Black/Urban English? Is the inability to speak correctly contributeing to unemployment?

originally posted by: NightSkyeB4Dawn
a reply to: grainofsand

Multi-lingualism is the requirement of tomorrow. If you want your children to have a chance at a decent job in the future, start them as early as possible in learning a second, or third language. Mandarin is a good start.

Agreed, but as the thread discussion shows, there are plenty of people who fail to communicate effectively in the business language of their home nation.

originally posted by: ketsuko

originally posted by: blupblup

originally posted by: crazyewok
not a homeless person or as we call them tramps.

No we don't, we call them homeless too.
Maybe those who are a little meaner and not quite up on the proper words to use for said group say tramps but those with tact and concern for their fellow human beings say homeless.

There are homeless and there are bums. The two do not have to be the same thing IME. Just sayin'. In other words, you can often have a homeless bum, a homeless person, or just a bum and be speaking about three different persons.

Also, we refer to my son's bum all the time, but then it's a part of his anatomy, not who or what he is.

Yeah but over here bum is only used to refer to ones arse.

So to call your son a bum to us is to call him a anus

a reply to: crazyewok

There is another use for the word. You can also bum some cash. Which basically means you can borrow it with no intention of paying it back or otherwise get something for free.

originally posted by: grainofsand

originally posted by:NightSkyeB4Dawna reply to: grainofsand

Multi-lingualism is the requirement of tomorrow. If you want your children to have a chance at a decent job in the future, start them as early as possible in learning a second, or third language. Mandarin is a good start.

Agreed, but as the thread discussion shows, there are plenty of people who fail to communicate effectively in the business language of their home nation.

I understand what you are saying and I agree. I think a person that is expected to communicate with the public, should be able to be understood by the clients.

I just find it interesting that people that do, speak their native language well, and professionally, will still find their application in the bin, if they are unable to fluently speak the language of a client that refuses to learn to speak the native language of the country they have chosen to live in.

While you can make the point of binning the application of someone that doesn't speak his native language to a acceptable level, my point is, we may all find ourselves in a similar pickle, when others don't feel our language skills meet their needs or expectations.

Just a little food for thought.

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

Hmm, I'm not so sure.
If I set up business in Uzbekistan then I'd only employ people who spoke business English as well as Uzbek.
I see nothing wrong with that.

There are already jobs in my home UK nation (Wales) which require bilingualism Welsh/English.
I could get by with my Welsh, learned as a second language in childhood/school, but needs and expectations about language/communicative skills are understandable.

...It is why I've learned quite a few key phrases/words/lines in Polish and Czech over the last decade.

*Edit*
Lots of Polish and Czech folk have moved here and become part of my social/working circles over the last decade due to the EU and all that, just for information purposes.

...it's all dobre

Lack of education is probably the root cause, but this is amusing to me none the less.

However, I thought this type of thing would be less severe in England, but I guess I was wrong.

Mainly because I got this movie stuck in my head, it's called "SNATCH". There's a couple of British, black comedian actors in there, when they crack jokes, it's funny as hell to hear them in proper Queen's English...

a reply to: crazyewok

This is what happens to poor urban schools when they try to educate poor urban kids. They fail miserably.
They are VERY underfunded and are VASTLY inefficient.
I have a better question why do most middle-class children and upper middle class children can speak correct english but poorer children have a higher percentage of children that don't speak correct english?

Racially biased employers can bin your application and just use the (clever)excuse of "poor language skills" to discriminate against them.
All the better reason to have decent english communication skills.

originally posted by: TheInhumanCentipede

It's bad enough that U.S. English dumbs down words in order to help the nation's uneducated plebe multitudes sound out words -- e.g., "sufur" (sulphur), "labor" (labour"), "skeptic" (sceptic) et al..

This is not dumbing down. It is a correction of linguistic accretions of questionable legitimacy. Sulfur is not derived from Greek, and the -ph- has no place in the word; -f- is attested in cognates and the parents of modern English. Labor is pure Latin; we spell it the same way educated people have for thousands of years. Skeptic is derived from Greek; sc- is an unnecessary Latinization.

a reply to: FurvusRexCaeli

Most people with poor english communication skills see words as set block of letters.
Words are blocks of smaller parts that come together

Latin commūnicātus, past participle of commūnicāre to impart, make common, equivalent to commūn (is) common + -icāre v. suffix

dictionary.reference.com...

a reply to: John_Rodger_Cornman

Basically, you are saying that people in poor communities lack phonemic awareness.

This is an educational issue in the main because in the US at least, we have moved away from teaching phonics as the base for reading instruction.

However, even for some kids who do learn phonics there is a learning disability that impacts phonemic awareness and impairs a person's ability to perceive the separate sounds in language.

a reply to: ketsuko

No.

Poor people get a substandard education from underfunded and inefficient schooling thus poor English.
This says more about the awful public schooling here. Its truly terrible.

a reply to: John_Rodger_Cornman

No, it's the same thing.

Phonics is teaching that each discreet letter has its own sounds, sometimes more than one. They have moved away from that. When you don't teach reading that way, kids have a harder time reaching the conclusion that each letter has its own discreet sounds and that impacts the idea that each word is a whole block, not a grouping of sounds that works together to form a unit.

This is poor education.

a reply to: ketsuko

All I know is I was taught that words have meanings to them inside every syllable. Reading thesauruses and dictionaries is really interesting. Especially the history of a word.It really helps when you don't know the meaning of a word but you do know that meaning of the parts of that word.

