Personal Experience: A Bilingual Analysis

Ever been in a situation where you were the only person who couldn’t understand a specific language? Ever been in a situation where you felt no one could understand you? Do you remember how it made you feel in that moment? Imagine feeling that way all the time; alone, isolated, and misunderstood. Jimmy Santiago Baca and Maxine Hong Kingston do a great job of conveying these feelings in their articles. In the article “Coming into Language”, Jimmy Santiago tells his story as a troubled young man who never saw the value in reading and writing. And in the article “The Language of Silence”, Maxine Hong Kingston tells her story as a first generation Chinese American who struggles with speaking English. As for me, I’ve always struggled with

In 1995, my family left Thailand as refugees and came to the United States. My Parents and I did not know how to speak English upon arrival, which limited our self-reliance and independence. Luckily, my older sister and her husband had been part of the first waves of Hmong immigrants to come to the United States and they had already acclimated to American’s culture. For the first couple of years, my brother-in-law acted as a translator and as my family’s personal guide to all things American. Of course, my brother-in-law wasn’t fluent in English, but instead, spoke a broken version of English which was adequate for taking us to the grocery stores and enough to teach us some of the cultural norms. This made the transition from the jungles of

The first and second year after moving from China to the United States, I was afraid to talk to strangers because my English was not quite well. I had to depend on my husband to deal with my personal business, such as making a doctor’s appointment, calling to the bank, or questioning the DMV officers. Douglass says, “being a slave for life began to bear heavily upon my heart” (62). Being a dependent and helpless adult is a shame for me. In addition, I did not have extra money to go to school to improve my English skills. Thus, I stayed home all the time to avoid the embarrassment that happened when I did not understand strangers’ conversation. Meanwhile, being silent at home leaded worries to my future. I realized that I had to improve my oral English to gain self-confidence. I spent time reading various articles on the internet, and I watched English dialogues’ videos on YouTube. As a non-English speaking immigrant living in the U.S., I challenged myself to overcome difficulties to integrate myself into a new

When I moved from Colombia to the United States on December of 2013, I started studying the language and using it for necessities. Despite of my efforts, I could not got rate of my accent and it made my pass a temporally hard time. People made fun of me and my bad speaking skills. Even though that I was from Colombia, for them I was Mexican. At the beginning it hurt my feelings because I knew that my speaking was not perfect but also it made me stronger, and made me want to improve it every day.

Coming from a foreign country where english is a second language, I didn’t know how to communicate. How was I going understand the information in school? How will I create new friendships without speaking? All these questions plagued me. As I sat quietly everyday trying to avoid making a sound, hoping not to get called on to answer a question or speak out loud in the class, I was trying to make clear of what these people were saying. I realized that just sitting there and listening wouldn't help me better speak English; I had begun trying to speak english with my father so I can become more fluent. After months of dedication, I was understanding and speaking a language completely different to mine. That was by far the most difficult

A lot of incidents happened along the way of learning English as a second language and many of them are rather funny than made me in trouble. What I was doing was foolish and I had to change how I see my new world and Adapt to it. I had to force myself in order to start making new friends and learn more about the American culture. I had a lot of good neighbors who helped me pass that period of my life and made it a little easy a comfortable to speaking in English. They guided me and encouraged me to speak more and never be shy again from my language and accent. Yet, I am still working to enhance and improve my language capabilities to be much better in the future. I view this phase of me learning a new language is a work in progress instead of learning something from the beginning. I am keeping a note next to me all the time, and whenever I hear a word or phrase that I don’t know, I write it down and I keep repeating it again and again until it sticks in my mind I become confident when I use it.

As a first generation immigrant, everything is new here; new culture, new language, and a new society . I think the most difficult thing I have faced in the United States is the language. Learning a new language is not that easy, but language is the most vital key of being success, and it is also an important key factor for communication. I was afraid of speaking English because I am afraid of making mistakes, which had made me to become introverted or even feeling depressed during the first year in the United States. But after a year long study in high school, I have realized that, making mistakes is fine as long as I am able to express what I want to say, as mistakes and failures are also the keys to success.

