Personal Narrative: Do You Have Someone Who Speaks Spanish

Before I turned four years old, my mother and I moved to join my father in Berwyn, Illinois. My sister ended having to stay back a couple of months so that she could finish her school year. We arrived to a nice apartment in the suburbs, it was a complete scenery change than what I was use to. Everyone seemed to have giant yards, bright green grass, large fences, and freshly painted houses. Back in Fresnillo, we had our large home, but it was rare for houses to have such large yards, so close to the heart of the town. From the time of the move until my first year in kindergarten, I had a bit of time to adjust, watching cartoons in English, I am not quite sure how I picked it up but I did. At that time my mother only spoke Spanish, my father is bilingual, but he would speak to us in Spanish.

In “Aria: Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood”, Richard Rodriguez discusses two educational philosophies regarding bilingual education. (main topic and support)

Cultural Diversity has lead schools to promote dual language and bilingual programs for ELL students. However, raising bilingual children according to Marsha Rosenberg is not something that simply happens. Parents must carefully consider how they will raise their children in their new culture. Unfortunately, many parents often forget that neglecting their primary language in the process of raising their children will only hurt them in the long run. However, what they fail to understand is that our current society insists on developing diverse learners, who can speak two or more languages and are diverse (Gensee, n.d). Therefore, in order to raise bilingual students they parents must provide the children with rich experiences at home as well as in a variety of settings (Broekhuizen, n.d.). Furthermore, families need to maintain a close family unity and sense of belonging when dealing with the bilingual issue at home.

People of all ages constantly learn how to speak multiple languages. Children are taught to become bilingual, which increases their knowledge. A young boy named Richard Rodriguez grew up in San Francisco, California with a household of Spanish speaking family members. Rodriguez barely knew English when he entered his early years of Elementary school. Through the course of his education Rodriguez took note of how different he was from his family, and slowly began to lose his heritage. Rodriguez’s family embarrassed him since he was categorized as a Scholarship boy, which means a good student yet also a troubled son whose moderately endowed (Rodriguez 19).

Marjorie Agosin’s “Always Living in Spanish: Recovering the Familiar, through Language,” gave me a deeper meaning of living in translation. I have always cringed whenever I found myself in the situation of tranlating everything to my parents from english to spanish and always acting as the translator wherever, whenever, with whom ever. I, too, like Agosin am foreign to this country, thus it should be our duty to keep our culture alive. Our language is our identity, and we are no traitors to the tradtions, cultures and the language the United States has to offer. Knowing two languages is a gateway to opportunites for jobs. Not only that, but we are also the living proof that cultures and languages can preside without conflict. Translating should

Speaking two or more languages is like a country having an atomic bomb during a war. The first situation is advantageous to a person and the second situation is advantageous to a country. “Aria: A Memoir of a Bilingual Childhood” is a memoir of Richard Rodriguez’s bilingual childhood and it was originally published in Hunger of Memory in 1981. In Rodriguez’s memoir, he discusses why he disagrees with bilingual education. His audience is bilingual or anyone that has an opinion towards bilingual education. The purpose in Rodriguez’s memoir is to inform people of the effects of bilingual education and persuade bilingual educators why bilingual education shouldn’t exist.

For our families with Latino roots, we had four speakers; Jesse Farias, Elia Banuelos Padron, Kathleen Cifuents Nekumanesh, and Eduardo Fabian Paramo. Indeed, Jesse, Elia, and Eduardo mention how their parents including themselves had to migrate to the United State for a better life from Mexico, Elia and Kathleen mention how their religion was Catholic, and within Elia’s family they would exhibit male supremacy with strict gender role. I was easily identified with all speakers because I am also a Latina. My parents migrated from Mexico to the United Stated for a better life to obtain the American Dream. I was happy to hear from Jesse that his dad is from Michoacan because my dad and mom’s family are from the same state. Even though I was not

I am a native Spanish speaker, English teacher, writer and translator from Venezuela. I have 5 years of experience in the field of general/legal translations and about the same time as a creative writer.

Growing up I never had a second language that I could feel secure and connect with my family. The only language I speak fluently is the primary language of America. Since I am adopted and not bloodrealted to my family, the opportunity to get a sense of my family’s history has always been a challenge. My family’s ancestry tree is completely different from one another. I also don’t have another language I can connect with my friends in the halls at school. With two different parents, authors Martin Espada and Ricardo Rodriguez have contrasting views on the subject of bilingualism. Across America, the arising multicultural complication of native people speaking another language than the “considered” language in the country has created a

Bilingualism is a very common trait in the Rio Grande Valley, but not in all parts of the United States. The need to learn other languages aside from English is often overlooked in other parts of the U.S. I often asked myself what is it that motivates people in this region to speak more that one language. I wanted to shed some light on my questions about raising bilingual children in today’s society. My interview subject has three children (now adults) that are all bilingual, and proficient in English and Spanish. We agreed that for the sake of the participant’s privacy I would give her a pseudo name to be used in this research. The family of five has a very typical Rio Grande Valley background. The parents are originally from Mexico, and came to live in the United States in their early teens. The Lopez’s

Introduction - Being a part of a bilingual speaking family, like with my mom and dad who are Chinese immigrants, is an experience that no one can imagine unless you are part of a bilingual speaking family. Experiences such as knowing a language that not many of our neighbors don't know can be frustrating for both sides. Being young in my early years, learning English was not only a struggle for me but for my family. I noticed that my parents struggled learning english and communicating with the outside world. From buying groceries to paying for the bills, I observed the painful experiences that my parents persevere through all these years. I was glad public schools gave me the opportunity to not only learn English but to help my family live in this English superior society.

“Same here with Spanish. I only know the common words but not all of them. If you want me to, then I can teach you German. It’s an easy language to learn. I can tell you that saying hello in German is saying hall with an O at the end: Hall-O.”

I have known my participant for many months previous to this interview so some of this information I already knew while other information was new to me. It is interesting to me to see the different cultures within the same language. Angie is from Columbia so she speaks Spanish as her first language. Within our swim team there are two different cultures within the Spanish speaking teammates, they are from Spain and Bogota, Columbia. All four of our teammates including Angie that are from Columbia have their own little subculture here. When talking about the settings that she speaks each of her languages in it was interesting that she only spoke Spanish to our teammates from Columbia. She discussed how it is natural for her to speak Spanish to the other Columbians because she already knew all of them before coming to America. Unlike the people that are from Spain, she speaks English to all of them. When I ask both types of Spanish about what words to use it is interesting that both of them give me different answers. I feel that the Spanish that the Columbians speak is easier to learn with already knowing English because they do not have as many phonetic differences such as the “z” sound in Spain Spanish is pronounced “th.”

This situation also supports the statement of Lyon(1996) that children become bilingual across the world in many communities and this can play a major part in the families into which they are born, and in their later lives at school. Bilingualism occurs within complex, multi-layered context, but from the child’s point of view the family is where it all begins.

Initially, I was an Ecuadorian girl that had a Christian family, I grew up surrounded by my family and loved ones. My cognitive development was in progress, and I had created fundamental bonds in Ecuador. Provided that my dad is an American citizen and due to his work in America, he could not spend too much time with us in Ecuador, so, my mom, my little brother, and I immigrated to America. After three years of my life, our family reunited, and I became an Ecuadorian-American. Since I was very young, assimilating the changes came to be unnoticed, if it weren’t for the fact that during the next years I spoke Spanish at home and English at school. As a result, my translations of these languages affected my communication, creating slow comprehensive