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We’re all Banglish... eh?

By Tawsif

English, though nothing but a mere language has quite an interesting effect on certain individuals of our country. These characters suffer from the delusion that English is the one and only element that defines the smartness, as well as the social hierarchy of a person. Their this idea lead to certain idiosyncrasies that entertain the rest of us.

That day I was enlightening my younger sister with a solemn lecture on how authenticity and truthfulness always shows us the right way. Bored and sleepy, my poor little sib was fumbling with the TV remote, hoping I'd take the hint and shut up. Suddenly, she switched into 'Africa TV' or something where a lady, resplendent in her elaborate war paint, (who, I assumed, also happened to be a news caster, rather than a cannibal), was mumbling about some depression or something, in her Ethiopian accent.

'See that's the point,' I cried. 'That African lady out there knows that she sounds odd. Still, she isn't faking an accent because she wants to keep it real.'

My sister looked perplexed. 'Err... bhaiya…I think it's BTV.'

I rubbed my eyes and looked again. Indeed, there was a small 'BTV' sign at the top corner of the channel. When did BTV start giving news bulletins in Ethiopian? I mean, we already have news bulletins in English and Bangla, and people don't even listen to those.

I cleaned my ears with a cotton-bud, and tried to listen again. I listened, and listened, and listened. And, after twenty long minutes I came to realise that the news caster was actually speaking English. Its just that she had so much style and (ahem...) 'attitude' in her accent that she ended up sounding African. Not that it mattered, though. With all the grammatical errors in her 'English' people wouldn't have understood the lady anyway.

I made one last attempt.

'Err.... If the news caster isn't African, why is she wearing Zulu war paint?'

'I think, its called make-up.' My younger sister replied.

Ah, well.

For some weird reason, folks who return from abroad find it imperative to prolong their 'i' s and 'u' s, a bit longer than necessary. Although this is absolutely normal for those who have been staying abroad for a longer period of time, for the 'One week holiday-ers' its nothing but a mere excuse to show-off their dumbness.

I'm sure you've seen those people who go off to America or the UK, or even Timbuktu, and when they come back, a mere month
or so later, both their English and Bengali get heavily accented. Some of the more extreme sorts claim to have forgotten Bangla altogether…"<>Oikhane khali English ei kotha bolte hoy to"….

Some of us, who are comparatively not fluent in the English language, suffer from an inferiority complex. They tend to use bits and scraps of (grammatically disastrous) English in their everyday tête-à-têtes, and should you go to correct them the encounter almost ends up in a fistfight. You'd expect them to be eager to learn the right pronunciation, right? Wrong. These people take offence at the 'patronising' attitudes of whoever is misfortunate enough to want to help.

Then again, when it comes to the 'medium' issues, the English Medium kids aren't angels either. Some English Medium kids tend to show off their fluency in the language any time and every time they get the opportunity. The outcome: Fake English Accent.

After G.W. Bush, fake accent is perhaps the most irksome element the modern era has inflicted upon us. I know this girl who has an E in her O Level English, and can still say 'Hi' in three different accents. (English, American and German, if you're guessing.) Considering the fact that she herself has never been to any of these countries, I'd say its quite a feat.

I know this other chap who's so addicted to Gangsta' Rap that he can't complete a single sentence without muttering 'yo', 'holla' and 'homie' (not necessarily in that order) at least five times each. When his traditionalistic grandpa came to visit him from the village, instead of greeting him with the formal 'Assalamuwalaikum Nana' he waved his hand in the typical Eminem style and went, 'Wassup ma' nigger?' Now, he's in the hospital. Apparently, his Nana's cane had been a rather sturdy one.

Then there are people who are so fascinated by certain English words and leap at the first opportunity to use them, regardless of their appropriateness to the context. Thus we have those amazing places, like the wrought-iron furniture store called Wrought n' Rust, a bread brand called 'Rank Bread", a milk company that sells 'Acid Milk', and a men's salon called 'Guys n Dolls'…and so on and so forth.

In contrast to the people I've mentioned so far in this article, there's yet another tribe who tend to deny the necessity of English altogether. They love to pretend that the Western influence is spoiling the culture of our country, and we can do much better without it. It sounds pretty good, that way. At the end of the day, though, these very people dressed in jeans and Caterpillars, and drool over American Burgers at Wimpy. Talk about hypocrites, eh?

Before I conclude, I'd like to clarify that I haven't intended to mock or ridicule anyone. Bangla is our Mother Tongue. It will always remain as our priority. But, in an era as competitive as ours, excelling in English is one of the necessities as well. If it's dumb to exaggerate your English prowess, it's perhaps dumber to ignore its usefulness altogether. In the end of the day, English is still nothing but a mere parlance. Perhaps, it's wiser to keep it like that.


 
 

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