Chronicon Mundi

I am moving Jottings to a new blog entitled Chronicon Mundi.

Olympic Trickery

The Financial Times comments:

The joy of sporting contests is that anything can happen. When you are a totalitarian state, however, this makes it risky to host them. The Chinese government has responded by trying to control every conceivable element of the Olympics, often by rather dubious means.

The stunning, widely used footage of firework “footprints” leading to the Olympic stadium during the opening ceremony was, it transpires, computer-generated. We now know why a film director was asked to run the event.

Lin Miaoke, the little girl who apparently sang the Chinese anthem, was in fact lip-synching to the voice of another little girl. A meeting involving a politburo member decided that although Yang Peiyi was the best singer, she was not pretty enough to take part in the ceremony. She should be heard, but not seen.

Then again, cheering crowds are being bused into stadia by the government, armed with noise-makers and decked in colourful attire to improve the leaden atmosphere inside. In some cases the visitors are taking the places of real fans, who have found themselves unable to buy tickets.

The reality is that the faults officials were trying to correct are not faults at all. No one would have complained that China had not followed its creeping barrage of fireworks with a helicopter. The little girl rejected as the face of the opening ceremony may have had imperfect teeth – but little girls usually do. And, we all know that not all Olympic sports are sell-outs.

Official obsessiveness was, of course, doomed to fail. The 10m air rifle competition was scheduled first so that China would win the first gold medal. But Katerina Emmons, a Czech, set a new world record and won while the Chinese competitor, Du Li, did rather badly.

Foreign companies often complain of Chinese counterfeiting, but the games are spectacular enough without fakery. Rather than announcing China’s arrival as a modern, dynamic country, they risk reinforcing the view that the Beijing government is comprised of control-freaks.

Six lines

Show me six lines written by the most honest man in the world, and I will find enough in them to hang him.

Qu'on me donne six lignes écrites de la main du plus honnête homme,
j'y trouverai de quoi le faire pendre.

Attributed to Cardinal Richelieu

Things Chinese

Lack of time (i.e., work) compels me to quit posting in this blog and to limit my occasional blogging to Things Chinese:

http://thingschinese.wordpress.com/

Paul

das wahre Antlitz des Menschen

«Wer von klein auf Wohlstand genossen hat, dann aber in Not gerät, der wird, so glaube ich, im Verlauf dieser Erfahrung in die Lage versetzt, das wahre Antlitz des Menschen zu erkennen.»
Lu Xun

"Mit dem Erzähler und Essayisten Lu Xun auf der Suche nach einem modernen chinesischen Selbstverständnis..."

Neue Zürcher Zeitung, 24. November 2007

http://www.nzz.ch/nachrichten/startseite/der_konfuzianismus_als_kannibalismus_1.588808.html

Garnett's translations

From Orlando Figes review of Richard Pevear and Larissa Volokhonsky's recently published translation of War and Peace:

No one did more to introduce the English-speaking world to Russian literature than Constance Garnett (1862– 1946), who translated into graceful late-Victorian prose seventy major Russian works, including seventeen volumes of Turgenev, thirteen volumes of Dostoevsky, six of Gogol, four of Tolstoy, six of Herzen, seventeen of Chekhov, and books by Goncharov and Ostrovsky. A friend of Garnett's, D.H. Lawrence, recalled her

sitting out in the garden turning out reams of her marvelous translations from the Russian. She would finish a page, and throw it off on a pile on the floor without looking up, and start a new page. The pile would be this high...really almost up to her knees, and all magical.

She worked so fast that when she came across an awkward passage she would leave it out. She made mistakes. But her stylish prose, which made the Russian writers so accessible, and seemingly so close to the English sensibility, ensured that her translations would remain for many years the authoritative standard of how these writers ought to sound and feel. For the English-reading public, Russian literature was what Garnett made of it. As Joseph Conrad wrote in 1917, "Turgeniev for me is Constance Garnett and Constance Garnett is Turgeniev."

The Russians were not so impressed. Nabokov called her Gogol translations "dry and flat, and always unbearably demure."[4] Kornei Chukovsky accused her of smoothing out the idiosyncrasies of writers' styles so that "Dostoevsky comes in some strange way to resemble Turgenev":

In reading the original [of Notes from Underground], who does not feel the convulsions, the nervous trembling of Dostoevsky's style? It is expressed in convulsions of syntax, in a frenzied and somehow piercing diction where malicious irony is mixed with sorrow and despair. But with Constance Garnett it becomes a safe blandscript: not a volcano, but a smooth lawn mowed in the English manner—which is to say a complete distortion of the original.

Joseph Brodsky sniped that the "reason English-speaking readers can barely tell the difference between Tolstoy and Dostoevsky is that they aren't reading the prose of either one. They're reading Constance Garnett."

For the rest of this review, see

http://www.nybooks.com/articles/20810

I fought the Borg and the Borg won

I wasn't planning to read the Harry Potter books for another ten years or so. But the other day Laura, who's seven and three quarters, started reading the first one to me and I'm hooked. We're on chapter three...

Empires of the World

I've just finished reading Nicholas Ostler's monumental Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World (Harper Collins, 2005). It's a magisterial introduction to the history of languages and to the history of the world through the prism of language. Unlike previous historical linguists, Ostler does not compare the structure of different languages with a view to reconstructing their past; instead, the compares the career of different languages: their social and political impact and staying power, as well as the reasons for their decline. "It is an approach, previously little explored, to understanding human societies." Much of what Ostler writes about Aramaic was completely new to me. I learned something from every page of this book, including the section on Chinese. In a review of the book, Robert Dessaix writes about the spread of Aramaic:

"Aramaic-speakers, for instance, who were nomads from northern Syria, simply swamped the Assyrian empire, which has been happily speaking Akkadian for 2,000 years, bringing with them a superior technology (always a plus): their alphabet, written on papyrus or leather, much handier than cuneiform on clay tablets.

In the 6th century BC the Persians found it practical to adopt Aramaic as their official language, so that by the time Alexander the Great invaded Egypt, he found the administration there communicating not in Egyptian but Aramaic, and even Ashoka in far-off India had inscriptions in Aramaic on his monuments.

No conquering armies from northern Syria, no settlement of foreign lands, just a bit of 'merger and acquisition' leading to bilingualism in the streets and offices and armies of the Middle East until hey presto! one day anyone who was anyone across half the known world, including eventually Jesus, and millions of nobodies at home as well (that's the important thing) was speaking and writing in an obscure nomadic dialect.

Arabic wiped Aramaic out eventually, of course, though invasion and the imposition of a unitary religion but, interestingly, it wiped out only related languages (as Aramaic, and even Egyptian were). It seems that invasion leaves unrelated languages intact and thriving (Persian, Malay, Turkish and so on in the case of Arabic) unless it's accompanied by massive migration and, ideally, a plague or two."
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/arts/ling/stories/s1461705.htm

Here's an interview with Ostler:

http://calitreview.com/2007/04/03/an-interview-with-linguist-nicholas-ostler/

Paul

Stepmother tongues

Bint Battuta writes:

"I was taught – and I agree – that you should only translate into your mother tongue (assuming you are raised monolingual). I have occasionally translated into Arabic, but I always get the translation checked by a native speaker, and I always feel that what I have done lacks style; it might be grammatically correct, but there are no subtleties or nuances. Translation, particularly literary translation, is more than knowing the target language well, it is about cultural familiarity, about knowing the resonances and connotations words might have, being aware of what the readership will understand as well as what the writer intended. That deeper knowledge cannot be learnt from books.
………………

I can think of many great authors who have chosen to write in a language they have not learnt from birth. Samuel Beckett chose to write in French (after years of living in Paris), and Milan Kundera now does too (again after a long period of living in France). Then of course there was the extraordinary Joseph Conrad, for whom English was a fourth language (after Russian, Polish and French), mastered in his twenties. Bahrain has its own example in Ebrahim Al Arrayedh, who wrote extensively in Arabic, although he only learnt it as a teenager when he moved to Bahrain from India. The Saudi novelist Ahmed Abodehman writes in French. (Eleiva recently told me about Kapka Kassabova, a Bulgarian author who initially wrote a novel and some poetry in English just to practise the language – but won awards for them!)

Beckett turned to French because he felt in French he could write 'without style' – it made his writing very spare (and he translated most of his own works into English himself).

Is there a difference between living for a long time in country other to that of one's birth and choosing to write in the language of that culture (for whatever reason), and writing in another language while still surrounded by your mother tongue?"

