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Amglish In, Like, Ten Easy Lessons_ A Celebration of the New World Lingo - Arthur E. Rowse [71]

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immigrant), and filmi (drama).

Indian movies have become powerful forces in spreading English. Although Hindi is the main language of Bollywood films from Mumbai, a growing amount of dialogue is in English, particularly in song lyrics. Bollywood, a portmanteau of Bombay (the former Mumbai) and Hollywood, has been especially instrumental in spreading English internationally since the 1970s when India became the world’s largest film producer.

Back in the States, some Americans who have lost jobs to India have coined the word Bangalore, as in “I’ve been Bangalored.” Translation: “My job has been sent to Bangalore,” a hub of such business in India.

HUNGLISH

This is a combination of English and Hungarian, often in the same sentence. An example from a blog called “The Great Hungarian Experiment” is the following: “Szia Emily! Thank you a konyvet! You are very aranyos! Elkezdtem to read it, I like it nagyon. Koszi again! Take care.” Translation: “Hi Emily, thank you for the book. You are wonderful. I started to read it, I like it greatly. Thanks again! Take care.”

Nick Grossman, a Hungarian native living in the United States, says English words appear regularly in Hungarian news reports. Sample words (including a misspelling) found in January 2011 included monitoring, parlament, sport, and forum.

ITALGLISH/ITALISH

Not surprisingly, there has been a massive influx of Amglish in Italy, the father of Latin and the great-granddaddy of many English words. By now, Greek, Latin, English, and Italian have become so intertwined that it is hard to tell which part comes from which language or all of them. If you asked a native if that’s true, the likely answer now would be “yes, yes,” not “si, si.”

The latest wave is a brash blend of Italian and English words, such as stoppare, fastforwardare, monitorizzare, and editare. Then there are shopping, la pop art, footing (for running), and basket (for basketball). To share is sherare instead of that mouthful condividere. As a result, it would not be surprising to hear an Italian say, “Ego shopping per la pop art . . .”

The newspaper word for help-wanted ads has become miojob. A random front page of the daily La Repubblica had more than three dozen English words, including foto, graphic novel, star control, shopping, news, style, torture, design, amnesty, showroom, sport, forum, topless, single, sexy, username, password, help, online, blog, and podcast. Many advertisers assume that all Italians can read English.

JANGLISH/JAPANGLISH

According to T. Kaori Kitao, professor of art history at Swarthmore College, Japan is unique among nations for the prominence it gives to English, especially the American variety, in the country’s culture. Much of the influence no doubt comes from the occupation of the country by Americans after World War II.

Alexander Michaelson says newspapers and magazines often use English-derived words, also known as wasei eigo, written in katakana, a phonetic syllabary that represents foreign words in Japanese. He added that English words are particularly common in Japanese fashion magazines, such as Glamour and Miss. For those who don’t know Japanese, there are computer plug-in translators on search engines to render everything into English.

The Japanese are especially ingenious at creating English words for their own use. Samples from whatjapanthinks.com include power harassment (bullying) and paper driver (a person who has a license but no car).

In katakana, the English word sensation becomes senseshon, charming becomes chamingu, shampoo becomes shanpu, sexy becomes sekushi, beer becomes biru, and a baseball out and strikeout become besuboru auto and sutraiku-auto, with a strong accent on the final syllables of the last two terms. The letters AV, which normally mean audiovisual, refer also to adult video (porn) in Japan.

Michaelson adds Makudonarudo for McDonald’s (or just plain Makku), Sutaba for Starbucks, and dokuta-sutoppu (pronounced “doctor stop”) for a doctor’s order to stop drinking or eating so much. Many English words are conveyed to young Japanese through

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