Possible Majors: Bioengineering, Psychology
Languages I Speak: English, Spanish (taken throughout school), Mandarin, Cantonese
Over high school and into college, my sister and I became interested in speaking our native languages and chose to speak to our parents more often in chinese (my sister preferring mandarin and i choosing Cantonese). I used to find it cool to speak to my parents on the phone in Chinese so that other people around me couldn't understand me. However, every time I did, my parents would respond: "What? I don't understand what you're saying. Just say it in English!"
*embarassed*
Numbers in chinese can be complicated, being in that the difference between eight and one hundred is the change of the tone. One time, I asked for eight dozen roses for a banquet and instead, I received a hundred dozen roses. Emphasizing tonality became SO important and my parents were NOT happy at all about having to pay that bill..
Why I am Interested in this class: I find it interesting that a person's identity can be based off the languages they speak and being multilingual affects a person's identity (sharing part in different cultures). In addition, I find it interesting that languages can be dormant and "forgotten" but then when placed in an environment where this "forgotten" language is needed, one can pick it up again quite fast.
I also find it fascinating that children are able to pick up languages and speak it without inhibition where as as a person grows older, it becomes harder for him/her to learn a new language.
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