For more, visit:

http://battutabahrain.blogspot.com/2007/10/stepmother-tongues.html

Che Guevara

When I was a teenager I used to have a poster of Che Guevara on my wall. Even then, almost 30 years ago, I thought that Fidel Castro was a bloody dictator who threw dissidents and gays in prison and had orchestrated an ugly cult of personality, but that Che, who had died young, had been an idealist who would never have approved of the dictatorial turn the Cuban revolution took in the 1970s if not before. Last year, I enjoyed and was moved by the movie The Motorcycle Diaries.

Jacobo Machover, author of the recently published "La face cachée du Che," has convinced me that I should have known then that this was too good to be true. (I've read a lot about the Chinese revolution, starting with Simon Leys' Chinese Shadows, which I read in 1981, a year before I started studying Chinese. Reading Chinese history is, or ought to be, a good inoculation against political propaganda of any sort.). Machover argues persuasively that Che Guevara not only ordered the execution of hundreds of prisoners but personally murdered several with his own hands (or gun). Not surprisingly, the rightwing press, which has never been keen to write about the Pinochets and Videlas of this world, has lapped up this book.

From a Sunday Times review: <http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,22428134-36235,00.html>

A prolific diarist, Guevara wrote vividly of his role as an executioner.

In one passage, he described the execution of Eutimio Guerra, a peasant and army guide. "I fired a .32-calibre bullet into the right hemisphere of his brain, which came out through his left temple," was Guevara's clinical description of the killing. "He moaned for a few moments, then died."

"I carried out a very summary inquiry and then the peasant Aristidio was executed," he wrote about another killing. "It is not possible to tolerate even the suspicion of treason."

Guevara found particularly "interesting" the case of one of his victims, a man who, just before being executed, penned a letter to his mother in which he acknowledged "the justice of the punishment that was being dealt out to him" and asked her "to be faithful to the revolution".

A couple of weeks ago, L'Express published a shocking article (shocking to me, still shocking, even after having read quite a bit about this recently):

http://www.lexpress.fr/info/monde/dossier/cuba/dossier.asp?ida=460199

An excerpt:

Luciano Medina, d'abord. A 81 ans, robuste, volubile et enjoué, il reste ce guajiro (paysan) qu'il fut au temps de la révolution quand il était le facteur personnel de Fidel Castro. Dans la sierra Maestra, en 1957 et 1958, c'est lui qui acheminait les messages du comandante en jefe à travers les lignes ennemies aux autres comandantes: Raúl Castro, Camilo Cienfuegos ou encore Ernesto «Che» Guevara. «C'est simple, je les ai tous connus», lance l'ex-coursier, dont la voix rocailleuse retentit dans le deux-pièces exigu de Miami (Floride) qu'il occupe depuis les années 1970. «Guevara? Il traitait mal les gens. Très mal», insiste Medina. Les deux hommes se sont fréquentés, deux mois durant, en avril-mai 1958, dans le campement de La Otilia, près de Las Minas de Bueycito. «Un jour que je lisais Sélection du Reader's Digest, peinard dans mon hamac, le Che, furieux, m'arrache la revue des mains et s'écrie: "Pas de journaux impérialistes ici! " Mais surtout, il tuait comme on avale un verre d'eau. Avec lui, c'était vite vu, vite réglé. Un matin, vers 9 heures, nous déboulons au Rancho Claro, une petite exploitation de café appartenant à un certain Juan Perez. Aussitôt, le Che accuse le fermier d'être un mouchard à la solde de la dictature de Batista. En réalité, le seul tort de ce pauvre homme était de dire haut et fort qu'il n'adhérait pas à la révolution.» Une heure plus tard, le malheureux caféiculteur est passé par les armes devant sa femme et ses trois enfants de 1, 3 et 4 ans. «Les voisins étaient traumatisés, indignés. Et nous, la troupe, nous étions écoeurés. Avec trois autres compañeros, nous avons ensuite quitté le Che pour rejoindre un autre campement.» A l'image de Juan Perez, 15 «traîtres», «mouchards», ou supposés tels, devaient pareillement être liquidés sur ordre de Guevara, entre 1957 et 1958. Et ce n'était qu'un début.

And another article in French:

http://www.stephane.info/show.php?code=che_guevara&lg=fr

Che Guevara staged public executions and carried out mock executions on prisoners. Having known Chileans who were tortured with mock executions (and many other ways), I'm ashamed I ever had a poster of Che Guevara on my wall.

Yesterday I heard an interview (in French) on Espace 2 with Jacobo Machover. He's what in Cuba they call a "gusano" but he's persuaded me that he is not making this stuff up and he's opened my eyes a bit wider (just as Simon Leys opened my eyes when I first started reading about China). Click on the link next to "JEUDI 18 OCTOBRE 2007" and above "L'image d'un malentendu" to hear the interview with him: <http://www.rsr.ch/espace-2/les-temps-qui-courent#jeudi>.

World Digital Library

Source: Washington Post (10/18/07):
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/10/17/AR2007101702260.html>

Checking Out Tomorrow's Library

In Paris, an International Working Group Shows Off the Prototype For a
Multilingual 'Intellectual Cathedral' of Digitized Knowledge
By John Ward Anderson

PARIS, Oct. 17 -- As ideas go, they don't come much bigger: Digitize the
accumulated wisdom of humankind, catalogue it, and offer it for free on the
Internet in seven languages.

The first phase of that simple yet outlandishly ambitious dream is about a
year away from being realized, according to a group of international
librarians, computer technicians and U.N. officials who unveiled a prototype
for the project, called the World Digital Library, in Paris on Wednesday.

Its creators see it as the ultimate multilingual, multicultural tool for
researching and retrieving information about knowledge and creativity from
any era or place. The WDL Web site (http://www.worlddigitallibrary.org) will
provide access to original documents, films, maps, photographs, manuscripts,
musical scores and recordings, architectural drawings and other primary
resources through a variety of search methods.

"The capacity to search in the various ways that will be possible in the
World Digital Library will promote all kinds of cross-cultural perspectives
and understanding," said James H. Billington, the Librarian of Congress, who
proposed the project two years ago. The ability to cross-reference
information pulled from "the deep memories" of cultures is "an exciting
frontier possibility for the world," he said in an interview.

"In essence, what they are doing is building an intellectual cathedral, and
it may never get finished," said Paul Saffo, a long-time Silicon Valley
technology forecaster. "But this is a good effort even if it fails, because
it is going to inspire a lot of other efforts, and if it succeeds it will be
a wonderful resource."

"The challenges here aren't technological," Saffo said. Financial hurdles
might be considerable, and the project could be criticized as too grandiose,
or its model might be considered too closed. But all those problems will
probably be resolved, he said. "For me, the issue is the will to make it
happen. The people involved in this -- will they really see this through?"

With entrenched interests starting to gain control of the Internet, he
added, "it seems like the right thing at the right time, and the most
important thing is that we try to do it."

The prototype introduced Wednesday allowed searches by time, geographical
location, topic and format, with the ability to narrow results by limiting
them to books, photographs, movies or recordings. For written materials, the
same content was simultaneously available in seven languages, and expert
analysis by site "curators" was either translated or available in subtitles.

"If you really, truly want to understand and respect other cultures, you
have to be able to access their materials in their own languages," said
Ismail Serageldin, head of Egypt's Bibliotheca Alexandrina, one of the
partners in the project. A key goal of the WDL is to make the site
user-friendly and widely available, he said, to help break down the digital
divide between rich and poor countries.

The different search techniques permit a user to retrieve information for
certain years and countries, so that in addition to being able to browse the
collected knowledge of the world in the 1400s, for instance, a user could
also limit a search to a topic such as art in Egypt and China in the 3rd
century B.C.

Similarly, a user could specify a medium -- for example, only photographs
from New York and Paris in the 1920s.

"The memory of different cultures is preserved in different ways,"
Billington explained. "This is an attempt to take the defining primary
documents of a culture" and make them interactive with other cultures, he
said.

The site "has an enormous educational potential," Billington said, noting
that its content is being designed particularly with children in mind. "It
has the capacity both to inspire respect for other cultures and their
histories and stories, but at the same time to establish critical thinking."

The WDL is being developed by the Library of Congress in partnership with
the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization
(UNESCO), which officials said would broaden the program's reach and appeal.

The general model for the WDL is the Library of Congress's National Digital
Library Program, which was launched in the mid-1990s. That program's
flagship is the American Memory Web site ( http://www.memory.loc.gov), which
offers 11 million digital files culled from U.S. historical records -- from
the Declaration of Independence and Civil War photographs to early Thomas
Edison movies and recordings of interviews with former slaves.

Billington said the United States was offering its experiences in creating
American Memory as a guide to help the 190 other member states of UNESCO
explore and digitally archive their own national and cultural memories for
the WDL. The site will be accessible in the six official languages of the
United Nations (English, French, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and Arabic) plus
Portuguese.

