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Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu

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Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#181

Post by thinkingemote »

For those thinking it's crazy, consider how we assume seeing trigger warnings for rape etc before certain content are normal and approved in our societies.

It could be simply a cry for a trigger warning: this lecture may contain words which sound similar to words which cause trauma. Sounds okay to me.

I predict that you will see these trigger warnings before Chinese subtitled films, lectures which talks about the Chinese language at the very least within a year. The university is ahead of the curve, this is progress and a natural extension of current protections against reliving past trauma.

If trigger warnings in general are also considered crazy, to say so would get you instantly fired in every YC startup and silicon valley corporation.

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#182

Post by BlackLotus89 »

Semaphor wrote: post #102
dgellow wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without trying to be alarmist, I have a feeling that's slowly spreading to Europe too, at least France and Germany.

Do you have examples for Germany? Haven’t heard much of it.

I think what the original author is hinting at is happening for years now. Maybe op meant something like Negerkuss or Mohrenkopf (Negerkuss now is Schokokuss or Aufgeschaeumte Zuckermasse mit Schokoglasur) and Zigeuner-Sausse/Schnitzel (this one was only recently).

And yes I got the feeling that american culture and american "stuff" is slowly but surely pouring over and I hope that misused words like the now "default meaning" of racism (racism in america can now "only be applied" to minorities whereas, of course, racism can in every country of the world can be had against any other "race") will stay an american thing and not be copied by us.

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#185

Post by DC-3 »

lordnacho wrote: post #173
DC-3 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sadly not - I am studying from England and have not spent too much time in Denmark yet. I look forward to these delights :-)

Hey, how do you study Danish in England? Need it for my kid.

The exercises I am doing are using spaced repetition tools for vocabulary and listening, using textbooks for fine-tuning grammar and pronunciation, and as a writing exercise that's more fun than translating fourteen-thousand different variations on 'the red cat ate a quick mouse', I have just begun attempting to translate the classic children's novel Moonfleet into Danish.

Some good resources:

Spaced Repetition

* Duolingo

* Anki - there are Danish decks readily available online

Textbooks

* Danish: An Essential Grammar (excellent, but too dense for younger kids)

* På vej til dansk (listening exercises, accessible to all)

Websites

* ordnet.dk: excellent online Danish dictionary - I find the phonetic transcriptions invaluable - while they may be inaccessible to younger children anyone can benefit from the plentiful audio snippets. I use this [1] greasemonkey script to help easily download the audio clips when they are particularly helpful, for example as exemplars of particular vowels.

* Wiktionary: A reasonable source of translations for Danish. A good accompaniment to Den Danske Ordbog. The IPA transcriptions don't tend to be quite as good as the ordbog though and there are some surprising gaps.

* Google Translate: Useful as a starting point, although I don't treat it as authoritative.

Misc

* Radio - DR P6 Beat - I'm only able to understand the odd word but I still find this useful for getting to grips with the sound of spoken Danish. Also they play pretty good music (although in case anyone from P6 Beat is reading, the correct number of times to play 'Brimful of Asha (Fatboy Slim Remix)' in a day is not 3).

* Reddit - /r/Denmark - I use this as an accessible font of colloquial Danish.

* Twitter - I follow Danish journalists for the sports I enjoy (Grand Prix racing and road cycling) to get repeated exposure to small fragments of Danish through the day.

Hope this helps :-)

[1] https://pastebin.com/raw/LygwA6bN

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#186

Post by username90 »

dragonwriter wrote: post #149
koonsolo wrote: post #142

Am I the only one who finds it very ironic that you can't use the "n-word" because it offends the African American community. Yet when you listen to rap music, it's all nigga this and nigga that. Makes me wonder if these offended students first complain, and then drive home singing along with Snoop Dogg.

> Am I the only one who finds it very ironic that you can't use the "n-word" because it offends the African American community. Yet when you listen to rap music, it's all nigga this and nigga that. No, racists that are upset that it's not socially acceptable to demonstrate their racism this way conplain about this a lot, you aren't the only one. Also, within the African American community there has very long been a v…

> context matters.

Yet people get fired even when context is as benign as possible.

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#187

Post by TomSwirly »

__blockcipher__ wrote: post #129

[flagged]

> it could be the result of decades-long subversion campaigns that sought to supplant western/enlightenment ideals with authoritarian-marxist ideals which view speech as inherently dangerous

You must be joking. Please - tell me you are joking. It's hard to believe an educated adult could actually say what you are saying with a straight face.

EDIT: someone else here said it better: "The idea that Marxists are subverting Western society is a delusional theory pushed by far-right lunatics."

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#188

Post by apexalpha »

prerok wrote: post #42

Some time ago a fellow countryman, a basketball player, made it into NBA. After a controversial ruling by a judge that one of his teammates performed a foul, he kept yelling "ni ga, ni ga, ni ga". Contextually translated, he meant "he hadn't touched him". He had to apologize profusely and explain to no end what he meant. Regardless, his career was soon over after that. We, non-native speakers, must be really careful…

>We, non-native speakers, must be really careful about using words in our own language that may sound offensive in the other language. What a world we created :(

And it's in English as well. Growing up in Europe but heavily influenced by American Music, Movies, TV and Internet one grows up thinking that N----- or Nigga is fine to use. You hear it all the time, especially in music.

Couple that with the fact that we don't really have "career-ending words" in Europe and it leads to a lot of awkward moments. You can't even say the word, and Americans tend to censor the word even when anonymously typing it online. I did because this is an American forum, but it's really weird to see to be honest. You can't even say the word as part of a debate over the word.

A while back a Dutch coach was forced to resign after using the word because it was in a song: https://www.theguardian.com/football/2020/feb/18/fc-cincinna...

The fact that you aren't even allowed to sing along with a song without muting yourself on certain words that the singer sings anyway... it's just mind boggling to me...

Re: Professor suspended for saying 那个 nà ge

#190

Post by neilv »

bananaface wrote: post #168
neilv wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd say it's not merely a curse word, for reasons I already suggested in the comment to which you're replying: I argue that it's understandably hurtful to some, and is associated with immense, tragic, shameful wrongs towards groups of people. Separately, could you have made your point without saying that anyone who thinks differently than you must be developmentally disabled? Would it have been sufficient to say you…

It's more that I think the only way you can be earnestly offended by something like this is if you're stupid, and I don't think they're stupid. I think they're dishonest. It's not reasonable to be offended by phonemes in Cantonese. I don't think they're sensitive, I think they're lying.

Thanks for the explanation. I wouldn't be surprised if some people are feigning outrage. But it's intuitive to me that some others would be genuinely bothered by the appearance of insensitivity to culture in language, by a professor who seems to be speaking as an expert about language and culture. (Not that there's anything wrong with a foreign language, nor with the coincidences in sound, of course.)

If I saw someone in the class who seemed offended, or they mentioned it to me, I'd reach out to the professor privately. Or, if I knew the professor, and had occasion to see this, I'd ask them if they thought there might be a sensitivity they want to realize and address.

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