tlhIngan-Hol Archive: Tue Dec 24 14:11:01 1996
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Ebonics, a 2nd language
- From: [email protected] (JEFF ZEITLIN)
- Subject: Ebonics, a 2nd language
- Date: Tue, 24 Dec 96 17:08:00 -0500
- Organization: Execnet Information System - 914-667-4567 - 206.181.98.136
I got this from an acquaintance on Compuserve. I figured that
some of the people on this list might get at least a little bit
of a chuckle out of it. If a spokesperson for the KLI would
like to make an official comment, I'll forward it back to
Compuserve...
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Cambridge, MA (AP) ... The city of Cambridge, MA, today passed an ordinance
declaring Klingon to be a first language for many students attending
prestigious MIT here.
"So many of our students are 'Trekkies' that we found many of them use
Klingon among themselves as a first language," said Ms. Harriett Noonian
Singh, Assistant Dean for Student Affairs at the Masachusetts Institute of
Technology. "Especially in computer lab, if you can't speak Klingon. you just
can't keep up. These kids were victimized from watching so much 'Star Trek'
growing up that we find they are now discriminated against by having to
communicate in English with people outside the Computer Science Department
here at school."
On Friday, the Board aof Directors at MIT, with the approval of the city
manager for Cambridge, declared Klingon to be the first language for students
at MIT, and submitted a formal request to the US Department of Health and
Human Services for a federal grant to both further Klingon culture and to
teach English as a second language. At the same time, MIT has submitted a
demand to the Educational and Testing Company in Princeton, NJ, to begin
giving SAT aptitude and achievement tests in Klingon starting in school year
1998.
"No one should be at a disadvantage in testing just because they have grown
up using the language of a different species, " explained Ms. Singh. "The
days of species-specific discrimination are over. Klingon-speakers feel
strongly that they should not be put at a disadvantage just because their
particular dialect differs from the norm of human white male patriarchical
oppression."
Reached for comment, senior Ronald Geekman was quoted as saying, "Malech bin
arghg nup haleechi boruchni squep!"
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It's really too bad that there's no clue as to what "Geekman"
was saying; I would have made an effort to rewrite it in Hol...
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Jeff Zeitlin [email protected]
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� OLXWin 1.00b � It was so quiet you could hear a pun drop.