Taiwan’s “more amiable English services”
Posted by site admin on 24 Nov 2006 at 04:20 pm | Tagged as: English, Taipei, Taiwan, languages, signage
With the end of the year approaching, it is once again time for Taiwan to tout the quality of the island’s English environment by putting together a “carnival” and tossing online a website in awkward English.
Perhaps word got back to the powers that be that the English in last year’s site was bad beyond belief, because this year’s site to promote English has largely left out use of that particular language! Much of the English that is there, while not so howlingly inept as that in last year’s site, is still awkward, clichéd bullshit. Here’s an example:
The Logo features close affiliation between the globe and the smiling Taiwan, symbolizing Taiwan’s linkage to the world. The expression of “English-friendly Environment” that circles the globe and the sign of “A+” on Taiwan fully convey the ideas of creating a quality and friendly internationalized environment, as well as broadening the scope of social participation. To advance Taiwan’s connection with the world, and provide better services to foreign friends who visit Taiwan, the Research, Development and Evaluation Commission of the Executive Yuan is going to use the Logo as the basis to design a emblem that identifies a quality English-friendly environment, which will be advertised and promoted through a certificating mechanism, in order to increase the number of popular locations that offer quality English services, so that foreign friends can not only easily identify those locations but also get access to more amiable English services.
One of the few parts of the site with any useful information is the page of “Important Achievements of Creating an English Living Environment.” Some of the things listed there even are important achievements. Nonetheless, Taiwan has many fundamental problems with its approach to English — and to romanization, too. One of the biggest of these problems is that English and romanization are treated as last-minute details of little importance.
I could go on and on about this; but it’s all too depressing.
source: 2006 English Carnival
I think they could have made that third sentence a bit longer.
They’ve corrected the spelling, but their graphic originally read “ENGLISG CARNIVAL.” That’s right, they couldn’t even spell the word “English” correctly!
Here’s are two screenshots I took on November 7, 2006:
http://img221.imageshack.us/my.php?image=englisg1hx0.jpg
http://img214.imageshack.us/my.php?image=englisg2qe0.jpg
The first one is from the banner ad that appeared on the Taipei Times’ web site. The URL is visible in the second one.
Those images are priceless!
English any better?! This is the rules for the ‘Plant the Tree’ game on the site..
‘Taiwan construction English environment more and more friendly, may see name that China and Britain contrast oftenning, Name of the way and sign , foreign friends buy snack from Taiwan, there is English can be contrasted. Wonder which people surface feature name that China and Britain contrast does it have? Come to play and plant the tree game quickly ,
So long as select can plant out big beautiful trees to correct English !’
omg..
“EnglisG” is back! As recently as today (December 7), ads appearing at the top of the pages on the Taipei Times web site had reverted to the wrong spelling. Unbelievable!
MarkW: Good catch. Amazing.
Tim: OMG, you’re right.
Although the “Englisg Carnival” is under the central government, this sort of extreme sloppiness could happen almost anywhere in Taiwan. The Taipei City Government, for example, is of the opinion that it doesn’t have any more serious problems with English. (Really! I’m not making this up.) That’s because foreigners aren’t submitting many complaints. But I think it’s just that most foreigners have given up hope that the city (or country) is ever going to get things right.
I clicked on the “Englisg” banner and was led to a page on the Taipei Times‘ site with the headline “Foreigners can also climb Mt. Yushan on their owns“.
“Welcome back, my friends, to the show that never ends!”
I just took a screenshot of that amazing “Foreigners can…” headline right on the index page of the Taipei Times site, still bearing the “EnglisG” spelling, of course. Can you say “OMGWTFBBQ”?
Ya gotta see the show — it’s a dynamo!
http://img215.imageshack.us/my.php?image=fernersqb5.jpg
As Tim so aptly put, it’s “the show that never ends.” Today I spotted another version of the ad banner. Although the people who made it did manage to spell “English” correctly this time, they still had some problems with the word “touring,” which is written as “toruing.” Even had “touring” been spelled correctly, however, the English would still be poor: “Leisurely toruing of Yingge Ceramics Museum and the Tsushih Temple for foreign visitors”. And the romanization ain’t too good, either, using both Tongyong (and Hanyu) Pinyin spelling (for “Yingge”) and Wade-Giles spelling (for “Tsushih,” which would is Zushi in Hanyu Pinyin and Zushih in Tongyong Pinyin).