Firstly, I was really poor at speaking English. When I go through the gate for foreigners in airport in USA, the officer said to me "Do you have food in your suitcase?". Of course, now I can see his point but then I couldn't understand what he said and I was confused. So it took a half hour to get the gate since I landed in the USA. And fortunately, I finally reached the International English School, FLS but I couldn't follow their class. That's why I study a lot more than other students. Nevertheless, I couldn't feel my English was getting better. I was struggling with the situation. If I would love to communicate with other students or native teachers,

At first, speaking English was a bit difficult because I did not feel confident using it with others. The most advanced students sometimes made fun of my English. The students who spoke my own language made more fun of me than the ones who were fluent in English. The teasing by the students made me feel embarrassed and shy to speak the English language, giving me a fear of being made fun of or looked at differently. Practicing the English language with my own siblings and playing with the neighborhood kids who already managed the language gave me more confidence to speak English. Taking Spanish courses in school was also an advantage, which helped me to get better at my native language and kept me from losing it.

In order to make life in America a reality, we had to sell most of our stuff and send the remaining to America. Making the move was not easy, and there was a lot of pressure on my parents, but we finally settled down in Syosset, Ny, America. Of course, getting used to the western lifestyle was not easy and the language was a barrier. Renting a house, Buying a car, enrolling in school, and purchasing new furnitures were the first things that we had to do in America, just as we had to do in China. I taught English would be difficult to handle, but since I had already mastered a language besides my native language, I was not scared of taking the initiatives. Thus, I enrolled in the ESL program in Syosset High School. My ESL teacher was very strict and a harsh grader, and I did not enjoy being in her class. However, by the end of the year, when I took the ESL exit test, and passes it with excellent results, I saw the influence that my ESL teacher had on me. To this day, I’m thankful to her for not only helping me with my English, but also for making me a better student. When I finished ninth grade and started tenth grade, I tried to challenge myself a bit more with the academics; however my counselor did not recommend me to take Advance Placement classes, nor did she recommend me to exit ESL history (Even though I was enrolled in regular English). At the time I had a few japanese friends who introduced me to Japanese culture and food, thus to speak Japanese I took one year of Japanese. My japanese class taught me the japanese alphabet, basic conversations, and above all Japanese culture. Since Syosset High School did not have any Chinese language or Chinese club, I joined Japanese club in order to be with my other Chinese

Walking into my high school, I already had trouble understanding the language, and top of that, I constantly feared eyes judging me. I felt lonely and lost hope of living a joyful life similar to the one I experienced in India. At times, I grew frustrated with the criticism I received when I could not effectively express my thoughts, but today, I write papers and give presentations fluently. My tenacity disproved my judgment and I started believing anything is achievable with determination. When I acknowledged the criticisms and challenged myself to learn the language and make wonderful friends, a different me

Being a Hispanic student who came from not speaking English at all to writing English essays on a weekly basis, I have learned many things that have helped me cope with the disadvantages that were brought on by my lack of English language skills and the advantages that came with being a bilingual student. When I first came to Canada in 2006, I barely spoke a word of English and had to rely on other people for help. I felt helpless and lost, as my classmates were doing things that I did not understand. Over time, I began to pick up the English language quickly and I started to take risks. I constantly challenged myself to try to speak English whenever possible and this allowed me to catch up to my classmates in writing and speaking by grade 3, which was my

The day I stepped off the plane and landed in America, I knew that I’d have to face a great challenge. Being a first generation immigrant from Vietnam, I would have to learn English as quickly as possible. Although I’ve arduously prepared for this transition by learning basic vocabulary and grammar in my native country, I quickly realized that my practical aspect of using the language such as listening, conversing, pronunciation to be insufficient. By immersing myself in an English-speaking world, I finally addressed my lingual deficiency within a year.

A bilingual journey from two different cultures, Amy Tan and Richard Rodriguez recounts their joys and pains of growing up in an english speaking country. An American born Chinese, Tan was born to immigrant parents from China, while Rodriguez hails from a spanish American-Mexican background, and just like Tan, was also born and raised in the United States. Although both writers grew up in native speaking homes, each varied in terms of parental influence on their second language.

How should the country teach English to the millions of English learners that reside in the country? The need to teach English to the students who come from Spanish-speaking households has always been clear, but what has not been clear is what the best way of doing so is. According to Kenneth Jost Georgetown-Harvard graduate and The Supreme Court Yearbook’s author, the United States during and after the World War I began to show opposition to the use of any language other than English (Jost 8). For that reason, there was not enough effort from the government or the schools to ensure that non-English speaking students became proficient in English. That changed thanks to the Civil Rights