#8 so say you were shopping...

Edioma: it sounds like a good concept in theory, but will it actually produce the perceived results?

Edioma is the new portable application on your cell phone (as if we needed any more) that helps foreign language speakers facilitate their integration into english culture, especially in the verbal sense. Taken word for word, Edioma is designed to allow "Spanish (or other) speakers to learn helpful English phrases through their cell phone." To minimize the common translation mistakes that occurs with online translators, search phrases are organized into different "situational needs" to best match the situation at hand.
Quote: "When a speaker needs to say something in English, they just look up the phrase in Spanish and then choose one. On the screen, the English phrase pops up while a voice speaks the words in English. A user can either listen and repeat the words, hand the phone to an English listener or use the service to memorize the phrases for later."
And to add to this idealized version of language translation, Edioma also promises "educational games" to further one's English learning skills.

Now that sounds like a good idea and all (afterall, pocket translators can become cumbersome...) but if we really think about it, will it really yield such desired results?

First, let's take it from an economic point of view;
premise: I'll discuss the following perspectives using the Spanish speaker's example
1. the cost of this application is unclear, and generally speaking, a large proportion of the Spanish population in California are immigrants (lets put legality aside for a moment..) and many arrive in the US with minimum percurniary capabilities. So that's to say, why would you, an immigrant, spend money on an application that's not guaranteed to work 100% of the time when you can take ESL classes at a local college/adult school at very nominal cost? Additionally, no electronic application can mimic the educational experience to be gained from a classroom setting.

From a sociological point of view (I think this is the crux of my argument against Edioma)
1. Edioma describes an ideal situaion where the English learner can "either listen and repeat the words, hand the phone to an English listener or use the service to memorize the phrases for later." But let's consider a real life situation:
A Spanish-speaking immigrant is shopping at the local mall during the Christmas rush season. He stumbles across an item that seems very intriguing, but can't exactly identify the purpose/ cost of the object. The only employee he sees nearby is one who looks very harried and busy, but decides that he has no other alternative. So, he approaches with employee with his handy dandy Edioma-equipped cell phone.
In this above situation, it is reasonable to surmise that
1. in addition to the language and cultural barrier, the spanish speaker will probably feel even more ill at ease if he had to approach the employee with an electronic translator. Just by simply visualizing the situation, one will see that when the Edioma user finally locates the English phrase he wishes to convey (and that's assuming that he's familiar enough with the technology and set up of the program to get the right within a decent number of seconds), the awkwardness and possible frustration will be enough to perpetuate tensions between the two parties. The employee, already not in the best of moods, will be aggravated when constantly handed the cell phone and detest communication with what essentially is an electronic party. On the other hand, the Spanish-speaker will be embarassed that he had to resort to such cumbersome ways to convey his questions, and at the same time uncertain whether or not the translator captured the nuances of his question. What can result is then, confusion, exasperation, or admittance to defeat ( or combinations of any of the above)

what we have above, then, is a very unideal situation. It completely defeats the purpose of cultural immersion, and in some ways is very counterproductive. Additionally, it is psychologically more comforting to have a translator constantly at your side than to have to rely on oneself for all the translation, so what can possibly happen is an over-dependence on electronic applications and subjecting oneself to the control of a inanimate entity.

This situation can also be used to address the question Steve posed in my last post: what are people really thinking when they interpret speech? When people process speech from another party, it is a combination of influctuations, tones, expressions, and words that help them put together a hollistic picture of what the other party is saying. Thus, with the advent of this electronic translator, only the words portion of the whole picture will be conveyed, thus depriving the receiving party of a large part of the equation. We ask ourselves, how realistic is it to expect a person to search up the phrase they want to convey, show it to the receiving party, and simulataneously put on expressions/gestures to get across what sentiments they wanted to accompany such phrases? Short answer: not very.

Thus, as ideal a language panacea this may seem, it is either an all too optimistic a forecast, or just a clever attempt of American capitalists to exploit and manipulate the situations of foreigners in America. Which interpretation do you guys think is more correct?

sources
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/sfgate/detail?blogid=19&entry_id=21348