I believe you guys have seen the movie Spanglish. Its a movie about a single mother and daughter who emigrate from Mexico to America in search for a better life. When they first arrived in America, you can see that Flor (mother), still stays within the Mexican community and is reluctant to step across the cultural divide. On the other hand, her daughter have already learned to speak English. Only when the money problem surfaced that she starts to work for a rich American family. You can see that even then, she have no knowledge of English and there were difficulties in communicating with the Claskys. After one particular incident, Flor then felt the need to learn English which she seek help from her daughter, Christina.
Christina was offered a scholarship in a Posh private school with the help of Deborah and we can see that Flor is not happy about it. I think that she was afraid that her own daughter will be influenced and become Americanised and forgot their own roots. She was worry about it and thinks one in two things will happen: (1) To be the odd one, or (2) Become one of "them". She was worried that Christina is afraid of being who she is. Towards the end of the movie, Flor asked Christina, "Is what you want for yourself to become someone very different than me?" It shows that how important it is to hold on to one's identity and Christina was able to realize it.
Flor's unwillingness to let Christina to fully assimilate into the American society because she was maintaining her ethnicity. In my opinion, I think that the feature of Ethnicity and staying loyal to their L1 can be seen here. Living in an completely foreign country, there are chances that there might be more of language shift than language maintenance. However based on this movie, its otherwise.
Now, what do you guys think?
Flor and Christina started out as outsiders of the American community. Flor didn't see the requirement to learn English because it wasn't important. As for Christina, she had to learn for her studies and also her communication with friends and teachers. Here, the needs of both of them are different. Only after Flor started working, she found out the importance of learning English.
ReplyDeleteWe can see that it depends on the need of the language. If we do not use the language often, we would not place much emphasis on learning it, like Flor at the beginning. As u said, she kept loyalty to her L1 and learnt L2 (English). Bilingualism without the lost of L1 shows that she was willing to learn a new language while retaining her mother tongue.
For Christina's case, she was young when she moved to America. Flor spent her childhood, adolescence, teenage years and adulthood in Mexico. For Christina however, the move to America was like a new start. Hence, the emphasis of maintaining her L1 won't be as high as her mum. The longer we use a language, the more we want to maintain it.
I agree with Aaron, we study a new language or not usually it will depend on our need. When we feel we don't need then we will not study. Based on this movie, Flor and Christina move to LA. Now, they stay in LA where the language is used is English. So that, they have to speak English to survive. Eventhough they can live in Mexican community, but it's not a solution for them to survive their live. We shouldn't have limit to study especially about language because if they just want to speak Spanish, they will let through better chances, better life, better jobs, etc. Especially for Christina who still young, she can explore many things by speaking English.
ReplyDeleteI think it's depend on where we live. And also Flor doesn't need to be worry about Christina's language. Her mother tongue is Spanish, so if she learn English, she will be a bilingual. It's also make her life better. She can speak Spanish and English. It's more complicated for the children who have to choose their mother tongue because learn 2 languages in one time are more difficult, but in this case Christina already become Spanish speaker.
For me, if we can get better life by speaking other language, why we have to maintain our language. But for some reasons, becoming a bilingual is the best way. Eventhough we have a difficulty in the beginning to speak 2 languages, but for the future, it will better for our life.
I myself am a nationalistic person. I would not bear it if my children do not know Mandarin and follow the traditions of Chinese in the future because I do not want them to forget their roots and ancestors. I am very proud of being a Chinese and I feel that Mandarin is one of the most beautiful languages among all the languages.
ReplyDeleteThat is the reason why I think I can understand why Flor was getting worried when Christina seemed to become more Americanised. Of course Flor didn't want Christina to forget her roots and Mexican language. Yet at the same time, they had no choice but to learn English in order to survive in American community.I think the best solution for them was to become a bilingual, and used different languages in different domains.
This reminds me of our Chinese dialects in Malaysia which are being used less nowadays. Will they extinct one day? It is best for the parents to teach their children the dialect and use it at home in order to preserve the dialects.
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