Hunglish or Engarian: Beszélsz magygolul?

(Illustration 1: Hello Tourist 4:00)

(Illustration 2: Hunglish 0:41)

1 What is Hunglish? (attempts at a working definition)

1.1 How many Hunglishes are there?
1.2 We are not alone: other –lishes
2 The rationale of Engarian and Magygol
3 Interference and interlanguage(s): bilingualism and semi-lingualism
3.1 Examples grouped
4 Is Hunglish really bad?
4.1 The driving force behind Hunglish
4.2 What/How can we learn from Hunglish?
4.3 The Hunglish Project at DSS

“Each country makes its own mistakes in a foreign language. Teachers of foreign languages know that there are certain mistakes
that are particularly typical of the country in which they are working. The most frequent—though not the only—cause of these
mistakes is interference from the learner’s own language. In the case of Hungarian learners of English, we have called the
language that arises Hunglish.”
(Susan Doughty and Geoff Thompson, Problem English, 1983.)

on the v. f. science university if I remember well Ne complainingelj! Futbal burdosház

gemkapocs itsy-bitsy geráré! STOP – árukiadás
a garázs szélén vettem klozet(t) a Böske broderja minket nyúz you 2 row
forkwash homokboszorkány baconszalonna megmarketingol
megmarkolták a lájszenszomat boxeralsó píár intercity
kollektál egérpad you get an egér míting
acidmumness flying machine mother ship fog peace call low farmer shop;
jeans saloon ice tea CHANGE (>csencselni) Vau!

“The French "gratte-ciel" is a word-coinage inspired by the model of the English "skyscraper" - "gratter" literally translates as "to
scrape", and "ciel" translates as "sky". The same is true for the Spanish word "rascacielos" (literally, a "scrape-skies") and to a
certain extent the German word "Wolkenkratzer" and the Norwegian word "skyskraper" (literally, a "cloud-scraper").”
felhőkarcoló
handball > kézilabda BUT football > labdarúgás (ball-kicking).

(http://www.everyculture.com/multi/Ha-La/Hungarian-Americans.html)
“The English language has had an impact on how Hungarian Americans speak Hungarian. This was particularly true for the less
educated immigrants, who readily mixed their simple Hungarian with working-class English. Thus, they rapidly developed a
language of their own known as "Hunglish" (Hungarian English), which introduced English words into the Hungarian, but
transformed them to fit Hungarian pronunciation and orthography: trén (train), plész (place), szalon (saloon), bedróm (bedroom),
atrec (address), tájm (time), szendsztón (sandstone), gud báj (good-bye), foriner (foreigner), fandri (foundry), fanesz (furnace),
bakszi (box), burdos (boarder), burdosház (boarding house), görl (girl), groszeri (grocery).”
“There was also a reverse version of Hunglish that may be called "Engarian" (English Hungarian), which adjusted the primitive
English to the ears of the immigrants. The result was two hodgepodge languages that were barely comprehensible to Hungarians
or Americans who did not speak both languages—for example: Szé, miszter, gimi order, maj hen trók brók ! (Say, Mister, give
me the order. My hand truck broke.). Such usage is no longer common, largely because the Americanized offspring of the turn-of-
the-century immigrants have switched to English but also because the more educated post-World War II immigrants never really
acquired it.”

www.ccusa.hu/fun/doc/Engarian%20Hunglish.doc and www.ccusa.hu/fun/index.html

(Illustration 3: Stranger than Paradise 3:05)

(Illustration 4: American Goulash Part 3 2:55)

Examples grouped
- if you forget/miss your cell phone at home -better than living in a college
- I think I’m not alone if I say -9 times from 10
- like in other western countries -to celebrate your triumph
- as you are on a lesson -full with strict rules
- with a little support of one of the shop assistants -try not to bring your room-mate in unpleasant situation
- shower you with useful advices -life is not so terrible than we thought before
-the top mistakes what a student can make -this shows that noone can agree with each other
-you will get fix salary -it really cause problem
PROBLEM ENGLISH: A PRACTICAL GUIDE FOR HUNGARIAN LEARNERS OF ENGLISH

*He told that he is tired. *The concert was a good amusement.

