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As my community modernized, we used Pennsylvania Dutch less and less. Now I’m trying to preserve it.

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Catch up quickly on the global stories that matter

The UN's agency for Palestinian refugees said that it would be unable to continue its operations in Gaza if it doesn't receive fuel by Wednesday night. Israel has blocked fuel from being delivered through Egypt. It has so far allowed the entry of only 54 trucks, containing food and medical supplies. On Monday, Hamas freed two elderly Israeli women it had taken hostage during its attack on Israel on October 7th. The militant group is still holding more than 200 people in Gaza, according to the Israel Defence Forces.

Israel's ambassador to the UN called on An tó nio Guterres to resign after the organisation's chief said that Hamas' attack "did not happen in a vacuum" and characterised Israel's bombardment of Gaza as "deeply alarming". Mr Guterres-who also condemned Hamas' actions-urged a ceasefire. Israel's foreign minister, Eli Cohen, reportedly cancelled a planned meeting with Mr Guterres.

The International Energy Agency predicted that demand for oil, gas and coal will peak before 2030-if governments meet their current climate commitments. It cited reduced demand for fossil fuels from China and the rise of electric cars, which it expects will account for over a third of new car sales by 2030. The forecast diverges from that of OPEC, a group of oil-producing countries, which expects oil demand to continue rising until 2045.

Tom Emmer dropped out of the speakership race in America's House of Representatives hours after Republicans nominated him for the job. Mr Emmer-who, after some dithering, backed certifying the results of the 2020 presidential election-failed to secure the support of hardline Republicans and was harshly criticised by Donald Trump on social media. He was the third Republican nominee for the post in less than a month.

General Li Shangfu, China's defence minister, was dismissed from his role, having mysteriously disappeared from the public eye two months ago. The Chinese government did not give a reason for his removal, but General Li has reportedly been under investigation for corruption. It is the latest in a series of dismissals in the upper ranks of the country's military.

More than 30 American states sued Meta, which owns Instagram and Facebook, accusing the tech giant of harming young users. They argue that Meta is breaking consumer-protection laws by intentionally designing "psychologically manipulative" features for its platforms and violating federal law by gathering children's data without parents' consent. Meta responded that it had created more than 30 tools "to support teens and their families".

South Korea detained a group of North Koreans seeking to defect from their repressive homeland. The North Koreans-reportedly a group of four-traversed the waters off the east coast of the Korean peninsula in a small wooden boat. They will be eligible for South Korean citizenship subject to passing an investigation by the country's security services.

Figure of the day: 500km, the total span of the labyrinth of tunnels under the Gaza Strip, according to Hamas. Read the full story.

Photo: Alamy

Alphabet and Microsoft prosper, but not because of AI

Alphabet, Google's parent, and Microsoft will on Tuesday kick off a massive week in big-tech earnings reports. Meta and Amazon will follow on Wednesday and Thursday, respectively. Both Alphabet and Microsoft are expected to post their best results for some time.

Analysts will be studying particularly closely the numbers for each company's cloud-computing and artificial-intelligence businesses. They want to know whether growth in cloud computing is picking up again after a few quarters of slowdown. The question about AI is whether both firms have started making profits from the billions of dollars they have invested. The answer will probably be disappointing, at least in Microsoft's case. It is reportedly losing money on many of the users of "Copilot", an AI assistant for many of its online services. Providing such tools gobbles up a lot of expensive computing power.

Photo: AP

The UN's nuclear watchdog in Japan

In August the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant started discharging over 1m tonnes of wastewater into the Pacific Ocean. The water, which was used to cool reactors after the triple disaster in 2011, contains a small amount of tritium, a radioactive isotope. The International Atomic Energy Agency says its health impact is "negligible". Nonetheless, on Tuesday an IAEA task force arrived in Japan in order to test the water at Fukushima.

The results will be closely scrutinised. China, once the biggest importer of Japanese seafood, imposed a blanket ban on Japanese seafood immediately after the discharge started. Kishida Fumio, Japan's prime minister, urged China to change tack and rolled out subsidies to help the local fishing industry. Criticising Japan is a convenient political tool for China to distract its citizens from the country's economic woes. Despite the cajoling from the scientific community, it is hard to tell whether China will reverse the ban.

Photo: EPA

Macron's belated trip to Israel

Emmanuel Macron arrived in Israel on Tuesday for his first trip there since Hamas's attack on October 7th, in which 30 French citizens were killed. France's president is one of the later European leaders to visit. Germany's Olaf Scholz, Italy's Giorgia Meloni and Britain's Rishi Sunak went last week, following an earlier-and clumsier -visit by the European Commission's head, Ursula von der Leyen.

Mr Macron expressed solidarity with Israel and support for its right to defend itself against terrorism, combined with a plea that it prioritise the release of hostages, including as many as nine French citizens. He also called for "a decisive relaunch" of the Palestinian "political process". And he will meet Mahmoud Abbas, the leader of the Palestinian Authority, on Tuesday in the West Bank. Mr Macron's visit takes place amid worries that the conflict will worsen tensions at home. On October 13th a teacher was killed in northern France in an attack that prosecutors classified as an act of Islamist terrorism.

Photo: EPA

Delayed gratification for Poland's opposition

"Poland won, democracy won," declared Donald Tusk, the opposition leader, as he claimed victory in Poland's election last week. Not so fast. The president, Andrzej Duda, decides who gets the first shot at forming a government. On Tuesday Mr Duda, who is formally non-partisan but once belonged to the governing Law and Justice (PiS) party, began meeting party leaders to discuss their plans for government.

Both sides believe they have a mandate to rule. PiS came first in the election, with 35.4% of the vote, but does not seem to be able to form a majority coalition in parliament. Mr Tusk's alliance-which spans conservative and radical-left parties-has the numbers. It argues that giving the largest party priority, as is convention, would lead to meaningless negotiations and delay a handover of power, possibly by two months. In the meantime PiS could appoint more cronies to jobs in government and state-owned companies and erase evidence of misdemeanours. Mr Tusk has tasted victory, but may have to wait to savour it.

Photo: Getty Images

NATO's weapons plan

Whether Ukraine prevails over its Russian aggressor will depend on many factors. Few matter as much as the ability of the West's defence companies to produce enough munitions. Ukraine needs artillery shells and air-defence missiles to stay in the fight. Its allies also need to replenish their depleted arsenals of weapons.

At NATO's summit in Vilnius in July the alliance launched its Defence Production Action Plan to ramp up capacity. On Tuesday the NATO-Industry Forum will meet in Stockholm to discuss progress. Attendees include industry executives and senior officials from NATO and from its member governments.

The picture is not reassuring. The industry is raising production where possible. (Lockheed-Martin, a defence contractor, is upping production of HIMARS rocket launchers, for instance.) But it is not yet getting from defence ministries the multi-year investment commitments that it needs to open the new manufacturing lines required to meet the demands of high-intensity warfare. For defence firms this is a show-us-the-money moment.

Daily Quiz

We will serve you a new question each day this week. On Friday your challenge is to give us all five answers and, as important, tell us the connecting theme. Email your responses (and include mention of your home city and country) by 1700 GMT on Friday to [email protected] . We'll pick randomly from those with the right answers and crown three winners on Saturday.

Tuesday: Which naval commander and hero of the Revolutionary War led raids on the British in his ship, USS Ranger?

Monday: In "Macbeth", the title character is warned that he will only be defeated if something comes to Dunsinane. What is that thing?

You must never be fearful about what you are doing when it is right.
Rosa Parks

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A U.S. scholarship thrills a teacher in India. Then came the soul-crushing questions

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She was thrilled to become the first teacher from a government-sponsored school in India to get a Fulbright exchange award to learn from U.S. schools. People asked two questions that clouded her joy.

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MIT News | Massachusetts Institute of Technology

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Researchers discover a shortcoming that makes LLMs less reliable

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MIT researchers find large language models sometimes mistakenly link grammatical sequences to specific topics, then rely on these learned patterns when answering queries. This can cause LLMs to fail on new tasks and could be exploited by adversarial agents to trick an LLM into generating harmful content.

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AI’s safety features can be circumvented with poetry, research finds

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Poems containing prompts for harmful content prove effective at duping large language models

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Icelandic is in danger of dying out because of AI and English-language media, says former PM

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Katrín Jakobsdóttir and her co-author want the 350,000 people who speak the language to fight for its future

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'Predator_ Badlands' Yautja expert explains alien language - Los Angeles Times

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Who knew two letters could spark so much conversation? This week, we’re breaking down the many uses of “um” and why the word is so controversial.

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Old-fashioned play builds serious skills

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Old-fashioned play builds serious skills

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Play, private speech, and executive function

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Old-Fashioned Play Builds Serious Skills _ NPR

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"To listen respectfully to others, to cultivate and speak your own voice, to suspend your opinions about others—these bring out the intelligence that lives at the very center of ourselves–the intelligence that exists when we are alert to possibilities around us and thinking freshly. Musician Michael Jones calls this 'intelligence of the heart.'" David Bohm

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"Not one day should pass in a man's life without his receiving at least one thought that alters his nature a little, that enables him to develop instead of merely to exist."

--Rudolf Steiner

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Plurilingual Teaching Across the Curriculum

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Plurilingual Teaching Across the Curriculum

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The "Tomorrow's Professor" is retired, sadly, but the archive is available at Stanford University

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Why every professor needs Linguistics 101

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Why every professor needs Linguistics 101

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Why Every Professor Needs Linguistics 101 - Commentary - The Chronicle of Higher Education

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Kinship categoies across languages reflect general communicative principles (Science)

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Kinship categoies across languages reflect general communicative principles (Science)

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As our languages make clear, context is a human specialty - latimes.com

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The reader comments are included at the end. Very insightful, some of them.

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George Packer. (March 2, 2023). The Moral Case Against Equity Language. The Atlantic. https://advance-lexis-com.proxyiub.uits.iu.edu/api/document?collection=news&id=urn%3acontentItem%3a67SC-00P1-JCG7-V432-00000-00&context=1519360&identityprofileid=KCKCRH51832.

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The Moral Case Against Equity Language.PDF

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Communication is a human right - but what happens when someone can't speak for themselves?

Sean Allsop struggled to talk until he was eight years old, when he began to speak thanks to years of speech therapy. He explores the technologies and innovations helping people around the world who struggle to communicate.

We meet Richard Cave, National Advisor at the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists, as he introduces a patient and their family to voice banking, a method that preserves someone's voice before it's lost, using recordings to create a personalised synthetic version. He explains why having your own voice is a major part of your identity.

In the United States, we hear from people trialling a brain chip that turns neural signals into speech. It's still in its early stages, but how close are we to seeing this kind of technology more widely available for those who would benefit from it? A child-friendly robot made in Luxembourg is teaching children with communication difficulties how to express emotions and build social skills. And in San Cesareo, Italy, the simplest solutions can sometimes prove the most effective. The town has introduced AAC (Augmentative and Alternative Communication) sign boards in public spaces, helping both users and non-users learn and connect.

