NOTE: I am NOT talking racism here at all...I'm simply talking about how different an Asian language sounds to me/our American ears...I/we have absolutely NOTHING against Asian culture in any way shape or form. In fact, I find it very impressive!

Having said that...I know some people (including myself) that occasionally like to switch to one of the Asian channels and watch the news. Partly to see what in the world is going on in the rest of the world...partly to hear those rather amazing sounding languages.

Having only studied English and Spanish...hearing Japanese or Chinese spoken pretty much blows my mind. It is just so radically different, so...unreal. It is very impressive.

And of course...being a typical American...we occasionally make fun of the way it sounds (see note...this all in fun!). Anyway I'm sure a lot of you know what I am talking about.

I was thinking back to a South Park episode when they went to China to play Dodgeball...and the Chinese announcers were making fun of the American language.

I've heard my friends make fun of Chinese or Japanese by making gibberish sort of sounds that sound (to us at least) kind of like what the real language sounds like...

My question is...the heart of this post...after all that explaining...

I'd LOVE to hear a native Chinese or Japanese speaker...that doesn't speak English...making fun of American style English. Do they do the same sort of thing? Make gibberish sort of sounds that to them sound kind of like American English? Do they toss in real words? Do they make fun of the way we sound?

Does anyone know?

Crawford

I think it is mostly American people that make fun of other people's languages.

"Hotdogs, Baseball! Hotdogs, Baseball!"

Tucker Max

Originally posted by Drift Monkey
I think it is mostly American people that make fun of other people's languages.

Mostly...perhaps. But not completely.

Like when I get instructions on how to install a Cusco part...sometimes the translation into English is horrible, even comical. There has to be instances of that the other way around.

Other cultures have to be making fun of us...no way is it 100% an American thing.

Crawford

Of course there is...but I can't recall in any way how I make fun of the English language. I'll tell you if i figure it out.

Bad translation is just that. It's not trying to be satirical.

I had a friend of mine who is Chinese...first generation born in America and his parents had very heavy accents.

He had a bit of an accent, but it was very minor...and he spoke fluent Chinese (I forget which dialect specifically).

He used to poke fun at English...saying how "flat" it sounds...how monotone...how boring.

Crawford

Originally posted by Drift Monkey
Of course there is...but I can't recall in any way how I make fun of the English language. I'll tell you if i figure it out.


How about....
"Fo shizzle my nizzle"

I would make fun of that..

Jackie Chan during the credits of Rush Hour:

Chris Tucker: jackie, do that again.

Jackie (making fun of Tucker) : haouw haouw haowww

Originally posted by phantom



How about....
"Fo shizzle my nizzle"

I would make fun of that..

But that is less English and more Verbal Diarrhea (cha cha cha!)...but should be made fun of under most circumstances.

Crawford

Originally posted by -=C=-
Jackie Chan during the credits of Rush Hour:

Chris Tucker: jackie, do that again.

Jackie (making fun of Tucker) : haouw haouw haowww

BINGO! That's exactly what I'm talking about. I remember that bit now! I'm gonna have to see that movie again.

Crawford

[Japanese guy making fun of American's]I'll poot eet onn my creditt carrd! Ahahahaha[/Japanese guy]

Freshman year my roommate was from Morocco and it was fun to listen to them speak. Its basically arabic and french mixed. I could pick up some of what they were talking about when I heard french, but arabic is a really weird language. Its almost like a less defined structure in terms of it seems like you don't have "words" so much as sounds. Its hard to explain but even in french or spanish or japanese there seem to be words, but in arabic its all run together like. I dunno how to explain it. :confused:

Originally posted by sorbee711
Freshman year my roommate was from Morocco and it was fun to listen to them speak. Its basically arabic and french mixed. I could pick up some of what they were talking about when I heard french, but arabic is a really weird language. Its almost like a less defined structure in terms of it seems like you don't have "words" so much as sounds. Its hard to explain but even in french or spanish or japanese there seem to be words, but in arabic its all run together like. I dunno how to explain it. :confused:

But did he make fun of the way you sounded?

