One of my favorite soap operas in Unbloggable EventsTM Land (henceforth UEL) is broadcast in another language with English subtitles. UEL is a pays multilingue with a high degree of personal plurilingualism (the ability of one person to speak several different languages at varying levels). One of the minor characters on this soap opera is a female native English speaker who is dating a male native speaker of the broadcast language. In order to better convey her awkwardness with the broadcast language, the subtitle writers translate her literal phrases into English. Thus, while the other characters appear to speak fluidly and gracefully, her phrases resemble those of many L2 (second language) learners. Par exemple, she uses anglicismes (English words in place of the correct words in the target language), omits or improperly conjugates verbs (“I happy to see you…I going coffee shop.”) and misuses prepositions (“I am on the car.”). I point out these errors not to mock the character, but because I have made these same and many others numerous times.
Turning to the world of film and fairytales, one of the great mysteries for me was how everyone in Disney movies spoke the same language even if they were from different worlds. Pocahontas “magically” learned English immediately after meeting John Smith. Moreover, one major issue I had with The Little Mermaid (H.C. Anderson and Disney) is the unlikelihood that an undersea form of communication would be roughly comparable to the language of landlubbers. So what if she sold her voice – would they have been able to talk or understand each other anyways? I do realize that yes, this is where the “magic” force of “true love” comes in and how clunky the plot would be if we had to go through a language-learning sequence in a movie ostensibly made for children. Yet, I did appreciate the scenes in Avatar explaining the English language school and how Neytiri teaches Jake her language. It adds a deeper level of commitment and understanding to their relationship as we see them work together towards a goal rather than be driven by sheer emotion and the vagaries of fate. And I often feel like both participants in that dinner table scene where Ariel combs her hair with a fork and Eric looks perplexed. Not angry, just…confused. Part of the fun of cross-cultural living!
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