Image: A student pointing at an image on an AAC sign board (Credit: Eleonora Vallerotonda)

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BBC Audio | People Fixing the World | Speaking out

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Solutions helping people who struggle with speech

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Indiana Learning Lab

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Throughout my life, my mum has always been a big reader. She was inthree or four book clubs at the same time. She'd devour whatever texts my siblings and I were studying in school, handwrite notes for our lunchboxes and write in her diary every night. Our fridge door was a revolving display of word-of-the-day flashcards. Despite this, she also was and remains, by some margin, the worst speller I have met.

By the time I was in primary school, she was already asking me to proofread her work emails, often littered with mistakes that were glaringly obvious to me even at such a young age. It used to baffle me - how could this person, who races through multiple books a week and can quote Shakespeare faultlessly, possibly think "me" is spelt with two Es?

It was on one of these occasions that she first mentioned she had been taught the wrong alphabet. "Google it," she said. "It was an experiment, so it doesn't exist any more, but it was called ITA."

At first, I thought she was joking, or maybe misremembering some exaggerated version of phonics. But later, I looked it up and, sure enough, there it was - a strange chart of more than 40 characters, many familiar, others alien. Sphinx-like ligatures, odd slashes, conjoined vowels - it looked like a cross between English and Greek.

"My memory is so poor, but I can still see those devilish characters," my mum, Judith Loffhagen, says as we sit in the garden of my childhood home in London. "An 'a' with an 'e' on its back, two 'c's with a line across them." She traces the shapes on her trouser leg. "What the hell was any of that supposed to mean?"

The Initial Teaching Alphabet was a radical, little-known educational experiment trialled in British schools (and in other English-speaking countries) during the 1960s and 70s. Billed as a way to help children learn to read faster by making spelling more phonetically intuitive, it radically rewrote the rules of literacy for tens of thousands of children seemingly overnight. And then it vanished without explanation. Barely documented, rarely acknowledged, and quietly abandoned - but never quite forgotten by those it touched.

Why was it only implemented in certain schools - or even, in some cases, only certain classes in those schools? How did it appear to disappear without record or reckoning? Are there others like my mum, still aggrieved by ITA? And what happens to a generation taught to read and write using a system that no longer exists?

English is one of the most difficult languages to learn to read and write. Unlike Spanish or Welsh, where letters have consistent sound values, English is a patchwork of linguistic inheritances. Its roughly 44 phonemes - the distinct sounds that make up speech - can each be spelt multiple ways. The long "i" sound alone, as in "eye", has more than 20 possible spellings. And many letter combinations contradict one another across different words: think of "through", "though" and "thought".

It was precisely this inconsistency that Conservative MP Sir James Pitman - grandson of Sir Isaac Pitman, the inventor of shorthand - identified as the single greatest obstacle for young readers. In a 1953 parliamentary debate, he argued that it is our "illogical and ridiculous spelling" which is the "chief handicap" that leads many children to stumble with reading, with lasting consequences for their education. His proposed solution, launched six years later, was radical: to completely reimagine the alphabet.

The result was ITA: 44 characters, each representing a distinct sound, designed to bypass the chaos of traditional English and teach children to read, and fast. Among the host of strange new letters were a backwards "z", an "n" with a "g" inside, a backwards "t" conjoined with an "h", a bloated "w" with an "o" in the middle. Sentences in ITA were all written in lower case.

By 1966, 140 of the 158 UK education authorities taught ITA in at least one of their schools.The new alphabet was not intended as a permanent replacement for the existing one: the aim was to teach children to read quickly, with the promise they would transition "seamlessly" into the standard alphabet by the age of seven or eight. But often, that seamless transition never quite happened. Many children - my mum included - found themselves caught between two systems.

My mum grew up in Blackburn in the 1960s, a bright child who skipped a year and started secondary school early. She doesn't remember the details of how ITA was introduced. "That's just what we were taught," she tells me. "I didn't know there was another way, or that I was going to graduate on to something else.

"I'm nearly 60, and poor spelling has dogged me my whole life," she continues. "Teachers always used to make jokes about my spelling, and I'd get those dreaded red rings around my work."

English was always her favourite subject, but it quickly became a source of shame. "I remember that absolute dread of reading in front of the class, stumbling on words. And then, at A-level, I'll never forget my English teacher said to me, 'You'll never get an A because of your spelling.' That was crushing. English was the one subject I loved - I felt so aggrieved."

In the 60s, parental involvement in schooling was minimal, especially for working-class or immigrant families (my mum's parents migrated from Nigeria in the early 60s). "Back then, parents wanted you to succeed in whatever you were being taught, but they didn't really question what you were being taught," she says. "There was also a reverence for British education, that whole colonial thing, the idea that the British know best."

Despite her inability to spell, she became a solicitor, and later started her own business. "Spellcheckers revolutionised my confidence in writing," she says. "I hate making mistakes. If I'm the slightest bit unsure of how to spell something, I'll check it. I'm fanatical about the importance of getting those things right."

Prof Dominic Wyse, professor of early years education at University College London, says: "ITA is regarded now as an experiment that just didn't work. The transition to the standard alphabetwas the problem. Children were having to almost relearn the real way the English language works. It doesn't surprise me that it failed. Any teaching that is based on anything other than the reality of what has to be learned is a waste of time."

Prof Rhona Stainthorp, an expert in literacy development at the University of Reading, agrees. "It was a bizarre thing to do," she says. "Pitman wasn't an educationist, and ITA is a perfect example of someone thinking they've got a good idea and trying to simplify something, but having absolutely no idea about teaching."

Sarah Kitt, now 60, was taught ITA at her state primary school in Plymouth in the late 1960s. For her, the legacy of ITA has lingered long past childhood. "I can tell when a word is wrong," she says, "but I can't always make it right. I get these complete blanks."

Her memories of those early years are clouded not just by the outre alphabet, but by the emotional toll it took. "I hated English. I would get to the school gates, burst into tears, and turn around and walk home again," she says. "I had a teacher who wasn't very sympathetic. I felt so stupid. I used to wonder whether I was dyslexic."

When Kitt was nine, she moved to Exeter. She quickly realised that other children at her new school hadn't been taught to read and write the way she had. "You just learned to mask it," she says. "You found ways to avoid spelling altogether."

Kitt was put off humanities, and went on to study economics and statistics at university before working at the Bank of England for more than a decade. Before the digital era, she relied on her mother to check her essays. "At university, we didn't have computers and spellcheck. I would get my mum to read through things."

Now a parent herself, Kitt is wary of any classroom experiment that puts children at risk of long-term disadvantage. She says: "I'd be hugely concerned if my daughter was taught like that. There would be more parent power now - people would be questioning it in WhatsApp groups. We didn't have that." Like others who learned ITA, Sarah's frustration isn't just with the method itself, but with the lack of transparency. "It seemed to just disappear," she says. "There was no explanation. No one ever followed up to ask: how did this affect you?"

Stainthorp says there's not enough evidence to prove ITA had a bad impact on spelling: "People who learned with ITA might blame their bad spelling on it, but there are many people who are bad spellers who didn't learn with ITA, and vice versa." Spelling proficiency is shaped by a tangle of factors, from teacher quality and parental involvement to self-esteem and natural aptitude. While many former pupils who used ITA blame their lifelong spelling struggles on it, others have had no such problems.

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In fact, early reports of ITA's effects were largely positive. Infant school teachers noted that reading ability among children taught with ITA outpaced those learning with the standard alphabet. But a 1966 study demonstrated that any initial superior reading fluency of ITA learners began to fade at around age eight.

Toni Brocklehurst, who taught ITA for four years in Lancashire in the early 1970s, still believes it gave many of her pupils - especially those from socially deprived homes - a head start. "These were kids who had no books at home," she tells me. "Once they'd learned those characters, they could decode anything in that alphabet. It gave them a huge boost in confidence."

However, she continues: "I don't think it would work for all children. It wouldn't work for middle-class children who are being introduced to reading books at home, because it would confuse them."

The biggest challenge to ITA's success was always going to be the transition back to the standard alphabet. And because pupils did that at different ages, many teachers were left juggling both alphabets simultaneously within the same class.

Even more puzzling is the way the system was rolled out. ITA was never adopted nationally, nor required. As Stainthorp explains: "At that time, there was no national curriculum - a headteacher could simply decide to implement it in their school, or a teacher in their class. There was no consistency."

In the early 70s, Mike Alder was a pupil at Devonshire Road infants' school in Blackpool. He was strong at maths and science, placed in top sets, and on track for good O-levels. But English was always different.

"We had little thin cardboard books," he remembers. "Stories about Paul and Sally. The letters were odd - some of them were joined together, like an 'e' and an 'a' welded into one shape. At first, I didn't question it. I just thought that's how everyone learned to read."

For Alder, the abrupt transition from ITA to the standard alphabet felt like a betrayal. "It was like they said: 'Right, we've told you a pack of lies for the past two years, now this is how you're actually meant to read and write.' My disgust at being lied to, that loss of trust, that stuck with me. I was never interested in English after that."

He believes that ITA has had a long-term impact on his attainment. "My spelling is still appalling," he says. "In all my subjects, I was getting As and Bs, but in English I really struggled. I got a C at O-level." He remembers one friend, also taught in ITA, who had to retake English years later at sixth form just to move forward academically. "It definitely held people back."

Now 58, Alder works as a technical specialist in electrical ground equipment at BAE Systems in Blackpool. Though he has built a successful career, spelling remains a daily obstacle. "I rely on spellcheck constantly. I sent an email today and 15-20% of the words had that red underline."

For decades, Alder assumed ITA was just a strange footnote in his own education. "When I tell people about it, most say, 'What's that?' No one's ever heard of it. It's like it never happened. I'd love to read a proper lessons-learned document from it. What did they find? What did they conclude? Because, to me, it felt like they tried something, realised it didn't work, and just buried it. If either of my kids had been taught ITA," he adds, "I'd have pulled them out of school with immediate effect."

The issue isn't simply whether or not ITA worked - the problem is that no one really knows. For all its scale and ambition, the experiment was never followed by a national longitudinal study. No one tracked whether the children who learned to read with ITA went on to excel, or struggle, as they moved through the education system. There was no formal inquiry into why the scheme was eventually dropped, and no comprehensive lessons-learned document to account for its legacy.

In some ways, ITA is an extreme manifestation of a debate about early-years education that is still relevant today. The "reading wars" - the long-running tension between phonics-led approaches, which involve breaking down and sounding out words,and those that emphasise context, comprehension and whole-language exposure - are very much alive. English's chaotic spelling system continues to divide experts and frustrate learners.

In 2022, a landmark study by researchers at UCL's Institute of Education found that the current emphasis on synthetic phonics is "uninformed and failing children", and "not underpinned by the latest evidence".

Some defenders of ITA, like Brocklehurst, think its logic wasn't so far removed from phonics - now a government-mandated method for teaching reading in English primary schools. But there's a key difference; phonics uses the same structure of the alphabet as every other bit of English language.

