Welcome to our first issue of the Language Exepress!

It was during a tear filled eleven-hour flight from San Francisco to Paris that I realised I would be happier living abroad for the rest of my life. This was my epiphany moment after having spent nine months studying the English language at Mills College (EF school), CA and living with an African American host family. So, what do languages mean to me? In short, a way to reinvent yourself. How?

 

First of all, it removes shyness. I often advise my Beginners and Intermediate students to practice French in an uninhibited manner. To do this, I tell them to reconnect with the five-year-old child in them because they are the one speaking in French, not the adult they are who is involved in complex-structured thoughts. Only time and practice enable progress to bridge the gap from basic sentences to multi-clause ones. Speaking with my host family with only the little broken English I had and them having the patience and the will to get to know the adult behind the child words felt like acceptance without bias. They were taking me from a clean slate point of view which gave me room to be the adult I was.

 

Second of all, it teaches you how to get things done and analyse your own native language. Preparing for my English BA final examinations, I remember my daily draconian timetable: translation, breakfast, work on linguistics and grammar drilling, lunch, literature revision, walk, dinner and film in English! Having an organisation and sticking to it gave me confidence and, day after day, I enjoyed my studies more and became better at them. It taught me about commitment and determination that I had deep down in myself, but never explored. Later on, when I did an MA to teach French as a Foreign Language, one of the mandatory programme requirements was to take a different alphabet language class to reflect upon your own language structure – I took Vietnamese which definitely was a stepping stone for rethinking French for myself, but also how to teach it and learn it for others.

 

Finally, most of you have already heard my story about the ‘Goldfish’, haven’t you? This is to exemplify the magic of words in languages! Indeed, words we use to name objects are part of the shared-knowledge culture and create unconscious images of these objects portraying how different language population interpret the world differently. Though the world is the same, the words to express what is in it vary according to specific languages and cultures. A goldfish, for example, is so as the English speaker sees it swimming in a pond glimmering: its body reflecting light. A French speaker, on the other hand, is more pragmatic and, therefore, describes the physical characterises of the fish: it is a red, so it is a called a red fish – ‘un poisson rouge’. I find these discoveries truly fascinating. Learning languages is embarking in an anthropologic journey to embrace differences and welcome otherness.

 

After this rather sad flight and for the past 27 years I have been sharing my language, learning other languages, exchanging ideas about how other languages and cultures feel with other people and experiencing a deeper connection with the world around me. I hope sharing these stories will provide you with some inspiration and motivate you to engage in a career where BEING human is the most important aspect of your job.