Mobile phones and Mipoho's prophecy: The powers and dangers of flying language

After reading the article from Monday about the commercial with "My BFF Jill" I remembered a similar cell-phone commercial that focused more on the grandparents and their use of cell phones.  The commercial is for "Boost Mobile" and it features a presumable "Grandma" speaking like a teenager would, surrounded by other elderly people who are behaving like high school or college kids would.  The cell-phone in this commercial is what is connecting the Grandma to her friends and as a result gets her invited to a "banging party." The last line the Grandma has in the commercial is about her getting "10 kinds of nasty!" The commercial ends with shots of old people grinding on each other and rap music bumping in the background.  They also insert a few lines of commentary:"Boost Mobile. Designed for young people. But it's just more fun showing old people. Phones just got fun."

I remember when this commercial came out and how big of it a hit it was. My parents especially were beyond amused by the actors in the scene.  Even when I watch it now, it is still hysterical!  The reason I chose this clip was because it hits on so many different topics that we have covered in class.  First of all, it addresses how our communication has changed through the generations and how there is a specific generational gap between the way we use cell phones and technology with our contemporaries and the way we use it with our parents and grandparents. In this commercial, it is so funny because an elderly woman would presumably never talk that way on her cell phone, nor would we ever see a group of old people grinding on each other surrounded by race cars.  However, Boost Mobile wants you to believe that perhaps that is the future of phone usage.

I also find it interesting that they chose a woman to narrate this commercial, instead of a man.  This, once again, reinforces the idea that women are in charge of educating their children and teaching them how to properly speak and communicate. However, in this commercial, the Grandma is proud of her speech, much like the Grandma from the "BFF Rose" commercial and unlike the Mother in that scenario who felt as though she had failed as a parent.

Finally, I want to connect this commercial to the reading for today from Janet Mcintosh.  She primarily focuses on a community in Kenya and how they communicate with each other through their phones and text messaging.  Many of the young adults use this as a means to interact with their lovers/boyfriends and girlfriends.  This type of behavior is looked down upon by the elders in the community who think that the younger generation is losing sight of who they are as a culture.  They believe that this form of communication (especially the integration of the English language) is dangerous and a form of witch-craft.    The elders also believe that this form of communication encourages the people to act more sexually than they normally would.  They believe that a connection has formed between the English language and sexuality.  When interviewed, many young people responded that their lovers would text them in English in order to appear more attractive and to impress their significant others.  In this commercial, the Grandma is speaking in a sort of slang English however she does relate it back to sexuality when she explains that she was getting "10 Kinds of Nasty."  The ending images of the old people grinding on each other also reinforces this idea.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oaa37H9r-do

Uses of Speech by Men and Women

The following video is a short segment taken from a reality television show based in Orange County, California. Alexis (the wife of Jim) accuses Mel (a new acquaintance) of flirting with her husband and cautions Mel to keep her distance. The discussion becomes heated and is eventually dismissed by Jim for its inappropriateness.

This situation is reflective of the Malagasy community’s gendered ground rules for performance. According to Keenan, women in the Malagasy community tend to utilize direct and often unpleasant methods of speech that are considered socially damaging; similar to Alexis’s confrontational accusations thrown at Mel. Her decision to confront Mel during a friendly get-together also exemplifies her disregard for the social appropriateness of the situation. The same public displays of behavior are common among Malagasy women but shied away from by men. While Jim seemed to understand that his wife was correct in her discomfort with Mel’s behavior (exemplified by his later acknowledgement that tequila “makes people irrational”), he intervenes during the argument and removes his wife from the situation. By pulling Alexis aside and defusing her anger, Jim is maintaining good communication and the “ideal” style of speech through his “wisdom” and subtle methods of performance.

On a personal note, I felt that this scenario exemplified the gendered speech concepts discussed is Keenan’s article in a context relevant to the United States. While watching this video it was hard not to view Jim’s behavior as more desirable/wiser than that of the women. However, I know that cultural gender norms influence the roles of men and women and their behavior is not solely attributable some kind of biological predisposition.

Video:

http://www.bravotv.com/the-real-housewives-of-orange-county/videos/alexis-fight-0

Norm-Makers,Norm-Breakers

     This Youtube video goes hand-in-hand with the more humorous gist of the article. I chose this video because it demonstrates how some women of the United States share a common obligation with the women of Namoizamanga in that both groups of women assume the role of of confrontation. Although the man in the video does not handle things as politely as the men of the article would, he still goes about the conversation with more respect and carefulness than that of the irate woman. Both women in the video are more confrontational than the man in that they almost get into a physical altercation over the sound and emission of a large truck. This can be compared to the landlord's wife yelling at the man for the children chipping off the patches of color from the house. I personally chose my words carefully when writing this blog as not to offend any women by making them assume I think they are crazy, thus avoiding the seemingly inevitable confrontation I would encounter if I had chosen otherwise.

