Showing posts with label British. Show all posts
Showing posts with label British. Show all posts

Wednesday, September 12, 2007

Babel

In the book of Genesis, there is a story about the tower of Babel, and where God confounded man's language, to make it harder for us to work together against His purpose. Some people question the veracity of the account, but certainly language is often a barrier to communication. This is not only true of people that don't speak the same language, it is often true of people that speak the same language, but in different ways.

It's been said that the United States and Great Britain are two countries separated by a common language. We say that we speak English, but there are many differences between the English spoken in the Untied States and the English spoken by the English people. Some of things that have evolved since the US gained its independence, some are things that simply were not standardized until after the split, still other things were adopted by one country or the other as a result of immigration. Automobile terminology provides several examples: What we in the US call the trunk (of the car), the Brits call the boot; what we call gas, they call petrol; our bonnet is their hood; etc. We still use the same units of measure, although the EU has tried to get the UK to adapt metric units.

It's also true that specialists in a particular field have a tendency to develop their own jargon. This is not always an attempt to be exclusionary, but it does work out that way sometimes. Jargon can make people within a certain specialty communicate more effectively with each other, but make it harder to communicate with 'outsiders' who are not familiar with the jargon. One individual I know has told me many times that PhD really stands for "Please Have Dictionary." If you've ever taken a college course taught by a PhD, you probably know exactly what he means. It isn't that they are trying to obfuscate the learning environment, however, the tendency to eschew technical terminology amongst individuals being indoctrinated into the profession isn't always what it should be. Sometimes the terms used within a profession become so ingrained that the professional doesn't stop to think that he or she needs to simplify the terminology when speaking to trainees, customers, or anyone else that wouldn't be familiar with the jargon.

Another thing that I have run across on occasion is that journalists are experts in researching things and expressing those things in such a way that the average person can understand. Journalists spend a lot of years in college learning the skills necessary to accomplish this. Unfortunately, they learn about writing, but they don't learn very much about the subject matter that they are supposed to be writing about. Frequently newspaper or magazine articles appear that have been considerably 'dumbed-down,' either as a result of the reporter's limited knowledge of the subject matter, or the reporter's belief that the average person knows even less than the reporter. Occasionally this happens simply because the publication isn't willing to let the article take up enough space in order for it to contain a thorough explanation of the subject. I get irritated sometimes when something happens, but when I read the local coverage of the event, I find myself still unsure of what actually happened. Doing a little research, I find another account of the same event, only to find that it's pretty much word-for-word the same account. Why? because both articles came off of the AP newswire, and the AP reporter didn't get the details that I was looking for. In those instances, I really wish that I could talk to somebody who has first hand knowledge.
One of the things that disturbed me the most is that a lot of people read books about what the Bible says, but don't ever actually read the Bible itself--not even to check the passages referred to in the book. Even if the author is legitimately trying to make scripture easier to understand, at best, you are limiting yourself to his understanding. I don't mean to suggest that such books are bad, or that reading those books won't help (sometimes they will, but sometimes they won't), but I will say that if you read the scripture for yourself, you may gain a greater understanding.

Friday, August 17, 2007

British-American Relations (sort of)

I haven't gotten any comments lately--I wonder if anyone is actually reading this... Oh, well, I will blog away, anyway.

I was just reading about a proposed Harry Potter theme park in Florida. Apparently Disney was in talks with J. K. Rowling, but she has very specific ideas about how this theme park should be, and they decided that her ideas would force them to charge about $600 admission per person. So now Universal Studios is working on it. It's not clear whether UP was able to talk dollars and sense to JKR or whether they just have other ways of bringing the cost down, but, in any case, they apparently have a deal going.
Mentioned in the article is a comment that back in the 80's, Disney tried to get another British author, P. L. Travers (what is it with British authors using their first two initials?), to let them do a sequel to Mary Poppins. One of the reasons that they never did was that Travers didn't like Dick Van Dyke as Bert. News flash: Most Brits didn't like Dick Van Dyke as Bert. The British slang expression for a really bad, fake cockney accent is, in fact, 'a Van Dyke.' Don't misunderstand me, Dick Van Dyke is a very capable dancer/comedian/actor, and his accent in the movie was good enough for American audiences, just not the British.
It seems odd to me, it's almost as though there were a rule in Hollywood that British actors are not allowed to play British leading men in American movies. Think about it: Who is the best known British character in an American film franchise? That would be either James Bond or Robin Hood. Of all the actors who have played Bond, which ones were the most popular? Sean Connery (who is Scottish) and Pierce Brosnan (who is Irish). Of all the actors who have played Robin Hood (at least as the title role in Hollywood made movies) only Barrie Ingham ('A Challenge for Robin Hood'), Cary Elwes (Mel Brooks' 'Robin Hood: Men in Tights'), and Brain Bedford (Disney's animated Robin Hood) are British (although Richard Greene played Robin in a TV series, and Michael Praed played Robin in a made-for-TV movie, and a TV series) (When I started listing British Robin Hoods, I didn't think there were his many--but, there are a whole lot more that aren't: Errol Flynn, Douglas Fairbanks, Jr., Kevin Costner...) (Actually, the British casting of Robin Hood tips considerably the other way when Robin Hood is a supporting character in the various versions of 'Ivanhoe'). Incidentally, Sean Connery also played Robin Hood in 'Robin and Marion.' Val Kilmer played British do-gooder Simon Templar in 'the Saint.' Of course, there are some exceptions: Roger Moore (who, incidentally played the Saint in England [and also had a speaking role in Val Kilmer's movie]) was the actor that succeeded Sean Connery in the Bond films. Michael York has played a few British characters in his time, and, of course, Basil Rathbone is the best-known Sherlock Holmes. Also, Daniel Radcliffe, of Harry Potter fame, is British.
So, we come full circle. I started out talking about Harry Potter, and I end up talking about Harry Potter.