About two weeks into my tenure teaching at the high school in Elulakeni, Swaziland, one of my students stayed after class one afternoon. He waited politely for the class to leave, and for me to sit down at my desk, and then he approached me.

Me: Yes, Mfanawenkhosi, is there something I can do for you?

Mfana: Yes, sir. I was thinking.

He hesitated.

Me: Did it hurt?

Mfana: What?

Me: This thinking that you did. Was it painful?

Mfana: Well, I don’t know. But I wanted to ask you something.

He seemed kind of nervous.

Me: Ask away.

Mfana: Yes, well, I wanted to ask you why your English skills are so poor. You are from America, where they speak English, but I can hardly understand you. I was talking with some other boys yesterday, and we were all wondering about this.

I could see that he was embarrassed to talk about it. I remembered the first couple days of class, and how I would talk about something woodworky, and be met with blank faces, and when I would ask the boys if they were following me, they just sat there. And at that time, I realized that I was speaking too fast, and the boys weren’t able to understand me. So I had slowed my speech way, way down, and that seemed to do the trick. At first, it was almost painful to do. I had to speak so painfully slowly, and over pronounce the words I was saying. I felt like that old Nestle’s Quick tv commercial, where the guy said really slowly, “I’ve got the slows.” I had to speak almost in a drone, to get my ideas across. I had sort of gotten used to that, and it was less painful now, but it seemed to take forever for me to get through what I was trying to teach. But I wanted him to clarify his issue with my speech.

Me: What is it that you are not understanding?

Mfana: Well, sir, it is that you do not pronounce words properly. It makes it difficult to hear you. Why is your English so poor?

I had been speaking English for 39 years. I was somewhat taken aback. But in thinking about it, I realized that the problem was my Texas accent. Swazis had learned English from the British, who had set up the schools, and infrastructure of the country. And the people of Swaziland spoke British English, which was a far cry from Texas English.

Me: I understand, Mfanawenkhosi. It is my accent that you do not understand.

Mfana: What is an accent, sir?

Me: It is a dialect. It is like how people in Kwa Zulu in South Africa speak slightly differently than Swazis do.

Mfana: Um, yes sir, maybe so.

Me: Ok, I will try harder to make sure that you can understand me.

Mfana: (looking relieved) Yes sir. Thank you.

And he left to go home. The next day in class, I took the bull by the horns, and addressed the issue with the whole class.

Me: It has been brought to my attention, class, that some of you are still having problems understanding me when I am speaking. Where I am from, we speak a different English than you are accustomed to hearing. You learned your English from the British, and we Americans speak our own style of the language. I am sorry that it is confusing you, and I will try harder to speak more clearly.

The boys looked puzzled. So, I spoke to them imitating how they spoke on Monty Python.

Me: Bring out your dead! We cahn’t tyke im, ees not dead yet! (a quote from one of my favorite Monty Python episodes, rendered in their accent)

A student: Yes! That is better.

Me: Well, in Texas, our English is different even from the English from other parts of America, but it is still English. In fact, I would like to teach you the special greeting that we use in Texas. Here is how we greet each other in Texas. “Howdy Y’all.”

Blank faces.

Me: I would like you to practice my home state greetings, so that when I greet you at the beginning of class, you can return my greeting in a manner that makes me feel less far away from home. Howdy Y’all. Come on boys, try it. Howdy Y’all.

The Boys: (mumbling)

Me: Listen. (I said it slowly and carefully) Howwwwdeee Y’all.

The Boys: Hoe dee Ull.

Me: Howdy Y’all

The Boys: Hoe Dee Ull.

If you have never heard words before, it is difficult to reproduce them.

Me: Howdy Y’all.

The Boys: Hoe Dee Ull.

I had to take what they had to give. At least they were trying. And from that day forward, my classes started with me greeting them in Texan.

Me: Howdy Y’all.

And the boys would say in unison, “Hoe Dee Ull.”

I had had the same problem with my name when I first started teaching. At first I tried to have them call me Mr Birchall. And they tried, but the SiSwati alphabet has no R in it, and as a result, they couldn’t say the R sound. So I found that a boy would be trying to get my attention by saying my name, but it came out so twisted because of their wrestling with the R sound, that I didn’t recognize that they were saying my name, and after two days, I started using my Swazi name, Maseko, which everybody knew and could pronounce.

One day, without thinking, I said “Howdy Y’all boys” and they promptly parroted back to me, “Hoe Dee Ull Boys.” Ok, keep it simple. And I kept it to Howdy Y’all from then on.

Proper English Matters