famous BIlinguals (Montel Williams, hockey)

[Loren Billings]

Anne Keown wrote:

>  Montel Williams, the talk show host, claims to speak
> Russian.  He learned it in the military- the Navy, I
> think.
>
> -A. Keown

Yes, an instructor at the Defense Language Institute, Jack Franke (who
also posts to this list from time to time), mentioned to me that Montel
Williams attended DLI around 1983-84 as a sailor.

Speaking of famous athletes, I think hockey is unusually multilingual
because there is another language that's so dominant in that sport.
Mike Eruzione (sp?), captain of the US olympic team that won the gold
way back when, claims to understand Russian, and I believe he mentioned
(as a commentator during the recent winter olympics) that Jagr and other
Czech hockey players know Russian as well.  I think that Hockey is a
good tool to use for playing up multilingual celebrities.

--
Loren A. Billings, Ph.D.
<loren.billings at colorado.edu>

Linguistics Department
University of Colorado
Boulder, CO 80309-0295 U.S.A.

Office phone: +1.303.492.7082
Office fax:      303.492.4416
Home phone:      303.546.6447

Home: 2610 Fremont Street
Boulder, CO 80304 U.S.A.