What ITA reveals is how tempting it is to try to simplify a problem that is, in truth, irreducibly complex. There was a clarity to its premise: let's make English easier. But the cost of that simplicity may have been borne by a generation of children, many of whom are still unsure of its impacts.

"You've only got one education," my mum says. "I do feel really resentful. My parents aren't alive any more, but on their behalf as well - and as a parent now - I'd be absolutely furious to think that my children were put into an experiment without me being asked." She pauses for a moment. "We weren't given a choice, we weren't asked and we weren't explained to. I think it's telling that it seems like this experiment slipped in and slipped out quietly. Fifty years later, we're still suffering as a result."

This article was amended on 7 July 2025. Phonics is mandated in English primary schools but not in the other devolved nations of the UK. Also, there was an error in the main image: a previous version used "faulld" as a representation of the word "failed"; however, this should have said "fælld".

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The radical 1960s schools experiment that created a whole new alphabet - and left thousands of children unable to spell

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Decades ago, a generation of UK schoolchildren unwittingly took part in an initiative aimed at boosting reading skills - with lasting consequences

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We are pleased to announce some new changes to our language map interface as of March 2018 as well as some exciting plans for future development. Take a look at our About page for more information.

FEATURED PARTNER

Through their 7000 Languages Project, Transparent Language is making language-learning technology available to language teams working with lesser-known and under-resourced languages.

K-12 TEACHERS' GUIDE

Langscape can be the basis for many innovative classroom learning opportunities - in foreign languages, geography, social studies and more! Read our teachers' guide for suggested activities as well as connections to Common Core and state standards. (PDF)

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We are pleased to announce some new changes to our language map interface as of March 2018 as well as some exciting plans for future development. Take a look at our About page for more information. Through their 7000 Languages Project, Transparent Language is making language-learning technology available to language teams working with lesser-known and under-resourced languages.

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Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Writer Who Condemned Colonists and Elites, Dies at 87

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Mr. Ngugi composed the first modern novel in the Gikuyu language on prison toilet paper while being held by Kenyan authorities. He spent many prolific years in exile.

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"The phenomenon of which I was an instance—the child who masters the English language but is not a member of the Anglo culture—was not uncommon across British colonies in Africa and Asia. As British control weakened and withdrew after 1945, significant minorities were left behind: middle-class “natives” who, attracted by the material advancement promised by British-dominated commerce and government, had done their best to anglicize themselves. Even in their isolated position in the newly independent nations, such minorities continued to feel they belonged to a worldwide Anglo culture, whose center was perhaps now the United States rather than Britain."

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A writer who made his name writing in English tries to leave it behind

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Six books that will help you understand how we came to speak and write the way we do

Image: Science Photo Library

This article is part of our Summer reads series. Visit the full collection for book lists, guest essays and more seasonal distractions.

Reluctant to start on a big masterpiece? Try these small gems instead

Five non-fiction books about a city that is both gilded and gritty

Some of these fictional holidays aren't fun, but they might enhance yours

The games fall short of their ideals, but they're still worth watching

There are plenty of duds, but a few gems

From Bethel to the Bahamas

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What to read about the origins of language

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Six books that will help you understand how we came to speak and write the way we do | The Economist reads

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Sign up for Chalkbeat Indiana's free daily newsletter to keep up with Indianapolis Public Schools, Marion County's township districts, and statewide education news.
For some students in Sui Tial's class, drawing a map of the Chin State of Myanmar is the first time they've looked closely at the country their families fled.

Born in the United States, these students may only speak a few words of Hakha, or the Chin language, Tial said.

But other students who were already fluent speakers also wanted to take the Chin heritage language class at Southport High School, the first such offering in Indiana. Tial asked them why.

"They said, because we don't know our culture. We don't know how to practice it. We don't know how our community is doing," Tial recalled. "And I said, okay, that's the reason we're offering this class."

Beginning this year, Perry Township schools will offer heritage language classes in Hakha Chin at both Southport and Perry Meridian High School in order to serve students from the large and growing Chin community. Unlike foreign language classes, heritage language classes are designed for students with some familiarity with a language, like hearing it at home. Spanish heritage language courses are offered at districts throughout Indiana, including Perry, Lawrence, and Washington schools.

For Perry students, the class is an opportunity to connect with Hakha-speaking family members, including relatives still living in Myanmar, formerly known as Burma.

Nearly 4,400 students in Perry schools - or more than one-quarter of all students - speak a language from Myanmar; around 3,700 speak one or more Chin dialects. The district had hoped to offer a Chin language course for years, but struggled to find a teacher qualified to teach it, administrators said.

"I can speak Hakha, but I can't really write in Hakha. I'm trying to learn how to write, that's my goal," said freshman Amos Cung. "When I text my family, I'm usually writing in English."

The Chin community south of Indianapolis is one of the largest communities of Chin immigrants in the world, many of whom arrived during decades of conflict in Myanmar. The Chin Community of Indianapolis estimates the population at 30,000 people.

For Chin immigrants, who may not have learned to read and write in the language after it was banned from schools in Myanmar, the class is a way to give their U.S.-born children that opportunity, said Julie Zing, executive director of the community center, which helped develop the course.

"We never really had a chance to learn the Chin language, reading and writing, in school. Basically, we had to learn it from churches," Zing said. "Now, what we're facing is that the parents don't speak English and the children don't speak Hakha. It's a huge concern."

Churches in Indianapolis hold language classes for students over the summer, Zing said. But there's a limit to how much they can cover in a few weeks.

"This is a year-long class, and we think that's a really cool thing," Zing said.

A refugee from Myanmar who arrived in the United States in 2009, she worked as a tutor and translator in Perry schools. Then, before she left for college and earned her teaching license, she wrote a letter to her Southport administrators telling them that she'd be back as a full-fledged teacher.

It's a path that Perry administrators hope more support staff and even students will take.

"We want more teachers who are multilingual," said Jane Pollard, the district's assistant superintendent overseeing secondary schools. "The diversity is what makes us special, and supporting that and students is important to the district, because students who are literate in their native languages, it's easier for them to be literate in English, too."

Tial travels between the two high schools to teach both sections of the Chin heritage language class. This year, Tial volunteered to build the Chin heritage language program at the district on top of her Algebra 2 and geometry classes.

One challenge was establishing a base of knowledge with her students, some of whom grew up in Indianapolis, others in refugee camps in Malaysia.

That's why they started with the geography of the Chin state, Tial said. Next week, they'll begin learning the alphabet.
Aleksandra Appleton covers Indiana education policy and writes about K-12 schools across the state. Contact her at aappleton@chalkbeat.org .
She relies on English to communicate with her students now. But she hopes that by the end of the year, they'll be able to converse in Hakha amongst themselves, and even write short sentences.

"If they don't understand, how will they know what's going on in the community?" Tial said. "We want them to communicate with their parents and the community, and we want the community to be more connected with Perry Township schools."

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New Chin language classes in Perry aim to serve growing community with roots in Myanmar - NewsBreak

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Sign up for Chalkbeat Indiana's free daily newsletter to keep up with Indianapolis Public Schools, Marion County's township districts, and statewide education news.For some students in Sui Tial's class, drawing a map of the Chin State of Myanmar is the first time they've looked closely at the country their families fled.Born in the United States, these students may only speak a few words of Hakha, or the Chin language, Tial said.But other students who were already fluent speakers also wanted to take the Chin heritage language class at Southport High School, the first such offering in Indiana.

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Are Elvish, Klingon, Dothraki and Na'vi real languages? - John McWhorter

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Opinion | Today’s Teenagers Have Invented a Language That Captures the World Perfectly

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Our kids’ lingo is not only better than any we used, it’s a useful window into the way they think.

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If you're like many digitally savvy Americans, it has likely been a while since you've spent much time writing by hand.

The laborious process of tracing out our thoughts, letter by letter, on the page is becoming a relic of the past in our screen-dominated world, where text messages and thumb-typed grocery lists have replaced handwritten letters and sticky notes. Electronic keyboards offer obvious efficiency benefits that have undoubtedly boosted our productivity - imagine having to write all your emails longhand.

To keep up, many schools are introducing computers as early as preschool, meaning some kids may learn the basics of typing before writing by hand.

But giving up this slower, more tactile way of expressing ourselves may come at a significant cost, according to a growing body of research that's uncovering the surprising cognitive benefits of taking pen to paper, or even stylus to iPad - for both children and adults.

In kids, studies show that tracing out ABCs, as opposed to typing them, leads to better and longer-lasting recognition and understanding of letters. Writing by hand also improves memory and recall of words, laying down the foundations of literacy and learning. In adults, taking notes by hand during a lecture, instead of typing, can lead to better conceptual understanding of material.

"There's actually some very important things going on during the embodied experience of writing by hand," says Ramesh Balasubramaniam, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Merced. "It has important cognitive benefits."

While those benefits have long been recognized by some (for instance, many authors, including Jennifer Egan and Neil Gaiman, draft their stories by hand to stoke creativity), scientists have only recently started investigating why writing by hand has these effects.

A slew of recent brain imaging research suggests handwriting's power stems from the relative complexity of the process and how it forces different brain systems to work together to reproduce the shapes of letters in our heads onto the page.

Your brain on handwriting

Both handwriting and typing involve moving our hands and fingers to create words on a page. But handwriting, it turns out, requires a lot more fine-tuned coordination between the motor and visual systems. This seems to more deeply engage the brain in ways that support learning.

"Handwriting is probably among the most complex motor skills that the brain is capable of," says Marieke Longcamp, a cognitive neuroscientist at Aix-Marseille Université.

Gripping a pen nimbly enough to write is a complicated task, as it requires your brain to continuously monitor the pressure that each finger exerts on the pen. Then, your motor system has to delicately modify that pressure to re-create each letter of the words in your head on the page.

"Your fingers have to each do something different to produce a recognizable letter," says Sophia Vinci-Booher, an educational neuroscientist at Vanderbilt University. Adding to the complexity, your visual system must continuously process that letter as it's formed. With each stroke, your brain compares the unfolding script with mental models of the letters and words, making adjustments to fingers in real time to create the letters' shapes, says Vinci-Booher.

That's not true for typing.

To type "tap" your fingers don't have to trace out the form of the letters - they just make three relatively simple and uniform movements. In comparison, it takes a lot more brainpower, as well as cross-talk between brain areas, to write than type.

Recent brain imaging studies bolster this idea. A study published in January found that when students write by hand, brain areas involved in motor and visual information processing " sync up" with areas crucial to memory formation, firing at frequencies associated with learning.

"We don't see that [synchronized activity] in typewriting at all," says Audrey van der Meer, a psychologist and study co-author at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. She suggests that writing by hand is a neurobiologically richer process and that this richness may confer some cognitive benefits.

Other experts agree. "There seems to be something fundamental about engaging your body to produce these shapes," says Robert Wiley, a cognitive psychologist at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. "It lets you make associations between your body and what you're seeing and hearing," he says, which might give the mind more footholds for accessing a given concept or idea.

Those extra footholds are especially important for learning in kids, but they may give adults a leg up too. Wiley and others worry that ditching handwriting for typing could have serious consequences for how we all learn and think.

