Sunday, December 20, 2009

Little Mraz

While on the website Today's Big Thing, I ran into the "Little Boy Kind of Sings Jason Mraz" in which a little boy plays the melody to Jason Mraz's "I'm Yours" on his yukulele.

                                                                                           


When I first saw this video a few weeks ago, I suggested to my wife that maybe the boy doesn't speak English, so he just sings what the song sounds like to him, without really understanding what he is saying or what the words to the song mean.  It would be similar to how I would sound to a Spanish speaker when I sing along to "La Bamba" or Santana's "Oye Como Va".  I just try to piece together the sounds of the song, even though I have no idea their meaning or even which sounds are combined to create a word.

Which leads me to another video featured at Today's Big Thing, which I think makes the case for me that the little boy may not be an English speaker.  "What English Sounds Like to Foreiners" is a video by "an Italian singer (who) wrote this song with gibberish to sound like English. If you've ever wondered what other people think Americans sound like, this is it."

                                                                                           

A psychedelic video with catchy music.  But it brings home an interesting point on how languages are viewed by people foreign to that language.

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