Do You Love Your Own Race/Ethnicity?

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
A'yn is by far, for me, the most difficult letter to pronounce in Arabic, especially if in the middle of the word. There aren't many words like that, but words such as 'jamiya' have a'yn in the middle and I cannot get it right. I pronounce it as ''ah'' which is evidently wrong, since the sound comes from the back of the throat.

ghan was the killer for me. the kha was kinda tricky also, until I found out it was the scottish "ch" (loch).

its such a crazy language though. lol, I knew a girl who said she just used her "man voice" when she needed to pronounce the ayn.

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
I don't know how it was with you, but I had two rows of letters, with the root on top, and then how the sound of the root ones changes depending on calligraphy...I still find it hard to pronounce certain sounds and I tend to think of myself as quite good when it comes to foreign pronunciations...

you mean for conjegations? ya, totally. We didnt get much on caligraphy unfortunatly, I would love to learn that. I have this pet dream of learning arabic well enough to learn caligraphy at a mid eastern school. ****, even just to write amazing looking grafitti.

I only took 3 semesters, and we went REALLY slow... I didn't think I was as advanced as I should have been (I didn't have the time to put in) and I was still getting As.

i just found out b/c my mom told me that we have a lil french in the family tree!!! 😱

i checked google to confirm her story and it showed that french immigrants migrated to mexico in our part of our family area.

then i ran a check on our family names and one of them popped up as a french origin.

which now explains the green eyes and dirty blond hair that some of my family members have randomly shown at birth.

i had chalked it up to old spanish/italian genes but i could see it being french as well with the last name and whatnot..

so we really are mutts all around which is why this be proud of a race is foolish when its centered not just on culture history and individual accomplishments but skin tone which doesnt matter and is a draw of the cards not just in the world but inside an individuals family.

some one bring me cheese and wine!!! also a burger with mayo and a cigerette!!

Originally posted by inimalist
ghan was the killer for me. the kha was kinda tricky also, until I found out it was the scottish "ch" (loch).

its such a crazy language though. lol, I knew a girl who said she just used her "man voice" when she needed to pronounce the ayn.

you mean for conjegations? ya, totally. We didnt get much on caligraphy unfortunatly, I would love to learn that. I have this pet dream of learning arabic well enough to learn caligraphy at a mid eastern school. ****, even just to write amazing looking grafitti.

I only took 3 semesters, and we went REALLY slow... I didn't think I was as advanced as I should have been (I didn't have the time to put in) and I was still getting As.

LOL!! 'Man voice'! I just tried it! It's not working for me...I just can't do it. I suck.

Kha was alright for me - it reminded me of when you eat caramel and try to say K.
And don't worry, I cannot write in Arabic to save my life. I can see separate letters and practice sounds, and words, but since they all start to change their looks once they are written together...bah.

I honestly believe the best way to learn a language is just to speak it, speak it and speak it. Make mistakes, make silly sentences and ridiculous conjugations and nonsensical structures then get corrected.
I don't have that opportunity, but I will get into learning it at some point. I must.

But it's good this way, because if you speak another language, or even if you have a base, it's easy to understand how speakers of other languages may have problems with English pronunciation.

Originally posted by 753
Because being latin or chicano has nothing to do with 'race' but eith a culture. Folk definitions of race have no consistancy whatsoever, they are defined arround skincolor (which is absurd enough) as wells language or religion.

Apreciating and taking pride in one's cultural background and nation, specially when faced with the opression of racist and xenophobic cultures who believe in their own superiority is both laudable and a way to fight opression itself. But it has nothing to do with race, rather with a way of life and the feeling of pertinece to a cultural group, not a racial one.

Well, if the whole concept of race is arbitrary to begin with, then why are "folk" definitions any less valid than ones that attempt to be scientific, despite having dubious beginnings? (By that, I mean 'Caucasiod', 'Negroid' and 'Mongoloid'😉. So turn-of-the-century anthropology aside, Hispanic/Chicano is considered a race in America.

