´óÏó´«Ã½

The Glass Box for Friday

Comments

1. At 06:20 PM on 03 Aug 2007, JimmyGiro wrote:

   So what is maddening about the ´óÏó´«Ã½, enquiring minds want to know?

2. At 06:42 PM on 03 Aug 2007, mac wrote:

   1. So the monsoon wasn't going to be big news this morning (AM)?
   Well the surprised tone to the item and some of its content helped weaken the charity response here Eddie.

   2. So the FTSE down 1.5 percent today isn't news is it? Not even on a Friday when the authorities usually try a little cosmetic adjustment 'for the weekend, sir'.

   3. Hey, C. Ghoti you got that dirty bomb one right! More power to the Secret Police then.

   But the actual mass murder by Nato in Baghran and in Hydrobhad doesn't get a mention.

   Big Sister, I've TRIED to reply to your piece on Thurday Glass Box. Take a deep breath.

3. At 06:59 PM on 03 Aug 2007, Peej wrote:

   Nice to see Orla Guerin bringing to the Zimbabwe tragedy the balanced style of reporting for which she was famous in the middle east. A despot goes barking mad and brings his nation to its knees, and she finds a bunch of white farmers in the neighbouring country to paint as the bad guys. Perhaps we can look forward to her investigating why Africa's leaders are so reluctant to speak out. No? Thought not.

4. At 07:02 PM on 03 Aug 2007, Peter Bolt wrote:

   Here is one to ruminate on :
   If the ´óÏó´«Ã½ does not have an "agenda" on Climate Change and/ or Global Warming, why does it carry the news about carbon emissions on its Religion & Ethics page ?

5. At 07:02 PM on 03 Aug 2007, educare wrote:

   The language thing. Its very difficult to explain but the education system does not 'found' what you learn, well.

   By that I mean what you learn is difficult to bring back to mind. This is partly because a great deal of the ethos of the system is that bringing it back to mind is a skill available to only the very best. (EXAMS!!)

   It is partly because of the atmosphere of difficulty of subjects. How else can so many mystiques be maintained in the class room and by teachers to the outside world?

   Parlty this may also be due to the transient and awful nature of where you learn. A bunch of kids or adults assembled purely for an arificial learning process. Compare the SUPPORT from remembered feelings that memory of the learnt language gets from that experience, to the supportative memories when trying to pronounce Oui! like a Parisian, which skill you learnt from a French friend.

   I'd say that many teachers know that the classroom is no place to learn and that they walk in and out with their subject, leaving almost nothing of it behind. In fact its quite a good place for teachers to learn. A captive audience, being able to put the point exactly your way. defining what's difficult and whats not.

   My goodness, no wonder they seem such profficient exponents of their subject.

6. At 09:28 PM on 03 Aug 2007, 2020hindsight wrote:

   5. Educare

   Er, pardon? (parled avec an accent francais...)

7. At 09:35 PM on 03 Aug 2007, RJD wrote:

   Gosh Peej - you obviously have a problem with Orla Guerin. Can't say I've ever found her anything but lucid, impartial and informative.

   And I can't see the problem with piece she did for PM - just as much about the plight of the escaping Zimbabweans as the actions of the white South African farmers. I don't think she particularly painted the farmers as the "bad guys".

   In terms of reporting the tragedy of Zimbabwe I think the piece helped to show the "knock on " effects of the awful situation there. Tied with yesterday's reporting of the astounding inflation rate and how it is going to escalate even further, I think the ´óÏó´«Ã½'s handling of Zimbabwe is pretty good.

   I agree that there is a story to be followed in why Africa's leaders don't speak out. But that is media-wide and not just the ´óÏó´«Ã½.
   

8. At 10:09 PM on 03 Aug 2007, nikki noodle wrote:

   A great handling of the vaguaries of communication again by Eddie!

   And a question (though, I realise, probably pointing elsewhere...)

   "Why was there no mention of the floods on the news at 6? Nor in the news read at 10pm?
   The utter mismatch was hugely and glaringly starkly clear. It is on the ´óÏó´«Ã½ news home page as the leading story...and lead the news headlines at 5 read by Brian Perkins on PM.

   All of us are concerned about the people, and also their plight being so sudden and similar."

   nik

9. At 10:12 PM on 03 Aug 2007, mittfh wrote:

   Only 7 words, eh? Let's see what I can do from memory...

   Bonjour, Je m'appelle Ben, et J'habite en Kidderminster. Ca va?

   (Pleasantries over, now for the big question)

   Ou est la toilette, s'il vous plait?

   Merci! Au revoir!

10. At 11:40 PM on 03 Aug 2007, educare wrote:

    Hey, Ben,

    That should work, especially if who you ask has done the '7 most common mistakes the English make in French' course.

11. At 11:52 PM on 03 Aug 2007, john cooknell wrote:

    So apparently buying clothes at Pri-mark is costing the Earth.

