STUDENT LIFE
Messiah Students on:
BEING BILINGUAL I N
A M E R I C A BY CHARMAINE LIM
T
he ability to switch from one language to another is a dream for some, but for others it’s just a part of daily life. Being bilingual is about far more than just speaking two languages fluently; with it comes the gradual understanding of a new culture, a new world and people different from ourselves. Even if the path to bilingualism is different for each person, those who do reach fluency can speak to a new appreciation for culture that they would not otherwise have. “To me, it’s something that’s always been natural,” says Jemi Lui, sophomore middlelevel education major. Like many other international students on campus, Lui came from a country where being bilingual was the norm. Growing up in Hong Kong, where Cantonese and English are the national languages and Mandarin is commonly taught in schools, she was used to always being surrounded by other bilingual people. “It was natural to know two or three languages at least, growing up,” Lui says. “If you only knew one, you had problems.”
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M AY
2018
In Hong Kong, it’s common for students to speak either English or Cantonese at home and with their friends and learn basic Mandarin in school. If a student chooses not to take Mandarin as their foreign language, they can choose from Spanish, French or German as some of the most commonly taught languages. “English is my first language now,” Lui says. “But, I actually only spoke Mandarin for the first two or three years of my life. My extended family spoke Mandarin, my parents spoke to me in English because they grew up in the States and I learned Cantonese because that [is] what’s spoken in Hong Kong.” According to a 2015 article by the Pew Research Center, learning a second language in America can depend on your state and school district. That results in inconsistent nation-wide language education and lower levels of bilingualism in high schools across the country. Students who are required to take a language class in high school and college might view it as more of an inconvenience than a chance to learn about a different culture, but this is not the case for everyone.