The WDL will begin offering content on its site in late 2008 or early 2009,
Billington said, with the ability to "rapidly ramp up" as countries digitize
their archives and make them available. The site will have a few hundred
thousand items to begin with, officials said.

The Library of Congress holdings, which include millions of items from
around the world, will form the backbone of the initial WDL collection, with
other digital content provided by six other libraries, including the
national libraries of Egypt, Brazil and Russia.

The start-up cost of American Memory was $60 million, about $45 million of
which came from private sponsors. WDL officials could not estimate how much
it would cost to fully fund the creation of their site, but they said they
hoped much of the money would come from private sources. Google gave $3
million to launch the project and develop the prototype displayed Wednesday.

The United States has often been criticized, particularly here in France and
in the developing world, for its dominance of the Internet and for the
global spread of its culture. But WDL officials called the project an
example of how the United States could use its vast resources and know-how
to bridge those differences.

"This is the best counter to that view of the U.S. . . . muscling its way in
and forcing other countries to do what it wants," said Serageldin, the
Egyptian library head. "The Library of Congress is the biggest library in
the world by far, and it has stretched out its hand to invite partners from
all over the world to participate. This is a wonderful way to show how true
U.S. leadership is being exercised by a great cultural institution and
bringing about a wonderful reaction from everybody."

Reaper

I've just heard on American National Public Radio that most of the fixed-wing US Air Force missions currently flown over Iraq are unmanned and controlled by pilots at an air base in Las Vegas. In a few weeks, the Air Force will deploy its first generation of unmanned bombers. The plane is appositely called "Reaper" and its payload of bombs will be dropped over Iraq and other countries by pilots sitting at desks in Nevada.

Brave new world.

"Being bilingual protects brain"

BBC News Reports:

Being bilingual 'protects brain'

Being fluent in two languages may help to keep the brain sharper for longer, a study suggests.

Researchers from York University in Canada carried out tests on 104 people between the ages of 30 and 88.

They found that those who were fluent in two languages rather than just one were sharper mentally.

Writing in the journal of Psychology and Ageing, they said being bilingual may protect against mental decline in old age.

Previous studies have shown that keeping the brain active can protect against senile dementia.

Research has shown that people who play musical instruments, dance or read regularly may be less likely to develop the condition.

Other activities like doing crosswords or playing board games may also help.

Language skills

This latest study appears to back up the theory that language skills also have a protective effect.

Dr Ellen Bialystok and colleagues at York University assessed the cognitive skills of all those involved in the study using a variety of widely recognised tests.

They tested their vocabulary skills, their non-verbal reasoning ability and their reaction time.

Half of the volunteers came from Canada and spoke only English. The other half came from India and were fluent in both English and Tamil.

The volunteers had similar backgrounds in the sense that they were all educated to degree level and were all middle class.

The researchers found that the people who were fluent in English and Tamil responded faster than those who were fluent in just English. This applied to all age groups.

The researchers also found that the bilingual volunteers were much less likely to suffer from the mental decline associated with old age.

"The bilinguals were more efficient at all ages tested and showed a slower rate of decline for some processes with aging," they said.

"It appears...that bilingualism helps to offset age-related losses."

The UK's Alzheimer's Society welcomed the study.

"These findings, that early development of second language may improve a specific aspect of cognitive function in later life, are very interesting," said Professor Clive Ballard, its director of research.

"It is a possibility that the acquisition of a second language in early childhood may influence the process of the development of neuronal circuits.

"However, the results of this particular study need to be interpreted cautiously as they were comparing groups of individual of different nationalities, educated in different systems.

"It is also well recognised that education in general can bestow benefits on cognitive function in later life."

Story from BBC NEWS:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/health/3794479.stm

Published: 2004/06/15 23:37:41 GMT

Eating and reading

The Language Hat (www.languagehat.com) quotes the following blog entry from the New York Times:

"Eating and reading is almost (if not more) enjoyable in restaurants than it is at home – thank god for restaurant bars, and tables for one. Who hasn't, on occasion, while stuck at a table with someone you had nothing to say to, gazed with envy at the guy sitting alone at a restaurant bar, happily stuffing his face and getting sauce on his new issue of The Economist?

Some restaurants are better - in terms of reading and the solo eater - than others. I'll never forget the time, back in the mid-90s, when I was traveling for a story and ate dinner alone at a good, small restaurant in Savannah, Ga.

I don't remember what I ordered. But I do recall that the headwaiter, when he saw I was by myself, brought over a tray of magazines - The New Yorker, Business Week, The Atlantic Monthly - and asked if I'd like to read one while I ate.

Yes, I said. Yes, I would.

I've never seen this act of grace and kindness repeated in any other restaurant - although these days I'm not foolish enough to enter one alone without something to read."

One of the comments reads:

"Same for me. Eating alone is not a sufficient occupation. Many a time did I fall asleep at my mother's breast, I'm told, simply because I hadn't learned how to read yet.

And yes, I, too, sometimes read while walking.

Posted by David Marjanović at September 13"

über das Sprachregime des Kapitalismus

„Es ist pervers"

Urs Widmer im Interview mit WirtschaftsWoche

Der Schweizer Schriftsteller Urs Widmer über das Sprachregime des Kapitalismus und die Unterwerfungslust der Manager.

WirtschaftsWoche: Herr Widmer, Sie behaupten, die Sprache des Kapitalismus habe „präfaschistische Beiklänge". Wie kommen Sie darauf?

Durch meine Untersuchungen über die Sprache des Faschismus und die deutsche Literatur nach 1945, also die Generation Heinrich Bölls. Deren Anspruch war es, sprachlich bei null anzufangen. Das stellte sich, wie ich merkte, als unmöglich heraus. Die Schriftsteller hatten keine andere Sprache zur Verfügung, als die, die sie im Faschismus erlernt hatten, und es dauerte Jahrzehnte, bis das Deutsche wieder jene Biegsamkeit zurückerhielt, auf die der Schriftsteller für seine Arbeit angewiesen ist. Jenes Minimum an Naivität, ohne die keine Poesie möglich ist. Und kein Leben.

Was hat das mit der Sprache der Ökonomie zu tun?

Alle Diktaturen, gipfelnd im Faschismus, suchen sprachliche Eindeutigkeit. Genau darin ist ihnen die Sprache der Ökonomie verwandt: Sie sucht nach eindeutigen Regelungen und gängelt das Sprachverhalten, freilich nicht durch Anordnung, sondern durch stilles gegenseitiges Abgleichen. Und sie hat eine Eigenschaft, die für alle korrupten Sprachen charakteristisch ist: Sie ist durch und durch euphemistisch. Sie setzt den Begriff an die Stelle der Wirklichkeit. Schon der Begriff „freie Marktwirtschaft" wirkt da wie Hohn.

Sie meinen, die Marktwirtschaft sei alles andere als frei?

Verstehen Sie mich nicht falsch. Ich behaupte keineswegs, die Wirtschaftswelt sei faschistisch. Aber die „Power" von heute erinnert verdächtig an die „Kraft" von damals. Die Sieger, die Tüchtigen, Kompetitiven und Gesunden setzen auf Sieger, und ich habe den Verdacht, dass sie in den Nicht-so-Gesunden und weniger Kompetitiven unwertes Leben sehen. „Lead, follow or get out of the way", so hat es ein hochrangiger Manager gesagt.

Und – was heißt das?

Das heißt, dass wir heute einerseits in einigermaßen funktionierenden Demokratien leben, in denen andererseits eine Ökonomie gedeiht, die die Menschen auf die kriegerischen Ideale des Kampfes und der Härte, des Vitalismus und des Funktionierens, der Disziplin und des Gehorsams einschwört. Ich wundere mich immer wieder, dass die gleichen Leute, die sich als mündige Bürger verstehen, sich schier widerstandlos Tag für Tag in eine Arbeitswelt begeben, in der nichts oder kaum etwas demokratisch geregelt ist. Am wenigsten die Verteilung des erwirtschafteten Geldes.

Sie kritisieren die Eindimensionalität der ökonomischen Sprache und ihre normierende Kraft. Was steckt dahinter?

Macht. Wer Macht anstrebt, muss Gefolgschaft und Konformität erzeugen. Dazu ist die Sprache hervorragend geeignet. Der eindeutige, formalisierte Jargon der globalisierten Wirtschaft hat etwas ungemein Beruhigendes, er suggeriert, dass man eine festumrissene Aufgabe, ein definiertes Ziel und eine klare Funktion, kurz: dass man die Wirklichkeit im Griff hat. Nur: Der Area Sales Manager wird ein Weilchen lang stolz auf seinen bedeutsamen Job sein, aber er kann sich bald nicht mehr verhehlen, dass er wie eh und je mit seinen Staubsaugern loszieht und von unwilligen Hausfrauen die Tür vor der Nase zugeknallt bekommt...

