My wife's sister and her family stayed with us last night.  They're on their way to France for a brief camping holiday, and broke up their long journey by stopping here.

I've never fancied camping myself - and by coincidence, I came across a beautiful description of the unpleasant aspects of it in the Guardian today.  The words were spoken by the late Matthew Crosby, a boy with Down's syndrome who is the subject of a new memoir by his mother Anne:

"Nasty peeing by tree, eated smoke, plates muddy, sitted on grass, no television, both socks wetted all time."

Wonderful.

Posted @ 23:50:25 on 23 May 2009  back to top

Boom-bang-a-diggi-loo-diggi-ley-dinge-dong-la-la-la

It was the Eurovision Song Contest last night (or last week, if you include the semi-finals they have now).  For the first time in ages, the UK finished in the top five - not, I think, because the song was an improvement on previous years (it wasn't), but because the voting system was changed to reduce political and regional voting.

In previous years, it's been clear that we have few friends in the rest of Europe prepared to direct any points in our direction.  Yet, somewhat paradoxically, most of the other countries' entries sing in English.  Why do they do this?  Because English is seen as the international language of pop?  Or because the acts see the contest as their big chance of breaking through in the English-speaking countries of the world, especially the US?  I don't know; I'm just suggesting possibilities.

Last year, there was huge controversy in France over the fact that Sébastien Tellier's entry Divine was almost entirely in English.  ('When one has the honour of being selected to represent France, one sings in French,' a government minister complained.)  If Tellier's intention was to speak to the English market, the bizarre lyrics undermined it.  A brief sample:

          Oh oh oh
          I… I'm alone in life to say
          I love the Chivers anyway
          'Cause Chivers look divine
          Look away
          They try to find the Milky Way
          They love to drink it every day

No, I've no idea who or what the Chivers might be.

The use of English lyrics often sounds a little odd in other countries' entries.  You can't help feeling it would have been a good idea to get a native speaker to give them the once over before they were finalised.  Here's an extract from I Wanna, the Latvian winner from 2002:

          Today you think you are the winner
          Today you think you are the king
          You make me sweat in my emotions

I've been sweaty in lots of places in my time, but never in my emotions.

Back to this year's contest, though, because there was one entry where you could see exactly why the contestants had elected to sing in English.  The Georgian song was called We Don't Wanna Put In - a thinly veiled attack on Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.  The chorus goes:

          We don't wanna put in the negative move
          It's killing the groove
          I'm trying to shoot in some disco tonight
          Boogie with you

The words 'I'm trying to shoot in' sound very much like 'I'm trying to shoot him' - and the female singers accompany them by miming a gunshot to the head in the song's video.

However, Eurovision organisers ruled that the song infringed the contest's rules against making political statements - and rather than amend the lyrics, Georgia decided to withdraw.

It was probably a wise move; singing about wanting to shoot Putin when the contest was held in Moscow would not have been advisable.

Posted @ 10:31:45 on 17 May 2009  back to top

Wight words - wrong words

Oh, I do like a good bit of gobbledegook now and then - not least because it serves as reassurance that there'll always be a need for copywriters who can write clearly.

Last week, the Isle of Wight council published a document on its adult learning programme, intended to help people improve their powers of communication.  Unfortunately, the document serves only to prove that those who produced it are in dire need of such help themselves.

For example, the council's Train to Gain programme is said to have been "well received within the Isle of Wight council with recent pilot with leisure staff leading to the future expectation of this would be to have this project open to all departments of the council and have people directly referred through self-referral and the PDR cycle".

There's also the news that the quality improvement plan has been revised "to focus and cross referenced to the new Framework For Excellence so we are working towards meeting future expectation enabling a more workable and live document which has met with the approval of the LLSC".

'PDR' and 'LLSC' are just two of the baffling acronyms used in the document - others include CAF, CFL, CPD, FLLN, FLIF, IAG, JISC, NCFE, NIACE, NLDC, NOCN, OCN, PCDL, QIP, SMT and WFL.  (None of them is even as memorable as SPLINK.)