What might be lost as handwriting wanes

The clearest consequence of screens and keyboards replacing pen and paper might be on kids' ability to learn the building blocks of literacy - letters.

"Letter recognition in early childhood is actually one of the best predictors of later reading and math attainment," says Vinci-Booher. Her work suggests the process of learning to write letters by hand is crucial for learning to read them.

"When kids write letters, they're just messy," she says. As kids practice writing "A," each iteration is different, and that variability helps solidify their conceptual understanding of the letter.

Research suggests kids learn to recognize letters better when seeing variable handwritten examples, compared with uniform typed examples.

This helps develop areas of the brain used during reading in older children and adults, Vinci-Booher found.

"This could be one of the ways that early experiences actually translate to long-term life outcomes," she says. "These visually demanding, fine motor actions bake in neural communication patterns that are really important for learning later on."

Ditching handwriting instruction could mean that those skills don't get developed as well, which could impair kids' ability to learn down the road.

"If young children are not receiving any handwriting training, which is very good brain stimulation, then their brains simply won't reach their full potential," says van der Meer. "It's scary to think of the potential consequences."

Many states are trying to avoid these risks by mandating cursive instruction. This year, California started requiring elementary school students to learn cursive, and similar bills are moving through state legislatures in several states, including Indiana, Kentucky, South Carolina and Wisconsin. (So far, evidence suggests that it's the writing by hand that matters, not whether it's print or cursive.)

Slowing down and processing information

For adults, one of the main benefits of writing by hand is that it simply forces us to slow down.

During a meeting or lecture, it's possible to type what you're hearing verbatim. But often, "you're not actually processing that information - you're just typing in the blind," says van der Meer. "If you take notes by hand, you can't write everything down," she says.

The relative slowness of the medium forces you to process the information, writing key words or phrases and using drawing or arrows to work through ideas, she says. "You make the information your own," she says, which helps it stick in the brain.

Such connections and integration are still possible when typing, but they need to be made more intentionally. And sometimes, efficiency wins out. "When you're writing a long essay, it's obviously much more practical to use a keyboard," says van der Meer.

Still, given our long history of using our hands to mark meaning in the world, some scientists worry about the more diffuse consequences of offloading our thinking to computers.

"We're foisting a lot of our knowledge, extending our cognition, to other devices, so it's only natural that we've started using these other agents to do our writing for us," says Balasubramaniam.

It's possible that this might free up our minds to do other kinds of hard thinking, he says. Or we might be sacrificing a fundamental process that's crucial for the kinds of immersive cognitive experiences that enable us to learn and think at our full potential.

Balasubramaniam stresses, however, that we don't have to ditch digital tools to harness the power of handwriting. So far, research suggests that scribbling with a stylus on a screen activates the same brain pathways as etching ink on paper. It's the movement that counts, he says, not its final form.
Jonathan Lambert is a Washington, D.C.-based freelance journalist who covers science, health and policy.

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Why writing by hand beats typing for thinking and learning

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Researchers are learning that handwriting engages the brain in ways typing can't match, raising questions about the costs of ditching this age-old practice, especially for kids.

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Why do Americans often find themselves on the receiving end of eye rolls when they step off their home turf? Is it just about being the loud tourists, or do personal behaviors weigh heavily in global perceptions?
1. Speaking Louder Than Necessary

Americans often speak at volumes considered too loud in many cultures, which can be perceived as obnoxious or disrespectful in quieter, more reserved societies.

2. Wearing Casual Attire Everywhere

The American preference for casual wear, even at formal or sacred sites abroad, often strikes locals as inappropriate or disrespectful.

3. Tipping Excessively or Not at All

Americans abroad can confuse or frustrate with their tipping habits-either by tipping when it's not customary, or by failing to adjust to local tipping standards.

4. Expecting Everywhere to Accept US Dollars

Some Americans travel abroad expecting to pay with US dollars everywhere, which can be seen as presumptuous and disrespectful to the local economy.

5. Ignoring Local Etiquette

From failing to remove shoes when required to skipping the polite greetings in local languages, Americans' disregard for local customs can come off as rude or ignorant.

6. Complaining About Local Foods

Voicing dislike for local dishes or incessantly comparing them to American food can be insulting to hosts and cooks, reflecting poorly on American openness and appreciation.

7. Making Everything About America

Conversations that always circle back to the U.S., its policies, or its global standing can tire international ears, making Americans seem self-centered.

8. Lack of Language Efforts

Americans often expect others to speak English and make little effort to learn even basic phrases of the local languages, which can appear disrespectful or lazy.

9. Over-Reliance on Credit Cards

The American habit of using credit cards for even the smallest purchases can disrupt local practices and economies that rely on cash transactions.

10. Joking at Inappropriate Times

Americans' sense of humor can sometimes miss the mark abroad, especially when jokes are made about serious or culturally sensitive topics.

11. Discussing Controversial Topics Loudly

Open debates about politics or religion, common in U.S. culture, can be awkward or offensive in places where such discussions are more private or sensitive.

12. Not Researching Basic Local Laws

Americans who neglect to learn local laws and regulations often find themselves in avoidable trouble, irritating both authorities and locals.

13. Questioning Local Norms

Directly questioning or criticizing local norms and practices can seem arrogant, suggesting that the American way is superior.

14. Showing Impatience

In many parts of the world, a slower pace of life is normal. American impatience-whether in line, in traffic, or at service establishments-can be jarring and disrespectful.

15. Flaunting Wealth

Displaying expensive gadgets, jewelry, or cash not only draws thieves but also can be seen as flaunting wealth in places where such displays are culturally insensitive.

16. Expecting Special Treatment

Assuming that being American entitles one to special treatment or quicker service is a common faux pas that breeds resentment.

17. Refusing to Adapt to Local Pace

Sticking rigidly to a fast-paced schedule and not adapting to the local, more laid-back rhythms can make Americans stand out negatively.

18. Ignoring Dress Codes

Whether it's showing too much skin in conservative countries or wearing streetwear in professional settings, inappropriate dress can send the wrong message.

19. Over-Packing Tourist Sites

Traveling in large groups and overcrowding small or delicate tourist sites, often without regard for local sentiment or conservation efforts, can annoy locals.

20. Misunderstanding Bargaining Culture

In places where bargaining is an art, either not engaging at all or pushing too hard can lead to misunderstandings or disrespect.

21. Taking Inappropriate Photos

Snapping photos without permission, especially of people or at solemn locations, can be intrusive and disrespectful.

22. Imposing American Standards

Expecting the same level of service or amenities available in the U.S. and complaining when they're not met overlooks local realities and can seem spoiled.

23. Using Foreign Spaces as Personal Stages

From loud phone conversations to sprawling out personal belongings in public spaces, treating foreign locales like personal stages is seen as inconsiderate.

24. Not Valuing Local Advice

Ignoring advice or warnings from locals about where to go or what to avoid can lead to unsafe situations or missed cultural opportunities.

25. Assuming Everyone Understands American Cultural References

Using American pop culture references that local people may not understand can make conversations one-sided and exclusive.

Reflection Time

Could it be that the way we carry ourselves abroad needs a serious rethink? It might be time to consider how our individual actions help shape the world's view of Americans. Isn't it worth making an effort to be better cultural ambassadors?

The post 25 Reasons Why Americans Are Increasingly Disliked Worldwide first appeared on Pulse of Pride .

Featured Image Credit: Shutterstock / VGstockstudio.

For transparency, this content was partly developed with AI assistance and carefully curated by an experienced editor to be informative and ensure accuracy.

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25 Reasons Why Americans Are Increasingly Disliked Worldwide - Pulse of Pride

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Why do Americans often find themselves on the receiving end of eye rolls when they step off their home turf? Is it just about being the loud tourists, or do

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Opinion | Some Words Feel Truer in Spanish

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To me, a maleta meant family had arrived from Peru, carrying flavors, textures and memories of my birthplace.

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Christine Ro uses ChatGPT to practise her Spanish

I tell my Argentinian pal that I've been using ChatGPT to practise my Spanish and, excitedly, I explain what it can do.

It can correct my errors, I tell him, and it's able to give me regional variations in Spanish, including Mexican Spanish, Argentinian Spanish and, amusingly, Spanglish.

And, unlike when I'm chatting to him on WhatsApp, I don't have to factor in time zone differences.

My friend is less enthused. "So you've replaced me?" he jokes.

I haven't, of course. The convenience and breadth of an AI chatbot can't compete with the pleasures of chatting with someone whose personality quirks I've learned over the course of years. It is however a useful supplement.

And I'm just one of many people who have discovered in recent months the benefits of AI-based chat for language learning.

A Costa Rican who works in the construction industry tells me that his AI-powered keyboard has been useful for polishing up his technical vocabulary in English. For instance, it's saved him a great deal of time to be able to find an English word for a tool by describing it.

A South African café owner has gone further in improving his Spanish grammar with the aid of AI. He had a hard time finding simple study tools, especially given his ADHD, so he started using ChatGPT to quickly generate and adapt study aids like charts of verb tenses.

Developers have been quick to jump on this wave of interest, and there are now numerous apps that have drawn on open-source code to customise AI for language learners. These can be more appropriate for learners than general chatbots like the virtual companion Replika.

Blanka Klímová, an associate professor of applied linguistics at the University of Hradec Králové in Czechia, says that Replika has been useful for her students to practise informal English.

But the conversations could become repetitive, language corrections were missing, and the chatbot would sometimes ask students for sexy pictures. "This was quite abusive."

A conversation in the AI language-learning app Tutor Lily

In contrast, one of the specific language-learning chatbots is LangAI, launched in March by Federico Ruiz Cassarino. Mr Ruiz Cassarino drew on his own experiences of learning English after moving from Uruguay to the UK. His English skills improved dramatically from speaking every day, compared to more academic methods. He's now using his own app to work on his Italian.

Many people get self-conscious about making mistakes in a language they barely speak, even to a tutor, Mr Ruiz Cassarino notes. But a chatbot won't judge you. And the new wave of generative AI is so advanced that it can cultivate AI penpals, which is how he sees his product.

Rather than sticking to boring pre-scripted roleplays, with current AI "you can speak about things that are interesting to you, which makes it feel like not as much of a chore to learn".

While many language learners are using popular chatbots like ChatGPT and Bard to practice, Mr Ruiz Cassarino believes that specific language-acquisition apps like his are useful.

"We worked really hard to make this well tailored for somebody who wants to learn languages," he says. The team customised LangAI's user interface to match users' vocabulary levels, added the ability to make corrections during a conversation, and enabled the conversion of speech to text.

According to Mr Ruiz Cassarino, they're seeing some impressive retention numbers for an education app. Of users who try the app for around 10 minutes, roughly 45% will still be using it a month later. They're now focused on building the subscriber base of people willing to pay for unlimited use.

Related to that, they're planning advancements like tracking of improved skills and the ability to personalise the chatbot's tone and personality (perhaps even to practise a language while conversing with historical figures).

