Tuesday, September 20, 2005

 

Multilingualism:

Yet Another Character Flaw

Our self-appointed class clown stood between a classmate and me in lab the other day, and as she answered a question of his, he said

"I'm sorry--I can't understand that damned accent of yours."

Amused with his little witticism, he smiled and looked at me.

I didn't laugh.

But lo and behold, there to save the day was his class-clown-in-waiting, who laughed a fake boisterous laugh into my ear. "I thought it was funny!" he approved.

"So did I!" laughed Head Clown, satisfied that someone else found him funny.

They both just thought it was one big laugh riot.

Of course they would--because there's nothing funnier than deriding someone who can speak more languages than you, especially if that someone is more articulate in English as a second language--albeit with an accent--than you are with English as your only language.

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