    What a load of absolute garbage!

    The fashion industry is one of the worst excesses of our consumer society, its overblown self importance is only matched by politicians, journalists and ´óÏó´«Ã½ news presenters!

    The environmental effect of buying clothes anywhere is exactly the same, the only difference is the price mark up.

12. At 02:02 AM on 04 Aug 2007, nightwatchman wrote:

    Very low prices results in a 'BTTOA' policy by customers.

    That's the claim, John (11).

    Buy Two, Throw One Away.

13. At 07:27 AM on 04 Aug 2007, Richard Menhinick wrote:

    What I find really sad about the general lack of ability to absorb other languages amongst the English, is that we have four languages of our own - english, welsh, scots & irish gaelic - and nobody teaches them! (except english ... and they don't even teach that properly any more)

    I enjoy going to Wales and learning new words and phrases from the dual-language signs everywhere. Now there's an idea ... if your town is twinned with another in France have public signs in english and french, of if twinned with a german town in german. That way, the exposure to the language will improve everyone's vocabulary and may just foster enough curiosity to learn more!

14. At 09:02 AM on 04 Aug 2007, jasper Corbett wrote:

    I was last night's editor.

    I decided to lead on the South Asian floods quite late in the day. It's one of those stories which is hard to gauge from London how big it is. But on the guidance of our correspondent and given the recent coverage of flooding in this country I felt it was worth giving it prominence in the programme. Also, even though the Monsoon rains happen every year, the figures for the displaced (20 million) this year are staggering.
    There was a big response to our item on teaching languages -- it's clearly something you feel strongly about, perhaps we should do more on it...

15. At 10:51 AM on 04 Aug 2007, I.moore wrote:

    Yes Peej that was my take on the Orla Guerin's report, and it would seem others have the same view, for that was their response to the discussion I posted on the ´óÏó´«Ã½ 5 Live international message board. Orla Guerin would seem to fit the stereotype ´óÏó´«Ã½ reporter, who we have all come to loath with a passion, and who have made the ´óÏó´«Ã½'s claim of impartiality a threadbare joke. Orla Guerin doesn’t need to open her mouth for we already know who she will cast as the villains. ( America, Britain, Israel, West and all white people )

16. At 10:58 AM on 04 Aug 2007, nikki noodle wrote:

    Jasper (14) Thanks, again for your response.

    re the monsoon floods, I am with you, a staggeringly large number of people killed or displaced. And following on from experiences in UK it is also appropriate!

    I'm going to ask again why this was not picked up on the news at 6pm.

    n

17. At 04:41 PM on 04 Aug 2007, wrote:

    Mac (20,
    "2. So the FTSE down 1.5 percent today isn't news is it? Not even on a Friday when the authorities usually try a little cosmetic adjustment 'for the weekend, sir'."

    Fri 7:55pm ^DJI Latin American Markets: Wall Street dive pulls regional markets deeper in the red - at MarketWatch
    Fri 7:05pm ^DJI Wall St Week Ahead: Subprime worries to spur more volatility - at Reuters
    Fri 6:00pm ^DJI Currencies: Dollar slumps after soft jobs data, ISM services; yen rises - at MarketWatch
    Fri 5:35pm ^DJI
    ^IXIC July job growth slowest in five months - Reuters
    Fri 5:24pm ^DJI UPDATE - FED FOCUS-October FOMC eyed for first rate cut - at Reuters
    Fri 5:04pm ^DJI
    ^IXIC UPDATE - Commodity prices, credit woes slam Toronto stocks - at Reuters
    Fri 4:57pm ^DJI Canadian Markets: Canadian stocks at lowest level in 3 months on U.S. slump - at MarketWatch
    Fri 4:42pm ^DJI
    ^IXIC RPT-TREASURIES-Bonds rally on stock rout, subprime fears - at Reuters
    Fri 4:36pm EK [$$] Take-Two Shares Plunge; Nasdaq Drops on Jobs Data - at The Wall Street Journal Online
    Fri 4:19pm ^DJI
    ^IXIC FOREX-Dollar tumbles vs yen, Swiss on credit fears - at Reuters
    Fri 4:10pm ^GSPC
    ^IXIC No Watershed Solution For the Market - at Minyanville.com
    Fri 3:50pm ^DJI Latin American Markets: Brazilian stocks accelerate losses; Mexico lower - at MarketWatch

    
    XX ;-0
    ED

18. At 12:13 PM on 05 Aug 2007, mac wrote:

    ed (17)

    Your electronic expertise is so breathtaking its taken me days to adsorb the import of your list.

    So can I ask you and all other Boxers again why isn't it covered both specifically and in broad implication in PM?

19. At 04:50 PM on 05 Aug 2007, mac wrote:

    re: the 7 words oflanguage stuff:

    back form Lidls I can see little use in modern Brtiain for my 7 words from French, Italian, German, and Spanish.

