Behemoth, bully, thief: English taking over the planet

I'm always interested in language. I keep noting that the easiest way to distract me and get me off-topic is to raise something that relates to dialect or a foreign tongue. So this Guardian article distracted me from sermon preparation (where I was kind of not quite getting it).

I'm thinking to my recent experience of the last handful of years of watching a lot of foreign-language films of television series. Many of them spoken in languages I'm not well acquainted with and subtitled (Swedish, Finnish, Russian, Japanese) some in languages I know fairly well (Spanish, French, American English -that last is a wry dig!). And so I've been observing with one part of my brain when English has been getting into those other languages (and for AmEng go along to this blog).

I note that English swearwords have become almost ubiquitous alongside or replacing native words and phrases. But I do wonder whether Tim Parks may have overstated his case or missed seeing it from a different angle:

The writer and translator Tim Parks has argued that European novels are increasingly being written in a kind of denatured, international vernacular, shorn of country-specific references and difficult-to-translate wordplay or grammar. Novels in this mode – whether written in Dutch, Italian or Swiss German – have not only assimilated the style of English, but perhaps more insidiously limit themselves to describing subjects in a way that would be easily digestible in an anglophone context.

My response is that perhaps this is more to do with culture than specifically language. That is to say the Hollywood story industry and its ancillaries.

I'm not saying that English as a language isn't influential, as I said above, I do notice it creeping into other languages and even influencing grammar. However, I do also notice that there are things that the subtitled translation doesn't pick up eg the change from formal to informal address -'you'- or a switch from Swedish to Danish in The Bridge which tells you something about the characters' relationship but isn't signalled in the subtitles. That doesn't seem to indicate Englishising. And in any case the variability of English itself may militate against this idea: regional and class and subcultural dialects some of which are driven by other-language contact may make a big difference in this analysis.

If we're worried about range of expression, it's capitalist globalising culture we should worry about; panicking about English may be a huge distraction from the real task.



Behemoth, bully, thief: how the English language is taking over the planet | News | The Guardian

Life at the end of Us vs Them

This is a book of essays but they share a family theme, so to say. The writer is a good communicator in prose. There is an amiable tone with a nice balance between well-chosen anecdotes and helpful and insightful comment and reflection drawn from the stories. These stories and the reflection on contemporary events through them would serve preachers and teachers well.

What I've enjoyed about reading this is the depth of analysis and the range of thinking-resources drawn upon. Sometimes that can leave a sense of 'where's this going?" but usually just after that, it gets resolved.

I've also enjoyed the masterclass it offers in how to think Girardianly and this has helped me to see more fully the power of Girardian analysis. I still remain a bit skeptical of the sacrificial thesis as '(pre-)history' but seeing the insights worked through the examples given has been really helpful.

Another thing that I've enjoyed has been to become re-acquainted with Ivan Illich's writing. And it's interesting to see how contemporary Illich still feels -even some 15 years after his death and considerably longer since some of his better known work. The thing that comes over as having been learnt from Illich is the humane-ness that we need to cultivate and the alertness to the way that human systems of care can be corrupted by, in effect, their dehumanisation, that is to say the loss of I-Thou from their heart.

I enjoyed in this book, also, the insight into the hinterland of Canadian issues related to their first nations and the genius of this book is how these become windows into how modern society often works -or rather doesn't work. Girard and Illich's insights are used to help us to see and begin to understand the gaps and contradictions and to gently consider how we might live otherwise.

I most value the thoughtfulness and the thought-provokingness of this collection of essays. I have valued too the unfolding example as I have read of taking seriously viewpoints with which we disagree; taking time to understand them argumentatively but most of all humanly. This is worth much in today's world.

And in the interests of full disclosure, I should point out that though I received a copy of the e-book, it was for review purposes. The opinions about it are mine and not produced to order or under any sense of obligation for them to be good or bad.

Link-Love 

Life at the End of Us Versus Them on Amazon
Life at the End of Us Versus Them Website
The Ferment Podcast - "a farmer philosopher and a mystic folkie set out after the yeast of the kingdom."
Marcus Peter Rempel on Facebook
Church Matters Podcast Interview
Englewood Review of Books Interview
Common Word Author Reading

 #UsVsThem Home: 'via Blog this'

PPI commission and labour rights; a speculation on a precedent

This is a very interesting potential precedent, perhaps.

 Under the Plevin rule, if more than 50% of a consumer’s PPI’s payments went as commission and this was not explained to them at the time, they could claim back payments above that threshold, plus interest

What I'm seeing there is the idea that if someone enters a contract but it is one in which they are exploited in such a way that the other party makes excessive profit, then they are entitled to money back. Now play that through the idea that workers in various industries have had wages depressed while business owners, shareholders etc have taken excessive commission ...

UK banks could face new multibillion-pound claims after PPI ruling | Money | The Guardian: