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Gene Kim-Eng wrote:
> Well, sort of. I do feel all that pressure, but have been
> feeling it all my
> life, not merely because I became a writer. When you grow up with
> people constantly asking you "how long have you been in this country?"
> and complimenting you on how good your English is "for a <insert
> ethnicity here>," the result is a nagging feeling that you have to
> constantly work on ensuring that your English is not merely as good
> as the average person's, but better.
Gene helped me realize my answer to diotima's question. Other people don't necessarily judge the way that I speak, but *I* do. I am conscious of every word that I write or speak, whether I'm at work or not, and I'm sure it's related to the household in which I grew up. Back when I was a kid, only grandparents were "allowed" to have accents, and I stood out because my parents were immigrants. I was always conscious of people's negative reactions to my parents' accents and speech, and I have to admit that I was morbidly embarrassed by it. After the kids finished telling me how little they could understand my mom or dad, they made fun of the way that I pronounced some words or ways that I screwed up sentence syntax. I learned to go out of my way to make sure that I spoke correctly because I wanted to fit in.
That could very well be why I eventually became a writer/editor. I have an internal grammarian going non-stop, and I can't turn it off any more than I could change my height or the color of my eyes. I love the English language because of how hard I had to work to become good at it, and I'm a stickler for what's considered "proper" because things that aren't "proper" are equivalent to fingernails running down a chalk board to me. If it's someone else's writing or speech, I usually shudder and move on, but if it's mine, I have to correct it.
Donna
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