The following ethnography is a study on how authors in the Foreign Language and Literature discipline research compile and publish information regarding the ability of people to fluently learn new languages. Furthermore, this ethnography will provide a full understanding of how these writers their different strategies and techniques to help determine if a human has really fully mastered a language to the greatest of their ability.
Writers in the Foreign Language Discipline have recently targeted to research and write on how human beings learn, adapt, and study any language that was not taught from birth; making that language an entirely foreign entity to them. Writers also tend to use a variety of different technologies to do studies on how focused a human is on the literature of a non-native language to see if that particular person actually learns and processes the language successfully. These modern methods of conducting research have opened new frontiers allowing for quantitative results of humanitarian issues that would have previously been nearly impossible.
Writers, in addition have started to investigate the influences of a human personality type has on perceptual learning style preference and language learning strategies. The general condense that was the perquisite to these research questions is that different human personas and personality types can vastly influence ones ability to learn certain intellectual skill . Concluding this research outline, the reader should have a better understanding of the language and structure of the various writers that compose the Foreign Language and Literature Discipline.
Introduction
According to North Carolina State University Foreign Language and Literature Department, the For...
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...learn any foreign language is to understand the individual learning needs of a pupil, have extensive exposure to the foreign language, and to learn the structure of the that language (Goss 2013). If those three strategies are followed writers feel that language systems should be should be grasped by a majority of those who put forth the effort and remain dedicated to these systems. While there is not a single one sized fits all formula for all of humanities learning needs, the combination of all of the techniques methodologies described will make the goal of fluency more achievable. Consequentially, as the world becomes increasing globalized and interconnected between nations, so will the individuals of various linguistically systems, previously isolated systems in the ability to intercommunicate amongst each other, resulting in unforeseen benefits to all involved.
“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.
Teaching world languages is a very specific, extensive field, and it should be noted that the texts presented here are only a small sample of what is available. Though it has long been known that language, culture and identity are interwoven, and extensive research to this effect has been presented, there exists an enduring trend to teach language solely as language. The texts presented within this annotated bibliography make it obvious that, as language is the main conveyer of culture, opportunities are being missed to help students develop their cultural understanding, and thus, their own identities, through the acquisition of second, or subsequent, languages.
Language is a means of communication and it varies from one community to another. Everyone has a mother tongue which depended on the family’s upbringing. A second language can be learned along the way. There are also instances where a person is born in a community that speaks two languages and therefore, had to learn both languages. The quality of the languages learned will be affected by how well the community speaks both languages. This can later develop into a new form of language. The essay describes the frustration of the author who felt rejected by different groups for speaking a different form of language. Her essay aims to gain sympathy from readers by seeing the issue from her point of view. Anzaldua attempts to achieve this in her essay by raising issues on identity and discrimination. She wanted to highlight that language is not determined by a country’s physical borders.
Language is an important part of who we are. It influences the way we think and behave on a great scale. However, sometimes it is forced upon us to go in different directions just so we can physically and mentally feel as if we belong to the society in which we live in. Just as we see in Amy Tan’s “Mother Tongue” and Richard Rodriguez’s “A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, both authors faced some challenges along the way by coping with two different languages, while still trying to achieve the social position which they desired.
Most people who grow up with a foreign language spoken in there house grow up with an advantage in society. This advantage can only occur once the individual learning that foreign language also learns the dominant language spoken in that country. Once both of these languages are learned and mastered, the individual has now placed them se...
Learning a language is quite possibly one of the most difficult and time- consuming endeavors a person could ever undertake. Therefore, it comes as no surprise, that a limited number of second languages are taught in schools across the western world, and languages are sometimes failed to be passed on to children growing up in a different country than their parents did. Even in Canada, an officially bilingual country, only 15% of Canadians speak English and one unofficial language (Statistics Canada 2008) and in America, only 21% of the population is versed in two languages (Logan, 2003). It has become apparent that there is a need for Canadians and Americans to learn a second language. For a country to survive, it needs to rely on other countries as there is no one country that can produce within it’s borders all the means to meet the needs of it’s people. Furthermore, with the threat of international terrorism, the economic crisis and environmental ruin looming above countries all over the world, governments and organizations need to work together to come up with solutions. These cross culture collaborations would not be possible without the ability of even a few people present to speak each other’s languages. Conversely, by remaining monolingual, skills and knowledge will become concentrated only in certain countries and as the transfer of knowledge will cease the rate of human advancement will slow. This report intends to discuss the interpersonal and personal benefits of learning a second language, and investigate different ways of learning. To accomplish this, I have conducted secondary research into the interpersonal and personal benefits of learning another language. These particular areas of research were cho...