Some of the many language learning apps

Assoc Prof Klímová, who is also a member of the research project Language in the Human-Machine Era, has assessed the useability and usefulness of AI chatbots for students of foreign languages. This research suggests that AI chatbots are helpful for vocabulary development, grammar and other language skills, especially when they offer corrective feedback.

To stay ahead of the trend, well-established language-learning apps have been integrating AI into their own platforms. Duolingo began collaborating with OpenAI in September 2022, using that company's GPT-4.

It seems unlikely that AI chatbots will replace Duolingo altogether. Joy Ehonwa, an editor and writer in Lagos, mainly uses Duolingo to learn French.

But lately she's also been using an AI chatbot developed in Nigeria to help with her French.

She interacts with this chatbot, Kainene vos Savant, the way she would with "an all-knowing human friend".

Ms Ehonwa explains, "My questions revolve around 'why'? When I fail an exercise on Duolingo, the app is not great at helping me understand why the thing that was wrong, was wrong. So, I ask Kainene. Also, when I think a sentence should be a certain way and it isn't, I ask Kainene why and she helps me understand why it cannot be the way I expect it to be, as an English speaker."

Joy Ehonwa says chatbots are good at explaining points of language

If the older language-learning platforms have weaknesses, so does AI-powered language learning. Users are reporting that chatbots are well versed in widely spoken European languages, but quality degrades for languages that are underrepresented online or that have different writing systems. Many of the AI language-learning apps are available for a limited set of languages.

Even in common languages, the chatbots make errors - sometimes even inventing words. One problem is that they deliver text so confidently, it would be easy for a relatively new learner to take what they say as correct.

Emily M Bender, a professor of computational linguistics at the University of Washington in the US, has concerns, "What kind of biases and inappropriate ways of talking about other people might they be learning from the chatbot?" Other ethical issues, such as data privacy, may also be neglected.

More technology of business:

Still, Assoc Prof Klímová believes that there will be an enormous market for such technologies. And like a number of language learners, she points out that GPT-4, available with a paid subscription to ChatGPT, has made astonishing strides on accuracy.

Though many teachers disagree, she believes, "It's just a matter of time when artificial intelligence will replace us as teachers of foreign languages."

While that may sound extreme, "teachers will still have an important role as mentors and facilitators, particularly with beginner learners and older people since teachers have a strong understanding of the individual learning styles, language needs, and goals of each student."

It will be key for language teachers to assess the added value of AI and their role in relation to it, as more sophisticated self-directed learning becomes possible. As Assoc Prof Klímová advises, "Technology is here to stay, and we have to face it and reconsider our teaching methods and assessments."

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Students switch to AI to learn languages

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Many people are using AI like ChatGPT to improve their language skills but learning that way has drawbacks.

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People Are Watching Netflix to Learn a Foreign Language

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Nearly half of language-learning app Memrise users want to consume media in another language. And after Memrise, they go to Netflix to do just that.

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Language learners chose Ukrainian to show solidarity

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Language learners chose Ukrainian to show solidarity

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More and more people around the world are learning Ukrainian as a symbol of solidarity following Russia's aggressive war of conquest, as is evidenced by Duolingo's 2023 statistics.

The popular language learning app referenced the sharp uptick in language learners, noting that more than 1 in 3 (37%) of new users worldwide that are learning Ukrainian are motivated by a desire for effective communication and a show of solidarity.

This percentage stands out when compared to the 17% of users learning English and the 18% studying French for similar reasons.

Duolingo's data identifies learners from Australia, Canada, and Finland as the most committed to pursuing the Ukrainian language, as measured by the average time dedicated to learning. Ukrainian users rank among the Top 5 in terms of commitment.

Also in the Top 5 are language learners from Belarus, Japan, Hungary, and Russia have the highest average learning times across all Duolingo language learners.
We're bringing the voice of Ukraine to the world. Support us with a one-time donation, or become a Patron!
Read the original article on The New Voice of Ukraine

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Language learners worldwide continue to choose Ukrainian to express solidarity - Duolingo

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More and more people around the world are learning Ukrainian as a symbol of solidarity following Russia's aggressive war of conquest, as is evidenced by Duolingo's 2023 statistics.

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Singing to babies helps them learn language

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Singing to babies helps them learn language

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A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P ... How many would read this to that tune?

According to scientists from the University of Cambridge, there's more to the earworm than infuriating parents across the English-speaking world - they have found that singsong speech is crucial to helping babies learn language.

The study concluded that infants learn languages from rhythmic information - the rise and fall of tone - as seen in nursery rhymes or songs, such as the ubiquitous alphabet song.

The team at Cambridge also discovered that babies do not begin to process phonetic information - the smallest sounds of speech - until they are about seven months old.

The researchers said that the findings, which have been published in the journal Nature Communications, challenge the view that phonetic information - typically represented by the alphabet - is the key to language learning.

They said it also suggests that dyslexia and developmental language disorder may be associated with rhythm perception rather than difficulties with processing phonetic information.

Prof Usha Goswami, a neuroscientist at the University of Cambridge who is the study's author, said: "Our research shows that the individual sounds of speech are not processed reliably until around seven months, even though most infants can recognise familiar words like 'bottle' by this point.

"From then individual speech sounds are still added in very slowly - too slowly to form the basis of language. We believe that speech rhythm information is the hidden glue underpinning the development of a well-functioning language system.

"Parents should talk and sing to their babies as much as possible or use infant-directed speech like nursery rhymes because it will make a difference to language outcome."

It has previously been thought that infants learn small sound elements and add them together to make words.

To understand whether that was the case, the researchers recorded the brain activity of 50 infants at four, seven and 11 months old as they watched a video of a primary school teacher singing 18 nursery rhymes.

The team used special algorithms to interpret how the infants were encoding this information in the brain.

The scientists found that phonetic encoding in babies emerged gradually over the first year of life, beginning with dental sounds (produced by the upper front teeth) - such as "d" for "daddy" - and nasal sounds (produced when airflow is directed through the nose) - such as "m" for "mummy".

Goswami said: "Infants can use rhythmic information like a scaffold or skeleton to add phonetic information on to. For example, they might learn that the rhythm pattern of English words is typically strong-weak, as in 'daddy' or 'mummy', with the stress on the first syllable.

"They can use this rhythm pattern to guess where one word ends and another begins when listening to natural speech."

She said rhythm is a universal aspect of every language where all babies "are exposed to ... a strong beat structure with a strong syllable twice a second", adding: "We're biologically programmed to emphasise this when speaking to babies."

The study forms part of the BabyRhythm project led by Goswami, which is investigating how language is related to dyslexia and developmental language disorder.

She said there is a long history of trying to explain these in terms of phonetic problems but the evidence does not add up, and individual differences in children's language learning skills may originate with rhythm.

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Singing to babies is vital to help them understand language, say scientists

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Researchers believe parents should sing to infants as rise and fall in tone helps them gain knowledge of words

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Trump warns of 'languages coming into our country' that 'nobody' has heard of - NewsBreak

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Warning about the dangers of illegal immigration at the southern border has long been one of Donald Trump's campaign mainstays, going back to the day he...

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Pros and shoppers play chess on Brick Lane market in Tower Hamlets. Kamira|Shutterstock

In response to a community petition, Tower Hamlets council in east London has designated Cockney as a "community language". This recognition paves the way for the borough to actively challenge the linguistic discrimination that speakers of "non-standard" English dialects face.

Research in 2023 found that young people in the south-east of England no longer speak the variety of English we think of as "Cockney". This has led some pundits to decry what they understand to be the death of this longstanding dialect.

Cockney has long been held, in the public imagination, as a criminal code of rhyming slang that emerged among Londoners born in the sound of Bow bells. This is historically inaccurate.

Our new report identifies - and challenges - the discriminatory, anti-working-class ideologies that underlie myths about Cockney and other non-standard varieties of English Englishes.

Pearly kings and queens attend a festival in Trafalgar Square in 2022. Tennessee Jones|Alamy

Cockney was originally posh

The earliest citation of Cockney dates back to the 1390s. In his medieval poem, Piers Plowman, writes: "And I sigge, bi my soule, I haue no salt Bacon, Ne no Cokeneyes". A "Cockeneye" was an imaginary "cock's egg" - the speaker is saying he had nothing to eat, not even imaginary food.

Early written uses of Cockney to describe people capitalised on an egg's delicate and embryonic qualities. When Chaucer wrote "Cokenay" in the Canterbury Tales he meant, "a spoilt or pampered child".

Even as late as 1904, "Cockney" was used to mean, "a feeble and pampered person from a city". The word reflected the perception that city life was luxurious compared with toiling on England's farms.

Because London is the prototypical English city, "Cockney" came to be used as a label for Londoners. The famous definition of the dialect as hinging on being born within earshot of Bow bells is attributed to a 1571 sermon by J. Bridges, in which he wrote: "We are thorough out all the Realme called cockneys that are borne in London, or in the sounde of Bow bell."

Bridges meant that people throughout England called Londoners "Cockneys". In the 16th century, the St Mary-le-Bow church was indeed a symbol for London, not a tool for distinguishing this one part of the city from the rest of it. All Londoners were Cockneys.

The Beigel Shop, a long-loved east London institution. Alena Veasey|Shutterstock

Recasting Cockney as a working-class English

Studies of language change in large cities often show that linguistic innovations emerge in working-class communities and then spread. It is likely that, in past centuries, east London working-class communities would have been drivers of innovations for the varieties of English spoken in the capital.

In the 1700s and 1800s, the emergence of the middle-class lifestyle as a target for upward mobility gave rise to a self-help industry for attaining higher social status. Along with prescriptions for how to dress and how to eat a meal, adopting "proper speech" became a target for ascending to the middle class.

Elocutionists sold books by picking out innovative features of London English and inveighing against using them. They recast the label "Cockney" as a working-class English that people should avoid if they wanted to sound properly middle class.

In the 19th century, authors including Charles Dickens followed the elocutionists. They assigned Cockney linguistic features to working-class (and often nefarious) characters. These characterisations reinforced the conceptualisation of Cockney as a working-class (and criminal) language.

Bethnal Green's annual Boishakhi Mela celebrates the Bengali New Year. Olivier Guiberteau|Shutterstock

Changing enregisterment

What changed over more than 600 years, then, was the way Cockney was, as linguists put it, "enregistered". Enregisterment is the process of linguistic features becoming linked in popular consciousness to a group or place.

By the 1700s, Cockney was enregistered as "London English". The leading edge of London English would have been the speech of working-class east London communities. Through the 1800s, intellectuals profited from stigmatising working-class linguistic features. This narrowed the enregisterment of Cockney to "working-class London English".

Our modern understanding of Cockney is based on this recent re-enregisterment. It conceptualises Cockney as a specific set of linguistic features, associated with negative social characteristics and constrained to working-class east London.

This is reflected in popular explanations for rhyming slang as a definitive feature of the dialect. Rhyming slang emerged in Cockney relatively recently, probably in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Contrary to popular belief, rhyming slang never could have been a way to obscure criminal activity from police. After all, code words only work until another person learns them. (Consider that today, street cops know the vocabulary for the crimes they encounter.)

