prohibition

T-shirt with phonetic signs

The other day, one of my respected colleagues and I were discussing how we can select a syllabus from among various content for our professional students -- those who do not have much time to study the Japanese language as young college students do. It is an important task but not an easy one. As for pronunciation, our primary focus is usually on helping the students make themselves understood, not on perfect, native-like pronunciation. But she said she prohibited a student of hers from giving presentations in Japanese at his workplace until he has had enough practice to pronounce like a Japanese adult. Her reason is that some pronunciations, affected by his mother tongue, sound rather childish in Japanese and may put him at a disacvantage in the business world.
Prohibition from presentations! I was deeply impressed by her profound thought.