TITG The Conversational Shapeshifter...
I have several groups of friends that I still keep in touch with. When I converse with them, I can't help but noticing that I adopt different speech patterns depending on which group.
Among my friends who speak better English, I mostly speak at the same level without including any of the local Malaysian slang where as amongst my Chinese educated friends, I catch myself using more 'lah' phrases in our conversations. We even go to the extent of using romanized chinese words in our MSN conversations!
I guess I instinctively do this so as to make the group feel more comfortable when everyone is able to speak at the same level. It would be rather awkward if someone in a group of many persists in speaking at a higher level.
Anyway, it would be more difficult for someone to speak at a higher language level then for the others to 'dumb' their speaking level down so as to put everyone at ease.
Sometimes, I can't help but wonder whether my Chinese speaking friends are doing the same for me when we speak in Chinese due to my half-past-six Cantonese and Mandarin vocabulary. =)
Among my friends who speak better English, I mostly speak at the same level without including any of the local Malaysian slang where as amongst my Chinese educated friends, I catch myself using more 'lah' phrases in our conversations. We even go to the extent of using romanized chinese words in our MSN conversations!
I guess I instinctively do this so as to make the group feel more comfortable when everyone is able to speak at the same level. It would be rather awkward if someone in a group of many persists in speaking at a higher level.
Anyway, it would be more difficult for someone to speak at a higher language level then for the others to 'dumb' their speaking level down so as to put everyone at ease.
Sometimes, I can't help but wonder whether my Chinese speaking friends are doing the same for me when we speak in Chinese due to my half-past-six Cantonese and Mandarin vocabulary. =)
Musing In The Park
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