A few hums

[Iljitsch van Beijnum]

On woensdag, jul 23, 2003, at 00:02 Europe/Amsterdam, Melinda Shore 
wrote:

> In the discussion of whether or not there's a problem
> accomodating ESL speakers, the discussion broadened a bit to
> cover cultural issues, the hum indicated that those present
> felt that we needed more text on this issue.

Something that people who aren't used to working in a second or third 
language may not realize is that it often simply takes more time to 
digest what is said in English for non-native speakers. For me, it's 
especially this humming thing that usually happens way too fast. There 
was more than one occasion last week where the hum was over before I 
could join in. For some unknown reason, this problem is much less for 
me with hand raising, although a few triple negatives in the question 
slow me down in that case too.

And was it just me or were many of the participants from Japan 
especially hard to understand? I think in many cases this is 
exacerbated when people (try to) speak too fast. Maybe some kind of 
sunday session where people who will be presenting later in the week 
can get some feedback on the way they speak can take the edge off here. 
The system they use for the ICANN meetings where all text is typed in 
verbatim and projected on a screen is also a very good solution and 
comes in handy for other reasons as well, but this is probably way too 
expensive.

As for cultural issues: it may be good to say something about what is 
the appropriate way to get someone's attention for exchanging a few 
words before/after a session or in the hallways.