Misspelled variable names

As a computer programmer, I face a conundrum whenever I see a variable name that is misspelled. For those of you who aren't programmers, variable names are words that exist in the source code (written in C or C++ or Java or whatever) of a program. Source code gets compiled into a binary executable, which is the thing you actually run.

For anything that's actually seen by users---prompts, error messages, configuration files---I, of course, insist on proper spelling and grammar. That's just part of putting out a quality product. But variable names aren't seen by anyone other than fellow programmers, and when a variable is used many times throughout a program consisting of thousands or millions of lines of code in perhaps hundreds of files, changing it is time-consuming and risky. The benefit is questionable, too; it might be easier for future programmers using that variable to remember it, but compilers will catch inconsistencies in spelling anyway.

My general practice is to leave the misspelling but grumble about it as often as possible to anyone who will listen. The latest one I encountered today was DELIMITER (something like a comma or space or tab to separate fields) misspelled as DELIMETER. People really don't think before they spell. The word "delimiter" comes from "limit", which this programmer presumably knows how to spell. "Delimeter" looks like "Deli-meter" to me, which looks like something a sandwich shop might use to keep track of sales or ingredients.

WHAT people?

A few days ago, I was listening to news coverage about Graham v. Florida and Sullivan v. Florida when I heard what is for me a dreaded phrase: "These people." Variations on "These people are unsalvageable. These people are recidivists. These people have nothing to offer society."

Although I hadn't heard of either of these cases previously, I immediately suspected that both Graham and Sullivan were black males. And I was right. Why? Because the vague designation of "these people" can only be used when the reference is obvious. And all too often, it is marginalized groups of society who are collectively characterized in this manner. I have heard "these people" used to refer to blacks, Asians, Muslims, homosexuals, and transgender individuals. Yes, individuals. The privilege to be considered individuals and not representations of an entire population is only granted to those in the majority. Try Googling "nidal malik hasan 'these people'" and nearly all of hits will use that phrase to designate...what? Islamic fundamentalists? All practioners of Islam? People with dark skin? By contrast, Googling "timothy mcveigh 'these people'" produces results in which the phrase refers as often to the victims or Washington politicians as to domestic terrorists.

Though not as blatantly derogatory as "you people" (think John McCain speaking to Latinos), I think we'd all be better off avoiding the use of "these people" or "those people". Let's say what we mean. At the very least, we avoid ambiguity. And perhaps, even, by asking ourselves the question, "WHAT people?" we might begin to notice our prejudices and assumptions and examine them.

¿No habla inglés? ¡No se permite manejar!

Apparently some officers on the Dallas police force have been ticketing drivers for not being able to speak English.

As a former software engineer who has spent a lot of time fixing poor user interfaces, I do think it's entirely plausible that rookie cops might select an option from a pull-down menu called "non-English speaking driver", thinking it was an informative note rather than an instruction to issue a ticket. At least, I prefer that possibility over the idea that police officers might actually believe this to be a real law and seek to enforce it. The police chief seems extremely cool about it all, which is a refreshing change from how these types of challenges usually go down.

Another chance to do good

My commute for my new job in Boston is entirely via public transportation. As I got off at the subway station earlier this week, I was approached by an Asian gentleman holding a coffee cup and a dollar bill. I thought he was a panhandler at first, but then he asked me (in Mandarin) whether I spoke Mandarin. My grasp of this particular language is "conversational" at best, and even that is a generous characterization. I answered "a little", and got enough of his response to realize that he was asking me how to buy a weekly pass. I navigated the menus on the ticket machine and managed to confirm, "七 天? (seven days)" and tell him that it was "十五 (15)"...I didn't know the Mandarin for "dollar", but he figured it out.

While I have assisted strangers with my Spanish skills several times before, this is the first time I've been able to use my Mandarin. Many times throughout my life, I've been approached by people who either assume or ask whether I speak Mandarin, and I've hated saying no. There is no greater joy to me than being able to build bridges between people, especially of different cultures, to forge connections that would otherwise not exist. I miss interpreting.

After this incident I found renewed energy for listening to my Mandarin lesson podcasts, but realized I'd left my earphones at home. There's nothing like real-world application to motivate one to learn.

Employed!

Language Lover is happy to report that after ten long months, she has finally found gainful employment.

It took much longer than I had expected, and was accompanied by far greater changes than I had envisioned, but all is well now. Yesterday, I got on a one-way flight to Boston, and on October 1, I'm beginning my new job on the technical staff of MIT Lincoln Laboratory, a research and development center that mostly does government defense work. My husband and two girls will be joining me in a few months.

Some highlights along the way...