In Brazil, the idea of race isn't all that big. But here in the States, the terms White, Black, Hispanic and Asian are all very distinct, and when people hear them, they know exactly what they mean. Obama may be in the White House, but the color lines are still drawn and visible.

Originally posted by inimalist

because my race is wholly insignificant to me

Why? You aren't proud of any of your ancestor's accomplishments?

are you proud for the 1st american to walk on the moon or the 1st woman to fly a plane?

i am proud for the individual not for the color of his skin or origin of his birth

Originally posted by inimalist
oh ya, as far as letter pronounciation goes, it is nearly different on a word by word (or at least varies depending on the letter it follows) basis. It is a serious area of current research actually, how it is the brain knows that the "s" sound after an "s" follows an "a" versus an "r", because if you look at the waveform analysis, the sounds are remarkably different.

So, words do have their local "pronounciations", which is where accents come from. The difference is that there is no change in the information the letter conveys.

Arabic is very difficult to transcribe, at least for me, because they have long and short versions of vowels that completely change the meaning of words. So ya, because the ability to parse these sounds peaks in very early childhood, it is very difficult for adults to learn it.

For instance, I could live the rest of my life in an Arabic-only environment and would likely never develop the ability of a natural speaker.

In terms of losing sounds, it might make it harder. Depending on how malliable "v" or "f" sounds are in german words, natural english speakers might mistake them for "th".

Yeah, I have noticed a lot of these problems people have. Having only learned English from German speakers of it and only recently looked into it more deeply I had quite some difficulty to even hear differences in words. The biggest problems a native German speaker has are the th sounds, "w" versus "v" and "j" versus "ch" (like jet or chat), in my experience. In turn English speakers have huge problems with the German "ch" sounds (IPA [x] I believe)

Originally posted by inimalist
actually, "thorn" and "eth" use the same "th" sound too.

"thorn" and "eth" use the same mouth/lips position as the letter "f", but the tounge curls up. Words like "this", "that" or "them" have the same mouthing and reverberation as the "v" sound, only again, the tongue is up.

For the "thorn" sound, this is the letter: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E1%B9%AE%C4%81%CA%BE

For the "this" sound:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%E1%B8%8E%C4%81l

Ah, okay, I was under the impression that (at least in Icelandic) the eth and thorn are two different pronunciations of the "th" variety that also use the different signs.

I find this area rather interesting, but I have never heard any lectures on it or anything.

Originally posted by Bardock42
Yeah, I have noticed a lot of these problems people have. Having only learned English from German speakers of it and only recently looked into it more deeply I had quite some difficulty to even hear differences in words. The biggest problems a native German speaker has are the th sounds, "w" versus "v" and "j" versus "ch" (like jet or chat), in my experience. In turn English speakers have huge problems with the German "ch" sounds (IPA [x] I believe)

Ah, okay, I was under the impression that (at least in Icelandic) the eth and thorn are two different pronunciations of the "th" variety that also use the different signs.

I find this area rather interesting, but I have never heard any lectures on it or anything.

Do you have an accent? I find that North Europeans, in particular Nordics tend to have close to immaculate English accents?

Originally posted by lil bitchiness
Do you have an accent? I find that North Europeans, in particular Nordics tend to have close to immaculate English accents?

I do have "an" accent. I don't have a German one though. I could probably upload a speech sample if you'd care 😛

And Scandinavians do have very good English usually, I have determined, totally unscientifically, aka "out of my ass", that it is due to two reasons. 1. Their languages already are very similar to English, as in they incorporate most of the pronunciation and 2. they are brought up on nothing but English television...

Originally posted by King Castle
are you proud for the 1st american to walk on the moon or the 1st woman to fly a plane?

i am proud for the individual not for the color of his skin or origin of his birth

Or you can be proud of both. I'm proud that those were American accomplishments. See, national and ethnic pride don't have to be the same, unless its something extremely homogenous like Korea or Japan. I'm proud to be an American, and I'm proud to be Chicano. Sociologists call it an "intersection"; when a person acknowledges that they have more than one identity or 'label' that makes them who they are.