Warum wurde der Code der Wirtschaft mächtiger als beispielweise der von Parteien und Kirchen?

Jede Gruppe hat ihren Code, auch wir Literaten haben einen. Nun kann man mit den Mustern, die man verwendet, identisch oder weniger identisch sein. Ich habe das Glück, in einem Beruf zu arbeiten, wo die Anpassungszwänge nicht so stark sind. In der Wirtschaftswelt, wo der Anpassungsdruck gewaltig ist, liefern sich immer mehr Menschen dem herrschenden Code aus – eben weil er herrscht. Sie suchen geradezu das, was man früher entfremdetes Leben nannte. Der Code ist so etwas wie ein rhetorischer Mitgliedsausweis: Wenn ich ihn drauf habe, bin ich dabei. Wenn nicht, habe ich nicht einmal eine Chance ins Vorzimmer zu treten, weil schon der Portier merkt: Was will denn der hier?

Der Jargon als Eintrittskarte?

Ein mit sich selbst identischer, kraftvoller Geist wird sich nie den Forderungen des Jargons beugen. Man begegnet solchen Köpfen durchaus auch in der Wirtschaft, gerade in den sogenannten oberen Etagen. Novartis-Chef Daniel Vasella oder Herr Ackermann von der Deutschen Bank sind gewiss gescheit genug, nicht allzu häufig in die Falle der gewollten Spracharmut zu tappen. Doch wird die differenzierte Intelligenz nicht dazu genutzt, sich gegen das potemkinsche Sprachverhalten der Wirtschaft zu wehren. Im Gegenteil: Der Siegeszug des Jargons ist dort ausdrücklich gewollt. Schließlich geht es, eben, um Macht. Der Jargon wird in den oberen Etagen also besser durchschaut als in den unteren?

Ja. Es ist wirklich merkwürdig, dass er am eilfertigsten von den – nennen wir sie mal so – Fußtruppen gesprochen wird. Wir Menschen haben die fatale Neigung, uns mit den Siegern zu identifizieren, mit einem als aggressiv erlebten Vorbild. Gerade die, die auf der Leiter des Erfolgs nur eine oder zwei Stufen hochzuklettern vermochten, sprechen auf eine oft tragikomische Art diese Siegersprache. Als gäbe es gar keine andere. Sie haben keine andere. Ihre eigene Hochzeit nennen sie dann eine Win-Win-Situation.

Wie ist dieser Jargon in die Wirtschaftswelt eingedrungen?

Die Täter haben keine Namen. „Es" war es. Beginnend mit Ludwig Erhard und dem Wirtschaftswunder ist „es" geschehen, und viele Leute waren beteiligt. Im Unterschied zum Faschismus, in dem es Täter gibt und eine Sprache, die von diesen Tätern manipuliert wurde, hat die Sprache in einer Demokratie die Chance, ihr eigenes Leben zu entwickeln. In der Vielfältigkeit einer Demokratie ist es schwieriger, der Sprache die Ambivalenz auszutreiben. Sie stößt das eine aus, wehrt das andere ab und nimmt ein drittes auf. Die Sprache tut also, was sie tut, sie mendelt sich nach darwinistischen Prinzipien durch. Es gibt keinen Schuldigen und keine Schuld. Aber wer auf die reichen Möglichkeiten der Sprache verzichtet, verarmt auch sonst.

In Ihrem Theaterstück „Top Dogs" haben Sie das sprachlose Wirtschaftspersonal schon vor ein paar Jahren auftreten lassen. Woher bezogen Sie Ihr Material?

Aus Interviews in Outplacement-Firmen. Und ich habe mich eine Zeit lang als Abendhobby in die einschlägigen Bars gesetzt, wo die Herren der mittleren Etage sich entspannen. In gewissem Sinn haben meine Manager die Groteske mitgeschrieben; die Unerschütterlichen und auch die, die nach zwei Whiskys ihrem Gegenüber Geständnisse machen wollten und auch im Privatesten ihre Sprachklischees nicht loswurden. Die Ambivalenz, die den Menschen erst definiert, ist in ihrem Sprechen systematisch ausgeschaltet.

Sie meinen, auf der einen Seite stehe der Schriftsteller, der den Leser verunsichert, und auf der anderen Seite die Wirtschaft, die eine Sprache der Bestätigung spricht?

Ja, wir sind gewiss Antipoden. Die Dichter geben keine Antworten, sondern stellen Fragen. Sie sind immer mit der Tatsache beschäftigt, dass eine Sache mindestens zwei Seiten hat. Es gibt keine guten Menschen und keinen bösen Menschen, es gibt in all unserem Tun immer auch sein Gegenteil. Ambivalenz. – Jetzt sehen Sie sich die Börsenberichterstattung im Fernsehen an. Alles eindeutig. Alles richtig. Alles sytemnotwendig. Es ist pervers.

Pervers?

Weil die TV-Ökonomen mit heiligen Ernst von Dingen reden, die vollkommen fiktiv sind. Sie liefern Spielkasinoberichte, tun aber so, als sprächen sie aus den Heilszentren dieser Welt. – In der Tat hat die Börse durchaus religiöse Rituale. Sie ist so etwas wie eine Kirche ohne einen Gott der alten Art. Es gibt Priester (die TV-Kommentare sind ihre Predigten), die Börsenkardinäle, die Finanzpäpste...

Sie übertreiben. Uns fällt bei der Börsenberichterstattung nur robuste Zuversicht auf.

Sie scherzen. Dieser Optimismus im Dienst der Sache kommt mir wie das Pfeifen im Wald vor. Wir sind bereit, alles, auch das Absurdeste zu glauben, wenn es nur unsere Ängste bannt. Die hysterische Selbstbejahung der Wirtschaft rührt gerade daher, dass das System in Wirklichkeit aufs äußerste gefährdet ist. Denn niemand weiß, wie viel Geld es überhaupt auf Erden gibt, wo es ist und was es dort tut. Man weiß es kaum vom eigenen Geld.

Können wir die Wahrheit nicht vertragen? Oder ist der Optimismus nur dazu da, sich selbst ständig neu zu beglaubigen?

Um das alles auszuhalten, muss man ganz schön viel weghalluzinieren. Und es ist dann nach Feierabend nicht einfach, das zu sein, was man gern wäre.

Was wären die Menschen denn gern?

Sie wären gern bei sich, was sonst? Bei sich selbst zu sein, das fällt einem in der mittleren Etage einer Großbank schwer. Naja, man verdient 8000 Euro, fährt ein schönes Auto, zweimal im Jahr in Urlaub…

Okay, jetzt werden sie ironisch. Aber im Ernst: Wollen Sie mir weismachen, dass man sich als Mitarbeiter identisch fühlen und herzlich freuen kann, wenn der Arbeitgeber seinen Quartalsgewinn zum achten Mal in Folge gesteigert hat? Nein, das geht nicht auf. Ein Arbeits-Ich und ein Feierabend-Ich, wie soll das gehen? Künstler sind darum immer auch solche, die gar nicht wissen, ob sie gerade arbeiten oder nicht. Wir arbeiten immer oder nie.

Könnte es sein, dass in Ihrer Einstellung zur Wirtschaft und Ihrer Sprache eine grundsätzliche Abneigung gegen den Homo oeconomicus steckt?

Mag sein, obwohl mein Sozialneid gering ist, denn ich verdiene gut.

Das meinen wir nicht, uns geht es um das Verhältnis des Schriftstellers zur Denkweise der Wirtschaft und zu ihrem Habitus.

Naja, natürlich, da spielt sicher auch meine persönliche Geschichte mit. Ich komme aus einem bürgerlichen Haus, Bücher statt Geld, mein Vater war Kommunist, dann, ab etwa 1950, ein kritischer Beobachter aller Politik, auch der linken. Ich war dann in den späteren Sechzigerjahren der deutschen Linken nahe. Das hinterlässt natürlich Spuren im Denken, bis heute. Ich möchte politisch teilhaben an dieser Gesellschaft.

Also auch dabei sein, wenn es um den Zugang zur Macht geht.

Künstlern geht es selten um Macht. Es geht um Freiheiten. Aber wir halten uns oft nolens volens in der Nähe des Geldes auf, in der Nähe der Macht. Wir haben keine sauberen Hände. Aber wir haben immerhin die Chance, dem beschädigten Leben den Spiegel vorzuhalten. Diese Chance nutze ich.

So wie das Establishment sich Künstler hält, die sie in ihren heiligen Hallen ausstellen lässt, so hält es sich also auch den Urs Widmer als Narren vom Dienst…

Schön wär's.