I'd hoped, as previously mentioned, to make a career change to a language-intensive field, or at least a technical field where knowledge of language would be useful. It seemed like a possibility when I was recruited for a software internationalization position at The Mathworks, but I didn't get the job. However, during the interview trip I realized that I really wanted to move back to Boston, so after discussion with my family, I refocused my job search to the East Coast. I had high hopes of working at multilingual software company Basis Technology after initial enthusiasm from the CEO and recruiting manager, but in the end they decided that they wanted local candidates with direct experience.

I decided that in this economy it's too hard to make a career change (without a huge pay cut, anyway...I did get considered for an administrative position at Berlitz, but decided that was way too impractical), especially one that involves a cross-country move. Although doing language and linguistics work full-time remains my ultimate goal, I'm content to stay in the scientific and high-tech fields while I make progress in other non-professional areas of my life. And the Laboratory does have a Speech and Language Processing division; they wouldn't consider me without a Ph.D. in computational linguistics or something, but perhaps once I prove myself there I'll have a chance to explore it further. For now, I'm just grateful to be back on my feet and looking forward to all the new changes in my life.

It's National Punctuation Day!

It's National Punctuation Day! If only that meant a reprieve from the egregious misuse of apostrophe's apostrophes.

Sync or synch?

I usually abbreviate various forms of the word "synchronization" with the spelling "sync". It just looks right to me, perhaps because it seems to be the more common spelling---the iTunes command, the band 'N Sync, etc. I've also seen it spelled "synch", but that looks a little weird and less aesthetically pleasing to me.

The linguist in me, however, realizes that the root is χρόνος ("time"), and the Greek letter chi (χ) is always transliterated into the Roman alphabet as ch. So it seems that one should preserve the final "h" in the abbreviation. "Synch" is more correct...but I still don't like the way it looks.

I feel torn between aesthetics and linguistic purity.

Dye it!

This evening I was at Starbucks and overheard a woman saying to her friend, "I'm going to diet tomorrow." This struck me as a little strange, both because she was fairly slim and because one doesn't usually decide to diet for one day---she hadn't said she would start dieting tomorrow, she just said she was going to diet tomorrow. I do live in California, home to weird ideas, so I figured maybe she was just hoping to make up for one pastry or one Frappucino too many with a one-day fast or something.

After surreptitiously eavesdropping a bit longer, I realized she was talking about her hair, and that she was going to dye it!

Mistaken identity

Today I called my friend Jocelyn, a sociologist who specializes in Latin America and speaks fluent Spanish. We'd been playing phone tag, and I was a little surprised when she answered her cell phone "Hola". But she has caller ID and she knows I speak Spanish as well, so I figured she was just being silly. I returned the greeting, "Hola, Jocelyn, ¿cómo estás?" and after a pause I heard her say in English, "I'm sorry...who am I speaking with?" Apparently her caller ID hadn't been functioning and she'd assumed I was her Colombian nanny.

It reminded me of a similarly funny incident that happened to me as a teenager once when my father was out of town. He'd usually call home every night, so one evening I answered the phone to hear a familiar voice ask in Mandarin whether my father was there. I thought, "Ha ha, very funny" and responded in a little girl's voice, "我不知道" ("I don't know"). He kept playing along, asking why I didn't know, to which I responded, "我聽不懂!" ("I don't understand!") Suddenly, I heard him speaking to a woman in the background who then got on the line to talk to me, and I realized in horror: This is not my father. By then I was mortified, and beyond the limits of my Mandarin, so there was only one possible course of action.

"MOM!!!!!"

FreeRice.com is back and even better!

Almost two years ago, I blogged about this wonderful site where you can test your English vocabulary. I stopped playing it after a while, and I think the site even disappeared for a time, but it's back and even better. The English vocabulary section is pretty much the same as it was before, just with the words distributed among more levels. And now there are other subjects, including art, chemistry, geography, English grammar, and foreign language vocabulary.

The English grammar quiz is pretty easy and there are only five levels; I got bored with it fairly quickly. The foreign language vocabulary quizzes have ten levels. For Spanish, in which I consider myself fluent, I hit level 10 quickly, as I'd expected. For German, which I took all through high school and have sort of kept up over the years, I could make it to level 10 but mostly centered around 9. I had much more fun with Italian and French, though, neither of which I've studied formally. With Italian, I found that my knowledge of Latin, Spanish, and music got me to level 8 fairly consistently. French is a bit farther from Latin, but combined with my Spanish and all the food-related terms I've picked up over the years, I managed to achieve level 7.

I don't think the database is that large for these languages, so I'll probably play them until I learn all the words. It's more fun than flashcards.