The idea that Cockney rhyming slang encoded criminality is predicated on the ideology that working-class people engage in criminal activity. Within this logic, it follows that if working-class people are talking about something, it must be crime.

E Pellicci's Italian cafe on Bethnal Green Road. Alex Segre|Alamy

Today, working-class east London communities continue to be a driving force behind linguistic innovations that are spreading throughout England. This kind of innovation is still stigmatised. Speakers who use them are routinely penalised in gatekeeping settings such as school and media and in hiring decisions.

Some people we have spoken as part of our research identify, specifically, as Cockney. Others claim an affinity with the personal resilience and community-mindedness that have long been central to the Cockney identity.

Further, we have found that Cockney is not a reductive, monolithic identity, but rather a multifaceted one. We have interviewed Londoners who identify as Bengali Cockney, Black Cockney, East End Cockney, Essex Cockney, Jewish Cockney and Sylheti Cockney, among others.

Linguists speak about "codeswitching" to refer to people shifting from non-standard to standard English for socioeconomic attainment. This practice illustrates how judging someone's speech as "non-standard" is always ideologically driven.

Tower Hamlets' recognition of Cockney as a "community language", by contrast, acknowledges the linguistic validity of all varieties of English spoken in the borough. It celebrates the role that non-standard dialects play in shaping individual and community identities and the ways in which identities such as "Cockney" continue to evolve. As one of our interviewees (all of whom are anonymised in our report) put it:

[Cockney] is a manifestation of working-class culture. That's how it feels, a kind of positive working-class culture, which is under the cosh. To have vibrant working-class culture is something that is absolutely valuable.

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'Bengali Cockney, Black Cockney, East End Cockney, Essex Cockney, Jewish Cockney, Sylheti Cockney': why community languages matter - NewsBreak

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In response to a community petition, Tower Hamlets council in east London has designated Cockney as a "community language". This recognition paves the way for the borough to actively challenge the linguistic discrimination that speakers of "non-standard" English dialects face. Research in 2023 found that young...

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Somaliland’s poets have toppled governments and ushered in peace.

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Every January, Scots around the world gather to celebrate the life and work of their national poet: Robert Burns. The centrepiece of this communal birthday celebration is a voluptuous, savoury sphere of offal, onion, oatmeal, suet, and spices encased in a sheep's stomach. The famed and unfairly reviled haggis, in other words. Its entrance is traditionally accompanied by the playing of bagpipes, after which one lucky individual is tasked with giving the Address to the Haggis.

Written by Burns in 1786, its opening lines are some of the best-known lines of poetry in Scotland:
Fair fa' your honest, sonsie face, Great chieftain o' the puddin-race!
When the poem reaches its climax, a knife is drawn:
His knife see rustic Labour dicht,
And then plunged into the haggis, tearing it open:
An'cut you up wi' ready slicht, Trenching your gushing entrails bricht, Like ony ditch; And then, O what a glorious sicht, Warm-reekin, rich!
The disembowelled haggis is now ready to eat, traditionally served with 'neeps and tatties' (mashed turnips and potatoes). Beverages are consumed, further poems are read, and the night concludes.

It does not take a trained linguist to notice that the language deployed by Burns to address Scotland's national dish is far from standard English. It is far even from a 'Scottish accent', let alone Scottish Standard English. The language of Burns' poem is in fact not English at all, but Scots, the country's native Germanic tongue.

By Burns' time its spelling was influenced enough by English that it appears like a strange dialect of it, accentuated by the apostrophes that are used in writing to convey colloquial speech, but it was not always so. Though they shared a common linguistic ancestor, Scots and English developed independently for centuries.

An English herald delivering a message to the (French) Queen of Scotland in 1560 found himself sufficiently perplexed by the 'Scottyshe tongue' that he 'well not understanding [it] was forced to speak French'. In the same era Scandinavian, Dutch, French, and German sources all attest to awareness of a separate Scottish language. An Italian scholar resident in England even noted that Elizabeth I spoke 'Greeke, Latine, Italian, French, Spanish, Scottish, Flemish and English'.

Scots has, however, over the centuries become so subordinated to and influenced by English that it has become 'dialectised'. Something akin to what has happened to Occitan or Low German, subordinated to standard French and German, respectively. The crucial difference being that Scotland continues to enjoy its own strong sense of nationhood rooted in a long tradition of statehood reaching back to the Middle Ages and a unique position within the United Kingdom. Today it is a nation without its own language, but it wasn't always so.

Long before the Kingdom of Scotland joined its southern neighbour to form the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707, before James VI inherited the English throne in 1603 and migrated to London to become its James I, Scots was the country's de facto national language. What happened?

Like many European kingdoms, Scotland was from its inception a multilingual land. Gaelic, Pictish, Britonnic, Norn, and West Germanic dialects were all spoken across the territory of today's Scotland around the year 1000. Latin, meanwhile, was the dominant ecclesiastical and administrative language thanks to the country's Christianisation. Rìoghachd na h-Alba - the Kingdom of Scotland as it was originally known to its natives - was formed through a union of Gaelic and Pictish-speaking polities, in which Gaelic eventually became dominant.

From the 11th century Scotland's rulers and aristocrats began to intermarry with Anglo-Saxon and Norman nobility from down south, bringing a gradual Anglo-Normanisation of the kingdom's ruling class. Simultaneously, migrations into Scotland of burghers speaking various Germanic languages planted Germanic linguistic islands across much of the Lowlands. The combination of Northumbrian Old English dialects present in the south and those of the new migrants produced a language that came to be known as Inglis.

During Scotland's Wars of Independence in the 13th and 14th centuries, Inglis seems to have spread at the expense of Gaelic to become the dominant national tongue. The first great literary work in the language was recorded not long after in the form of the patriotic poem recounting the heroic deeds of Robert the Bruce. Besides literature, royal proclamations, records, laws, and correspondence from the following centuries all indicate Inglis had become the dominant language of the Scottish Lowlands, generally written in the emerging Edinburgh standard.

By the end of the 15th century a terminological shift had also taken place. The Lowlanders now called their language Scots, which used to refer to Gaelic, while Gaelic they now called Erse, or Irish. Gaelic had originally come from Ireland and, despite displacing the local Celtic languages, it remained strongly associated with the emerald isle. This was now reinforced by the language's diminished status.

The island of Great Britain was therefore home to two independent kingdoms, each with related but distinct Germanic languages and large Celtic-speaking minorities (the Welsh, and the Gaels in Scotland). Though the two languages were similar enough that some people took them to be the same, it was usually on equal footing rather than treating Scots as a subordinate element of English. The English scholar Henry Saville, for example, saw both 'nations' using 'the Saxon language', which 'the Scots and the north people of England speak more incorruptly than the south' due to a lack of French influence. Interestingly enough, this was not quite the case. French and Latin words also seeped into Scots. In English one could propose but in Scots one would propone, for example. This was just one of many ways in which Scots in this period was actually growing apart from English. What linguists would call Ausbau, or 'building-out', creating further distance from its close linguistic relative.

Saville nonetheless believed a political union between the two countries was only natural thanks to their linguistic affinity. Such a union when it came would indeed create one of the most successful countries the world has ever seen. It would be disastrous for the status of the Scots language, but the same could not be said for Scotland as a whole. The union was not the culprit for the language's decline, however. The Lowland Scots themselves were to blame.

The people of Scotland not only abandoned Scots as a language of high culture and state administration, but they failed to ever produce a movement to correct this linguistic course. As Burns as well as novelists like Walter Scott and Robert Louis Stevenson show, Scotland's literary tradition thrived, often making use of both Scots and patriotic themes even as Scots faded away as a written language. Scots as a spoken language lives on to the present day, and Scottish poets and novelists have hardly ever concealed it.

The existence of a distinctly Scottish literary tradition never translated, however, into a wider movement to standardise Scots and employ it as a national language. It even, perhaps, solidified the role of Scots as a dialect in a wider English-language world, relegating it to the status of a provincial literary curiosity. Scots is seen as fit for addressing a haggis, but not for political debates, tax returns, or education.

All over Europe there are examples of vernacular languages whose fortunes ebbed and flowed over the centuries before re-emerging to become fully-fledged national languages. That goes even for kingdoms that were incorporated into neighbouring ones to form 'composite monarchies' consisting of multiple distinct polities. This never happened with Scots. Not yet at least.

In the 17th century, for example, a craze for all things French swept across what is today's Germany. Aristocrats and anyone who wanted to be associated with them adopted the French language. Their native German was widely seen as crude and incapable of expressing the kind of profound and beautiful thoughts that French could. As the wife of a later German revivalist put it: 'nothing [was] more plebian than to write letters in German'.

Germany's most celebrated enlightened monarch, Frederick the Great, who ruled Prussia for 46 years, maintained an entirely Francophone court. Towards the end of his life, he disparagingly reviewed recent advances in German literature, dismissing Johann Wolfgang von Goethe's work as 'disgusting platitudes' and German as a 'half-barbarous language' that would take centuries to catch up with French.

Frederick was proved terribly wrong. By the late 18th century German had been standardised, refined, and elevated to such an extent that it had become a regional lingua franca in Central Europe, even where the vast majority of people were not German speakers, such as Bohemia, Croatia, or Hungary. These places in turn would standardise, refine, and elevate their own languages in the 19th century, successful revivals that turned once-scorned vernaculars into fully fledged national languages.

The decline and lack of revival of Scots can be traced back to three distinct social institutions that elsewhere played leading role in the development of national languages: the kirk (church), the state, and the social elites.

Protestantism came to Scotland with a force in the 16th century. While its leaders promoted vernacular literacy so that the Bible could be accessible to anyone, internal turmoil meant a full Scots Bible was never produced. Instead, they had to make do with the English Bible so that in Scotland God spoke English. The established Church of Scotland's hundreds of parishes would promote literacy and religious knowledge across the country for centuries based on an English-language document rather than a vernacular Scots one.

The kirk cannot single-handedly be blamed for abandoning Scots, however. England and Scotland entered a personal union in 1603 when the Scottish James VI inherited the English throne. Though he failed to enact his hoped-for union of the two into a single British kingdom, the Scots-speaking and writing king made a conscious shift to standard English upon his accession.

English, always carrying a certain prestige thanks to England's size and wealth, exerted more and more influence over Scots over the course of the 17th century. Its golden age was long over by the time that Scotland and England were united into a single United Kingdom of Great Britain in 1707. Scottish politicians would thereafter sit in a united parliament at Westminster with their English counterparts. The Scottish contingent was too small to have an independent voice and instead simply joined existing English groupings. Leading aristocrats made a similar linguistic transition as their monarch.

Perhaps Scots could have been kept alive or revived even without nobles or priests. In Germany it was the work of enlightened scholars in the late 17th and early 18th centuries that spearheaded the country's vernacularisation. Breaking with the Latin tradition of the universities, the philosophers Christian Thomasius and Christian Wolff taught their enlightened philosophy in German, a crucial factor in the language's elevation in the 18th century.

