Features and Reviews

Culture Shock- Feature

The English Language is a Funny Thing - Feature

This is not a feature as such. More a small collection of memories I have from childhood and a desire to know more..

My grandparents lived in Haddenham in the 30's and 40's ..their names were Daisy and Albert Middleton. My mother  Dorothy was born there, one of three daughters, and she moved to London and married a Christopher Warren.  As a small child I have vague memories of visiting my grandparents in Haddenham ..and of  standing with my father and grandfather outside 'Mrs Hall's Shop' which was just down the road from their cottage. I remember very little of the cottage except that it had a well in the back garden,.. this I remember vividly,  having collided with the well handle  and cutting my tongue which still bears the scars some sixty years later. My grandfather died shortly after this and was buried in St Mary's Church graveyard…and I didn't return to Haddenham with my parents until  several years later when I remember German prisoners of war walking along  wearing  garments marked POW. My grandmother by this time had left Haddenham and also moved to London.

Yesterday my son took me back to Haddenham, but all I could recognise was the pond and St Mary's Church. I walked around the churchyard hoping to see some kind of marker or gravestone to show where my grandfather had been laid to rest but unfortunately there was nothing.

I would dearly love to know if any of your older residents could  help me find fill in some of the gaps in  these memories….either with  messages or pictures (not originals of course) …and especially what happened to 'Mrs Hall's Shop' and its original location.

Thank you and best wishes. Mrs Dorene Gates. Please email me @ djgates43@aol.com 

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Culture Shock - Extract from an article in FMX Magazine 2001 by Ian Boughton - An amusing and revealing look at concepts such as truth and duty, attitudes to business agreements and how English expressions are understood across nationalities

'When we find ourselves seated opposite individuals dressed like us, their branded, poised pens the same as ours, their branded briefcases bearing familiar names, we tend to assume that they see what we see, and hear what we say. But our two sets of minds are working in very different ways,'

Germans believe that the truth, however unpalatable, will achieve a successful outcome. The English prefer not to rock the boat with the truth. To the Chinese, there is no absolute truth. To the Italians, truth is a negotiable. In a theocratic culture, governed by religious leaders, what God says is truth and anything else can be ignored. In some countries, it will simply not matter that you can supply a product better and cheaper - if they believe their own citizens should get the work, even if it is dearer and not so good, then their truth is different from yours.

'Chinese duty is not American duty, and the English notion of "revenge" bears little similarity to the Sicilians'. 

The concept of "contract" is different - to Europeans and Americans, it is something to be adhered to, but the Japanese consider it unethical to be bound to a contract if circumstances change. The South American doesn't see it as achievable at all, but signs it to avoid argument.' 

Trying to understand your overseas colleagues or staff invariably brings in national stereotypes `Traits of "national behaviour" do exist, but the secret is turning them into "added value".

Don't denigrate the American drive, because it brings with it a very positive sense of "can do", and if something goes wrong, the American will often inspire your people to get up and have another go. German sobriety is incredibly useful, because when everyone else is carried away by the hype they ask "Is it possible?" The Italian's lack of organisation actually lends itself to remarkable individual creativity.'

But stereotypes can be dangerous. 'If you think your software suppliers are sourcing from India because of cheap labour, you've missed something significant - Indians have a distinct competence in complex thinking, which is why they're so good at software,' 

Language is a cultural minefield, and it is true that the `linguistic arrogance' of the British is now leaving us behind - typically, a German company which bought one of our biggest industries, and directed the British managers to learn a little German for social purposes, discovered two years later that not one manager had taken a single lesson. However, an unusual trick is the ability to speak two languages - our English, and another kind of English, the way foreigners speak it. This, he says, is nothing so patronising as pidgin, but a very serious and effective concept. The Danes, Swedes, and Germans say that they can all communicate clearly in English, until an Englishman joins them. Then we start saying we have "a raft of ideas to float past them", and they wonder where the water comes in... or the case in Singapore where someone said we only do something "once in a blue moon", which was translated literally into phases of the moon, and came out as an instruction to do it monthly! 

Speaking English the way the world speaks it is a real art, but worth learning.

Extract Article submitted by June Jones – Jan 2002

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Ah the joys of the English language - Let's face it: English is a stupid language – read on for more…

There is no egg in the eggplant, no ham in the hamburger and neither pine nor apple in the pineapple. English muffins were not invented in England; French fries were not invented in France.

We sometimes take English for granted.  But if we examine its paradoxes we find that quicksand takes you down slowly, boxing rings are square and a guinea pig is neither from Guinea nor is it a pig. If writers write, how come fingers don't fing?

If the plural of tooth is teeth, shouldn't the plural of phone booth be phone beeth? If the teacher taught, why didn't the preacher praught? If a vegetarian eats vegetables, what the heck does a humanitarian eat!? Why do people recite at a play yet play at a recital? Park on driveways and drive on parkways? You have to marvel at the unique lunacy of a language where a house can burn up as it burns down and in which you fill in a form by filling it out. And a bell is only heard once it goes!

English was invented by people, not computers, and it reflects the creativity of the human race (which of course isn't a race at all). That is why when the stars are out they are visible, but when the lights are out they are invisible. And why it is that when I wind up my watch it starts but when I wind up this story it ends?

Some food for "Thought":

Do infants enjoy infancy as much as adults enjoy adultery? If love is blind, why is lingerie so popular? Why is the man who invests all your money called a broker?

Why is a person who plays the piano called a pianist, but a person who drives a race car not called a racist? Why are a wise man and a wise guy opposites?  Why do overlook and oversee mean opposite things? If horrific means to make horrible, does terrific mean to make terrible? Why isn't 11 pronounced onety one? If lawyers are disbarred and clergymen defrocked, doesn't it follow that electricians can be delighted, musicians denoted, cowboys deranged, models deposed, tree surgeons debarked and dry cleaners depressed? Why is it that if someone tells you that there are 1 billion stars in the universe you will believe them, but if they tell you a wall has wet paint you will have to touch it to be sure? If you take an Oriental person and spin him around several times, does he become disoriented? If people from Poland are called "Poles", why aren't people from Holland called "Holes"?

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