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Speak English Quotes

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Speak English Quotes

“I was in the second year of my PhD when I first had the idea - I'd recently started working as a translator, which meant firstly that I was hearing about amazing-sounding books from other translators, and also that I was getting enough of an insider's view of the publishing industry to be aware of all the implicit biases that made it so difficult for these books to ever get published, especially if they weren't from European languages (harder to discover, editors can't read the original, lack of funding programmes, authors who don't speak English).”

IfsYearsFirstsMadeBookIdeasEnoughSpeakLanguageDifficultViewsIndustryHarderOriginalsHearingMade ItEditorsPublishingFundingProgrammesImplicitTranslatorsSpeak EnglishInsidersPhdsPublishing Industry
Author:Deborah Smith
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“One of the producers, Wonjo, was an amazing interpreter. I don't think we really knew how it was going to work at the beginning. Yet it was something that a couple of days into it seemed so seamless and it wasn't something that we noticed or thought about. A couple of times I cornered him and forced him to speak English but we didn't speak much English at all. That said, I don't think anything was ever lost in translation. It was all very easy.”

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Author:Mia Wasikowska
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“If you do not learn English in this country, you cannot get anywhere. We are in America. We are not in Mexico, we are not in China, we are not in Saudi Arabia - we speak English in this country! And what bilingual education does, is keep them from learning English, so they are doomed to be second-class citizens.”

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Author:Rafael Cruz
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“I have a funny story to tell about English and how I came to fall in love with the language. I was desperate to fit in and spoke English all the time. Trouble was, in my household it was a no-no to speak English because somehow it is disrespectful to call parents and grandparents "you" - impersonal pronouns are offensive in Vietnamese.”

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Author:Andrew Lam
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“I speak English, obviously, Afrikaans, which is a derivative of Dutch that we have in South Africa. And then I speak African languages. So I speak Zulu. I speak Xhosa. I speak Tswana. And I speak Tsonga. And like - so those are my languages of the core. And then I don't claim German, but I can have a conversation in it. So I'm trying to make that officially my seventh language. And then, hopefully, I can learn Spanish.”

TryingI CanSpeakLanguageConversationClaimsSouthCoreHopefullySouth AfricaDutchDerivativesSpeak English
Author:Trevor Noah
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“To write or even speak English is not a science but an art. There are no reliable words. Whoever writes English is involved in a struggle that never lets up even for a sentence. He is struggling against vagueness, against obscurity, against the lure of the decorative adjective, against the encroachment of Latin and Greek, and, above all, against the worn-out phrases and dead metaphors with which the language is cluttered up.”

WritingArtSpeakLanguageStruggleInvolvedMetaphorSentencesGreekPhrasesLatinWornObscurityLureAdjectivesWorn OutSpeak EnglishEncroachmentVaguenessLatin And Greek
Author:George Orwell
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“Until I am free to write bilingually and to switch codes without having always to translate, while I still have to speak English or Spanish when I would rather speak Spanglish, and as long as I have to accommodate the English speakers rather than having them accommodate me, my tongue will be illegitimate. I will no longer be made to feel ashamed of existing. I will have my voice: Indian, Spanish, white. I will have my serpent's tongue - my woman's voice, my sexual voice, my poet's voice. I will overcome the tradition of silence.”

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Author:Gloria E. Anzaldúa
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“At this point two elderly security guards in parkas, the guys who normally work the front desk at the plant, asked John to step behind the tape. John claims that here he told the guards that he could not speak English and when that failed to persuade them, he fa...ked a violent seizure. I am unclear as to the purpose of this part of his plan. John flung himself down and began rolling around in the snow, thrashing his limbs about and screaming “EL SEIZURE!!! NO ES BUENO!!!” in a Mexican accent.”

TwoPurposeGuySpeakBehindsStepsPlansSecurityFrontsClaimsDown AndPlantViolentSnowTapeAccentsDesksRollingLimbsMexicanElderlySpeak EnglishUnclearSeizuresSecurity GuardsKedsFront Desk
Book:John Dies at the End
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“MTV and video games have solved that problem as far as most of humanity goes. That, and telly, as it were.” “Telly?” Who was that? He grunted in amusement. “Television, of course. Don’t you speak English?” “You sure don’t,” I muttered. Shaking his head, he frowned at me.”

ProblemHumanityCoursesGamesSpeakTelevisionVideoAmusementShakingMtvSpeak English
Book:Halfway to the Grave: A Night Huntress Novel
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“I'll try to communicate, Taylor said. She spoke slowly and deliberately. Hello! We need help. Is your village close? My village is Denver. And I think it's a long way from here. I'm Nicole Ade. Miss Colorado. We have a Colorado where we're from too! Tiara said. She swiveled her hips, spread her arms wide, then brought her hands together prayer-style and bowed. Kipa aloha. Nicole stared. I speak English. I'm American. Also, did you learn those moves from Barbie's Hawaiian Vacation DVD? Ohmigosh, yes! Do your people have that, too?”

PeopleThinkingWayNeedsTryingLongSaidHelpingHandsTogetherMovingSpeakPrayerMissingStyleArmsCommunicateSpreadWideHipsSpokesVillageVacationHelloLong WayDvdsNeed HelpColoradoBarbieSpeak EnglishDenverNicoleHawaiiansHands TogetherTiarasBeauty QueenAloha
Book:Beauty Queens
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“You may be right in believing that if you study hard, one day you might become fluent in English. But you will still look Chinese, and when people meet you, they’ll see a Chinese girl no matter how well you speak English. You’ll always be expected to know Chinese, and if you don’t, I’m afraid they will not respect you as much.”

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Book:Chinese Cinderella: The True Story of an Unwanted Daughter
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“We may hope that machines will eventually compete with men in all purely intellectual fields. But which are the best ones to start with? Many people think that a very abstract activity, like the playing of chess, would be best. It can also be maintained that it is best to provide the machine with the best sense organs that money can buy, and then teach it to understand and speak English.”

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Author:Alan Turing
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“Race doesn't mean what it used to in America anymore. It just doesn't. Obama's black, but he's not black the way people used to define that. Is black your experience or the color of your skin? My experience is as a Mexican immigrant, more so than someone like George Lopez. He's from California. But he'll be treated as an immigrant. I am an outsider. My abuelita, my grandmother, didn't speak English. My whole family on my dad's side is in Mexico. I won't ever be called that or treated that way, but it was my experience.”

PeopleWayMeanWholeAmericaUsedSpeakSidesBlackRaceColorDadSkinsMy DadTreatedCaliforniaGrandmotherImmigrantsMexicoOutsidersMy GrandmotherMexicanWhole FamilySpeak English
Author:Louis C. K.
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