Originally posted by Bardock42
I do have "an" accent. I don't have a German one though.

Then what would you call it? If not a German accent, then what kind?

Originally posted by Quiero Mota
Then what would you call it? If not a German accent, then what kind?

Japanese school-girl.

Originally posted by Quiero Mota

Then what would you call it? If not a German accent, then what kind?

I don't really think there's a word for it. It's a mix of many different accents. I am sure I have some habits still that a German speaker might have, but I lived in Maine and England, and have consciously worked on pronouncing certain words in a specific way. If you'd hear me talk you could likely tell I am not a native speaker, but where I am from, probably not. I took an online test a while ago and apparently I pronounce many things like people in the Northern US do, the Great Lakes area it said.

Originally posted by Quiero Mota
Why? You aren't proud of any of your ancestor's accomplishments?

I'm more inclined to view my ancestory in terms of nation and clan

Originally posted by Bardock42
If you'd hear me talk you could likely tell I am not a native speaker, but where I am from, probably not.

So you don't sound quite like Arnold Schwartzenegger or Albert Einstien?

Originally posted by Bardock42
I took an online test a while ago and apparently I pronounce many things like people in the Northern US do, the Great Lakes area it said.

Many of them are of German ancestry.

Originally posted by inimalist
I'm more inclined to view my ancestory in terms of nation and clan

What nation or clan do you hail from?

Originally posted by Bardock42
I don't really think there's a word for it. It's a mix of many different accents. I am sure I have some habits still that a German speaker might have, but I lived in Maine and England, and have consciously worked on pronouncing certain words in a specific way. If you'd hear me talk you could likely tell I am not a native speaker, but where I am from, probably not. I took an online test a while ago and apparently I pronounce many things like people in the Northern US do, the Great Lakes area it said.

Well that's certainly disappointing, I've imagined that if we ever met in person, you sound something like this.

Originally posted by Quiero Mota
So you don't sound quite like Arnold Schwartzenegger or Albert Einstien?

I have never heard Albert Einstein speak English, I do not sound like Arnold Schwarzenegger though, sorry 🙁

Originally posted by Quiero Mota
What nation or clan do you hail from?

I identify mainly as a Canadian, but I am really fond of my Scottish heritage:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clan_Graham

I still think both are meaningless in general, aside from the personal meaning I can take from the stories. I didn't know these people, they would have only influenced my life in the most indirect of ways, it has little to do with me at all, in my opinion at least.

windtalker :

"i am navajo of the bitter water clan, born for the towering house people."

red_indian

seriously.

i agree with what inimalist says.

i mean i have various background in my family and although ppl will look at me and say i am mexican if i go to mexico they laugh at me and say i aint mexican and call me slurs like chilungo or just gringo..

if i go to a native tribe like the navajo and apache depending on the area they would laugh at me look at my name and say i am not one of them and i am a mexican or just an american.

same with my spanish, italian heritage how can i claim a culture i am not a part of?

i mean if i go to a french guy and say check out one of my family last name its french.. they look at me as if i am stupid and say i am not french.

if i try to find a meso american and tell them my meso american heritage they wouldnt understand the language i am speaking and only know one word of my family's name as being from their langauge.
http://epaminondas.fileave.com/MesoamericanFantasy.jpg

I love being white. I've been white my entire life and it's been pretty cool. No complaints here.

Originally posted by Tired-Hiker
I love being white. I've been white my entire life and it's been pretty cool. No complaints here.

Originally posted by Rogue Jedi
Dude you're WHITE?

Yep. I'm Irish, Russian, Polish, and French. I pride being Irish the most. I probably look Irish more than anything. My grandpa was full blood Irish. His dad was a runner for the IRA before they became the IRA. He basically ran for miles and swam across rivers to deliver messages to other towns, to set up revolts against the English. The townfolk bought him a boat ticket to the USA when his name showed up on a list of people the English had to hang. A few months later they sent his wife over where they were reunited. They resided in New York where my grandpa and dad were born. My dad was born in Brooklyn. So that practically makes me a Beastie Boy.