Today at 12.00, over 100 students marched in favour of Modern Languages, making a stand against the vicious cuts proposed by the University. Despite the freezing cold, a good number of student came to support the funeral march. Not to mention that it wasn’t just Modern Language students there today. As well as key members of the Swansea Union Exec, such as the SU President Luke Young, the History Society were there in force showing solidarity with their fellow Humanities students.

I’m beyond happy that I was able to be there today, despite having to run off at the end to attend a lecture. Other commitments have meant that I was unable to attend the National Demo back at the beginning of November, so it meant a lot to me to be able to march for something I personally feel so strongly about. The University is proposing a gross injustice to the Modern Languages Department. I may not be a student here next September to see the devastating effects of these cuts, but there’s no way in hell I’ll just stand back and let them happen without a fight.

We began outside the Abbey, proceeding towards the Faraday building with a coffin holding the letter of opposition leading the way. Some excellent speeches came from the SU President Luke Young, F.I.G.S (that’s the French, Italian, German and Spanish Society) leader Ben Lowell Sluckin, our Education Officer Luke James (whose blog is well worth a read) and the lovely Sarah Woodvine, President of the French Society, General Secretary and resident bell-ringer! The diversity of the speakers reflected well the diversity of the students supporting the cause; after all, this is an issue which is symptomatic of growing problems within the University. First MFL, then what?

Afterwards, we headed back towards the Abbey and made sure that the Vice Chancellor knew we were there. Unsurprisingly, security wouldn’t allow us into the building and the VC wouldn’t come out to see us, so we went and caused some good old traffic disruption outside Fulton House, even preventing a cement delivery!

Today was meant to be D-Day, when the cuts were put to the deciding vote. However, it has been decided that this vote is to be delayed until March. As Luke Young put it, we’re not just going to forget about this. Come March, we’ll be shouting outside the Abbey just as loudly : No Ifs, No Buts, No Modern Language Cuts. Sooner or later, the Vice Chancellor is going to have to have the guts to come out and face us, as he failed to do today.

The key message from the march is clear – we need to stick together and stand against the gross injustices that the University is proposing. A comment was made today about how all these problems of rising tuition fees and the cutting of departments are ones which are inextricably interlinked.

So Thursday, those of you in Swansea, get yourselves to Castle Gardens and join the students of Swansea University and Swansea Metropolitan in protest against the rise in tuition fees! Unfortunately I won’t be there to almost burst the eardrums of my fellow protestors, so I think if at least ten people reading this go in my place, you’ll make up the difference!

Dear guest

Celebration of Study Abroad Event- December 6^th 2010

Please be advised that the above event has been postponed. We will contact you later in the year regarding rescheduling.  We are very sorry for any inconvenience caused

 

I wonder how many snotty emails they received before they decided that perhaps a Celebration of Study Abroad on the same day as the protest against the cuts would be a bad idea? It’ll be interesting to see whether they actually do reschedule it – if the cuts go through, I’ll be boycotting it for sure.

As some of you may know, Swansea University are planning to make significant cuts to the Modern Languages Department. I’ve already written about this for ThirdYearAbroad, as well as being lucky enough to write about the cuts already affecting the department (Catalan, Portuguese and Russian went this year) for Swansea’s student newspaper. Here are the key cuts, courtesy of the Modern Languages at Swansea blog (which incidentally, is well worth a read for an update on the situation):

Management proposals specify 10 new academic staff FTE (full-time equivalent) posts in the reconstituted Department, broken down as follows:

French            4          (reduced from 6)

German          3.5       (reduced from 7)

Spanish          2.5       (reduced from 5 full-time and 2 part-time staff).

Italian              0          (reduced from 2)

As you can see, they’re planning to cut the department pretty much in half. There’s been a huge uproar from the students here at the University, with an event going on tomorrow outside the building where most Modern Languages lectures take place as well as a ‘funeral march’ for the department planned for the 6th of December. (EDIT : Here’s the Facebook link for the event for those of you who’d like to attend!) Our point is that these cuts may as well be the death of languages at Swansea University. No other department faces such extensive cuts. We already lag far, far behind our  European counterparts in terms of linguistic ability, as I experienced first hand in Germany. It’s sobering to think that most German 12 year olds can speak more English than your average British 18 year old can French or German. These cuts show a complete disregard for the importance of Modern Languages.

Considering all this, you can imagine my disgust when this pops up in my inbox this morning:

The 8th of December you say? Exactly the same date and time as the march? Light refreshments? Don’t mind if I do, I’ll happily munch on a ham sarnie as the University gives themselves a big pat on the back for their excellent job on the study abroad programmes while the rest of my peers make a stand for Modern Languages.

Words fail me.

So here’s my RSVP :

Dear Sir/Madam,

I’m afraid I’ll have to decline your invitation. As you may already be aware, there will be a funeral procession that day in protest to the cuts to the Modern Languages Department, and that is far higher on my priority list than attending a celebration of a programme which is likely to be in jeopardy if those cuts go through.

I find it utterly hypocritical of the University and the Vice-Chancellor to organise such an event considering the cuts proposed. The Modern Languages Department is the whole reason I went to Germany on a year abroad – I didn’t go just to ‘study abroad’ and have a whale of a time, I went to SPEAK GERMAN. How can you expect a German department consisting of 3.5 staff to provide the same sort of experience to future students?

Furthermore, the fact that it’s been organised for the 6th of December at exactly the same time as the funeral procession seems like a shallow attempt to divert attention from the march. Shame on you if this is the case.