Yesterday on NPR the had this segment where a guy went around asking people from different countries what sound animals made. In America we say a ducks goes "quack quack" but in other countries they say it makes a very different sound. Same thing with the American "OW!" when you hurt yourself.

At one point the people he was interviewing asked the American what sound a pig makes...and he said "oink oink". The people totally busted out laughing..."Oink oink! What the hell is that?"...or words to that effect.

So that sorta got me started on this.

I find I think of really strange things to think about. I should think less.

Crawford

Originally posted by Drift Monkey
I think it is mostly American people that make fun of other people's languages.

You need to watch more Monty Python. Silly Knnnnnnnighit.

I guess it because I grew up in America that I don't find it too wierd. Although it is very flat compared to my native language.

The animal noises thing is pretty funny. "Meow" is actually pretty close to the actual word for cat in my language.

Vietnamese is tough, too. The inflection of how you say a word in Vietnamese can make it mean something else entirely. I dated a Vietnamese girl for a while, they made fun of the way I talked.

So, as payback, I always made her re-enact the hooker in the "What can I get for $10?" scene from Full Metal Jacket. :lol:

She was always a good sport about it.

- Trent

Vietnamese is actually tougher than the aforementioned because it is very tonal. I would know.

Originally posted by dcrawford
He used to poke fun at English...saying how "flat" it sounds...how monotone...how boring.
Crawford [/B]

He or she probably means that English is not that strict compared to the asian languages, also European languages, where feminine and masculine makes a differences. Not to mentioned the pitch of the word being said could make it totally odd, or out of place, in certain circumstances. Where as in English, the words can be say any which way and it'll still be the same meaning.

Yeah...the whole pitch of a word part is so very...foriegn.

In English if I change the pitch when I speak it generally is to convey greater emotion...but doesn't really change the actual meaning of the word.

Say I'm nailing some boards together and drop the hammer on the ground. I may say "damn". But if after I picked it up and accidentally hammered my finger I might sceam "DAMN!". Same word, same meaning...greater emotion.

But that isn't so much pitch as it is just volume. I guess it would be more like telling a kid "no" vs telling a dog "no". With a kid...you can say it simply....no (as long as the kid is smart and get's it). With a dog I may say "no" with a deeper voice, a little more urgency, a little sharper (but not nec. louder). But again the meaning hasn't changed.

Crawford

I think people CAN make fun of other languages when they don't know, or can't comprehend any part of the language. When non-English speaker gets a little bit of training in how to speak English, then they will "try" harder to make sense of the language being spoken. When someone isn't willing to learn, then it's all gubuligak - and stay as gubuligak. Admit it, typical Americans and British don't "have to" learn other languages since most folks on the planet will try to speak English. So, Americans and British folks "proportionally" tries less harder to learn other languages. I think that's the reason why Americans and British make fun of other languages more often than others. This is just my opinion as a foreigner. But I think Sourth Park and Beeves & Butthead (or were they?) making fun of other culture is pretty funny.

Dude, you want to see something funny?

Watch the spanish channels sometime, almost everyone gets Galavision, it's the biggest channel in the world... They play Chinese kung fu flicks... in Spanish. Talk about BAD dubbing.

It's not Chinese or Japanese, but my German relatives say English sounds like...

Blah, blah, blah, blah... and that we talk really fast.

When i was in Germany i had a few of my friends imitate what english sounds like to them.
It had a lot of oys and vowl sounds

I think it's always the country making fun of other people trying to speak their language. For example, I'm Taiwanese, and white people (not to be racist, but it's mainly white people) make fun of me. But if you were to flip the situation, such as you (american or other contry) were to visit Taiwan and try to speak Chinese, then definitely people will make fun of you. It just depends on what territory your on.