*Tell a few words about your holiday. *We are six.
*He suggested us to go to a restaurant. *a hundred fifty-six
*He mentioned us the title of the book. *He’s got much money in the bank.
*There were a lot of gossips about Charles and Diana. *I eat many apples to keep healthy.

Magygol

Kedves Bözsi ángyom! (Első levél és válasz)

Read more: http://www.kantorpal.com/kba/default.asp?qpage=1

-degrees of recognizability (bepancsolom magam, TRIPOLI)

-relation to folk etymology (Horror Bar for Hortobágy)
-juhtúró – you 2 row
-further examples: fakanál, forkwash, homokboszorkány
-ember! (for ‘Man’,); felejtsd el (for ‘forget it”); Vau! (for ‘Wow’)
-sapingolni vs. szévolni és csárdzsolni (az –ing végződés elhagyása/odabiggyesztése)

geráré! (Get out of here) [elimination of certain sounds], szanamabics (son-of-a bitch) [replacement of certain sounds], kanna sör
(a can of beer), bepancsoltam magam (I punched myself in), ma 40 bakit csináltam (I made 40 bucks today) [misuse of
vocabulary items through analogy of sounding], panoling (paneling) [vowel harmony], sitrakkolni (to work with sheet-rock
boards) [shortening of vowels], megyek a Tripoliba (I’m going to the AAA) [folk etymology],etc.
+ Kontra 1986, p 245, on klozet:
That semantic borrowing of this kind can cause genuine misunderstanding between speakers of Magygol and Standard Hungarian
became clear to me in the "Jail House Motel" in San Diego, California a few years ago. Having checked in with the owner, my H-
A friend and I started unpacking in our room when my friend said Egy fia klozet sincs itt, mi?. I was baffled by the question,
which I understood as There isn 't a single toilet here, is there?, all the more so because my friend had just come out of the toilet.
On a moment's reflection, however, I realized that he meant clothes closets. Klozet in Standard Hungarian means 'toilet' but in
English closet meaning a particular room or outbuilding has long been replaced by toilet, bathroom etc. Now the word means
'clothes closet'.

(E)SL > (H)TL

I’m hot. Meleg vagyok.
It’s raining. Esőzik.
Last night I went to bed early. Utolsó éjszaka korán ágyba mentem.
I still remember my wife’s younger sister. Még emlékszem a feleségem hugjára.
This is my last cigarette. Ez az utolsó szimfóniám.
I would like a “sarokház” cake. Kérek egy szarokházat.
Etc., etc.

Further sources:
Bakó, Elemér. Az amerikai magyarok nyelvének kutatásáról.
http://mek.oszk.hu/01600/01689/01689.htm#8

Dániel, Ferenc and István Orosz. Ah, Amerika! Dokumentumok a kivándorlásról (1896-1914).
Budapest: Gondolat, 1988.

Kontra, Miklós. 1985. “Hungarian-American Bilingualism: A Bibliographic Essay.”

http://epa.oszk.hu/01400/01462/00002/pdf/1985_2_257-282.pdf

---. 1986. “Az amerikai-magyar kétnyelvűség kutatásának áttekintése (1906-

1984)” KÜLÖNLENYOMAT A MAGYAR NYELVŐR 1986. ÉVI 2. SZÁMÁBÓL

---. 1990. Fejezetek a South Bend-i magyar nyelvhasználatból. Linguistica, Series A, 5.

Budapest: Institutum Linguisticum Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae. x+188 pp.

---. 1995. Túl a Kecegárdán: Calumet-vidéki amerikai magyar szótár [=Beyond Castle
Garden: An American Hungarian Dictionary of the Calumet Region]. Collected and compiled by Andrew Vázsonyi, edited by
Miklós Kontra. Budapest: Teleki László Alapítvány. 242 pp.

Nádasdy, Ádám. Mi az angol [Magyar Narancs, 2002/11/14]

Ardó Zsuzsanna, How To Be European: Go Hungarian – counter-example / ellenpélda