Quotes About Language

Certainly working with teens keeps me up to date with language and with certain kinds of thinking. I often feel like I have to go back to that 17-year-old Chris Crutcher, and that forms the core voice. I can draw on teens from 1964 to 2001 to find a part of the voice I need.

I'd given up Catholicism in my teens but something of it stays with me. I try to create the perfect sentence - that's as close to godliness as I can get.

I wanted to have a book that showed there's no one way to sound black. I wanted to tell teens that the way you speak is okay; you're good the way you are.

Trinidad's language is a fusion of English, African, and French, and so we have our own words and even our own dictionary. Steupse is a common local word, and it's the onomatopoeic word for the sound people make to show disapproval, or to show they are vexed, when they suck their teeth together.

Telephone operators have called me 'sir' since I was 6.

I use a pseudonym, because my real name is very difficult to pronounce, to remember, and to spell. And many people who have been talking about me on television have yet to pronounce it correctly.

Somebody should tell the president of Mexico that when he appears on American television, he should speak English.

I was always nervous before a television show, and I still am now. But 'The Great British Bake Off' is a happy show; there is no bad language, and although we do have drama, we deal with it calmly.

Writing and telling are almost the same, the way I do it.

The French are simply incapable of telling the truth.

A friend of mine tells that I talk in shorthand and then smudge it.

I hate the word lesbian; it tells you nothing; its only purpose is to inflame.

If you want to communicate with the American public, the literature tells you you've got to be talking at about a sixth-grade, seventh-grade level.

I'm half Telugu. My mom is Telugu and dad, a Maharashtrian. I was brought up in Gwalior. I was exposed to English, Hindi, and Marathi. I heard my mom speak to her family in Telugu, so I got the hang of it.

I have an impeccable memory, and I can learn dialogues in any language in 20 minutes, including Telugu and Malayalam.

I have sung some songs in Telugu and Malayalam. And I want to sing in Tamil, too.

Since I am originally from Hyderabad, I speak Telugu fluently.

While I can't speak Telugu, I do understand the language.

Should I be offered the right kind of script, I will be doing a straight Telugu film.

When I did my first film, I did not understand or speak Telugu.

True, I was born and raised in Chennai, fluent in Tamil, but essentially, I am a Telugu guy and a Telugu actor.

I can speak Tamil fluently, and the sentence structures in Telugu are quite similar.

I can speak Odiya, Telugu, apart from Hindi and a little bit of Rajasthani, so, truly Indian from that context.

I can understand Tamil and Telugu when a conversation is aimed at me, but I cannot hold a conversation.