Word: englishing
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...seems like an unlikely fate for a "goofy Jewish-American" in mismatched socks, as Adelstein presents himself, but his juicy and vividly detailed account of investigations into the shadowy side of Japan shows him to be more enterprising, determined and crazy than most. One assignment saw him teaching English at a Maid Station massage parlor (so-called because female employees are dressed to look like French maids); another moved him to impersonate an Iranian to try to catch an Iranian believed to be a murder suspect. It wasn't a long step between that and hearing a mobster say things...
...like that line, the dialogue in Tokyo Vice is often so snappy and quotable that it sounds as if it were a treatment for a Scorsese movie set in Queens. "The word isn't victim - it's sucker," one made man pronounces. A cop is described as saying, in English, "Please go get me some smokes, angel." Yet the facts beneath the noirish lines are assembled with what looks to be ferocious diligence and resourcefulness. For even as he is getting slapped around by thugs and placed under police protection, Adelstein never loses his gift for crisp storytelling...
...Crosby and Presley did, Dylan ranges from pop songs to traditional hymns. His perky take on "Here Comes Santa Claus" is scrupulously close to the Gene Autry original. "Winter Wonderland" comes with pedal guitar and cooing girl backup group. He does "O Come All Ye Faithful" in its English and Latin readings (including the approved Anglican hard g's for "regem angelorum"). "Must Be Santa" turns the rollicking polka into a frantic, very klezmer Christmas...
...attempt to utter a word of what's often called la langue de Shakespeare until they've mastered it on paper. "I think a lot of French people are hesitant to speak another language at what could be considered the expense of French," says Karin Hull, who has taught English at Berlitz for four years. "The legacy of cultural protectionism is one factor, and the way foreign languages are taught in school is another. Students pass language exams only to discover they can't really speak [the language]." (Read "Plagiarism Software Finds a New Shakespeare Play...
...Shifting the focus of foreign-language study from written to oral instruction is only one way of making classes more practical. Berlitz also offers First Jobs, an increasingly popular course in which students are taught business and financial English vocabulary and are given help improving their résumés and job-interviewing skills - in English. "These are students who've wanted to improve their English as part of many things they'll need in their careers," says Alain Nothern, the polyglot director of Berlitz's Opera center. "The focus is English, but it's a wider tool...