Linguist John Mcwhorter In Conversation With Novelist And Playwright Kia Corthron
In the following conversation, John McWhorter, linguist and author of Talking Back, Talking Black, and Kia Corthron, playwright and author of the Center for Fictions First Novel Prizewinning The Castle Cross the Magnet Carter, discuss what makes a language standard, cultural acceptance of Black English and Black American Sign Language, and accents in literary dialogue, in life, and in the movies. This conversation is part of the BLP Conversations series from Bellevue Literary Press, featuring dialogues that explore the creative territory at the intersection of the arts and sciences.
Kia Corthron: John, your book inspired for me such an admiration of your profession! My work is all about language, yet I never examine it under such a fascinating microscope.
I really appreciated that Talking Back, Talking Black is not about judgment or condescension toward those who are reluctant about or hostile toward any defense of Black Englishthat you arent just pulling the race card to shut up the inquirerbut the book, on the contrary, is an honest attempt to help interested readers understand why Black English is not incorrect English but rather alternative English.
In Haiti, where the native tongue of most speakers is Creole, should Creole be more correctly considered standard Haitian? Or is standard always defined by, as you wrote, the language of print, school, and the media?
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Here Are 3 Tips That Should Help You Perfect Your Signing Of ‘damn’:
- Look at the way native signers say ‘damn’: use YouGlish for that purpose. Repeat the track as much asyou need and if required, slow down the speed of the player.
- Record yourself signing ‘damn’ on camera then watch yourself. You’ll be able to mark the points of weakness in your techniques.
- Look up tutorials on YouTube on how to say ‘damn’ in Sign Language.
Vaffanculo Go F*#^ Yourself
This is probably the most famous, and most naughty, Italian swear word of all.
Its literal translation is very crude , and its implied meaning is go f*#^ yourself or f*#^ off!.
It is not to be used lightly or shouted at someone without consequence.
Fess up! What other Italian swear words have you heard or used? Tell us in the comments below.
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Che Cavolo What Cabbage
How hilarious is it that the mild form of cazzo is the word for cabbage?
I still giggle when someone says this, because the idea of saying, what cabbage just makes me laugh.
It means something along the lines of what the hell or damn and it is used very frequently.
It is mild enough that you can use it in many settings and it wont likely seriously offend anyone.
Swear Words In Italian To Add Sass To Your Vocabulary
Want to hear these swear words in real life? Come on the next Not Your Typical Tourist Language Immersion Retreat in Tuscany. Get more details here.
Cursing in Italian can add an entirely different flavor to your Italian studies.
Plus, not all Italian swear words are like ours in English because they have many mild words and expressions that are used frequently, in everyday conversation.
Knowing these parolacce or bad words, even if you dont use them, will allow you to better relate to those around you since youre sure to come across them at least a few times when visiting Italy.
Below are 8 of the most common parolacce worth remembering.
Also Check: How To Say Sorry In Sign Language
Tap To Play Or Pause Gif
“Since I started making tutorial videos, I’ve gotten so many requests to do a bad words video,” Nyle told BuzzFeed. “I think curse words are some of the first things a lot of people learn when they are studying a new language. It’s something every language has in common. ASL, especially, can be more discrete. I try not to take myself too seriously and had a lot of fun shooting this.”
Examples Of Damn Straight In A Sentence
You want to talk about nepotism? Not having to talk about the biggest scandal in the country when it has to do with your brother and youre hosting CNN, thats nepotism. The Cuomo family and CNN are the worst kinds of nepotism that the media has an example of, if it were my brother and he had been accused of this, you’d be damn straight I would be talking about it on ‘The View’ this morning, and that makes all of them cowards.
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The Order Of Figure And Ground Depending On Whether The Referent Is New Or Known
4.1.1 The order of Figure and Ground when the Figure is new
Before describing the spatial relationships between the known Ground entities and the new Figure entities observed in the second room setting, every signer in one way or another first mentioned that the objects they had both observed during the first room setting were still present in the room and in the same locations. After that, the signers all expressed in one way or another that four new objects had been added to the room. From the discursive point of view, this means that at this point, both of the participants shared the same knowledge about which objects were present and where those objects were located in the room. Once this information was shared, the signers went on to describe the spatial relationships between the four known Ground entities and the four new Figure entities. Table 2 shows a summary of the order in which Ground and Figure were expressed in the second room setting.
A summary of the order of Figure and Ground when Figure is new
| Order of elements | |
|---|---|
| Figure Ground | 1 |
4.1.2 The order of Figure and Ground when Figure is known
A summary of the order of Figure and Ground when Figure is known
| Order of elements | |
|---|---|
| Figure Ground | 3 |
The Case For Learning Sign Language As An Accessibility Engineer
Liz Certa | February 7, 2020 | Development
Once upon a time I was writing a story in my free time with a Deaf 1 character in it . My background research suggested knowing a little about ASL to get the character right, so I took a 6-week course to get some of the basics. One class in and I was hooked ASL clicked with my brain in a way that all the other languages Id tried to learn never did. A year later I was conversant and going to regular Deaf socials. And now, in preparation for CSUN, Im taking the time to brush up on my ASL again so I can network effectively with Deaf attendees.