The english language is a lot of different languages layered on top of each other.
One surprising thing is how much spanish is similar to latin and how english shares alot of latin.Police(policia),Aqua(Agua),impossible,grande(grand)

Should look up the meaning and history of sherriff.

a reply to: uncommitted

The believe he did live readings of his works in his time to live audiences, and was not heretical but perceived as eloquent.

Its a shame now that phrases as ""Romeo, Romeo? Where for art thou Romeo?...has turned into "Dude!? Waz up? Where you b at?"

And "Juliet? What light from yon window breaks?"...becomes..."Yo! Jules? Wat dat shine be brurnin" out ch'o crib?"

Come on let's be honest. The reason people can't find jobs is because there aren't any left.

originally posted by: mysterioustranger
a reply to: crazyewok

I saw on the morning Detroit News shows that they are teaching Shakespeare to rap music altering the real words so the kids...s bopping...will "get him".

I'm at a loss...we're doomed.

In all fairness, who truly understands shakespeare....

a reply to: Cypress

Start the counter...

1.....


It's not as if it is hard to actually grasp the thrust of what he was getting at in his plays. They all poked various hornets nests in a way which made it difficult for the people at whom he was cocking a snook, to come back at him.

originally posted by: TrueBrit
a reply to: mikemars261

I would beg to differ with you on one key aspect of what you have just said.

There is no way for someone to have the exact same conversation as me, unless they utilise the entire breadth of the English language in the doing of it. The simple fact of the matter is that a reduced pool of words, grammatical devices, and phraseology prevents a person from being able to converse on a level with me, on a great plethora of topics.

Nuance, subtlety, context, a full and comprehensive understanding of these things allows for a depth of communication which is UTTERLY impossible without that understanding. Scientific discussion requires accurate understanding of terminology, and precise, nuanced language in order for a valuable and interesting exploration of the topic to come to pass.

Let us, for a moment, look upon the matter of street speak, in the same way as we look at the Klingon language from Star Trek. Although quite a few science fiction buffs can speak some Klingon, what few people realise is that although the Klingon language has words for things like disruptor pistol, knife, sword, photon torpedo and so on, it has no words for normal things, like automobiles, banking services, payroll department, or street maps. There is nothing wrong therefore with learning the language, but there is something wrong with using it in the wrong context, and/or company.

Without nuance and understanding of vocabulary of a high standard, certain concepts cannot even be grasped, and discussions of merit on topics pertaining to those concepts are impossible therefore.

a reply to: TrueBrit

While I admire your ability to stretch one tiny thought (they can't speak science) into a whole essay, I would like to point out the title of the thread, and that is

"Black/Urban English? Is the inability to speak correctly contributeing to unemployment?"

And then to my posts, which were on topic.


Next I would like to point out that, as I've said before, the English language is not an effective language. As demonstrated above, people who wasted their lives studying it usually feel the need to waste other peoples time when speaking it, throwing unnecessary words around like they are browsing the dictionary. I appreciate the thesaurus entry on (n) Details, but is it really necessary? No, and that's my point.

"PROPER English? Is the ability to speak correctly overrated?"

originally posted by: FurvusRexCaeli

originally posted by: TheInhumanCentipede

It's bad enough that U.S. English dumbs down words in order to help the nation's uneducated plebe multitudes sound out words -- e.g., "sufur" (sulphur), "labor" (labour"), "skeptic" (sceptic) et al..

This is not dumbing down. It is a correction of linguistic accretions of questionable legitimacy. Sulfur is not derived from Greek, and the -ph- has no place in the word; -f- is attested in cognates and the parents of modern English. Labor is pure Latin; we spell it the same way educated people have for thousands of years. Skeptic is derived from Greek; sc- is an unnecessary Latinization.

I love this - it's the type of logic that I often employ myself, for example when I explain to my flabbergasted kids that in olden days the Earth was vastly overcrowded. My proof is simple, but unrefutable: - look - you have a father and a mother - and I have a father and a mother. That holds true for everybody, right? So, for each person walking this earth now, TWO had to walk the earth in the past. And to worsen matters: they in turns also had TWO parents! So, imagine how crowded our earth was 10.000 years ago..

A Skeptic, BTW is not a sceptic. A Skeptic has a religion, a sceptic is merely trying to apply logical thinking (and probably both will come to the wrong conclusions).

a reply to: mikemars261

Science is merely one example of a field in which it would be impossible to communicate effectively, without access to a certain level of vocabulary and attention to detail. Engineering of a high calibre is another, and the list actually goes on and on, and for the sake of brevity, I will not list them all. If people refuse to learn the English language, that refusal puts them at a massive disadvantage when dealing with the issue of gaining qualifications of merit, and even when it comes to gaining opportunities for further education, let alone getting gainfully employed afterward.

But more to the point, proper use of language allows for a depth of communication which is useful in all areas of life, from dealing with local government, to effectively communicating ones feelings to friends, family and lovers alike. Given that so much of human happiness revolves around our connections with other people, it is vital that our communications with those people are as densely packed with information and nuance as possible. The problems that are caused when people do not have words for the way they feel are many, and can be catastrophic in their outworking. Misunderstandings caused by an inability to be direct, concise, and at the same time provide accurate detail can also be dangerous to human life. A miscommunication between lovers can result in murder, and use of street speak during a call to the emergency services is not going to be as effective as clear diction, and the ability to be both precise and concise.

The existence of alternative parlance or dialect, even the existence of other languages is all very well and good, and I welcome that. Anything which promotes the privacy of the regular citizen, even coming up with entirely new phonetic systems or language uses to confuse the uninitiated, all entirely sensible. But they should never be the ONLY linguistic option available to an individual.