And how about the middle-eastern languages, it sounds like a bunch of spitting and throat clearing.

Well its German speakers again (and they usually spoke better English then I did and French and often something else as well) but I spent a few months in Switzerland and they would make fun of english sometimes by throwing out a combination of a kind of a cowboy drawl crossed with sort of a valley girl type thing. It actually did the trick pretty well.

I had never heard anyone do that before and I was pretty blown away and made them do it again. I don't know if it work as well if your native tongue didn't have the same base sounds.

Originally posted by peepshow
Vietnamese is tough, too. The inflection of how you say a word in Vietnamese can make it mean something else entirely. I dated a Vietnamese girl for a while, they made fun of the way I talked.

So, as payback, I always made her re-enact the hooker in the "What can I get for $10?" scene from Full Metal Jacket. :lol:

She was always a good sport about it.

- Trent

I'm dating a Vietnamese girl and try to learn the various foods and how to refer to her parents in Vietnamese. For the longest time I would put an inflection if I was asking a question, which apparently is entirely wrong. The word choice makes it a question, not the tone.

Where's that clip of that Japanese breakfast show from a few years ago? :p

Prime example of what crawford wanted. :)

Originally posted by Hiroki Tada
Where's that clip of that Japanese breakfast show from a few years ago? :p

Prime example of what crawford wanted. :)

Wah-sup my n***a? MFing fujitsu heavy industries one crazy n***a!

Originally posted by Capt Crunch


I'm dating a Vietnamese girl and try to learn the various foods and how to refer to her parents in Vietnamese. For the longest time I would put an inflection if I was asking a question, which apparently is entirely wrong. The word choice makes it a question, not the tone.
The tone/pronouciation of indivual words can change the meaning drastically. Vietnamese is highly tonal and is VERY difficult for non-natives to learn it....even more so than Chinese.

Originally posted by Hiroki Tada
Where's that clip of that Japanese breakfast show from a few years ago? :p

Prime example of what crawford wanted. :)
The clip is here: http://www.albinoblacksheep.com/video/tokyo_breakfast.php (13.2MB)

It's true that only Americans seek to mock other cultures actively.

I've been in Asia and Europe, and most of the modernized world, and i gotta say, New Jersey and white middle class suburbia is the place where i am least comfortable. It seems that the rest of the world is kind of expanding and wiring itself into one global community, whereas white america is just so sure of their own propoganda that they are the best, there is nothing better, and that their language is superior. When i watch prime time news in Taiwan, Japan, London, and Germany, i get national news, then i get international news. Riots, disasters, financial and technological acomplishments all over the world.

In America, when i watch prime time news, i get national news, then local news, and not a shred of international news unless it's headline worthy... most of the time it's just some local bull**** news story... It's kind of ironic that America, which has the largest overseas influence with financial and military influence all over the world, has the least internationally concerned population groups. It sure explains the avg. joe's bitterness to the rest of the world, and towards immigrants in his own country.

"SPEAK 'ENGRISH' YOU'RE IN AMERICA!" is a common bigotted comment i hear. And even in my liberal, grass smoking private liberal arts college i hear some whack ****. It was during fraternity rush week, and i met this really cool senior guy who learned chinese to the point of fluency and had been to Taiwan a few times. I started chatting with him in Chinese, and one of his friends shows up and goes

"CHING CHANG CHONG CHING CHANG, hey, what did I say?"

And in all actuality, i've never heard anything even close to that in Chinese. The senior apologized for his pea brained friend, but that was nothing to compared to the disspleasure of meeting a racist jewish guy who would tell me jokes like "how do chinese people name their kids? they throw pots and pans down the stairs", and what not. I didn't get it, but as a kind of minority himself, he seemed to enjoy saying the most bigoted and outrageous **** about each and every racial/minority group including his own. Maybe his parents didn't love him when he was small, or he got his ass railed by neo nazis in middle school or something.