Most of us working in accessibility engineering only deal with Deaf people in theory we know videos need captions, audio recordings need transcripts, and sounds conveying information need an accompanying visual cue. Or else we work with Deaf people in the context of available accommodations, like an interpreter, chat application, or our colleagues ability to lipread. Personally I think everyone should learn at least a little of their local signed language, but for this post Id like to lay out how ASL has benefited me as an accessibility engineer, and perhaps how it might benefit you too.
1Deaf with a capital D refers to people who dont hear that also identify culturally as Deaf, and use a signed language to communicate. This is in contrast to lower case d deaf, which refers solely to people who dont hear, who may or may not be a part of the Deaf community.
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To Further Improve Your Sign Language Skills We Suggest You Do The Following:
- Learn the alphabet:: this is the basic and the building blocks to signing like a pro.
- Practice with native signers:: hanging out with Deaf people is a good away to practice as it is going to force you to use the signlanguage.
- Subscribe to 1 or more Sign Language teaching channels on Youtube:Check outSigned With Heart andASL Rochelle channelsto name just a few.
YouGlish for:
Examples Of Damn You In A Sentence
What I did not want to happen under any circumstance was to say goodbye and be sitting at home, thinking ‘damn, you would really like to play now. Why did you do this’, but my body was not good. To be honest my foot where I had surgery last year was not well throughout the year. I knew it would not be getting any better.
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Deaf Not Dumb: Chinese Sign Language
John Pasden
inlanguage
22 Apr 2008
Its been a while since I last wrote about sign language, but some interesting YouTube videos by Alice recently pulled me back into it.
Below is the video that I found most fascinating. Its subtitled in Chinese, but worth a watch even if you dont read Chinese. Ill sum up the main points in English below the video.
Before I list Alices main points, I need to first explain some background. In the video, Alice discusses the Chinese sign language counterparts of the Chinese words and . The former is the most common way to refer to a Deaf person in Chinese, whereas the latter is the word many in the Chinese Deaf community wishes everyone would use. is the word for mute, and its definitely not polite.
Alices main points are:
I have to say, this video fascinated me. Theres so much there, linguistically . I think you can tell when a gifted orator makes a stirring speech in a foreign language, and this is the same feeling I get watching Alice deliver her message. Its inspiring.
Check out Alices other videos. Not all of them have Chinese subtitles, but one interesting one that does is an interview with Deaf rapper Signmark. Alice interviews him in international sign language.
I havent watched them all, but it looks like none of Alices videos to date have English subtitles. Im working on convincing her that it would be worthwhile.
Related:
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Recommended Reading: Sign For Poop In Sign Language
Strategies To Express Spatial Relationships Between Figure And Ground
Different ways of expressing the spatial relationships between Figure and Ground entities are found in the data. Table 4 summarizes the strategies used in both room setting 2 and room setting 3 . In Table 4, the strategies are first divided into simultaneous and sequential. The simultaneous strategy includes the simultaneous activity of both hands . This type appears in 15 of 24 utterances with a new Figure and in 23 of 24 utterances with a known Figure. The simultaneous strategy contrasts with the sequential strategy . As can be seen in Table 4, the relationship between Figure and Ground is expressed sequentially 9 times in utterances with a new Figure and only once with a known Figure.
A summary of strategies used in expressing spatial relationships between Figure and Ground
| New or known Figure | Use of simultaneous or sequential strategy | Use of adposition |
|---|---|---|
| Without adposition | 0 |
In Table 4, the second-level division concerns the use of adposition signs. As can be seen in the Table, adposition signs are used with both simultaneous and sequential strategies. However, the use of adposition signs is more evenly distributed between the two strategies in room setting 2 while in room setting 3 , the use of adpositions is associated almost entirely with the simultaneous strategy .
4.2.1 A new Figure entity and a simultaneous construction
Profanity In American Sign Language
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American Sign Language , the sign language used by the deaf community throughout most of North America, has a rich vocabulary of terms, which include profanity. Within deaf culture, there is a distinction drawn between signs used to curse versus signs that are used to describe sexual acts. In usage, signs to describe detailed sexual behavior are highly taboo due to their graphic nature. As for the signs themselves, some signs do overlap, but they may also vary according to usage. For example, the sign for “shit” when used to curse is different from the sign for “shit” when used to describe the bodily function or the fecal matter.
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What Rhymes With Damn
This page is about the various possible words that rhymes or sounds like DAMN.Use it for writing poetry, composing lyrics for your song or coming up with rap verses.
- adj.
am·bahm·bam·bram·cam·camm·cham·clam·cram·cream·dahm·dam·damm·damme·deem·diazepam·dram·fam·flam·flamm·frahm·fram·gahm·gamm·glam·gleam·graeme·graham·gram·gramm·hahm·ham·hamm·hamme·jam·jamb·kam·kamm·klamm·kram·kramm·kramme·lahm·lam·lamb·lambe·lamm·lamme·lamp·ma’am·mam·nahm·nam·pam·pham·plam·pram·quamme·rahm·ram·ramm·ream·sahm·sam·scam·schram·schramm·scram·sham·slam·spam·sram·stam·stamm·steam·stram·stream·swam·tam·tamm·tham·tram·wham·yam·zahm·zam