…und in Ihren subventionierten Theatern lässt es Stücke wie „Top Dogs" spielen…

Also erstens ist es für einen Maler nicht ehrenrührig, wenn er von der UBS oder der Deutschen Bank gesammelt wird. Zweitens habe auch ich schon einmal beim Züricher Rotary-Club einen Vortrag gehalten. Am Paradeplatz, wo sonst. Im Publikum saß zusammengenommen Privatvermögen von geschätzten zwei Milliarden Euro. Zur Belohnung bekam ich zwei Flaschen mittelprächtigen Weins.

Kann die Literatur Menschen, die sich im Netz der Arbeitswelt verheddert haben, eine lebensöffnende Perspektive bieten?

Das kann sie, ja, sie kann den Menschen das Angebot einer Ursprünglichkeit der zweiten Art machen. Die erste Ursprünglichkeit, die nicht kulturell vermittelte, ist eine Fiktion, von der zu träumen dennoch schön ist. Wie die nackten Göttinnen und Götter Griechenlands auf den weißen Uferfelsen saßen und in unendlicher Muße übers tiefblaue Meer hinsahen...

Es gibt Leute, die behaupten, man bräuchte die Literatur nicht – eben weil sie keine Eindeutigkeit herzustellen vermag.

An diese Leute sei die Frage gerichtet: Wieso denn ist die Wirtschaftswelt emotional so karg? Dermaßen spracharm? – Ihr gegenüber steht eine Literatur, die von der Sprache des Mainstreams schon deshalb abweicht, weil die Dichter gar nicht anders können. Literatur ist Sprachabweichung.

Weshalb sie sich ständig der Gefahr aussetzt, nicht verstanden zu werden – und nicht verstanden werden zu wollen.

Es gibt Dichter, die so sehr vom Mainstream abweichen, dass man sie nicht mehr versteht. Der späte Hölderlin. Diese Dichter sind in unseren Augen dann verrückt. Ver-rückt. Es geht also in der Literatur darum, die rechte Balance zwischen Sprachabweichung und gelingender Kommunikation zu finden. Wir wollen ja schließlich verstanden werden. Pathetisch gesagt: Es ist für eine Gesellschaft überlebenswichtig, dass jemand ihr ihre Geschichten erzählt. Sei es in Büchern oder in Filmen, Bildern, Fotografien, Musikstücken – Geschichten müssen sein.

Warum? Weil sie uns eine Ahnung von unseren verpassten Möglichkeiten vermitteln? Weil sie uns weh tun?

Sicher auch das. Vor allem aber, weil sie Trost spenden. Du bist nicht allein mit deinen lichten und eben auch schwarzen Gedanken und Gefühlen. Und Geschichten zeigen, dass die Sprache der Ökonomie die Sprache der wirklichen Welt nie endgültig in den Griff bekommen kann.

[09.09.2007] dieter.schnaas@wiwo.de, christopher.schwarz

Aus der WirtschaftsWoche 37/2007.

http://www.wiwo.de/pswiwo/fn/ww2/sfn/buildww/id/124/id/303817/fm/0/SH/0/depot/0/

"macho" kanji and "feminine" hiragana

The Japan Times, Sunday, Aug. 26, 2007

"It's ladies first now in Japanese love hotels"

By DONALD RICHIE
JAPANESE LOVE HOTELS: A Cultural History, by Sarah Chaplin. London/New York: Routledge, 2007, 242 pp. with photos, figures and tables, £85 (cloth)

The love-hotel industry is one of Japan's most profitable. It accounts for more than ¥4 trillion a year, a figure nearly four times than that of the profit of Toyota Motors, double that of the anime market, and a trillion yen more than the annual takings of the Japan Racing Association.

Supporting this are 30,000 love hotels nationwide providing places for the 500 million visits that take place each year. Some 1,370,000 couples use a love hotel daily (1 percent of the total population of 127 million people on any given day), and one research project has calculated that half of all sex in Japan takes place in a love hotel, and that consequently a large part of the country's offspring is conceived in one.

This is because a large percentage of the patrons are married to each other. It has been estimated that customers fall into three categories: married, just dating, and adulterous. Their demands, however, are all the same — couples (married to each other or not) seeking space dedicated to sexual intimacy on a short-term basis, away from their crowded, nosy homes.

Other countries have their love-hotel equivalents — South Korea, Singapore, the Philippines — but these are not often of the same caliber as Japan's. Here the love-hotel establishment is not only geared to provide security and quiet, but also to create an atmosphere that is romantic (even fantastic), as other-worldly as Disneyland but at the same time stuffed with various handy gadgets.

Love-hotel excesses are well known, though now less evident since the 1985 revision to the Law Regulating Businesses Affecting Public Morals. This put an end to the large mirrors and big, round dendo (electric) beds that moved of their own accord. The contemporary love hotel is now much more kawaii (cute) than kinky.
Among the the reasons offered for this is that there has been something of a power shift in love-hotel choice. It used to be the male half that decided. Back then the places had hopeful macho monikers — Empire, Rex, King. Then the female half began to choose. Love hotels started calling themselves "fashion hotels" or "boutique hotels," and began to have lavish lobbies with theme-shops, colors like beige and lavender, and decor like Laura Ashley.

This change can be documented in the Meguro Emperor (still in Meguro), which began in 1973 as a he-man fort before it slowly metamorphosed into a romantic Disneyland castle. The interior has been several times revised to segue from male- to female-friendly. Even the name has changed. It is now Gallery Hotel.

In most love hotels "macho" kanji has been replaced by "feminine" hiragana, trendy katakana or, more often, romaji, that romanized script that carries no male/female associations at all.

The fashion hotel has grown ultra discrete (no one sees you once you are inside; in fashion motels, your license plates are hidden and there are no windows) and the erotic becomes the exotic, the risky becomes riskless, and the bed is seen as more trophy than taboo.

In her learned and entertaining book on the anthropology of the love hotel Sarah Chaplin follows the ups and downs of her subject and is particularly good in connecting its changes with those within the larger public. From the hovels of the late 1950s, almost entirely associated with adultery and prostitution, we have proceeded to the present pleasure palaces of Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto and almost everywhere else.

The entrances of such places used to resemble those of public toilets (a bafflement that allowed entry but discouraged voyeurism, and which one critic called "a purely pragmatic answer to a basic physical need.") Not now. Privacy otherwise ensured, we scan the modish room-menu, take a look around the shop and note the brand-name goods for sale, and then proceed to a bedroom in all ways more lavish than our own.

Since Chaplin is an academic, a number of authorities are evoked and acknowledged, but her style remains lively and readable. Remarking on the dispatch necessary of those cleaning the room and changing the sheets in the five minutes after an occupancy, she quotes that one might liken the process to a pit crew of a Formula One racing team's.

Here then is everything you would want to know about one of Japan's most significant architectural achievements, one which is also certainly its most lucrative.

http://search.japantimes.co.jp/print/fb20070826dr.html

eine verdammte Fleißarbeit

Jongleur mit Wörtern
Deutschlandfunk, 22.08.2007

Der Indogermanistik-Student Sebastian Heine beherrscht knapp 35 Sprachen
Von Martin Koch

Wer in Deutschland mehr als drei Sprachen fließend spricht, gilt bereits als Ausnahmetalent. Der Bonner Student Sebastian Heine übertrumpft dieses Maß um das Zehnfache. Als sein Erfolgsrezept nennt er schlicht Fleiß und den regelmäßigen aktiven Sprachgebrauch.

"Mein Geliebter opferte sich fürs Vaterland, aus dem Haar der Locken webe ich ihm das Leichentuch."

Wenn Sebastian Heine paschtunische Gedichte rezitiert, verklärt sich der Blick des 22-Jährigen:

"Das Pashto ist süß, gleichzeitig sehr herb. Das Pashto kann unglaublich feinfühlig sein und andererseits sehr hart und männlich, das Pashto lebt, es schreit, es weint, es freut sich, es stöhnt, es stirbt."

Pashto ist seine Lieblingssprache: Und das will wirklich was heißen, denn alles in allem spricht Sebastian Heine etwa 35 Sprachen: Altpersisch, Sogdisch, Sakisch, Aramäisch - die Liste ließe sich noch lange fortsetzen. Das beeindruckt viele, doch der schlanke Mann mit den braunen Locken wehrt sich gegen zuviel Ehrfurcht: Er sei zwar ein Exot, aber auf keinen Fall ein Genie:

"Es ist nicht das Ingeniöse, das man das einfach so kann, es ist der Fleiß, die Arbeit. Ich sitze jeden Tag Stunden über diesen Sprachen, jeden Tag wiederhol' ich die Grammatik, jeden Tag lern' ich Vokabeln, ich treffe jeden Tag diese Menschen und über die Sprache im aktiven Gebrauch, es ist einfach eine verdammte Fleißarbeit."