Code switching

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2zqPcAcAlr4


This video shows a dad and his son driving in a car and connects code
switching with their hybrid car. It demonstrates what the article is
talking about and appeals to the mixed identity of the code switchers.
However it also demonstrates how certain languages or forms of a language
are valued differently. Although it does not portray Spanish as bad or
ridicule the father for using it like the Puertorican children in the
article, this commercial subtly elevates English as the language that will
move them forward and provide them a brighter future. And not just any
English either, very standardized American English. But what's funny is
that the Spanish the father uses is also standardized. They are conveying a
subtle message that English will help them advance socially or financially
ect. But they draw this idea from the stereotype that native Spanish
speakers in America are uneducated. Using standardized versions of both
languages contradicts this stereotype and could be used as evidence that
code switching isn't used to cover up a speaker's ignorance like the
teachers in the article assume. Instead they use it for emphasis or to
express a certain opinion or idea that sounds better in one language or the
other.

Clarification of the Zentella Article

In the Zentella article there is a lack of clarification that stood out to me in particular.  Zentella often refers to the Puerto Rican community in New York City as one specific sub culture.  I am curious however if she meant to exclude the different racial categories of the Puerto Rican community such as Tainos, Blacks, and Whites of Puerto Rican descent.  Briefly in the article she talks about how many blacks and native islanders of Puerto Rico have Spanish surnames from the Spanish conquistadors who enslaved them.  However she does not distinguish how each racial category within the Puerto Rican community may have different ways of speaking Spanish or English in the United States due to their economic advantages or disadvantages. She simply refers to Puerto Ricans, Whites, and African Americans as distinct cultures in New York as if Puerto Ricans are a separate race of people.

One sentence that confused me in the article was when Paca, the Taino girl from Puerto Rico who adopted African American ways of speaking, said "I don't like that, when a Puerto Rican tries to be Black" (Zentella 106).  I was confused by this comment not only because Paca often times used common African American dialect when she spoke English, but also because many Puerto Ricans come from African descent.

In a video that I found on youtube.com it shows a young Puerto Rican college student who shows the difference between speaking Spanish and speaking English if one identifies as being Puerto Rican.  In the English video, the college student says that many people who commented on her Spanish video said that she does not sound like she has a Puerto Rican accent but that she sounds "White".  This goes to show that even though she may come from a White Puerto Rican background, she clearly distinguishes herself from that culture by calling herself Puerto Rican.  

Although this may seem like a confusing topic to most who are not familiar with it, it has always been something that has intrigued me.  As a Spanish major, I have taken many Latino studies courses that have taught me about the different Latino cultures including AfroLatinos.  However,  Latinos, no matter what racial group they belong to, are often described as one distinct culture even though they may come from many different backgrounds, i.e; European Spanish descent, African descent, or Indigenous native descent. I appreciated the article by Zentella but I wish that she had clarified how coming from different racial backgrounds from Puerto Rico can affect the lives and ways of  speaking for Puerto Ricans living in New York City.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xBJjZyw6e0I&feature=related -Speaking Spanish

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlQuajOshLc&feature=related- Speaking English

Reaction to Zentella

After reading the Zentella article several main themes stood out. Chief among these is evident in the Family Guy clip.  In the clip, an Asian woman is portrayed following certain stereotypes. Her physical appearance shows an Asian descent, however the viewer is immediately tuned into her race based on the way she speaks.

Zentella made a similar point in the essay "Multiple Codes, Multiple Identities: Puerto Rican Children in New York City." On page 109, Zentella said, "Language is singled out in many studies of Puerto Ricans to explain their high rates of economic and educational failure." Sometimes in the United States, this can also be said of other races. In the US, the races can only be seen as White or Black.     While many people in the US come from diverse backgrounds and have both white and black members in their families, many mixed racial backgrounds are accepted by neither the White group nor the Black group. In the Family Guy clip, the Asian woman is not accepted by the other drivers on the road and is stigmatized by the creators of the show. 


Additionally the clip demonstrates another important point that the essay attempts to convey. On page 98 of the essay Zentella said, "No language is pure, everyone speaks a dialect."

The clip fails to acknowledge any dialectal differences in the predominately Asian part of the world. There are many different part of Asian culture as well as many different languages that come from that part of the world. While the people that immigrate from that part of the world may speak these languages, they cannot all be put under one umbrella term.  


In essence, the essay wants to make the point that people of non-White and non-Black origin have trouble establishing a place for themselves in the United States. Video clips like the one from Family Guy do nothing to stop perpetuating negative stigmatism's about the switching of languages and the power of dialects. 

Mom Celebrity Translator and Identity

I found this SNL skit that describes a celebrity translator to help teenagers identity which celebrity their mothers are actually talking about.

This skit clearly marks two different identities: 'moms' and youth. In the "commercial" the moms are unable to pronounce celebrity names and clearly don't really know what their talking about in reference to pop culture. The moms in the skit sound almost like they aren't quite paying attention to the news and so mispronounce names and movie titles. Youth are positioned as people who are savvy and in the know about pop culture. The "translator" allows youth and moms to connect across a gap of language and knowledge. In this case, mothers are positioned as people who aren't current about pop culture, are white and middle-class, perform sterotyped activites (cooking etc) and are blithely unaware of how little they actually know. Their teenage, young-adult children on the other hand, are knowledgable and patient, willing to work with their naive mothers to connect on celebrity gossip. Mary Bucholtz talks about identity work happening in language and in non-verbal ways and this "commerical" seems to be an example of that. The moms are identified by their older, middle-class whiteness, but most esepcially by their inability to get celebrity names right (their language use). Obviously this skit is a parody and is supposed to be extreme but I still think it points to an interesting generation division in our culture - one that is marked by "inside" knowledge expressed by language.