Word: accents
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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Aman has a tip for Americans wishing to improve their verbal-abuse techniques: "Look for a distinguishing characteristic. Each of us is deviant in some way. For instance, I wear glasses, I'm five-foot-seven, 20 pounds overweight, have short hair and a Kissinger accent. So you could start off calling me a fat, four-eyed, runty, reactionary, sewer-mouth Kraut." Still, he considers it unsporting, and sometimes destructive, for cursers to pick on physical characteristics. Says he: "Insults should be aimed at behavior, something a person can change...
...river set the Egyptian apart from the desert Arabs, who are Semites. By contrast, a Hamitic strain prevails in the blood of Egypt's river people. Outsiders often have difficulty distinguishing a Syrian from a Jordanian, or either from a Lebanese. But an Egyptian stands out. His Arabic accent is different, and his speech is peppered with odd words, some dating from the pharaohs, some borrowed from visiting?or conquering?Europeans. Although Egypt is a predominantly Muslim land with a large Coptic minority, its customs differ from those of its Islamic neighbors. In Saudi Arabia, for example, tombs are unmarked...
...cultural schizophrenia start when he is nine. As World War II begins, his family moves to the U.S., where he enrolls in a New Jer sey boarding school. Robbed of sharing England's finest hour, young Pendrid must suffer a blitzing from unruly students who find his accent and manners fruity. His charades of Churchillian courage only complicate his humiliations. Back in postwar England, Chatworth once again finds himself a foreigner. There he plays the American with painful results. But in the U.S., Chatworth has tasted freedom from his crusty English Catholic past...
...Englishman in America was more impressive in those days than his clockwise counterpart. Before the cattle boats began disgorging secretaries, English voices were unheard between New York and the Gold Coast, and I had the best. So the old ladies who used to gush over my cute accent would now be made to pay through the nose for it. Young Chatworth gave a bitter laugh as he remembered how he used to flinch and try to hide that accent. Pah! Does the bearded lady shave? Does Tom Thumb lie about his height? Use it, boy. Sell anything...
Eliza confronts the injuries of class in an avowedly egalitarian society when she moves to San Francisco and takes a job in a doctor's office. Her co-workers -a working-class white and a ghetto black-initially mistrust her Eastern accent and sense of style. But Harry Argent, a blunt, flamboyant movie producer, is intermittently attracted to Eliza for what she is: "A sort of zaftig Jane Fonda," who needs not only a vocation but also...