Apparently a rewrite is already under way.

Posted @ 22:53:36 on 11 May 2009  back to top

Snap, crackle and... ugh!

It's not quite a spoonerism, but our son Harry (aged 2) asked for a surprising spoonful this morning.

Me:      Harry, what do you want for breakfast?

Harry: Umm... Christ Pispies, please.

Now there's a name for a cereal.  Wonder if that's what the photographer Andres Serrano has in his bowl every day?

Posted @ 21:42:31 on 25 April 2009  back to top

Ooh, let me think, I've seen it somewhere...

Not sure whether this is an illustration of the imprecise nature of language or just another example of me being a bit thick, but anyway...

My five-year-old daughter Emily asked me a question a couple of days ago.

Emily:  Dad, where's Madagascar?

Me:  It's a large island off the east coast of southern Africa.

Emily:  (rolling eyes) No, I mean the DVD...

Posted @ 22:12:55 on 14 April 2009  back to top

A fish by any other name...

It's been reported that Sainsbury's has given a new name to the fish pollack after research showed that customers were too embarrassed to ask for it.

Who on earth did they talk to when they carried out their survey?  Are there really people out there who blush at saying 'pollack', presumably because it sounds a bit like 'bollock'?  I don't suppose the respondents ask for calamari at the fish counter either, since 'tentacles' sounds a bit like 'testicles'.

But what new name has Sainsbury's given to the fish?

Colin.

This is supposed to be pronounced in the French style (i.e. 'co-lan' rather than 'co-lynn'), but it's still going to look as though the staff have started giving the produce pet names.

Wonder if they'll call the monkfish Harry next...

Posted @ 19:56:05 on 08 April 2009  back to top

At least sticks and stones are straightforward

As a parent of two young children, I'm obviously aware that the language you use with them is hugely important in shaping their development; not just for their self-expression, but for their self-confidence.  However, I was completely taken aback by a revelation in this week's fascinating edition of Horizon on BBC1.

In the programme, David Baddiel went in search of the best way to maximise his children's potential for both success and happiness.  He interviewed Professor Carol Dweck of Stanford University, whose research has shown that parents can often ruin their children's chances by using three little words.

The words?  'You're...so...'

'Stupid?' I thought.  No.  'Clever'.

She explained it thus:

'Our research shows that it makes children think, "Oh, I have to be intelligent all the time.  That's what they value me for".  They stop taking on challenges, they hide their mistakes - so many people think we're building confidence, we're showing our regard for them when we praise their intelligence, but I have found it's just the opposite.'

This parenting lark really is a minefield. 

Posted @ 21:20:59 on 21 March 2009  back to top

Addenda and miscellanea

First, a few follow-ups to some topics we've already covered.

_______________________________________________________

It was while researching Bald that I first came across the Livonian language.  Specifically, I discovered this Livonian proverb: 'The bald pate speaks most of hair'.

Now it turns out that Livonian is all but dead.  This week, Unesco published a list of the world's endangered languages - all 2,500 of them.  500 of these are 'critically endangered'; 199 have fewer than ten native speakers.  And Livonian, which was the mother tongue of thousands until the Nazi occupation of the eastern Baltic and subsequent Soviet annexation, is now the mother tongue of just one person.  He or she has no one else who grew up with the language to converse with.

The demise of a language is just as regrettable as the disappearance of an animal species.  As Christopher Moseley, editor-in-chief of the Unesco survey, put it:

'...each language is a uniquely structured world of thought, with its own associations, metaphors, ways of thinking, vocabulary, sound system and grammar - all working together in a marvellous architectural structure which is so fragile that it could easily be lost forever.'

It seems there are a variety of reasons for the dwindling and disappearance of languages.  Most often, it is the large-scale movement of people from the country to the city, leaving their regional tongue behind.  It can also be the impact of what have been termed 'killer' languages such as English or Spanish; major languages which simply steamroller the smaller ones.