    My Russian might help but personally I think it would be marveloous to be appropriately polyglotal these days.

    (My one word of Welsh and one of Gaelic complete the seven words of other languages I know)
    

20. At 08:26 PM on 05 Aug 2007, wrote:

    Re Orla Guerin:

    It seems to me that those who criticise her really only want one story at a time from anywhere. In this case, Mugabe is the bad guy, Zimbabwe is on the point of collapse.

    Well, we all know that, don't we? So, do we want the same story again, or shall we look at it from someone else's point of view? Perhaps we could ask if there are other stories to be told ...

    Sid

    PS - I'm never quite sure when these threads come to an end ...

21. At 09:48 PM on 05 Aug 2007, john cooknell wrote:

    Jasper, (14)

    Bad Monsoon floods in Bangladesh and surrounding regions are due to de-forestation in the Himalayas. A man made disaster

    I bet it still gets blamed on CO2 induced Climate Change!

    Nightwatchman(11)
    BTTOA !!

    I know what they were suggesting, I just think its total garbage.

    It is in our nature to overproduce or overconsume, every living thing does if given the chance.

    In this case the overproduction is of self important hot air!
    

22. At 09:57 PM on 05 Aug 2007, Chris Chamberlain wrote:

    Just like to say that I agree with the comments critisizing Orla Guerin. Why was it necessary to state that the South African farmers were white if not to put a racist slant on her report? Typical ´óÏó´«Ã½ it seems.

23. At 04:30 AM on 06 Aug 2007, wrote:

    Dear Team,

    Correct me if I'm wrong. Would it not be the case if one learned one's own mother-tongue more adequately (including grammatical structures) that one could learn another language more readily.

    I am of a generation that was taught English through vocabulary only (maybe that's obvious) and last year I heard that senior educationalists were again promoting the idea that English could be taught WITHOUT grammar. I believe if one tries to learn another language without understanding the principles of grammar it makes it nearly impossible!

    ³§±ôá¾±²Ô³Ù±ð,

    Mick McNeill

24. At 10:13 AM on 06 Aug 2007, Big Sister wrote:

    Richard Menhinick - I'm afraid you're wrong to the extent that Welshg language lessons are compulsory in all Welsh State Schools and have been so for many years. They take their own language so seriously that there is a requirement for all teachers in Welsh schools to be Welsh speaking (as I found to my cost when I considered teaching in Wales).

    Mick McNeill - As a language teacher myself, I share some of your frustrations about the need to have a knowledge of the structure of language, or grammar, in order to learn languages effectively. And, indeed, since grammar was largely taken out of English lessons, it has become very difficult for modern language teachers to deal with the more advanced stages of language assimilation.

    It's a very complex debate and has merits and demerits on both sides. However, I think the first hurdle that we STILL have to overcome in this country is the reluctance which is prevalent amongst children and their parents to accept that there is a case for English speakers to learn any language other than their own, on the basis that 'everybody speaks English, don't they?' The great difficulty lies in trying to convince them that (a) this is not true, (b) it is an intensely arrogant position for us to adopt, and (c) there are many reasons anyway to learn the languages of other, centring around commercial good sense and the quality of our interactions with other countries.
    

25. At 10:40 AM on 06 Aug 2007, wrote:

    Mick McNeill:I think there are two distinct issues here.

    We all learn our mother tongue without grammar. We can, if we wish, learn about grammar.

    We could, if we wanted, learn foreign languages the same way we learn our mother tongue (by starting young, using immersion). We can also learn the grammar of other languages.

    Our problem is that we do neither - we don't learn English grammar, so we can't map other languages onto our own, and we don't start so young that we don't need to. We should start learning other languages much earlier (5-years-old would do).

    But we (English) won't tackle this seriously until we overcome our national arrogance, as Big Sister says.

    Sid
    

26. At 01:06 PM on 06 Aug 2007, admin annie wrote:

    I have studied a few languages in my time; some at school and uni and some at evening class. I have to say that the ones that stick best are the ones I learned at evening class, which is possibly something to do with motivation, or with the fact that you learn useful everyday stuff, or with the fact that they are not so long ago.
    However I have to say that nothing holds a class up so much as the people who have trouble following grammar; ie the ones who have to ask what a noun is, or why there is more than one version of the past tense etc etc and the most irritating ones are those who, faced with a concept thay doesn't translate directly into english such as noun genders and adjectival agreement, start abusing the foreign language and its native speakers. Yes I really have heard people say' but that's just stupid' and 'why do they do that, it's silly' and even 'why can't it be like it is in English'.
    I try hard not to let my irritation show because for many people it isn't their fault as they weren't taught english grammar at school. Quite often peolpe look aghast when you explain that not only does english 'have a grammar' but that it is one of the most difficult to learn.