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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| TheMatthias Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6056 days ago 105 posts - 124 votes  Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: Mandarin | Message 25 of 46 17 January 2011 at 2:33am | IP Logged | |||||
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The only language in my family, other then English, was hungarian by way of my great grandmother. And she failed
to teach it to my grandmother, so it was lost there. It always makes me sad to hear of people who have parents that don't pass down a family language, such a shame... Edited by TheMatthias on 17 January 2011 at 2:34am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Lucky Charms Diglot Senior Member Japan lapacifica.net Joined 6759 days ago 752 posts - 1711 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: German, Spanish | Message 26 of 46 17 January 2011 at 5:02am | IP Logged | |||||
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My Oma, who came to the U.S. in the 1960s and began a family a few years later, had an added motivation for not German to her children. She had studied English at university, worked as a translator, gone to England as an au pair to improve her English... basically, she loved English and the English-speaking world, and she had gone to great lengths to improve her English. For such a person, I imagine that having monolingual English-speaking children while living in the U.S. would be something of a dream come true, and might even cement in her own mind her status as an 'authentic' American. I'm sure that likewise, there are many Francophile American women who fantasize about moving to Paris and speaking French with their children as the most chic and cultured thing one can do.
(By the way, my Opa was also a German-speaker whom she had met in the U.S., and I'm not sure in which language he spoke to my dad and uncle. Either way, he passed away prematurely when my dad was only five years old, so it wasn't long before the two brothers went from fluent German to monolingual English.) This kind of motivation (perhaps with an added racial factor) is something I sometimes see among Japanese and other Asian women - the types who are really gung-ho about studying English, not for their career or travel or anything like that, but because they feel some kind of status associated with being 'Western' and hanging out with foreigners, I guess. These kind of women actively seek a 'foreign' (which usually means white) husband, move back to his home country with him, and do anything (including, of course, speaking in English to their kids) to see themselves and be seen by others as authentically Western. By no means am I saying that all Asian women in an international relationship or who are passionate about English feel this way, but it's just a sentiment I've observed in several people. I guess that English for them must be what French is for some of us. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Phantom Kat Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4873 days ago 160 posts - 253 votes Speaks: Spanish*, English Studies: Finnish | Message 27 of 46 17 January 2011 at 5:51am | IP Logged | |||||
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I have a good friend of mine who knew fluent Spanish as a kid and even knew some simple French because her mom knew some of it. However, her elementary did not have ESL classes, so she was forced to learn and only use English. Then her mother began to speak to her in English rather than Spanish as my friend's English grew. Now she only knows English. D:
My two other friends (brother and sister) have Spanish as their native tongue. However, their mother talks to them mostly in English. Their dad talks to them only in Spanish, but he's only around maybe once a month. They know Spanish, but their pronunciation is awful. Every time they speak it, it sounds awkward and forced. I fear what's going to happen to them once they move out. (Due to the two examples, I'm partly glad neither of my parents are fluent in English.) I am really, really curious as to how my sister is going to raise her future children. She speaks native Spanish while her husband speaks native Mandarin. Their parents are not fluent in English, so if the children only know English, it's going to be a disaster when it comes to communicating with their grandparents. I hope both Mandarin and Spanish are used at home, at least to the extent that they can speak and understand it; English can always be learned in school. It would be such a shame if either language was lost just because they live in the US. (I can't do anything about Mandarin, but if I have to, I'll visit every day and teach them Spanish. I'll do the same with my brother's future kids since it seems he favors English more than Spanish.) - Kat Edited by Phantom Kat on 17 January 2011 at 5:52am 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Fabrizio Pentaglot Senior Member BelgiumRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4992 days ago 103 posts - 157 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2, French, SpanishB2, Portuguese | Message 28 of 46 17 January 2011 at 8:59am | IP Logged | |||||
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Sorry guys if I keep talking about my "little, humble and basically unknown language,"
but for all those interested in learning something more about Sardinian, please have a look here at this website: http://www.sardegnadigitallibrary.it/index.php? xsl=648&s=17&v=9&c=4460&na=1&n=24&nodesc=1&c1=Memorie+in+lin gua+sarda&xctl=1&mtd=67&o=3 All the videos are exclusivelly in Sardinian and either Italian and Sardinian subtitles are available. I think someone might find this material interesting, expecially if you're fond of romance languages. A si biri cun salludi :) 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| doviende Diglot Senior Member Canada languagefixatio Joined 5796 days ago 533 posts - 1245 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Hindi, Swedish, Portuguese | Message 29 of 46 17 January 2011 at 10:00am | IP Logged | |||||
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My mom grew up in Canada speaking German, and didn't start learning English until she started going to school. Later on when she had me, she didn't speak any German at home because my dad can't speak it. She said that she didn't want to start speaking it to me, because it would leave my dad out, which I can sort of understand. I remember going to visit my grandparents (who lived quite far from us) and hearing them speak German with my mom...at one point I asked them what they were saying, and they said they were talking about my christmas presents! Later on, this served to motivate me when I started learning German on my own.