Anyway, Mandarin is a fluent and flowing language that actually has musical properites, and tone and pitch involved in it's meanings. If i were to whisper something into a girl's ear during sex, it'd be in Chinese. I'm not too fluent in spoken japanese, so i'll not touch it. American English however, is very practical, and i think in English whenever i'm doing anything academic or technical... English is also fairly easy to learn compared to other languages.

But whenever people mock other people's languages, it really ****ing pisses me off. Language is a huge part of one's indentity, and people should think twice before they insult/mock other people's cultures.

On the topic of languages...

Doesnt japanese have like 7 different levels of respect when your speaking and you have to know which level of respect o be using at which time.

My current GF is white but she took 3 years of japaneese in highschool and was the founder/president of the japaneese club and she said that in those 3 years she barely touched on the language.

Bryan

Interesting that some east Asian language speakers think English sounds flat. As a native English speaker, I hear the exact opposite. For example, my wife is Chinese (from Malaysia) and Cantonese is her native language. To me, it sound very flat because there is no rhythm to it. Each syllable is inflected, but the "sentences", if you can call them that, are flat. I think that is one of the major problems that far eastern language speakers face when speaking to a speaker of an Indo-European language. The IE speaker doesn't understand because the rhythm is wrong or absent, not because of basic accent.

Notice when people say "im not racist but.." the next following sentence is the most racist thing youve ever heard? :lol:

Canadians make fun of americans all the time. I dont know about other races, but im pretty sure north americans arnt the only people that make fun of other races. Dont flatter yourself.

BTW, ive often wondered what it would be like to see another culture (im very isolated in eastern canada :( )

an interesting consideration is that asians (and probably just about any other culture in the world) would likely use real english words. it's important to realize that the american culture and language is so pervasive, that it's almost impossible to avoid completely world-wide. they DO know english words.

i can't say the same for asian cultures and languages, but i do know some german stuff (ok, i'm almost fluent in the freaking language, but that's aside the point), french, spanish, italian, and russian. those languages are at least a little more pervasive than most asian languages, so i make fun of them with the words i know .... that and funny accents.

bjlee, you're not Hmong are you? Anyway, my grandma usualyl refers something sopken in English to some words that are spoken in my native language, Hmong. Funny at the same time and enjoyable.

Ching Chong was a word that the bullies used to throw at me when I was younger in elementary school. Of course we were kids and it was like war back then.:lol:

nope, fuji. i'm about as white as they get.

English, French, a little german, scandinavian descents mostly.

haha I always thought you were AZN. :lol: well..I was assumming....:p

Anyway, when's DDR time?:banana:

aww damn!!!

i'm sorry i never got back to you on that. long story short, my buddy no longer lives there (he does, but he's away for the summer) so i never see those guys any more.

i still have your PM. i'll try to give you a call this fall when the guys are around again.

yeah, i suck.

Originally posted by sha_zapple
Notice when people say "im not racist but.." the next following sentence is the most racist thing youve ever heard? :lol:

I wouldn't say I'm racist as much as I am Neilist. I laugh at everyone that is radically different than I am...but not in a mean sort of way. I don't think any less of Asia, or Asians, or Asian dilects...I am just blown away by the language. Honestly it is impressive...but at the same time...to me, kind of comical. Do I think it is lower class, or backward, or uncivilized? Hell no!

In fact, I'd love to learn an Asiatic language simply because it is so radically different than English. But I can say, with all honesty, that I lack the mental capacity. The friend of mine I mentioned earlier attempted to teach me Chinese...and my pronunciation was so amazingly terrible that he would bust out laughing...

Which works both ways it seems ;)

And Roy Lin...I'm sure every country has aresholes that actively and loudly rip on other cultures...quite often that is a major part of patriotism. I mean...look at some Japanese and the Koreans... I just think that being here in America...we hear the loudest aresholes of all.

Perhaps by bringing this up I was secretly hoping that America wasn't alone in it's mocking of other cultures.

Crawford