In both of these cases, there is a failure to recognise the value of these small languages.  And I think I may have been guilty of this myself.

When the proverb mentioned above appeared in Bald, I gave the origin as 'Latvia' rather than mentioning Livonian.  Now it's true that the language was spoken in a region of Latvia.  And I'm certainly not taking full responsibility for its death.  But all the same, I'm feeling a bit bad today that I wasn't more specific about the source.

Posted @ 21:32:03 on 24 February 2009  back to top

Adult language, infant language

A couple of things this week.

On Monday evening, an edition of Panorama on BBC1 presented by (slightly surprisingly) Frank Skinner looked at the issue of swearing on television.  According to a poll conducted for the programme, 55% of the public believe that it is currently at an 'unacceptable' level.

At first, I was surprised by how high this figure was; can so many really be so easily offended?  Two such people were interviewed - a senior writer on the Daily Telegraph and the director of Mediawatch (the organisation originally started by Mary Whitehouse) - but they hardly seemed representative of the general population.  They were the sort of middle-aged types whom one cannot imagine ever having been younger - and in the case of the latter gentleman, it is effectively his job to look for things to be offended by.

It would have been useful to know the exact wording of the question used in the poll.  Could it be that people are simply bored with 'bad' language rather than outraged by it, and think there's too much of it for that reason?  I often find swearing on TV tiresome - for example, when it's used in a conscious attempt to be 'edgy' or is so frequent that it becomes an irritating verbal tic - but I'm not offended by it.

Swearing can be powerful and expressive; the English language is blessed with some wonderfully meaty Anglo-Saxon words.  It can be very, very funny.  But it has to be used judiciously or it loses its power and effect.

It's rarely said, but this is the real reason why children should be told off for swearing and why adults shouldn't swear in front of them.  It's not because the words are intrinsically bad, but because getting into the habit of swearing all the time is likely to reduce their powers of expression.  They don't have the experience to know how and when to use them, and the overused and wrongly used words lose their power.

Not that this issue came up at the language-related talk at my daughter's primary school which I attended on Wednesday evening.  It was a presentation on phonics - the relatively new technique being used by the school to teach the children how to read and write - and the purpose was to give parents advice on how to give help and support at home.

Some of the advice was rather surprising.  For example, we were told that we shouldn't:

-  use letter names.  We should only refer to their sounds to avoid causing confusion;

-  mention vowels.  The children won't understand what they are;

-  say 'puh', 'tuh', 'muh' and 'nuh' for p, t, m and h.  The sounds are 'ppp', 'ttt', 'mmm' and 'nnn';

-  refer to 'curly /k/' and 'kicking /k/' for c and k.  They are simply different ways of writing the /k/ sound;

-  talk about the 'magic e' which modifies the sound of the preceding vowel when it comes at the end of a word (e.g. cub/cube).  This isn't taught any more.

I certainly don't disapprove of these new guidelines, you understand; the school is apparently enjoying great success with the phonics method already.  But these new tricks will take a bit of getting used to by this old dog.

During the question and answer session at the end of the talk, I was tempted to ask whether it's still acceptable to correct a child's mistakes with a sharp rap over the knuckles with a stick, but I'm afraid my nerve failed me...

Posted @ 10:14:28 on 31 January 2009  back to top

Red wally, yerrollowarry...

It occurs to me that I haven't given an update on our two-year-old son's developing use of language since... well, this one.

All of the words in that list have now (slightly sadly) been replaced by the proper ones - except for one.  For some reason, Harry still can't say 'lorry'.  He doesn't say 'lolly' any more, though; his latest attempt comes out as 'wally', which caused some embarrassment recently.

I was pushing him in his buggy past a supermarket in Teddington, outside which a delivery lorry was parked.  The very large and very burly driver was standing next to it on the pavement, having a quick fag - and as we passed him, Harry pointed up and said loudly: 'Look!  Big wally!'

We moved on with markedly increased speed...

Posted @ 21:27:14 on 20 January 2009  back to top

School's out