy Tan.

I often make lapses in grammar as English is not my first Language. As I speak or write in English, I often make grammatical errors as German is similar to the English language. Even though German has helped me understand the English language better due to the similarities at first, it has now become less useful for me that the languages are so similar. This is because, even though they are similar, the sentence structure and grammar is different, making it easy for me to make grammatical mistakes as they sound similar. These grammatical errors however have never hindered me very much, as I am still able to get my point across. 

A Good Name

The name "Lukas" is a Swedish and Latin name. It means "light" in Latin, and "brings light" in Swedish. People with this name are said to have a deep inner desire for order and physical creativity, as well as wanting to be involved in conventional and safe activities. This does not really apply to me as I would rather be involved in adventurous and somewhat unsafe activities instead of being involved in conventional and safe activities. I guess that I have a deep desire for order, as I like to be organised rather than being unorganised. The name "Lukas" also gained very much popularity due to Luke the Evangelist ("Lukas der Evangelist" in German).

The surname "Schroth" emerged in the former German province of East Prussia. This surname is said to be derived from the German verb "schroden", which means "chop" or "cut". It was most likely borne by a wood-cutter, tailor, or a transporter of wine and beer, which is currently known in Germany as a Schröder. 

As the name "Lukas" is widely spread around the world and easy to pronounce, other people have no trouble pronouncing the name. This however is different when it comes to my last name "Schroth" as people have trouble pronouncing the "Sch" part correctly. This is because other languages don't have this sound, unlike in Germany, where this sound is very common. 

Introduction

Hello, my name is Lukas and I’m 16 years old. I’m in grade 11 and study at Raha International School. I have several hobbies and interests, which include road biking, football, tennis, skiing and many more. I particularly enjoy the subject History in school, as learning things such as how wars started and how people lived in the past greatly interest me. In this year of school, my goals are to get good grades, staying organised, and on top of my schoolwork, while participating in some sort of sports team. Once I am done with school, I plan to take a gap year before going to university in order to travel the world and see many different places. Language has always played a big part in my life as I’ve been moving countries roughly every 2-3 years ever since I was 9 months old. Due to this, I was exposed to many different languages such as Spanish, German, English, Arabic and Thai. I believe that it is important to study language so that you are able to communicate with everyone both verbally and in written form. Sometimes, language barriers can make one feel excluded, especially if many of your friends are locals and speak their own language between them, which you might not understand. This was the case in Thailand, where sometimes they would start to speak Thai amongst themselves, which I did not understand. This makes people feel excluded, as they do not understand anything due to the language barrier. Due to this, I believe that it is important to study languages so that the language barrier doesn't exist.