When I was working out at the gym with a French friend of mine, Pascale, a
friend of his came up and enthusiastically inquired, "What's up?" Pascale paused a
moment, took a step backward and looked up, checking out the ceiling.
Realizing he didn't get it, I quickly piped up and explained, "Oh, that's slang for
'How are you?'" He looked confused, obviously not understanding how "What's
up?" could possibly have anything to do with "How are you?" But his friend didn't
stop there.
"So, Pascale, did you hear how the Italian soccer team licked the French
team?" As Pascale's eyes widened and his mouth dropped open, an expression I
hadn't seen since the days of "Our Gang" comedy, I suddenly realized where he
had gone with that one and could only imagine what image his mind was conjuring
up.
It was at that moment that I realized for the first time that there was absolutely
no way a nonnative speaker of English could fully understand an American movie,
TV show, news broadcast, or even a typical conversation without help because our
language is loaded with nonstandard English, i.e., slang and idioms.
No comments:
Post a Comment