Scotland had a somewhat analogous figure in Francis Hutcheson. A professor of moral philosophy at the University of Glasgow in the early 18th century, he too broke with the Latin tradition of the university and laid the foundation for his country's Enlightenment. He became the first professor to lecture in a Germanic vernacular at the university, but that vernacular was English. Like Wolff, his influence reached far and wide. One of his students, Adam Smith, would go on to become the father of economics. Other enlightened Scots, such as David Hume, would meanwhile become some of the most important philosophers in the world.

All of them wrote in English even though they were from Scots-speaking backgrounds. Hume was even the likely author of a guide on how to avoid 'Scotticisms' in writing. Many such guides appeared in the 18th century as middle-class Scots in the larger cities - especially Edinburgh - abandoned written Scots altogether in favour of English. Celebrity language 'improvers' even appeared, giving lectures on how to write and speak 'proper' English.

This unique linguistic situation produced what is known as Scottish Standard English. In its written form it is very similar to other English standards, but with many Scots features, especially when spoken. Phrases like 'sore head' instead of headache or words like 'outwith' are not simply odd Scottish inventions but elements of Scots that seeped into Scottish English usage. This is also the root of the famed Scottish accent, the result of native Scots-speakers and their descendants speaking English.

The irony of the Act of Union of 1707 is that despite its staying power, it was neither universally popular nor unchallenged. Less than a decade after its creation the union narrowly avoided dissolution in the British Parliament. Jacobinism - the desire to see the exiled Stuart dynasty returned to the British throne - was a powerful centrifugal force well into the 18th century. These early hiccups were, however, largely overcome by the middle of the century, partly thanks to the new commercial opportunities afforded by the union, as well as a new understanding of Scotland and its place in the world.

The very same enlighteners and aristocrats that abandoned Scots were by and large enthusiastic unionists. Even if a 'British nation' never quite replaced the English and Scottish ones, many generations of Scots were committed to the project of a single Britain. The phrase 'North Britain' even entered into usage in the 18th, reflecting the strong desires of many prominent Scots to fuse the English and Scottish nations into one.

Those who believed in 'North Britain', even if they were not in favour of abandoning Scottish nationhood entirely, had a by and large negative view of Scotland's history and a positive view of England's. Their vision of Britain was fundamentally Anglocentric rather than multinational. In Scotland's past they saw the darkness of religious strife and poverty, but in England they saw the foundations of enlightened liberal modernity developed over centuries through English constitutionalism.

If history was a story of progress, and England was the most progressive force in the world, then Scots had hit the historical jackpot. They had the opportunity to share in the fruits of England's progressive development without actually having to abandon their own nation. Setting aside the determinism of this view, over the following two centuries there would be little to disabuse Scots of this historical notion. Britain became the heartland of the industrial revolution, it became the envy of the world for its liberty and prosperity, and it built the largest overseas empire in history. Scots and Englishmen achieved all this together, in the very same language. Indeed, when it came to the empire Scots were overrepresented just about everywhere.

The adoption of English as Scotland's national language never had any clear drawbacks. If anything, it was the strongest and final force for linguistic unity in its long history. In the early 19th century one in five Scots were still Gaelic speaking. By the turn of the century, it was one in 20, and by the 1970s there were no monolingual Gaelic speakers left. Conversely, the romanticised tartan image of the Highlands that developed in the 19th century helped reconcile Lowland Scots to the country's Gaelic heritage even as Gaelic Scotland was being irrevocably destroyed.

Scotland as part of Great Britain became truly whole for the first time in its history. It became prosperous and its inhabitants had the chance to explore, administer, and settle in far-off lands. The dominant view of union in the 19th century was not that Scotland had been annexed by England but liberated by it. The proudly British street names in Edinburgh, such as George Street and Hanover Street, or colonial Glasgow streets bearing names like Jamaica and Virginia, reflect the new idea of a Scotland within the United Kingdom.

So disinterested were Scots in their own distinct history that it took until 1901 for a permanent professorship in Scottish history to be created at a Scottish university. Two transformational world wars and the building of a powerful welfare state only brought the people of Britain closer together in the 20th century, even if the strongest movement to challenge it since the 18th century emerged at the end of it.

In 1999 the Scottish Parliament convened for the first time since it voted for its own dissolution in 1707. Two years prior, Scots voted overwhelmingly in favour of its establishment in a historic referendum. Galvanised by the country's newfound autonomy, the pro-independence Scottish National Party swept to power in 2007 and has dominated Scottish politics ever since. Even after the party failed in its 2014 bid for independence, its grip on power tightened, only to loosen in the wake of a series of scandals in the early 2020s and the recovery of the Labour Party under Keir Starmer.

Scotland's new-found autonomy gave hope to advocates of its now-minority languages, but their hopes have been largely dashed. Since 2005 Gaelic has been given nominally equal status with English as the official language of Scotland, but its number of speakers still declined between 2001 and 2011. Despite the lack of any monolingual Gaelic speakers, street signs across the country are bilingual.

In a sense, the elevation of Gaelic to the status of Scotland's national tongue is the culmination of a long romantic tradition celebrating the Highlands and Scotland's Celtic heritage in an almost purely symbolic form that does not actually threaten the fundamentally English nature of modern Scotland. It is a position afforded to Gaelic purely by sentiment rather than reality - a cultural nationalism that long post-dates Scotland's union with England. There are about as many Polish-speakers as Gaelic-speakers in Scotland today and both pale in comparison to the one and a half million that claim to speak Scots as their native language.

Though it is a number that must be taken with a grain of salt considering the ambiguities around the linguistic boundary between Scots and Scottish Standard English, it is impossible to deny that Scots is and has been a far more important language to the country in the last millennium. It was not 'originally' native to Scotland, but then neither was Gaelic. Indeed, few nations in Europe can point to some sort of linguistic continuity to the beginning of history.

The Scots language is clearly a linguistic conundrum that the overwhelmingly Anglophone leaders of the SNP would rather not engage with, appearing too distant and irrelevant in the day-to-day lives of Scots to make it the subject of government intervention. Advocates of Scots themselves have struggled to transform recognition of the language into its active use, the principal obstacle being that the language still has no standard. There are many Scots dialects across Scotland, most under the heavy influence of English. To privilege one over the other would alienate some Scots speakers, it is feared.

This is the natural course of any language on its journey to becoming a national standard. In the same period that Scots was abandoned as a written language, certain dialects of German, Czech, Hungarian, Croatian, and countless other European languages were codified, standardised, and elevated to the status of national lingua francas. The power of English is perhaps simply too much to overcome. A century of independence has not freed Ireland from its grip, nor has Wales fared much better against the linguistic tide. If the bonds of the union are fraying, the bonds of Britain's linguistic union appear healthier than ever.

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The disappearance of the Scots language from its native land is more than a linguistic conundrum. It is testament to Scotland's distinctive status within the British Isles and its complex relationship with England, both of whom once spoke related but distinct Germanic tongues.

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Introduction

The makers movement that has taken hold in the United States and around the world over the last decade presents itself as a democratization of fabrication, and an opportunity for people to learn, innovate, and construct whatever they can imagine. It is called a movement due to the growth of Makers Faires, and the burgeoning hobby area known as DIY (or Do It Yourself). One of the most appealing aspects of the maker movement can be found in the community of learning and shared knowledge or experience that people in the DIY community enjoy. What has made turned the community into a viable movement are the same learning elements constructivists have talked about for years, and that language teaching professionals have sought to implement in their classrooms, namely: to build a community of learning that thrives on motivated learners helping each other to solve problems while at the same time interacting with others and solving problems through the use of a target language. The Maker Movement Manifesto lists several requirements for makers to follow, among them are: make, share, give and learn (Hatch, 2013).

To an educator, the maker movement and the makerspaces that have followed might resemble a constructivist learning environment (CLE), that is a space (real or theoretical) where learners are presented "with an interesting, relevant, and engaging ill-structured problem or project to conduct" (Jonassen & Rohrer-Murphy, 1999, p. 69). This is, coincidentally the same definition used to discuss problem-based learning environments (Ram, Ram, & Sprague, 2016). Because activity theory forms the basis of our analysis of the maker course, our understanding of how it works will best be served by referring to the CLE. In the maker community, real, non-theoretical CLE's grow organically, often times with several of them under one roof of a maker- space. In these areas the work of the Vygotsky Circle is made visible and themes such as sociocultural theory, activity theory, and the zone of proximal development are easily observed. Furthermore, the benefits derived from experiential learning and situated learning are readily visible in the maker community and such opportunities to learn allow the community to thrive. How, then, might the same idea, that of building a maker community among language students benefit their language skills, while at the same time providing them with valuable knowledge for their future careers? How might it be done economically, and, if successful, shared to benefit even remote or underfunded communities? This article discusses the results of an experimental English as a foreign language (EFL) class that was based on the tenets of the makers movement, and that took full advantage of the basic concepts of the CLE. The course design results will then be analyzed according to activity theory, while the generally positive student results and reproducibility of the experiment will be analyzed from an experiential learning viewpoint.

The Maker Movement

At the time of this action research and continuing to the time of revisions there has been little, if any research on the maker movement as a context for language instruction. Where the idea of a 'makerspace' or 'fab lab' do most often seem to coincide with education are in technical school settings, or in after-school programs in urban environments, and mainly in the United States. Because the course was not taught as a pure language course, but as a vocational technical course with English as the language of instruction, the reviewed literature was restricted mainly to works concerning constructivist learning and constructivist learning environments, activity theory, and situated learning. A makerspace, by the way, is nothing more than a constructivist learning environment. For activity theory, I relied heavily on the work of Engeström (2001). I also relied on the seminal work of Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) for their research in situated learning. Though I am possibly presenting an over-simplification of their work, Lave and Wenger (1991) posited that learning occurs best in the context where that learning will be applied. An apprentice learns better on the job than with a master craftsman in a classroom, for example. Because a makerspace is a constructivist learning environment, Lev Vygotsky naturally comes to mind when researching constructivism, but for this work, more task-specific interpretations of his work proved helpful. Among the more helpful works were those by Donato (2000) about Sociocultural theory and Second Language Acquisition. Donato's findings were particularly helpful to explain the community the students might experience in their future careers and how that might be leveraged for educational purposes. No less important to interpreting the value of realism in the classroom community was Lantolf (2000) who did similar and valuable research in sociocultural theory. Experiential learning can result from problem- and project-based learning, and in this course, that was no exception. I relied on the work of Kolb (1984) for a deeper understanding of how experiential learning took place in the course. Finally, it is important to clarify that the English for Makers course was not a CLIL course, nor was it an English language course in the traditional sense. For those reasons, works about CLIL were not consulted, nor was extensive research done about problem-based learning. It was felt that much greater insight might be gained by reviewing the literature for the factors that became directly evident as the course progressed.

The course

English for Makers was designed as an experimental course that would involve students of engineering at Universidad Panamericana a small, private university in Guadalajara, Mexico.

Course participants

Eight students from the different course tracks of the engineering program volunteered to take part in the semester-long course that ran for 18 weeks in the spring semester of 2016. Comprising all of the career tracks of the department, students ranged in age from 19 to 23, and three participants were female. An additional participant was a member of university's technology and education staff. None of the participants had been students in the university's English language program prior to this course.

