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There's also the problem that most immigrants who filled steerage weren't well educated. My grandfather (Sicily) was a laborer and his father an orchardist. My grandmother's parents (Rheinhessen) were peasants. Same on the other side of the family. These folks weren't hired as teachers!
"I don't know which is worse: ignorance or apathy. And, frankly, I don't care." - Anonymous
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Also, the people who filled steerage - the great mass of immigrants - were generally not well educated. My grandfather (Sicily) was a laborer and his father a carpenter and orchardist. My grandmother's family (Rheinhessen) were peasants. It was similar on the other side of my family. Nor did they speak English when they arrived, so they weren't considered suitable as teachers.
"I don't know which is worse: ignorance or apathy. And, frankly, I don't care." - Anonymous
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Carpal Tunnel
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most immigrants who filled steerage weren't well educated
Also, most immigrants to this country usually did not speak the standard language of the nation states they came from, but the local dialect.
Ceci n'est pas un seing.
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@ beck: your double post reminded me of a poem of Yeats' that is available in two edited versions. It is fascinating to see the mind of the poet working across the two edits of the poem. To google the poem is a bit beyond me else I would have posted its two versions here.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Luke, I had the same experience of even foreign languages teachers* having to learn it first, and I wonder if it is due to geography: we in the middle of the U.S. got significant numbers of immigrants far later than coastal areas?
*With the exception of my college professor who was French-Canadian, and warned us that her French wasn't Parisian. I likewise taught French for a number of years, hearing it only on movies or recordings, and based on what my teacher had taught. Having had the opportunity to visit Quebec I had the most difficult time understanding what was being said. I could read and speak, but not understand, it was most frustrating.
----please, draw me a sheep----
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Heres my new word for the day.
elec·tro·myo·graph
an instrument that converts the electrical activity associated with functioning skeletal muscle into a visual record or into sound.
This technology can help people who have lost their voice due to an accident or illness. But an interesting application is its use as a translator. Because the electrical pulses are universal they can be transformed into the language of the user's choice. Much like the universal translators employed in Scifi stories.
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@ beck: your double post reminded me... I wish I could say I were imitating Yeats, but the fact is that my computer geeked things up. I couldn't see the first post once I posted it, so I recreated its essence from memory... and then couldn't see that version in the forum, either! So, not hardly a poet, but you've all had the chance to see the mind of a simpleton at work, which might be interesting in itself.
"I don't know which is worse: ignorance or apathy. And, frankly, I don't care." - Anonymous
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...an interesting application is its use as a translator. Because the electrical pulses are universal they can be transformed into the language of the user's choice. Is this actual or potential technology? I've never heard of it, and I don't see how it could work. Wouldn't the pattern of pulses be different if one is saying (voicing?) the word "work" rather than " trabajo?" The use of voiceprints to identify unseen speakers or to detect stress reflected in vocalizations suggests that the pulses are not universal. Tell us more.
"I don't know which is worse: ignorance or apathy. And, frankly, I don't care." - Anonymous
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Still in development but Here is the article I read. I'd imagine the output would be similar to a speech recognition device, stilted and electronic sounding with no context or intonation.
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Carpal Tunnel
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I could see how something like that would work. one could simply have several(many) language/waveform databases to draw on when translating. certainly "work" in English would have a different waveform than "trabajo" in Spanish.
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