In today’s society, especially in the United States, most people are monolingual English speakers. As a result, these monolingual speakers are at a significant disadvantage compared to those who speak more than one language fluently. This disadvantage is crucial to realize since it is important to learn how individuals and the nation can be enhanced. Multilingual speakers have an advantage in global affairs that involve countries that speak different languages. Speaking multiple languages makes it easier to communicate with people when involved in foreign affairs. Those who speak multiple languages are also more aware of other cultures in society. Monolingual speakers are not as exposed to other cultures and have difficulty understanding or even recognizing them. Furthermore, being multilingual increases your
Rodriguez, Richard. “Learning the Language”. Constructing Others, Constructing Ourselves. Ed. Sibylle Gruber. Dubuque, Iowa: 2002. 89-97.
Languages is the key to communicate. Everyone learns language at the early stage on their life when their parents trying to transmit some simple vocabulary to them. Communicate means we can give and receive knowledge through language. I was born and raised in Malaysia, which means I have to learn at least 3 languages which are Chinese, Malay and English as well. I would say learning few languages was actually a difficult task to complete. Although it was hard at the beginning, I have also found the fun part of learning several languages which is having the ability to communicate in few languages.
...xpressing her Chinese culture. Mastering a second language allows her to articulate her and her mother’s thoughts; it is a foundation for her pride and a foundation to express herself. For Gloria Anzaldua, instead of choosing one language over the other, she chose a mix of the two and fights for it. She realized the value of her language when she lost it and now treasures it. The kind of Spanish she speaks is neither English nor Spanish, but both. It is overflowing with culture from Medieval Spain, France, Germany, etc., just from the origins of the words. It is her pride and a representation of herself, fighting and living. In conclusion, in addition to Lera Boroditsky’s article proving that the structure of language affects how we think, the articles by Eric Liu, Amy Tan, and Gloria Anzaldua show how language is a foundation for a person’s culture, pride, and self.
As much as we are inclined to believe that now, in the age of globalization, when people all over the world are more interconnected than ever, the cultural boundaries are no longer unbreakable, they still represent an impediment in one 's attempt to develop a new linguistic identity. If this was easily overcome by adults under normal circumstances, the very aspect that makes an individual identify with a language would be too shallow and would fail to build a strong and meaningful enough connection to account for a new linguistic identity.
A static language is a dead language. Language needs growth for development and it is this necessity that defines a creative writer’s responsibility to his language of communication. Language can only grow through the efforts of writers and speakers who use it creatively and imaginatively by relating it to contemporaneous events, new experiences and futuristic visions. The writer’s responsibility to his language is therefore to ensure the growth and development of that language (Mbithi: 2014). He deploys certain means in his writings to achieve his aim. First, he uses language in a creative manner which enlivens his language of communication, that is, he uses his old stock of works and expressions in such a telling manner that they become refreshing to his audience. Secondly, he creates new words to depict new experiences thereby using neologism to enhance the growth and stature of the language and of course, the widespread use of neologism is an index of a blossoming language. And thirdly, he incorporates borrowed or foreign words into his language of communication to capture moods, situations and experiences which his language of communication would have been incapable of describing. All these, in a nutshell, define the creative writer in his relationship with a particular language of communication but multilingualism introduces a far more complex dimension to the creative person of the writer as well as to his responsibility to his society. It is with this in mind that the notion of multilingualism will be
Hundreds of years ago, people used to stay in their native land, get along with their compatriots, and speak in their native languages. So nobody thought that there was any reason to study a foreign language. However, notions have changed nowadays. People have started to leave their hometowns, go into the world, and make new friends all over the world. Students in California State University, Fullerton(CSUF) also have the needs to work, travel or research in multiple languages. Although some students still do not think learning a second language is necessary, the truth is that adding a language request in CSUF to undergraduate and graduate students is imperative, because a second language
The issue focused on importance of learning of foreign languages. Many people ask "Why should I learn foreign languages?" Learning a foreign language takes assiduity and free time. In order to understand this importance we need first to understand benefits of knowing and learning foreign languages. I offer several groups of these benefits below, which may help to convince you to take the plunge, if you need such persuasion. One groups of benefits represent economic and practical reasons, others have intellectual and even sentimental content, but whatever reasons you choose, you will have a clear idea of why learning foreign language so important and how it can help to motivate you in your studies.
It is necessary to draw a distinction between foreign language and second language learning. According to (Wisniewski, 2007), a language lear...