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The essay of "Teach yourself Italian" was written by Jhumpa Lahiri and published in the New Yorker. Lahiri talks about her interest and devotion to the Italian language she gained. In 1994, she visited Italy for the first time and realizes that she wants to learn the Italian language, she becomes fascinated by it. She says it herself, "for a writer, a foreign language becomes a new adventure." Her mom knew Bengali and Lahiri tried to speak, write, and read it herself but she wasn't as good as her mom. She had an accent and she wasn't able to pick up the language. However, when she went to Italy she knew this was the language she wanted to learn because she had all these questions to ask but little knowledge of how to even say it. She wanted
“Se Habla Español,” is written by a Latin author, Tanya Barrientos; and Amy Tan, a Chinese author, wrote “Mother Tongue”. In both literate narratives the authors write about their experiences with language and how it impacted their lives. In This essay we will be discussing the similarities as well as the differences in the stories and the authors of “Se Habla Español” and “Mother Tongue”. We will discuss how both authors use a play on words in their titles, how language has impacted their lives, how struggling with language has made them feel emotionally, and how both authors dealt with these issues.
In the story “Mother Tongue,” by Amy Tan, Mrs. Tan talks about (in the book) her life and how she grew up with different Englishes was very hard and how it has affected her today. The setting of the book goes from being at lecture to the past of Amy Tan and her mother along with the different Englishes she had to come accustomed to. In “Mother Tongue” by Amy Tan, the author’s attitude towards the “different Englishes” she grew up with is fascinated. Amy Tan conveys this attitude through wanting to learn all different kinds of Englishes, her use of Englishes in her novel, and the acceptance she developed of her mother’s broken English.
From the moment that we are born, we are exposed to means of language and communication. Though technically we can not speak as babies; we give our parents small signals to let them know what we need such as, being hungry or needing a diaper change. Language is proven to be essential and an important part of life. In the essays, Homemade Education, by Malcolm X and Spanish Lessons, by Christine Marin both essays give a strong example of why language is important. In Malcolm’s essay, he explains how when he was prison the power of language completely changed his life. In Marin’s essay she talks about her experience with the English and Spanish language and how both languages opened up new doors for her in her life and
In 2009, I went to Italy to become an Au pair for two years. This was a difficult decision for me. I wasn’t able to speak Italian and had never lived abroad, away from my family and friends. I felt I needed this experience to push my boundaries and broaden my horizons. It was incredible to experience another country’s culture. Living in Italy made me realize how grateful, fortunate, and capable I am.
The author of the story was born in 1967 in London, and soon after she moved to Rhode Island in the United States. Although Lahiri was born in England and raised in the United States and her parent’s still carried an Indian cultural background and held their believes, as her father and mother were a librarian and teacher. Author’s Indian heritage is a strong basis of her stories, stories where she questions the identity and the plot of the different cultural displaced. Lahiri always interactive with her parents in Bengali every time which shows she respected her parents and culture. As the author was growing up she never felt that she was a full American, as her parents deep ties with India as they often visited the country. Most of Lahiri’s work focused on the Indian American culture and the story “Interpreter in Maladies” is a set of India and part of United States.
