Bilingualism: Lost in translation? Or plain laziness?
I was riding the MTA on my way to an appointment. Like most of us on the subway, I was looking up at the advertisements and trying not to look directly into anyone’s eyes. I had forgotten my book and had no iPod to keep me entertained. It was then that I spotted the NYC Dept of Education posters advertising the many “so called” improvements to the system’s education for our youth. I applaud them for their effort to inform the public in both English and Spanish but I have to fail them on their translation. They were inconsistent at best. Although the messages were understood, to this native speaker, who suffered grueling spelling and dictation quizzes as a youth in South America to learn that omitting accent marks, can and does, in some cases, affect the meaning of a sentence, the missing accent marks on the translations, were enough to frustrate me all the way home. If we’re going to speak to the public in their language, shouldn’t we do it effectively and without undermining their education?
Labels: Bilingualism
posted by Malena @ 11:48 AM
1 Comments:
At February 17, 2011 at 8:24 PM ,
Anonymous said...
Admittedly I came to the US as a child, nevertheless, I did go to private schools for my first few years in Colombia and completed 6th grade there as well, so I am puzzled by your description of having had spelling quizzes in South America, I for one do not recall ever having had a “spelling” test in Spanish, you description totally goes against my knowledge and experience with the Spanish language. In can readily understand why there are spelling quizzes in English, since the language has roots in several dialects of Europe, past and present, and hence the language has no consistency, but I can not imagine having spelling tests in Spanish, once one knows the connection between pronunciation and the spelling and I can not see how one can get it wrong, with a few exception, like the silent “H”, as in “hola”, or the use “LL” vs. “Y” as in “llave”, or “B” vs. “V”, as in “vaca”. In a total of the four or five years I studied in Latin American I never had a spelling test, so I am puzzled by your mentioning of having to pass quizzes in Spanish spelling. Furthermore, I disagree with you that accents, or the lack of one, drastically changes the meaning of words, is there really a difference between “mas” and “más”, I do not think so! Accents in Spanish are used primarily to reflect the pronunciation of the word, as in “teléfono”, not to change the meaning of it, hence “telefono” may be grammatically incorrect, it is missing the accent, but it does not make me scratch my head as to what the author meant, unlike some languages where a missing symbol changes the meaning of the term, for example in Chinese kanji. Moreover, it has been my experience that in informal Spanish, i.e. letters to one’s friends, accents are sometimes not used at all, as opposed to say a business letter to a customer.
Ray
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