Hoomor Has It

Monday, 07 May 2012
At a local yogurt shop with Owen this afternoon, while we sat quietly eating out comsetibles, a song came on over the speakers. This conversation ensued:

Owen: What’s “hoomor”?

Me: What?

Owen: “Hoomor.” H-O-O-M-O-R. The lady in the song keeps saying “hoomor has it.”

Me: Oh. No, actually she’s saying “rumor has it,” and it’s spelled R-U-M-O-R.” [Note: Yes, I know Adele spells it “Rumour,” but I didn’t want Owen to learn it the wrong way. Adele is British and British people always get our language wrong.]

Owen: Oh. Well what’s that mean?

Me: Rumor? That means, like, something you’ve heard but you don’t know if it’s true or not. Like if I say that I heard a rumor that you’re going on a vacation, but I don’t know if it’s true or not until I check with you.

Owen: It still doesn’t make sense – “rumor has it?”

Me: Oh, I see what you’re saying. Yeah, it technically doesn’t make sense. “Rumor has it” is a colloquialism. Do you know what that is?

Owen: No.

Me: Well, it’s like a fun way of saying something. Like, she’s singing about how she’s heard rumors from her friends that her boyfriend doesn’t love her anymore, so she is telling her boyfriend that she’s heard rumors, but instead of saying “I have heard rumors that you dont’ love me anymore,” she says “rumor has it.” It’s just a funny way people say it. It doesn’t really make any sense, and it’s tough for kids, like you, who are learning the language, because they might understand all the words, but not understand what the words mean when they’re put together like that. People who move here from other countries have the same problem.

Owen: Are there other colloke…colloquil…

Me: Colloquialisms? Oh yeah. There’s loads of ’em. [Thinking for a minute.] I can’t think of any right now, though. [Thinking some more.] Nope. I can’t think of any. Listen to this part of the song, she’s about to say “rumor has it” a bunch of times.

Owen: Why do they play this song?

Me: It’s just a popular song right now. She’s a famous singer, and when famous singers make new songs, radio stations like to play them.

Owen: Why is she famous?

Me: I don’t know all the reasons. She’s a good singer, but I suppose there’s a lot of good singers who aren’t famous.

Owen: Why is she a good singer?

Me: Well, she can sing really high and really low. And she can change pitch pretty easily. She also does things with her voice that most singers can’t do.

Owen: I bet her mom and dad are proud of her.

Me: Yeah. Hopefully they are. I hope they would be proud of her even if she wasn’t a really good and famous singer, though, right?

Owen: Yeah.

We got up to leave, and as we passed the cashier, I said, “See ya!” Then I said to Owen, “Hey, that’s a colloquialism – ‘see ya’. See? It doesn’t really make sense, it’s just a fun way of saying “Good-bye, we will probably see each other again sometime.”

Owen: My hands are sticky.

Tuesday, 08 May 2012
As today was the last regular class of “The Twentieth Century and You” (or whatever it’s called), the professor asked what we felt were the most important accomplishments or issues for the United States between 1900 and 2000.

One student raised his hand and said, “Civil rights.”

Yeah, that’s a good answer. You might hear ‘civil rights’ and just think of the racial issues of the 1960s, but that’s just the most memorable part of it. The whole century, really, featured women’s rights issues and black-white issues. To a lesser extent, there were pushes for Native American rights, prison reform, gay rights, and reforms in immigration, poverty, and education.

The next student said the triumph of democracy. I think this is a good answer, too. On the one hand, it’s not right to say democracy has triumphed, since many places are without democracy, and many other places (including the US) could go a long way towards becoming a true democracy. But really, indigenous groups have pushed for their freedoms and for expanded rights. The Nazi and Soviet systems are no more, and the majority of the world – under European colonialism in 1900 – is now under self-determining rule. Did you know that as of 2004, the majority of the world lives under democratic law? And look at a world map: oodles of countries (where “oodles” is defined as “196”) and very few colonies.

A third student said “The ascendancy of technology.” This is another good answer, and not just because the student used the word “ascendancy.” This dovetailed into the related issue of the US’s change from isolationist, to shared superpower status (first with Britain, then with the USSR), to it’s standing as the sole colossus on the globe.

A fourth student said “Vietnem,” which just proves not everyone understands basic American history.

Wednesday, 09 may 2012

I met with the professor today to hammer out a few questions regarding the upcoming exam. While talking with her, she commented on my vote for a 45 minute exam yesterday. Let me take you back one day real quick…

So, in class yesterday, the professor asked if anyone had any questions about the impending exam. I raised my hand and said: “Last week, you said the exam would be 45 minutes, but today you said one hour. Which is it?”

She said: “Which do you want it to be?”

I shrugged as if it was obvious, and said, “45 minutes.” A bunch of my fellow students balked at this. One student turned to look at me and said, “Why would you want only 45 minutes?” I hurriedly explained, “If she’s only expecting 45 minutes of writing, we don’t have to prepare as much, and we can write for, like 50 minutes and get all the info down.” The professor put it up to a vote.

I was the only one who voted for the 45-minute option. Everyone else, it seemed, wanted the teacher to expect an additional 25% of work.

So, today, in her office, the teacher said, “I don’t think those other students knew what they were voting for.” I laughed and said, obviously, I agreed with her. “They way I see it,” I said, “If you are only expecting me to write for 45 minutes, then I can write for close to an hour and I’ll be able to cover everything. But if you’re expecting an hour’s worth of writing, now I have to write for, like, 70 minutes to fit in everything you’ll want.”

She agreed. She said a lot of the students are still young and are overwhelmed by all the issues of the late 20th century. I asked her if she’d every heard “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”