Saba Qamar Quotes

Because I had an accent, people had this impression that I was dumb.

Just because I don't speak English with an accent anymore doesn't mean that I'm better than the people who do.

As far as getting work, no one thought I spoke English. It was absolutely ridiculous. I'd show up at a meeting and they'd be like, 'Oh my God, you speak English! That's so cool.' They didn't really know what to do with me.

When an American person hears you speak a different language, you're automatically the bad guy.

Speaking Spanish isn't a benefit in Hollywood.

Bilingualism used to have an undeservedly bad reputation; then it got an undeservedly exalted one.

While I was doing Hindi, people there laughed at me because I couldn't speak Hindi and English properly.

It annoys me when I phone a hotel receptionist in my own country, and they don't understand what I am saying because they don't speak English. I think that's wrong. It's nothing to do with being politically correct or incorrect; it's just not right.

Has my accent held me back? I don't believe it has at all. I think it can be a colourful accent.

So many Indian novels, quite unfairly, do not get the prominence they should because they have been written in a language other than English.

In the British embassy in Afghanistan in 2008, an embassy of 350 people, there were only three people who could speak Dari, the main language of Afghanistan, at a decent level. And there was not a single Pashto speaker.

People who do not speak our language very well do complain of feeling rebuffed by French people, who can sometimes be impatient, or even intolerant.

Most educated Indians are bilingual. Amongst the urban elite though, there is a disdain for regional languages. That's unfortunate.

Even though I am very tied to and close to my heritage, I learned Spanish in college; I didn't grow up with it. Growing up in South Texas is different from Miami or L.A. where it is a necessity to speak Spanish.

You only have to look at London, where almost half of all primary school children speak English as a second language, to see the challenges we now face as a country. This isn't fair to anyone: how can people build relationships with their neighbours if they can't even speak the same language?

I unfortunately don't speak French, but my wife is now fluent in English, which really reflects rather badly on me.

Move beyond the educated elite, and the great majority in most countries outside Europe don't speak English.

I was always curious about the anxiety a person would feel when you open your mouth and you have an accent. You could have a Ph.D. or be a lawyer, but as soon as you say something, you may be diminished in the eyes of someone else.

When I was a kid, I resented my grandparents not speaking the perfect English I wanted to speak.

One of the biggest problems is - you know, I've got some Hispanic friends - is that a lot of those folks that don't know English, is primarily because they don't even know Spanish. They don't even know their own language.

In Paris, one is always reminded of being a foreigner. If you park your car wrong, it is not the fact that it's on the sidewalk that matters, but the fact that you speak with an accent.

Everybody at home speaks mandarin except me.

I grew up in a community that was bilingual. I've done it for a while, singing in both languages.

Unless you speak English and read well, you'll never be a first-class citizen ... but when you say "official," that becomes a racial slur.

I didn't move to Miami to live in a Spanish-speaking province.