Schon als 15-Jähriger las Sebastian Heine im Schulunterricht Homer im Original. Als er hörte, dass Griechisch eng mit Sanskrit verwandt sei, lernte er auch diese Sprache. In der Folgezeit tauchte der Sohn eines Historikers immer tiefer ein in die Welt der Sprachwissenschaft - und berichtet begeistert von unerwarteten Zusammenhängen:

"Konzepte, wie wir sie in den althochdeutschen Merseburger Zaubersprüchen finden: Das ist ein Spruch, wo es heißt Bein zu Bein, Blut zu Blut, können wir verknüpfen mit Zaubersprüchen in Griechenland und im alten Indien. Ein Konzept wie in den Merseburger Zaubersprüchen gab es also aufgrund des Sprachvergleiches vermutlich schon in der neolithischen Zeit!"

Dass er schon damals nur Wenige für seine Passion begeistern konnte, machte Sebastian Heine nichts aus. Jahr für Jahr lernte er drei bis vier Sprachen aus dem Nahen und Mittleren Osten hinzu. Das fand er spannender als Diskobesuche mit seinen Klassenkameraden. Auch bei seinen Kommilitoninnen und Kommilitonen gilt der gebürtige Thüringer als schräger Vogel (oder sympathischer Kauz?). Doch er ist glücklich, wenn er jeden Tag für Stunden in der Bibliothek Sprachen studieren kann. Und danach beginnt der andere Teil seines Studentenlebens:

"Ich verbringe Tage, Stunden mit Paschtunen, Persern, ich ziehe mit Menschen, die hier wohnen, die hier heimisch geworden sind, um die Häuser. Stellen Sie sich mal vor, Sie leben ganz normal, feiern Partys, treffen Menschen, erleben interessante Dinge, aber eben nicht auf Deutsch, sondern auf Pashto, Persisch oder Urdu."

Äußerlich unterscheidet sich Sebastian Heine von seinen paschtunischen Freunden vor allem dadurch, dass er zu jeder Gelegenheit einen Anzug trägt. Aus ästhetischen Gründen, wie er sagt. Allerdings: Eine kleine Annäherung an das Erscheinungsbild der Paschtunen sprießt, wenn auch noch etwas zaghaft, in seinem Gesicht.

"Diese Parodie auf einen Bart?! Ja, ich gebe zu, ich habe ihn mir ein bisschen stehenlassen mit dem bescheidenen Ergebnis, wie sie jetzt sehen, als kleine Reminiszenz, ja."

Über seine Zukunft macht sich der 22-Jährige viele Gedanken. Kein Wunder, hat er doch gerade seine Magisterarbeit abgegeben. Mit seinen Sprachkenntnissen hätte er angesichts der aktuellen Lage in Afghanistan beim Militär oder in Wirtschaftskonzernen sicher beste Chancen, doch Sebastian Heine will sich seine Unabhängigkeit als Forscher bewahren. Ende des Jahres wird er erstmal als Stipendiat der Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes nach London gehen, um an der renommierten School of Oriental and African Studies seinen Doktor zu machen. Und was danach kommt - dafür hat er schon einen ganz persönlichen Wunschzettel:

"Afghanistan wäre mein geheimer Traum, weil die Arbeit, die es dort zu tun gilt, rein wissenschaftlicher Art, die Dialekte aufzuarbeiten, die Sprachen, über die es noch keine Grammatiken gibt, ihre Geschichten, Märchen, Sagen, Dichtung, das wäre unglaublich reizvoll. Und so Gott will, 'Inshallah', wie meine Paschtunen sagen würden, ändert sich die Situation in der Zukunft und es ergibt sich eine Chance."

http://www.dradio.de/dlf/sendungen/campus/661053/

Between sixteen and three-and-twenty

"I would there were no age between sixteen and three-and-twenty, or that youth would sleep out the rest; for there is nothing in the between but getting wenches with child, wronging the ancientry, stealing, fighting," says the Shepherd in Shakespeare's Winter's Tale.

In an article on English yoofery (to coin a word), the Economist comments, "It is true that more teenage British wenches are got with child than other European ones, and that British teenagers are unusually prone to taking drugs, fighting, venereal disease and boozing..."; and "there is something else peculiar to British families, at least among Europeans—an oddity that is especially salient at this time of year. Visitors to piazzas or plazas are likely to see several generations of continental families happily talking, eating and even dancing together. British children, by contrast, spend relatively little time with their parents, and not only because the parents aren't around: many see fraternising with them in public as a fate worse than a mobile phone without a camera. Meanwhile, as that senior policeman complained this week, many British parents, whether there are one or two of them, seem indifferent to their children's antics, or incurious about them. Since the clubs and churches that once thrust them together have withered, unrelated youngsters and older people don't talk much either."

A caveat. The Economist also says, "But few who drink or smoke pot graduate to knife crime. Many do none of these things; most are better-off and better-educated than ever."

http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9653083

Reto–Romaans

Kunsttaal moet Reto–Romaans redden

GENEVE (ANP) – In tientallen gemeenten in het Zwitserse kanton Graubünden stappen de scholen maandag over van onderwijs in hun plaatselijke Reto–Romaanse dialect op de kunstmatige Reto–Romaanse standaardtaal, het Rumantsch Grischun. Op die manier moet de Reto–Romaanse taal tegen uitsterven worden beschermd.

Dit meldde de krant Tribune de Genève donderdag. Reto–Romaans is –naast Duits, Frans en Italiaans– de vierde officiële taal van Zwitserland, maar wordt nog maar door 35.000 mensen gesproken. Daarnaast is de taal, die verwant is aan Ladinisch en Friulisch in Italië, in verschillende Alpenvalleien versplinterd in vijf dialecten: Surselvisch, Sutselvisch, Surmeirisch, Vallader en Puter.

Het gebruik van het in de jaren '80 'gemaakte' Rumantsch Grischun, dat door niemand als moedertaal wordt gesproken, is echter omstreden. De recente beslissing om de nieuwslezers op radio en tv Rumantsch Grischun te laten spreken, stuit op verzet. Tot nu toe sprak iedereen op de radio zijn eigen dialect.

GENEVE (ANP) – In tientallen gemeenten in het Zwitserse kanton Graubünden stappen de scholen maandag over van onderwijs in hun plaatselijke Reto–Romaanse dialect op de kunstmatige Reto–Romaanse standaardtaal, het Rumantsch Grischun. Op die manier moet de Reto–Romaanse taal tegen uitsterven worden beschermd.

Dit meldde de krant Tribune de Genève donderdag. Reto–Romaans is –naast Duits, Frans en Italiaans– de vierde officiële taal van Zwitserland, maar wordt nog maar door 35.000 mensen gesproken. Daarnaast is de taal, die verwant is aan Ladinisch en Friulisch in Italië, in verschillende Alpenvalleien versplinterd in vijf dialecten: Surselvisch, Sutselvisch, Surmeirisch, Vallader en Puter.

Het gebruik van het in de jaren '80 'gemaakte' Rumantsch Grischun, dat door niemand als moedertaal wordt gesproken, is echter omstreden. De recente beslissing om de nieuwslezers op radio en tv Rumantsch Grischun te laten spreken, stuit op verzet. Tot nu toe sprak iedereen op de radio zijn eigen dialect.

GENEVE (ANP) – In tientallen gemeenten in het Zwitserse kanton Graubünden stappen de scholen maandag over van onderwijs in hun plaatselijke Reto–Romaanse dialect op de kunstmatige Reto–Romaanse standaardtaal, het Rumantsch Grischun. Op die manier moet de Reto–Romaanse taal tegen uitsterven worden beschermd.

Dit meldde de krant Tribune de Genève donderdag. Reto–Romaans is –naast Duits, Frans en Italiaans– de vierde officiële taal van Zwitserland, maar wordt nog maar door 35.000 mensen gesproken. Daarnaast is de taal, die verwant is aan Ladinisch en Friulisch in Italië, in verschillende Alpenvalleien versplinterd in vijf dialecten: Surselvisch, Sutselvisch, Surmeirisch, Vallader en Puter.

Het gebruik van het in de jaren '80 'gemaakte' Rumantsch Grischun, dat door niemand als moedertaal wordt gesproken, is echter omstreden. De recente beslissing om de nieuwslezers op radio en tv Rumantsch Grischun te laten spreken, stuit op verzet. Tot nu toe sprak iedereen op de radio zijn eigen dialect.

Reformatorisch Dagblad, 16-08-2007

http://www.refdag.nl/artikel/1312540/Kunsttaal+moet+Reto%96Romaans+redden.html

Road Trip

I'm off on a road trip to the south of France and the north of Spain with Véronique, Laura, and Yin the dog.

