In our group discussion, we talked about the meaning of the word Pidgin. The Free Dictionary defines the word as “a simplified form of speech that is usually a mixture of two or more languages.” (2016) I found it so interesting that I didn’t know what the word meant as I have heard a form of Pidgin being spoken. Because my city has a large Filipino population it is common to hear Tagalog being spoken. Sometimes you could also hear English words interspersed when Tagalog is being spoken. My friend explained to me that they were speaking Tanglish, a combination between Tagalog and English. Tanglish is a Pidgin. My friend jokes that she speaks Tanglish because she is a bad Filipino. She says that some of the words in Tagalog are really deep and she finds it much easier to say them in English. It is interesting that she labels herself as a “bad Filipino” because she finds it easier to speak Tanglish rather than Tagalog. She feels as though she is “white-washed” and not involved with her culture enough. We as a city encourage English, especially in our high school. This is why I feel like we need more incorporation of the languages in my city like Tagalog. I think that our immigrant population should be encouraged to keep their language and traditions rather than encouraging English. I think there is a way to include both in our city, we just need to be more inclusive. Why don’t our schools bring in different language speakers more often, showing students that it is okay to speak your first language and even encouraging students to speak their language?
It is interesting that you can tell where people are from based on their dialect. People could be speaking the same language but not understand each other. For example, words like toque or toboggan are not used in the United States. An American understands a toque as a beanie and a toboggan as a sled. Another example is donut holes, I wouldn’t understand if someone talked about eating donut holes, but I would understand if someone talked about eating Timbits. We found this cool because even though we both speak the same language we still have our originality. I had an experience with a different language at a restaurant. I wanted to try something new and so I tried bangers and mash a dish from England. I was surprised to see that I got sausage and mashed potatoes. Canada also has different versions of English: the word bunny hug is only used in Saskatchewan while most others call it a hoodie. If someone says “I’m just going to go put on my bunny-hug” I would understand that they were just going to go put on their sweater, but someone from Ontario might not know that word. The article linked here by Laux, 2019 is a list of words you will only hear in Canada. It feels kind of cool that we as Canadians have words that are different than anyone else in the world.
I am reading the novel The Marrow Thieves by Dimaline (2017) in my Early Childhood Education class, and it focuses a lot on the loss of language. The novel is in a post-apocalyptic world (only 30-40 years in the future). The novel is about a world where only Indigenous peoples can dream. The focus is an Indigenous family running away from “recruiters” who are trying to steal their bone marrow because that contains the ability to dream. A turning point in the novel is when an Indigenous elder Minerva is captured, and the Recruiters try to extract her bone marrow. She started singing “words in the language that the conductors couldn’t process, word the Cardinals couldn’t bear, words the wires couldn’t transfer” (Dimaline, 2017, p. 172). This really shows the importance of language, and all that I as a white person do not understand. To the Indigenous children in the novel, language is everything they have lost. But by the end language was the key to saving the Indigenous peoples.
I had never heard of the words “Benevolent Racism” before this class. It took me some time to understand what it meant. Someone in class said that colonization and residential schools were benevolent racism. This makes so much sense when the settlers came into Canada with the idea that the Indigenous peoples needed to be saved, needed to learn English, and change the rest of themselves to survive in the world. They were already surviving but the settlers had the view that they were saving Indigenous peoples. I think another example of Benevolent Racism is an Instagram page called Barbie Saviour linked here. Barbie goes around posting pictures of herself volunteering in different countries and speaks about how much she is helping them. If someone were to do this, they would likely be looking for acknowledgment for being so helpful, rather than helping with no appreciation from their peers.
One question I have for the future is, if we ever get to a time when there are more people who speak Tagalog rather than French, would the national language change? I think that the national languages are in our constitution, but can that change? I think that it should, but would Canada choose a language that is not predominately spoken by white people to be one of their national languages? My group discussed the fear of change, and the “if it’s not broken, don’t fix it” mentality in the government. We also thought that the government’s motivation to make people from other countries feel at home seems to be a lot of talk and no actions, so they wouldn’t change the language unless it was mandatory.
References
Laux, S. (2019, October 24). 7 words you’ll only hear in Canada. Cottage Life. https://cottagelife.com/general/7-cottagey-words-youll-only-hear-in-canada/
Barbie Savior (@barbiesavior) • Instagram photos and videos. (2018). Instagram.com. https://www.instagram.com/barbiesavior/?hl=en
Dimaline, C. (2017). The marrow thieves. Dancing Cat Book
The Free Dictionary. (2016). pidgin. TheFreeDictionary.com. https://www.thefreedictionary.com/pidgin