Perseverance does pay off

A long tradition of blissful unawareness made it possible for epic blunders to happen in Spain. Just take the famous case of the Servicio de Hostelería Industrial de Terrassa (see photograph below).

 

Okay. That may be an extreme example but the trend still exists. We are still ignorant of many aspects of the English-speaking world. Let’s take the case of the dubbing industry in Spain. Leaving aside incorrect translations, one could argue that changing an actor’s hairstyle would be unacceptable. Oddly enough, it is perfectly alright to change his voice. Constantino Romero, for instance, had a voice which sounded just as elegant, throaty and velvety as that of James Earl Jones. It was therefore the perfect choice for the characters of Darth Vader in "Star Wars" and Mufasa in "The Lion King" but was clearly inappropriate to dub Clint Eastwood, who has always had a raspy voice which, by the way, fitted the “rough-around-the-edges” tough cop we all know as Dirty Harry. That’s just one example of an iconic voice (Eastwood’s) that was drastically modified by the film industry in Spain.

We should not forget our famous problems with English sounds. Incredibly, in the Internet era we have managed to come up with ridiculous pronunciations of personal names (Johnny Depp, Andy Murray), of brandnames (Reebok, Pioneer), of supposedly sophisticated words (socialite, vintage) or technology-related terms (Linked In, meme, etc…)

As for vocabulary issues we have created an infinite number of nonexistent words:

Real English	Made in Spain
audition	casting
camp site	camping
to switch channels	zapping
supermodel	top model

To be fair, as far as imaginary “English” vocabulary goes, analogous situations can also be found in France (whose elite invented its fair share of un-English expressions such as footing, autostop, parking, etc.) and, of course, in Germany, where unbelievable terms like handy, streetworker or basecap were mysteriously coined to refer to concepts like cellphone, social worker or baseball cap). Anyhow, I don't think that should make us feel any better.

Still… It is hardly understandable why Banco Sabadell chose to use the name “BS online” for its Internet service. I think it is safe to say that B.S. is precisely the kind of thing that no client needs to get from his or her bank.

The course is over. It is time to look back on your progress. At school you’ve had the chance to be in touch with a good deal of real English. I have tried to teach you some basic principles: imitate native speakers, seek exposure to the language, favor natural expression over grammatical productions, and so on and so forth. Those of you who are still coming to class will soon realize how rewarding perseverance can be. Hopefully you have gained a sense of direction and a more realistic take on the whole learning process.

N.B. There will be one last post in a few days.