Annie Oakley

From A New Dictionary of Eponyms (OUP):

An Annie Oakley is a complimentary ticket to a theater. The ticket has holes punched in it to prevent its exchange for cash at the box office. This oddity came about in an unusual way.

Annie Oakley (1860–1926), born in Darke County, Ohio, was the stage name for Phoebe Anne Oakley Mozee. Annie was probably the greatest female sharpshooter ever. She got her professional start when, at the urging of friends, she entered a shooting match in Cincinnati pitting Frank E. Butler, a vaudeville marksman, against all comers. Butler gave no thought to this fifteen-year-old girl who dared compete with him. But upon seeing Annie's first shot, he paid strict attention. She won the contest, and a husband to boot, for Butler and Annie fell in love and were married. They then began a vaudeville tour as a trick-shooting team.

The Butlers joined Buffalo Bill Cody's Wild West Show in 1885, but it was Annie who became the star attraction. She remained as the rifle sharpshooter for forty years. She thrilled audiences with her expert marksmanship and dazzled them with her trick shooting. In one of her outstanding feats, she would flip a playing card into the air, usually a five of hearts, and shoot the pips out of it.

But what, you might ask, has that to do with a free ticket? Circus performers were reminded of their meal tickets by the riddled playing cards, because their meal tickets were punched every time they bought a meal. Hence they came to call their tickets "Annie Oakleys." The idea of a punched card caught on, so that today a complimentary ticket to a show, a meal, or a pass on a railway has Annie Oakley holes.

Annie Oakley needed no encomiums during her forty years with the Wild West Show, but she was given one, nevertheless, by Sitting Bull, who labeled her "Little Sure Shot." In more recent times Ethel Merman, the star of Annie Get Your Gun, popularized Annie Oakley once again, making her for today's generation a "big shot."

Source:
"Annie Oakley" A New Dictionary of Eponyms. Morton S. Freeman. Oxford University Press, 1997.

In a New York bar

A letter to the Guardian, July 21, 2007:

SIR – One example of a subtle message being more effective than a loud government health warning is found in New York ("None so deaf as those that will not hear", June 23rd). Bars across the city display a plaque with the standard boilerplate that "Alcohol during pregnancy causes birth defects." In one establishment the message has been rendered brutally effective by a patron who has scrawled underneath, "Just look around."

Brigg Reilley
Albuquerque

MITOPENCOURSEWARE

Here's a gold mine from MIT:

http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/index.htm

MIT OCW is a large-scale, Web-based electronic publishing initiative funded jointly by the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation , MIT, and generous support of the Ab Initio software company.

MIT OCW's goals are to:

Provide free, searchable access to MIT's course materials for educators, students, and self-learners around the world.

Extend the reach and impact of MIT OCW and the "opencourseware" concept.

MIT OCW would not be possible without the support and generosity of the MIT faculty who choose to share their research, pedagogy, and knowledge to benefit others. We expect MIT OCW to reach a steady - though never static - state by 2008. Between now and then, we will publish the materials from virtually all of MIT's undergraduate and graduate courses.

We will be continually evaluating the Access, Use, and Impact of MIT OCW. With 1,550 courses published as of November 1, 2006, we are still in a learning stage of this MIT initiative and we will benefit enormously from your feedback, as we strive to make MIT OCW as rich and useful as possible for our users.

Visit:

http://ocw.mit.edu/OcwWeb/index.htm

Harsh and guttural

A New York Times reader who calls himself "rrrrbyrnes" writes of Guillermo del Toro's Pan's Labyrinth:

"...I had an unfortunate problem with what I perceived to be a harsh presentation of the Spanish language. It seemed to harsh and gutteral. This must be a problem with me - I don't see Spanish language movies often. But it nevertheless grated."

How anyone could think that Spanish, and particularly the Spanish spoken in this film, is harsh and gutteral (or guttural, for that matter), is a mystery to me. The New York Times' review can be read here:

http://tinyurl.com/yvgfbg

In a wonderful interview (about much more than movies) on NPR last year (http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=7031354), Guillermo del Toro said that the title of the film was changed in English because American viewers don't know what a faun is.

Critics around the world have praised this violent and disturbing and beautiful film. I wonder if it would have been stronger, and less graphically violent, if it has been told _entirely_ from the perspective of Ofelia. Her escape from fascist Spain into her dark fantasy world would have been just as powerful, if not more so. But it is a great movie nonetheless. It's certainly the most violent movie I've watched all the way through (over the years, I've stopped watching many violent movies half way through).

Behind bars

"Today, almost 7 million people are under the supervision of the U.S. correctional system, and roughly 2.2 million Americans live behind bars. In 2001, the United States spent a record $167 billion on its criminal
justice system, which equals 7 percent of all government spending on state and local levels, and is roughly as much as is expended on health care and hospitals."

From Juergen Martschukat's H-Law review of Marie Gottschalk's The Prison and the Gallows: The Politics of Mass Incarceration in America (Cambridge University Press, 2006).

Sanskrit

The Christian Science Monitor reports that spoken Sanskrit is enjoying a big revival both in India and among Indian expatriates in the United States, mainly thanks to the "efforts of a private group, Samskrita Bharati, headquartered in New Delhi. The volunteer-based group's mission: Bring the pan-Indian language back to the mainstream and lay the groundwork for a cultural renaissance."

Some excerpts from the CSM article:

There were many reasons for the decline of Sanskrit," says Chamu Krishna Shastry, who founded Samskrita Bharati in 1981, "but one of the foremost was the unimaginative way it was taught since [British] colonial times." Later, in a newly democratic India, the language associated with upper-caste Brahmin priests held little appeal to the masses. The present movement to revive Sanskrit aims to teach the "language of the gods" to anyone who cares to learn it.
...
In 25 years, an estimated 7 million people have attended spoken Sanskrit classes offered by Samskrita Bharati in India and abroad, says Shastry. There are 250 full-time volunteers and 5,000 part-time teachers in the United States and India, and their numbers are growing.

Samskrita Bharati has chapters in 26 of India's 28 states. There are also groups in such places as San Jose, Calif.; Seattle; Pittsburgh; Buffalo, N.Y.; Dallas; San Diego; and Chicago. Requests are coming in from other US cities as well.

Source:

http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/0705/p14s02-lihc.html?page=1

Sie trägt alles

Die Neue Zürcher Zeitung (30. Juni) über die neue Zürcher Bibel und die Kulturgeschichte früherer Bibelübersetzungen:

Sie [die Zürcher Bibel] markierte schon bei ihrem ersten Erscheinen 1531 einen Einschnitt, indem sie sich - unaufgeregter und sprachlich weniger ambitioniert als die Bibelübersetzung Luthers - als Gemeinschaftsarbeit von hochmotivierten, im Hebräischen und Griechischen versierten Theologen präsentierte. Seit einigen Tagen liegt die Zürcher Bibel in einer neu erarbeiteten Übersetzung vor, die jene von 1931 ersetzt. Sie ist noch untadeliger geworden, als sie schon war; ihr Deutsch, genau auf der Spur des hebräischen und griechischen Urtextes, ist wunderbar klar.
...
Die deutschsprachigen Kulturen stellten im Rahmen der Übersetzungsgeschichte der Bibel einen Sonderfall dar. Auch in karolingischer Zeit, da die Missionierung der germanischen Stämme sich der Volkssprache zu bedienen begann, galt die deutsche (sprich: fränkische) Sprache als ungehobelt, grobschlächtig und feinerer Ausdrucksnuancen unfähig. Dass sie das Monopol der drei «heiligen» Sprachen Hebräisch, Griechisch und Latein durchbrechen und selbst Trägerin der Heilsbotschaft werden könnte, schien undenkbar.

Einem anonymen Autor des 9. Jahrhunderts allerdings gelang es, das Undenkbare zu denken. In einem wichtigen Text - «De vocatione gentium» («Über die Berufung aller Völker») - hielt er fest, dass Gott nicht nur wegen der Sünden der Menschen Mensch geworden sei, sondern auch, um deren «erbärmliche Sprache» («propter lamentabilem vocem humanam») - in diesem Fall das Deutsche - zu retten: «Denn Gott liess sich um des Menschen und seiner erbärmlichen Sprache willen barmherzig herab, als er vom Himmel zur Erde kam, um menschliche Gestalt anzunehmen, Leiden zu ertragen und den Tod zu dulden.» - Damit war die deutsche Sprache legitimiert, im Interesse einer alle Völker umfassenden Mission, die Heilsbotschaft zu verkünden.
...
Die Inständigkeit der Texte jedenfalls hat die Jahrhunderte überdauert. Man höre das Hohelied der Liebe nach 1. Kor. 13, 4-6 in der Fassung, wie sie im schon zitierten Text «De vocatione gentium» aus dem 9. Jahrhundert eindrücklich erklingt: «Gotes minni dultic ist, / Frumasam ist, / Nist apultic, / Ni zaplait sih, / Ni habet achust, / Nist ghiri, / Ni sohhit, daz ira ist, / Ni bismerot, / Ni denchit ubiles, / Ni frauuuit sih ubar unreht, / Frauuuit sih ubar uuarnissu. / Dultic ist gauuisso diu gotes minni, huuanta siu ira uuidarmuoti ebano gatregit.»