My dad's father, on the other hand, grew up speaking Polish with his parents, but learned English early on. They later moved to a tiny town in central Canada that had no other Polish speakers, so he apparently forgot almost all of it. My dad says he remembers occasionally asking my grandpa about this or that word in Polish, but it was a rare thing. My dad never learned to speak Polish at all, but it's on my todo list, so I might actually start on it fairly soon. My siblings don't have much interest in languages, and they think my language hobbies are pretty strange, but I remember them mentioning once or twice that they wish they could have grown up speaking German with my mom. I'm hoping that once I get back from Germany and I'm finally able to speak German with my mom, it'll motivate my siblings to get their act in gear as well. 3 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Sunja Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 5895 days ago 2020 posts - 2295 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English*, German Studies: French, Mandarin | Message 30 of 46 17 January 2011 at 10:37am | IP Logged | |||||
I think part of the reason for refusing to pass on a language is that parents want their kids to succeed in school. With out proactive support (like say, some sort of immersion or dual-language classes) then the parents are more or less on their own to teach the kids languages. Many can't; either they have problems languages themselves, or they aren't able to teach language (it's not effortless, you know). They simply become worried that junior will fall behind. My daughter is in her second-year in the German school system and her minority language is English. She's having a really hard time with German right now, and is forced to accept extra classes (Förderung) so as not to fail her second year. This is the reason I think parents give up teaching multiple languages at home. Same with the kids who grow up in dialect-speaking households. (German's got a huge amount of incredibly interesting dialects). Many of the dialects are dying. Parents/Grandparents aren't passing them on, because of the problems that kids can develop when they start learning Hochdeutsch in school. Success or failure is not always pre-determined. The parents have to make a choice. Edited by Sunja on 17 January 2011 at 11:03am 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| vilas Pentaglot Senior Member Italy Joined 6770 days ago 531 posts - 722 votes Speaks: Spanish, Italian*, English, French, Portuguese | Message 31 of 46 17 January 2011 at 1:24pm | IP Logged | |||||
Which kind Sardinian do you speak? There is not one Sardinian but many. As far I know if somebody from Cagliari meet another person from Nuoro or Sassari they can understand each other only speaking standard Italian . Once I have been near Olbia and a man that lives 15 km distant did not understand the local language. In the link below the map of sardinain languages http://sardegna.blogosfere.it/2010/08/cartina-linguistica-de lla-sardegna.html 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Fabrizio Pentaglot Senior Member BelgiumRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4992 days ago 103 posts - 157 votes Speaks: Italian*, EnglishC2, French, SpanishB2, Portuguese | Message 32 of 46 17 January 2011 at 2:40pm | IP Logged | |||||
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"Sardinian" has official status of language and shows a standardized set of grammar and
spelling rules exactly as Italian do. But you're right: many local variants - I'd rather call them "dialects" - are still existent, but differences don't generally impede communication among speakers of different areas. As for my personal case, I speak the "Campinadese" variant (which is the one typical of the southern half of the island), and I've never had any insurmountable problem with speakers of other zones. Having said this, I personally believe things change a lot if you refer to the specific linguistic situations of the city of Alghero (and its surroundings) and the whole island of Carloforte where Catalan and Ligurian are respectively spoken. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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