From a young age, writing become a big part of who she is, since it was the only way she could express her feelings without really speaking. Lahiri expresses when she says, “My reading was my mirror, and my material; I saw no other part of myself” (4). She is describing how writing really made her feel like a different person, did not have to worry about the two cultures she had to switch around, follow a certain tradition of which to write, and could write express her thoughts without a problem. Her tools, desk, everything she used to do here writing became a part of who she was because she had never made any other connections with anything else. She is now showing what it meant, “When I became a writer my desk became home; there was no need for another” (Lahiri 6). While Lahiri had trouble identifying her identity, she did not know what was really her home. She struggled to find a place that she could be happy to call “home,” and was able to find that when she started to explore and expand her writing. When Lahiri said “I belonged to my work” (6), she was describing the passion she had found within the work she was achieving. Even though, her parents did not think she could make a living from her writing, which she did by publishing her book back in 1999. The different
In all, it is important for students of all abilities to learn a foreign language. Not only
In the passage by Amy Tan ,” Mother Tongue”, she tries to show or emphasize the fact or theory that we all speak differently even if it is the same main language such as English. The author is considered a fictional writer that is “fascinated by language in a daily life”. Throughout the story through her experiences she realizes or notices there are different types of English or different ways people use it. The first time she realized it was when she was giving a speech about one of her books called “The Joy Club” and her mom was there. She realized that she could not talk to her mom the same way she was talking then. Another time was when she was talking to her family and realized she was using broken English and would
There’s a lot more to being Italian than the typical stereotypes that we have come to know from movies, television and books. From the Catholic mobsters who kill during the week but always make it to mass on Sunday, to the “how you doin” views of Joey from the television show “Friends”, people often forget the more important parts of being Italian. It is a culture like no other, full of history, art, and most importantly, their passion for food. Italian food, in my opinion, is the best in the world. Italians put so much into everything they make that the time and effort is tasted with every single bite. One of my favorite dishes would have to be fettuccini alfredo and it just happens to be a fairly easy, but extremely delicious, dish to make. Trust me, if I can make it, you can make it.
“Mother Tongue” is an essay that show the power of language and how Amy Tan uses the many forms of English and the different ways in which the language she knew impacted her life. I feel connected to Tan’s essay because I also come from a multilingual home. I have smart emigrant parents who are educated, but even though they are educated they still need my help with communicating with people occasionally. I believe the most important idea in Tan’s “Mother Tongue” is the limitation that an imperfect English can cause in a society and the richness that such English can bring to
Language is like a blooming flower in adversity – they are the most rare and beautiful of them all as it struggles to express itself. It blooms and flourishes in strength, awe, and passion as the riches of thought is imbibed from the seed and into a finished beauty. For others, a non-native person speaking in a language that they are not familiar with sprouts out like a weed – the way its thorns can puncture sympathy and comprehensibility. Amy Tan, however, addresses the nature of talk as being unique under its own conditions. In Tan's “Mother Tongue”, she discusses how her mother's incoherent language is “broken” and “limited” as compared to other native English speakers. When focusing on Amy Tan, she grows noticeably embarrassed with her mother's lack of acuteness in the language, which then influences Tan to “prove her mastery over the English language.” However, she soon learns from herself and -- most importantly -- her mother that a language's purpose is to capture a person's “intent, passion, imagery, and rhythm of speech and nature of thought.” With such an enticing elegance...
As a kid, I could easily pick up words and understand languages. Therefore I very easily learned on my own to read and write in Romanian, I learned Spanish, English and found out that I could without training understand Italian. Furthermore Traveling around the world and studying history also convinced me that learning foreign language had a huge impact on me and could surely offered me many opportunities.
Visiting Europe has been a long dream for me, especially visiting Italy. Italy has fascinated for as long as I can remember. Italian history and culture has always been intriguing to me ever since I learned about the Roman Empire in elementary school. I’ve always had Rome as my number one place I want to visit in the world. However, due to my financial status, I never had the chance to go to outside any country except the United States and my native country, Peru. Being in college has given me the opportunity to study abroad in a place I’ve always dreamed of. My university, Loyola University Chicago, have their own campus abroad in Rome, Vietnam and Beijing. Being already enrolled in the university, choosing to study abroad is facilitated as all my financial aid, including the university’s, and credits will transfer. I actually never planned on studying but the opportunity my university gave me to study in a place I’ve always wanted to go was too good for me to pass on. I
The capital city of Italy is a very extraordinary place to visit. The population of Rome is well over two-million. The people there are very friendly and are extremely proud of their country. Rome is a beautiful bustling city that has a moderate cli mate. The temperature usually stays around eighty degrees. The main way of transportation is by bus.
If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his head. If you talk to him in his own language that goes to his heart.” ‒ Nelson Mandela. Since the 1960’s learning a second language has decreased by 30 percent in today’s society. People who wish to learn an additional language often do so to communicate with people who reside in different countries. With an increase in today’s globalization, it is forcing companies throughout the world to break the language barrier. However, with the advancement of technology, numerous citizens find it unnecessary to learn another language, as a translation is at the tip of their fingers. The methods of learning a foreign language can differentiate between people. Nevertheless it has been