Regards,
Elena Cresci

Sorry V.C, I’ll be too busy wearing my black veil to attend any sort of shallow, self-serving attempt to draw attention from the gross injustice you’ve proposed to inflict on the Modern Language department. You can take your invite and shove it where the sun don’t shine, I’ll be grieving the department that came so recommended when I began studying here.

Not to mention that slang differs between regions – think about what you called the shoes you used for sports in primary school, either like the ones above or those black ones with the elastic in the front. If you asked me what they were called, I’d say daps. Ask someone from England, they’re plimsolls. Then go across the Atlantic and ask an American and they’ll say something different again!

Germany’s no different. Thankfully I haven’t encountered many problems in the way of difficult dialects, but I’ve heard tales from other year abroaders who’ve struggled with Schwäbisch (you’ll hear this in Baden-Würtennberg) or Bayerisch (Bavaria).

For example:  order a Bratwurst here in Dortmund and you’re wanting a ‘Bratwurst mit Brötchen’ – head to Bavaria and you’re wanting a ‘Bratwurst mit Semmel’ . Ever heard the story about how John F Kennedy once called himself a doughnut when giving a speech in West Berlin? It’s a long- standing urban myth that the oft quoted ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’ actually means ‘I am a doughnut’ because of a grammatical error. Perhaps in Nordrhein-Westfalen, but not so in Berlin, where Berliners are called Pfannkuchen. The differences are even more noticeable when you compare Austrian German with Germany’s German. Heuer instead of dieses Jahr (this year), Grüß Gott instead of Guten Tag… it’s enough to make your head spin!

These kinds of linguistic differences with regards to slang are what make studying a language both difficult and interesting at the same time. Language is constantly changing, you’re never going to be aware of all the colloquialisms of your own language, let alone those from other languages!

I bet you all thought Insert Title Here was actually the real title eh??

So this blog will be called Can’t Say Strawberry from now on, not that the URL or anything changes as a consequence, but if any of you (three) readers have me bookmarked, then the title needs to be changed!

As for the reason… well.

Being thrust into a world run by a completely different language has many different challenges, from grammar and vocabulary to just not being able to understand what the hell everyone around you is on about. Lots of ‘pardons?’ (or ‘bitte?’ in my case, but I seem to just utter a dumbfounded ‘’schuldigung?’ every time) and patience are required.

But then there’s that accent problem, you know, that thing that completely gives away your un-nativeness, your status as foreigner trying desperately to master the lingo, bumbling through your ‘ich bins’, ‘ich wills’ and ‘darf ich auf der Toilette gehen bittes’ to get to some sort of conclusion. Pronunciation gives a lot away! I’ve never had a problem with the ‘ch’ sound, being fluent in Welsh, but that’s only half of it. I find that speaking German often makes me thirsty from the effort of trying to sound as German as possible. So far I have been mistaken as Dutch, so I’ll take that one as a compliment!

Despite this effort, I still can’t bloody say Erdbeere – or strawberry to us English native speakers. See the problem becomes apparent every time I order a crepe from the crepe stand at Dortmund Hauptbahnhof – ‘einmal Crepe mit Erdbeere bitte’ I say, but try as I might, I can never escape the look of confusion and the ‘bitte?’ or ‘mit was?’ that follows. People have suggested that maybe I go for the easier to pronounce Nutella Crepe, but NO, I want my Erdbeere Crepe bitte!!

I thought it would make a good title anyway because this blog was begun in order to document my year abroad, and it’s a fairly interesting title if I ever wanted to open a shop or something like that!

For those who want to know, this is how Erdbeere is meant to sound – but when I say it, it sort of comes out more as ‘ARDDBAAAAAAAR’ (why I’ve been cutting off the –eh bit at the end I don’t know) So, any readers out there with pronunciation troubles like me? Perhaps you’re on a year abroad too and are all too familiar with the confused look from locals? I’d love to hear your stories!

A while back, another sewing blogger linked to Manequim’s collection of free patterns – really chic, really cute… one problem? They’re all in Portuguese! So I downloaded the pattern for this beauty : 

Now, for good old Google translate. I loved how back in Year 9, kids used to try and fool the foreign language teachers into thinking that they’d done awesome German/French/whathaveyou homework by writing it in English and then using google translate – except not only would Google translate use forms that they hadn’t even learn yet, it would use them incorrectly! Fun times to be had when marking that piece of work! I half want to give out homework just to see if anyone does it at my school, but it’s a Gymnasium, and they’re all clever enough and hard working enough to do it themselves! There goes my fun

But anyway, here’s what  google translate makes of the  instructions:

MOUNT
• Close the sides of the external and internal parts separately.
• Add the external and internal parts, right on right, with a seam by
edges of the armholes. Beat the seams of iron, turning the gaps on the inside parts
internal and secure with stitching different. Revire parts, inside on inside.
• Close the collar with a seam, holding the edges under, right on
right. Next, crease the collar along the length, leaving the
edges higher, right on right.
• Sew the edges of the larger collar, without closing the edges of the neckline assembly
front and back. Revire, inside on inside.
• Sew the right edge of the inside of the collar at the neckline of the right front
and back, matching the numbers mount.
• Put up the outside edge of the right of the neckline and secure with
different stitching.
• Put up the bottom edges (0.3 cm, approximately) for the reverse. Tap
iron. Put up the borders again and again secure with stitching.

Go on then! Get to it! BEAT THOSE SEAMS OF IRON DAMN YOU!