Speaking in Tongues

You have to admit that languages are amusing. Today, a woman who is a former colleague posted a new picture of herself on a social media site. She looks great, so I thought I’d be clever and tell her she was beautiful in Afrikaans, as she now lives in South Africa and is married to an Afrikaner. The word for “beautiful” in that language is “pragtig,” if I read the Google-supplied translation site correctly.

PRAGTIG? Does that sound like anything close to “beautiful” to your ears? Probably not if you’re an English-speaker. In any event, I tried the same tactic on the Filipina teller at my bank, using the Tagalog word for beautiful, which is “magunda.” She broke into a smile, so I guess it worked. But “magunda” just doesn’t have the flow that ”beautiful” seems to have.

As you can probably guess, the benefits of indulging in this hobby are limited, so I don’t do it all the time. But it’s interesting how many of us think our language is the best, just because that’s the one we grew up with, and besides, we like the sound of it. Unfortunately, some of us think our native language is the only one that should be spoken in our own country.

Admittedly, most linguists will tell you that not all languages are equal. Some are better as applied to some things. We have words in English for which some other languages have no equivalent, and the same is true in reverse.

All this brings me back to one of my favorite themes, that language is nothing more than a tool of communication, not a political weapon or something to take special pride in. Used to be, if you wanted to be cool and demonstrate your savoir-faire, as that very expression implies, your second language, at least, had to be French. But that was 200 years ago.

I believe that children who are raised in and educated to fluency in only one language are children in danger of growing up to think there is only one way of approaching problems – not good for the brain.

Here’s a good theme for a romantic science-fiction novel: a mysterious cloud spreads over Earth, and people find that they are unable to fall in love unless it’s with someone who doesn’t speak their language. Either Rosetta Stone would be flying off the shelves, or there’d be no need for it – I don’t know which.