This post made me laugh out loud. It identifies a phenomenon which I have noticed at various times in my life: the propensity of certain Caucasians to be “secretly Spanish”. You know the type??
getupgrrl says in the above-linked post:
If you’re a descendant of Caucasian Europeans whose family members have lived in the United States for generations, I will giggle if you strain to pronounce Spanish words in a Latin American accent.
And:
I think it’s wonderful that your apartment is decorated with tapestries woven by Ecuadoran women who started their own fair trade craft cooperative. I love your indigenous Mexican yarn art depicting the animal spirit guides of the Huichol shamans. You look great in that Mayan corte and Peruvian beaded necklace! But if you dot your New York twang with words spoken in a throaty South American purr, I will giggle. I can’t help it. If you talk about going on vacation with your muhthuh and fathuh and olduh bruhthuh to Pwerrrto Vayarrrta in glorious Mehhikko, I will give you a nickname like “Secretly Spanish” and write about you on my blog, because you just sound silly.
Just go read the whole post. I was laughing out loud.
(Another funny thing in the comments section: “Alex Trebek has to be the poster boy for the Secretly Spanish.” SO TRUE!)
OOOO…my blood boils when *anyone* pronounces Spanish names and toponyms in Spanish. When I am speaking in English to another English speaking person, I do not call Ireland Eire, Wales Cymru, Germany Deutschland, or France…oh. Forget that last one.
In one of those PC college courses they forced you to take to graduate where you have to sit and have all sorts of ethnic visitors tell you why white people are the root of all evil and why you are really a racist and just don’t know it yet, etc., we had an American Indian fellow come in for a lecture. He kept talking about this place called “Tayhoss.” Being a geography minor, I was very embarrassed and disappointed in myself that I was not previously aware of this place “Tayhoss.” “Tayhoss,” I thought to myself, desperately. “Where in the hell is Tayhoss?” Then he said something about travelling through Austin and I occurred to me that he was talking about Texas.
Emily – do you happen to remember the hilarious Jimmy Smits skit on Saturday Night Live addressing this very annoying thing? Which, if it’s annoying to us, imagine how annoying it must be to people who REALLY speak Spanish!
That skit is emblazoned in my mind. Jimmy Smits working at a TV station – they’re having some kind of staff meeting, discussing what’s in the news, what to program, etc. And all the white-bread people are saying:
“Neek-ahhh-rrrag-wa.” and “Meh – eeco.” etc.
Jimmy Smits gets more and more annoyed, like: “Guys. You’re from Iowa. You should just say ‘Nicaragua’, okay?”
he finally blows his top when they order out for lunch, and one of his colleagues, a perky white chick, says she wants, “en-hee-lah-das.” hahahahaha
SNL had a skit once making fun of that. I think it was based on news anchors trying to pronounce foreign words with the proper accent. Had a bunch of them in a backroom discussing the news. They started off reasonably, then degenerated into saying things like “I’m going to go to… Tahco Belll… to get a… burrrrri-to.”
dorkafork: I think you and I just had a psychic moment. Yes to that SNL skit!! :)
How’s that for timing?
hahaha Jinx!!
For the love of God, somebody say my name!
One of the comments in that post over there made me laugh:
“Hello, my name is Megan and I am Secretly Spanish.”
I remember those skits. Also, the anchor woman from “Married With Children,” the way she pronounced her name, which I don’t recall, but it was something like “Mahhh-rreea Consowayla Viyyya Looobooos” or whatever.
I can’t stand it even when Spanish speakers do it. If I am in a Spanish speaking country, fine. When you are speaking in English, you should SPEAK IN ENGLISH. ARGH! I think I’m going to go around saying the names of European countries in the native tongue just to confuse everybody. “Yeah, on your visit to Eire, do not skip Baile Átha Cliath or the beauty of Cóbh. If you get to the European continent, enjoy Pair-ree and Köln. Don’t miss Roma, either. Italia is a fine place.
The instant I read your post on her post, I thought of that SNL sketch. Apparently, so did everyone else who read it.
This makes me think of the problems I keep having with Hebrew words. It’s a little complicated to explain, but the short version is there’s two basic approaches (in the US, anyway) to pronouncing Hebrew. I grew up with what my wife calls “Ashkenazis” pronunciation. On the whole it’s a lot less precise, certain letters get an “s” sound instead of a “t”, and it’s used mostly by the Eastern European originating Jews I grew up around.
Now, of course, I’m married to a woman who learned hebrew properly, and we have children in a school that teaches it in a more Israeli-style pronunciation. I keep biting my tongue trying to figure out which way to say things, and I end up using both styles alternatively.
In my case the pronunciation issues are not pretension, they’re just confusion.
Ah yes, the Alex Trebek Syndrome. At least, that’s what I’ve always called it.
Dude … strangely enough, AS you added your comment, I just added another sentence to this post.
Damn, another psychic moment!!
The Alex Trebek Syndrome indeed!
Ok, I agree that people who try to sound all ethnic and stuff should probably be smacked, especially if their attempt to appear culturally senstive and broad minded is particularly transparent.
However, some of my sisters-in-law are Mexican, first to third generation, and sometimes you gotta use the right accent when you’re speaking Espanol. In fact the children of immigrants use the correct pronunciation of Spanish words in the middle of English conversations. If you want to really complicate things, try dating a Mexican whose father would be very impressed if you could address him formally in Spanish.
Patrick:
It is obvious from Chez Miscarriage’s post that she is talking about Caucasians who say “Meh-Hico” just to be pretentious, and just to pretend they are more ethnically “interesting”. She’s not talking about mispronunciation, or not trying to speak the language correctly or whatever. She’s talking about the idiots who PRETEND they are Spanish.
I have always wondered about the inverse of this phenomenon: how come the overtly Spanish (i.e. people literally from España) are not considered hispanic here in PC-land?
I have read more than one government form that says explicitly that natives of the Iberian peninsula do not qualify as hispanic. It always reminds me of “NewSpeak” in 1984.
Also, most of the people here in South Florida are not Secretly Spanish, they are really hispanic. For all those who make fun of gringos using Spanish pronunciation, I recommend you go to a Dunkin Doughnuts in Miami and try out your gringo-speak there :)
Are you secretly Spanish?
This describes half my colleagues on the faculty. My problem with them (or there problem with me, I guess) is that I’m not so secretly a Hugenot/Sicilian/Irish, the dreaded genetic combo that creates the deviant personality type of HUGSICMICK. How…
Red: I know. I’m just being difficult. I’m part Irish and part English so sometimes the genetic and psychic conflicts on my interior make their way out of me as “difficult.”
It’s a tough call, but for single most pretentious thing in this general category, I’d say the Ivory Coast’s telling everyone else that it has be pronouced IN EVERY LANGUAGE as “Côte d’Ivoire” is definitely up there.