In der neuen Übersetzung der Zürcher Bibel 2007 heisst das: «Die Liebe hat den langen Atem, gütig ist die Liebe, sie eifert nicht. Die Liebe prahlt nicht, sie bläht sich nicht auf, sie ist nicht taktlos, sie sucht nicht das Ihre, sie lässt sich nicht zum Zorn reizen, sie rechnet das Böse nicht an, sie freut sich nicht über das Unrecht, sie freut sich mit an der Wahrheit. Sie trägt alles, sie glaubt alles, sie hofft alles, sie erduldet alles.»

Quelle:

http://www.nzz.ch/2007/06/30/li/articleFAPYA.html

200 Proof

"Almost half of working-age men in Russia who die are killed by alcohol abuse, according to a new medical study which says the country's males die in excessive numbers not just because they drink lots of vodka but because they also consume products containing alcohol, such as eau de cologne, antiseptics and medicinal tinctures. Some products contain 95% alcohol by volume, equating to 200 proof."

That's from a recent Guardian article, which also says that in 2004 Russia's life expectancy was 59 years for men and 72 for women. Due to the low life expectancy and birthrate, the population in Russia is falling by 700,000 a year.

The Guardian, June 15, 2007

http://www.guardian.co.uk/frontpage/story/0,,2103841,00.html

Are native English speakers better English teachers?

Scott Sommer writes in his Taiwan blog:

"There is no place in the world with a high standard of English as a foreign language where a majority, or even a lot, of the teaching is done by foreign teachers.

Think of a few places you know where there's a high standard of English? It should be easy because there are a lot of them: places like Holland, Belgium, The Philippines, Switzerland, Sweden, to name a few. Not a single one of these countries has a significant number of foreign teachers. Probably every single one of those European and South American businessmen you know who speak flawless English was taught by a local teacher. The Filipino, Indian, and Malaysian students at you school were all taught by local teachers.

I know, I know, Dutch is very similar to English, and in the Philippines and India, English is the language of the professional class. Things like this make it much, much easier to learn a language. But not only is this not particularly true in some of the places where English is best spoken, but it's not even particularly important. What is important is that there are plenty of places where having been taught by a properly trained local teacher is not a significant handicap.

Let's look at the flip-side of this problem. Have foreign teachers made a big impact in the places where they are widely used? In Japan, virtually every school in the country is provided by either the JET program or other locally developed programs with a foreign teacher. The next largest foreign teacher programs are Korea and Taiwan. All of these countries are notorious for the poor standard of their English compared with, for example, Scandinavian countries. In fact, if you look at it this way, it's the countries with the worst record that have the most foreign teachers.

There are many excellent foreign teachers who have made a big difference to their students. But that's not the point. My point is that there is no place on Earth where English is spoken widely as a foreign language where most, or even a lot, of the teaching is done by foreign teachers. Being taught by competent and skilled local teachers will never be a disadvantage to a learner."

I would quibble with Scott that the standard of English in Switzerland is high (mainly because the Swiss have traditionally learned one or two of the four official languages as second and third languages in school). But other than that his point is well taken.

Source:

http://scottsommers.blogs.com/taiwanweblog/2007/06/are-native-spea.html

Immunity

The Observer recently published an extraordinary article about sex workers in Kenya who are immune to AIDS. A few excerpts:

...Agnes has, in effect, a callus: the first time she was exposed to the virus, her body produced enough killer T cells to fight it off. This part isn't unique - the body of every person who is exposed to HIV mounts some level of response, and sometimes manages to fight it off; a single exposure does not guarantee infection. But Agnes's body, it seems, not only produced sufficient and strong enough cells to fight the virus off the first time, it then produced a whole raft of those killer Ts, flooding her system with guardians whose sole brief was to keep an eye out for cells infected with HIV. The infected cells have a distinct pattern of little bumps on them, called epitopes, which act like a red rose in the lapel as far as the killer Ts are concerned, letting them know just which cells they want to hunt down. Then every subsequent time - probably thousands of times - that HIV got into Agnes's body, her killer T cells drove it back. A person does not normally maintain a large number of killer T cells for a long period - just long enough to kill something off, then production drops. But in Agnes, fairly constant exposure to HIV kept her killer T cell count high.

This conclusion was reinforced when Plummer and his team noticed that women who take a 'sex break' - who make a trip home to the village for a few weeks, or save up a little money and leave sex work for a while to try selling shoes instead, or hook up with a regular who keeps them in cash for a year or two - were far more likely to get infected, almost immediately, if they returned to sex work, even though previously they had had years of apparent immunity. On the break, their bodies stopped making the killer T cells, leaving them vulnerable again...

From the moment it became clear that Agnes and a handful of other women in Majengo - about 100 to date - really could fight off the virus, the researchers in Nairobi hoped that their biology would hold the secret of an HIV vaccine. Soon a team from Oxford University was at work on a vaccine that used the epitopes (the tell-tale bumps on infected cells) that triggered Agnes's killer Ts. They hoped it would provoke other people's bodies to produce killer T cells in the same way that the real virus appeared to trigger production in the sex workers. Trials began in Nairobi in 2001, and a second trial was mounted by Pontiano Kaleebu and his colleagues in Entebbe a couple of years later. But despite high hopes, the Oxford vaccine didn't cause that explosion of killer T cells. And so it was back to the painstaking work of trying to figure out the secret of Agnes's immunity. 'Sometimes a vaccine feels impossibly far away,' sighed Keith Fowke. 'All our knowledge about these HIV-resistant people is interesting and I feel it's important... but it is frustrating.'
...
Today, the research strategy in Majengo revolves around intense study of Agnes and the other resistant women (who make up about five per cent of the cohort at any one time), from analysing their genome to breaking down the chemical components of the mucosal membranes in their vaginas, in an effort to figure out what may be protecting them. So far researchers have not found anything present in 100 per cent of the women, so it may be that the protection comes from multiple overlapping factors, including some that are genetic. There is a strong family correlation - people related to an HIV-resistant woman seem to be half as likely to get infected as people who are not related.

Agnes is aware that she is a fascinating specimen. 'Most of the people have been very interested in me,' she said matter-of-factly. But she has no understanding of the biological basis for her HIV resistance. 'No one has told me,' she said with a shrug. She gets good, free health care at the clinic for the occasional sexually transmitted infection and also for respiratory infections which plague residents of the polluted slum. So she is happy to give them her blood a couple of times a year, and to enjoy a sense of contributing something to her community.

But Agnes's survival has served to highlight a disquieting aspect of this research. She has come to the clinic for more than 20 years. In that time, more than $22m in scientific grant money has flowed through the project, and many of the researchers have earned reputations as the top experts in their fields. Yet Agnes and a handful of other women are still selling sex, to an average of eight clients a day, still for a dollar or two each time - although they say they would like nothing more than to get out of sex work. When I asked her what she would like to do instead, Agnes's broad face lit up. 'Any kind of job I could do. I could be a cleaner or anything. But it's very difficult to get a job - you have to know somebody to get a job.' And Agnes said she doesn't know anybody who could help. With only limited literacy after three years of primary school, and no other skills, Agnes said she sees no other options. 'It's embarrassing, this profession,' she said. She refuses to discuss what she does for a living with her children, although she is sure they know. 'I've never told them what I do, but I think they can see it. I think they know what I'm doing is not good but they know I do it to provide for them.'

Agnes's frustration with her life in sex work raises troubling ethical questions about research, the kind that bedevil investigations into Aids vaccines, prevention technologies and treatment, all of which, by definition, involve large groups of poor Africans, the people most at risk. What obligation does a researcher such as Plummer have to the women who have given him their blood for 20 years? What does this project owe Agnes?
...
Agnes's mysterious immune system has garnered her considerable fame in the world of Aids, but little else. She lives a life almost totally unchanged from her first days in umalaya 30 years ago. 'I can buy our daily food out of what I earn, and that's all,' she told me as we sat in the shade of her bustling alley. 'I don't feel famous. It's only that my problems push me to do sex work. If I could find something else, I would.'

The Observer, Sunday May 27, 2007
http://www.guardian.co.uk/aids/story/0,,2089312,00.html