My relationship with the English language is one of the most confusing. I was born in New York to Jamaican parents and when I was younger most of my mediate family member spoke to me in broken English (patwa or patoise), but as soon as I started to sound “Jamaican” my mother started to push me to speak more proper English but instead started to speak a mixture between American English and my “heavy tongue why can you not pronounce that word” speech. When I went to Canada to live with my grandparent I was told by my cousin I spoke terrible and my English grammar was so American she would said “that not how you say this word or pronounce that word” she believed the way that Canadian speak is superior to how American speak (well, that is her opinion!), after coming back to America I continue to talk Yankee until I moved to Jamaica. I lived in Jamaica with some of my relative and I started to pick up patwa again but I was not allowed to speak it in primary school I spoke English. So when I came back to America and started high school anyone whose anyone belived that I was not from the country and assumed I’m from the Caribbean , I spelled “color” colour and pronounce the word “the” different then everybody else among other words. The funniest thing is that I spoke more patwa here than I did in Jamaica which is weird. I’m now learning Spanish and for me pronouncing words is hard but that’s just me, I switch between standard English to patwa before I know who I’m talking to and then learning another language on top of that is really annoying.
that always happens when someone goes back to their country and come back to the US they always end up speaking their hometown language alot more. That always happens to me when i go to colombia and guatemala i always speak spanish there so when i come back i end up speaking spanish all the time and i end up forgetting some words in english. So i will end up speaking in spanglish like talk in english and end up saying spanish words or speak spanish and end up saying english words.
ReplyDeleteVery interesting. Whether its Canada or US, we all speak English but how we speak it really makes a difference. English sounds like a foreign language when British speak, due to their way of articulation.
ReplyDeleteI guess everyone has to go through the difficulty in adjusting our accent and languages in a different country. I have been living here in US for almost 10 years now and I try my best to sound American (if there is such) but one or the other always catches me and tells me that I some what have Indian accent.
Hi, just wanted to remind you, BP # 2 is due before the class tomorrow ( 9/18/2011)
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