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Karl Eccleston and Fiona Pepper star in "Skwerl."

If you are a native English speaker, it is probably hard to imagine what people who don’t speak the language hear when you are talking. “Skwerl,” a short film by Karl Eccleston and Brian Fairbairn, attempts to demonstrate what English sounds like to people who don’t speak the language.

The film was created in 2011 for Kino Sydney, “a monthly open-mic night for filmmakers” based in Sydney, Australia. Since being posted to YouTube 12 years ago, it has received over 52 million views.

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Muna Hussaini walked into her polling station near Austin, Texas, with her daughter on Election Day. Her excitement was weighed down by fear.

Now a mother of two, Hussaini was born and raised in the United States to immigrant parents from India. But as a Muslim woman who wears hijab, she's seen firsthand the angry and xenophobic rhetoric that still plagues this country. Sometimes, she still feels unsafe in her rightful home.

"This election has wreaked havoc on our family as Muslims, who have continued to look on in horror as women, Latinos, Blacks, gays ... so many have been denigrated," she confessed in a private post to tens of thousands of strangers in Pantsuit Nation, a secret Facebook group. (Her post is shared here with permission.)

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In the Illinois senatorial debate Oct. 27, 2016, incumbent Sen. Mark Kirk responded to a challenge about foreign policy with a shocking joke that mocked opponent Tammy Duckworth's mixed-race heritage.

Photo by Gabriella Demczuk/Getty Images.

Duckworth, who was born in Thailand and lost both legs while serving in Iraq, was touting her qualifications in evaluating the need for future military action, citing her family's long history of service:

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Dear curious people: This is how I want you to ask about my race.

'What’s your ethnicity? Are you Korean? Cambodian? Sometimes it’s so hard to guess.'

This past summer, I worked in customer service.

While I absolutely loved my job and the interactions I had with people, there’s one conversation I’ll never forget.

As I was helping a woman with her items, she asked, "What’s your ethnicity? Are you Korean? Cambodian? Sometimes it’s so hard to guess."

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