Why do I speak as I do and how does my language define me?
Everyone has a different way of speaking. Some can be more formal than others. It usually depends on where you are and who you are around, for example: If you’re around you friends, you would probably use a very casual, informal way of speaking, maybe even using modern-day slang. However, if you’re in a professional environment or you’re in class talking to a teacher, you might talk more formally than usual. But what I find most interesting about formality of speaking, is that when talking to parents, you have a mix of both formal and casual slang, sometimes even depending on which parent you are speaking to.
I think the biggest influence that had led me to speak English was the fact that both my parents spoke it and that I grew up in Singapore, where a large majority of people speak English. I’m glad that I speak English because almost everyone I’ve ever known speaks English and that plays as a huge role in communicating with other people (even though I’m terrible at it.)
How can language include or exclude, represent or misrepresent?
Since the world is split into different countries and not one country is the same as another, there’s an obvious difference with how people speak English. For example, places like Britain has a stereotype of being posh and fancy, when most of the time it’s their accents. Other places like Singapore has Singlish, which uses many ‘extra’ words that are used as exclamations such as ‘Lah’ and ‘aiyo’. Sometimes even when people speak Chinese, they mix in English words. It sounds funny but its surprisingly common. Linking back to what I said about how people stereotype about Britain for being fancy, theres also some stereotypes that people in Singapore could be that we’re uneducated or improper.
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