Fraggle -- 1. Your joke was black and not appreciated.
This is a cultural issue. In America we joke about black market software all the time. (We actually use the word "bootleg" rather often, but I assumed that you might not understand it.) No offense was intended so I apologize, but I also urge you to "get with the program," to use an American colloquialism. Most Americans will not understand why you consider that an insult, so very few of them will bother apologizing.
2. This is a forum for discussing linguistics, not teaching of English language.
Actually quite a bit of teaching occurs on the Linguistics board. Saint started a question-and-answer thread a long time ago and it now has 20 pages. I'm the most experienced teacher here (I've taught technical and business writing and English-as-a-second-language as well as other subjects such as software measurement) and I'm also the most knowledgeable about linguistics, so I answer more of the questions than the other members do. Nonetheless the other members do chime in.
Any forum in which people ask questions about the use of language is a teaching forum. And this is true whether they are native speakers of a single dialect (most of us are Americans); native speakers of another dialect (we have plenty of Indians here as well as Aussies and Kiwis, all of whom speak dialects other than American English); or speakers of another language (we have members who speak Chinese, Russian and several others).
A namaste with joined palms is much more prevalent, and it is for all occasions. Try that, it is much more mutually satisfactory.
In America when you say
namaste to an Indian man he bows and returns it. But if you say it to an Indian woman she just giggles and thinks you're silly. A friend finally explained to me that when a foreigner says
namaste to an Indian woman, she thinks he is just flirting. It would really be bad to say that to her if she's with her husband!
4. Your Indian friends pronounce words which are hard to understand by you. But it is the other way round too. Ever thought?
Of course! Although these people have lived in America for so many years that they now understand our accent. It's easier to learn to understand someone else's accent than it is to learn to mimic it. I know people who have lived here for fifty years and their pronunciation is still so bad that we have trouble understanding them. (I'm not talking about Indians; I would say that Russians and Chinese have the biggest problem with English phonetics.)
Your right to offense does not translate as an obligation for others to act, deal with it.
Of course it's not an
obligation, especially in America where manners are not a high priority. We are regarded as the rudest people on earth by many foreigners. Nonetheless, I don't see any reason to be proud of that reputation. Civilization is, after all, built on the premise that we are
civil to each other. This means that we should try not to casually hurt each other for no reason or very little reason. Obviously that includes not hurting each other with words, which are not too difficult to correct.
English is like Spanish: There is a huge international community consisting of many different countries in which people speak the same language. But unlike Spanish, the differences in culture and customs between the various English-speaking countries is much greater. A Nicaraguan can fairly easily avoid being casually rude to an Argentine; even in Spain the customs are familiar enough that Latin Americans can be polite with only a little bit of thoughtfulness.
But on the other hand it's easy for Americans and Englishmen to insult each other without thinking, despite our shared language. Fortunately we have been watching each other's movies and TV shows and listening to each other's music for so long that we're used to it and we usually just laugh instead of taking offense.
And the difference between America and India is
much greater. Indians are a different culture; they're not just the great-grandchildren of English immigrants like we Americans are (spiritually if not by DNA). India has a separate history going all the way back to its origin: It's one of the world's six independently-founded civilizations, not an offshoot of Mesopotamian civilization as all of Europe, the Middle East and Americas are.
[The other four are China, Egypt, Olmec and Inca.] On top of that it was overrun by the Persian empire; so it has roots in both Hindu and Muslim culture, unlike our roots in Christianity. This makes it
really different.
This is a linguistic subforum which is inexorably linked to customs and nuanced interpretation. Instead of applying your local interpretation of the link between improper and immoral why not accept his words which described intent explicitly?
Indeed. I understand that in some contexts "immoral" and "improper" have similar meanings; nonetheless to be accused of doing something immoral is much harsher than to be accused of doing something improper. In other contexts there is no comparison. To tell someone that the reason his TV isn't working is that he connected the components
improperly is no moral judgment at all: it's just a helpful technical comment. If you say he did it "immorally," at the very least that means something like having
bootlegged his neighbor's cable or satellite service and getting it without paying for it. Even so, in America it's a national pastime to cheat corporations so this immorality is of a very minor kind, unless you happen to be talking to the police.
However, he often fails to grasp Americanism's, because in truth their literal translation is nonsensical.
The idioms of any dialect of any language are often inscrutable. That's what makes them
idioms!
In the Muslim World, to shake hands with somebody is a welcome sign and the practice of the Prophet Mohammed. The social behavior of the Companions also included handshaking along with saying, "As-Salamu `Alaikum." This Hadith by Abu Dawud shows that the custom of handshaking was prevalent in Yemen before Islam. When some Yemenites came to see the Prophet, they displayed their practice of handshake. He approved of it and made it a part of his sunnah.
It's commonly asserted that the practice of shaking hands evolved in the Bronze Age as a means of demonstrating to a person from another tribe or city that you are not concealing a weapon. Apparently everybody was right-handed in those days.
In some Muslim countries (such as Turkey or the Arabic-speaking Middle East), handshakes aren't as firm as in North America and Europe. Consequently, a grip which is too firm will be considered as rude.
Yes, over the past few decades handshaking has become a sport and men try to fracture each other's metacarpals to show which one is stronger.
Kissing each other on the cheek twice is a more common practice.
That is still practiced is some European cultures but never in America. It carries a hint of homosexuality, an issue with which our culture has been struggling for half a century. We've made a lot of progress but heterosexual men are still not ready to kiss each other.
In China, where a weak handshake is also preferred, people shaking hands will often hold on to each other's hands for an extended period after the initial handshake. In Japan, it is appropriate to let the Japanese initiate the handshake, and a weak handshake is preferred. In South Korea, a senior person will initiate a handshake, where it is preferred to be weak. It is a sign of respect to grasp the right arm with the left hand when shaking hands.
In those countries bowing is the traditional greeting and it comes with a whole catalog of nuances. The person of lower social status bows first and bows lowest, one always bows deeply to a foreign guest, etc. Handshaking is strictly a Western practice. They have adopted it in order to integrate with the Western economies, but it still feels foreign to them.
In America, since the feminist movement began in the 1960s, it has become almost standard for women to shake hands with men or with each other, at least in business relationships.
Lately, hugging has become common practice, although not in business. When you meet a person you know socially, even if one of you is male and one female, the greeting is often a hug. It's very unusual for Americans to shake hands outside of the business environment. In some social groups men and women will kiss each other, even if they're just friends without any romantic involvement.
Many of the Indian women I work with are so Americanized that they practice hugging too (even men). I understand that in the old country this might be considered scandalous in public.