Additionally, two students from the mechatronics engineering career field volunteered to participate as assistants to the professor and were required to use English at all times. In exchange, the students earned their required social service work hours. The assistants both had excellent levels of English and had already completed the required coursework in English. Additionally, the assistants were known and well-regarded by the students in the course. Students were also made aware of the experimental nature of the course and that they ran the risk that their English might not improve as a result of taking the course. They were also informed of the much larger extramural experiment behind the course.

Jalisco, Mexico has a persistent shortage of English language teaching professionals. Similarly, the uneven distribution of financial resources precludes expensive materials, extensive instructor training, or anything that could be a heavy burden on school or local internet infrastructure. The substance of the English for Makers course was constructed with the idea that a school that might have a shortage of financial or professional assets might be able to enlist the help of an English teacher to help teach a science course, or that someone in the STEM teaching area might chip in to help with the teaching of English. The material should still be useful in the hands of a more mature student or community service volunteer who might have recently returned from living in the U.S. or Canada. The latter scenario is certainly within the realm of possibility in Mexico.

The author of this article served as instructional designer and professor for the course and had no experience with electronics, and, with the exception of a few years' stint in the military as a photographer and laboratory technician, very little experience in a scientific setting. The instructor also had very little experience with the maker community. The experience that the instructor would bring to bear was his language teaching skill set. As part of the instructor's role as a mediator/participant, the professor had to make things, just as the student did, and limit his speaking time in front of the class to under ten minutes per two-hour session. Finally, the discrepancy between the perceived necessary level of expertise in at least half the subject matter was intentional as it formed the basis of the experimental aspects of the makers course.

Course requirements

The course requirements were simple. In each six-week portion of the class, students had to create a useful or entertaining object, machine, or project using Arduino controller circuit boards (More on the technical and instructional materials used is forthcoming). Sixty percent of a student's grade for each of the three portions of the semester was based on whether or not the product the students made during their class time actually functioned. The other 40 percent of the student's grade were the assessment of the student's presentation of their project, a video explanation of their product, and detailed instructions on how to replicate the design. The platform for delivery of the content was optional, with the exception that the detailed instructions would have to be in an interactive PDF format. This format was chosen to test whether the interactive PDF's might be later used 'in the field' as a content delivery system. Students would also be required to take a mock TOEIC reading exam at the beginning and end of the course to measure any progress that they might have made in the English language. Class was held once a week on Friday afternoons from 3:30 to 7:30 PM. Class time was devoted to researching and finding a project of the student's choosing as well as build time. The exceptions to the schedule were 1-2 hours devoted each week to basic tasks such as learning how to use the Arduino IDE (Integrated Development Environment), a workshop in 3D printing, and a course on Adobe creative cloud programs, among other topics. One particularly fruitful topic was learning reverse engineering. One week of instruction early on in the semester was dedicated to disassembling cheap household appliances to evaluate design, functionality, and longevity. The task gave the students an opportunity to learn new vocabulary as well as to practice using the software needed to deliver their assignments.

In addition to the completed project, the final forty percent of the required work was assessed accordingly:

10 percent: Completion of work: all required items were complete, nothing missing.

15 percent: Clarity of instructions. Could someone else with little experience, say anotherstudent from the following semester, follow their instructions and replicate the object?

15 percent: Grammar and Structure (in the first and final portion of the course, student scores on the mock TOEIC reading exam would count toward their grammar/structure scores.)

Student attendance policies are set by the university and therefore not counted as part of the final assessment during each third of the semester. Similarly, the instructor made no explicit demands that the course participants use only English and did not count this as part of the course assessment, either.

Materials used in the course

Based on cursory research, but more extensive interviews with people involved in the maker community, the Arduino microcontroller board and prototyping boards (these are used to work with motors and other specialized devices) were chosen as the basis for all student projects. The boards use the C++ programming language which requires the use of English. The university language department bore the cost of these materials. Other material such as LED' s, jumper wires for making circuits and breadboards for building more complex material were provided at the instructor's expense, while others were donated by course participants and the student assistants. The Arduino boards are not expensive; however they do vary in price depending on manufacturer and location of manufacture. The boards are open-source and anyone can manufacture and sell them, and as an added feature, the basic package of instructions and programming are all on a Creative Commons licensed website. The students used the university's Adobe software to make the PDF's, and a small video studio to make their instructional videos. There were no specialized engineering lab spaces made available to the English department for this course, and students had to move the desks and chairs of a standard classroom when necessary to suit whatever they might be making or doing. Only on a few occasions were they allowed to use the engineering department's specialized workshops for soldering, laser cutting, etc. The inexpensive household appliances were supplied by the instructor as well as some cameras for documentation of student work in finer detail.

Finally, in lieu of a textbook, the website Instructables (www.instructables.com) was designated as the course project resource. The site publishes everything under a Creative Commons license that requires redistribution and modification be done for free while attributing the original material to the original author. The maker community thrives on improvement and adaptation, so this sort of license provides easy adaptability at no cost or royalties. This also had the added benefit that students would have to familiarize themselves with Creative Commons and very basic, but nonetheless important copyright law. The Instructables site became so much more than the de facto textbook for the course. It was one of those happy accidents of language instructional material in that the site provided seemingly boundless opportunities for students to learn, not only about building circuits, but also about solving what appear to be hopelessly intractable problems by relying on the learning community around them.

Students were required to find their projects on the Instructables site. The instructor purchased a site-wide membership in order to download complete illustrated instructions for the students. In general, the instructions are serviceable though geared to more technically oriented native speakers of English. On the one hand, it meant students would have to learn the vocabulary of the maker community and deal with a lot of expressions they had never encountered. They also had to contend with poorly written instructions. Makers generally are very good at building things though not necessarily skilled at technical writing. The contributions at the website are all from skilled maker amateurs with varying degrees of clarity and accuracy, and there is no guarantee that the author is a skilled builder or writer of technical English. As students worked on their project, they began to rely more and more heavily on their student peers and their instructor for help. Because of the instructor's lack of knowledge on the subject, and the students' insufficient English vocabulary, the participants turned to Google for answers when neither the assistants nor the professor could provide a workable solution to their difficulty. Because the original problem was in English, the students would be compelled to word their Google search using English, particularly if they were not sure of the required concepts. Students also turned to Google in Spanish when the problem became too difficult, or to Google translator when the problem was unclear. Remember, the goal was to build a complete and functioning project. No mention or obligation was made on how to accomplish that. As the end of first part of the semester approached, student projects began to take shape. Students had made it each step along the way, and as they saw the projects take shape their confidence grew. Then it came time to program the Arduino so that the device would function as advertised.

Generally, in Instructables' projects, the object or device is constructed first. Programming of the Arduino and testing of the complete program take place in the very last part of the project build. What students discovered was that the programming included in the project package was often-times obsolete, incomplete, incompatible or, in more than one instance, the wrong set of code for the device. Only occasionally throughout the course did a student's Instructable project work the very first time. One unintended benefit of these poorly written instructions was that students had to become proactive and creative users of the target language. When the programming phase of the projects began, students relied heavily on their fellow builders first, for help, and then on their student assistants and the professor for extra help or suggestions. Failing that, this maker community then decided their best course of action might be to find an English-speaking computer programming faculty member to guide them. Sometimes the programming was so poorly written that their expert couldn't help at all. Some students ended up having to learn aspects of the C++ language very quickly via YouTube and Google or via the many Arduino chat rooms, message boards, and programming sites on the web. Because the errors they encountered were based in English, students had to use and stretch their language skills to resolve those problems. These experiences weren't lost on the students. They took extra care in the following weeks to thoroughly read instructions and programming before settling in to make their next project. This however was no guarantee of a flawless design or perfectly compiling program later on.

Quantitative results

The student average score on the mock TOEIC reading test was 69% at the beginning and 72% at the end. Clearly, this was not a large improvement. The average scores over a semester for other courses of English taught by the same instructor reveal an average 10 points higher, though the range of improvement remains about 5%. Other instructors reported similar results on the same test. Students from the English for Makers cohort who took the formal TOEIC test at the end of the semester scored on par with students who had finished their English in traditional classrooms. While the group held their own on the TOEIC scores, students had difficulty producing written instructions, though their videos generally had a higher degree of polish and accuracy. As writing was not a focal point of the course, and oral communication was effectively the class mode, this outcome is not surprising. Students had difficulty working with the Adobe software even though they had received training from a competent professional. It was later determined that some of the required deliverables may have been excessively difficult or too time consuming to produce. Other issues that came to the fore were that the projects took a great deal of the student's time. Now while this may seem like a legitimate concern, students took a longer time to complete the projects that were challenging than they normally might have with anything in a standard English class. There was also a much longer exposure to English than in a standard course, though because of the number of issues encountered using Instructables, it was not always a pleasant experience for the students.

Qualitative results

Students were extremely engaged. Friday evening classes in English at this university aren't common. In the eighteen-week run of this course, students continued to voluntarily work on their projects past the class hours on several occasions, while none asked to leave early during the semester. One student achieved a 640 score on her institutional TOEFL. She attributed her high score to the English exposure she got while in the class. Another participant passed a difficult course in circuitry with the highest notes. He attributed his success to having previously learned what he needed to know in the maker course. Additionally, students in the maker course who took the official TOEIC test achieved scores that allowed them to finish the English requirements of their career field, much like those who completed their English in standard traditional courses. So it begs the question: How could students who essentially received no traditional English language instruction still maintain their level of English and in some cases excel in their use of the language?

Discussion

One means of analyzing the efficacy of the learning environment is through activity theory. Activity theory focuses on in the individual's learning as part of a larger social, cultural historical context. The academic discussion of activity theory (AT) traces the roots of AT back to Vygotsky's sociocultural theory. Leontiev, a contemporary of Vygotsky, expanded on the original theory to include collective activities (Haught, 2006). The result of all this is that "activity and cognition are inseparable and unified" (Haught, 2006, p. 2). Of course, where all this becomes most interesting is when the cognition/activity is used to achieve goals. There are several elements to activity theory that may be best understood against the backdrop of the makers class. In his 1987 work, Yrjö Engeström developed a diagram which is reproduced in Figure 1 explaining the activity system.

Figure 1. The structure of a human activity system (Engeström. 2001, p. 135).

Jonassen and Rohrer-Murphy (YEAR) used a similar model as a means of analyzing a CLE and the definitions they apply to this diagram are as follows:

The subject: This would include the participants in the activity. In the case of the maker course it was the students, the assistants and the professor.

The object: The reason for activity, though it might be better understood as the objective. In the case of the maker course there were several objectives. Officially, the objective was to learn English. For students however, the objective was to make a working object, and explore the making philosophy. English language acquisition was not the highest priority.

Tools and signs: These include all the physical objects such as Arduinos, hand tools, etc. textbooks, and anything that could have an effect on the direction of the activity.

Rules: The basic requirements of the activity, and in the case of this activity, with the exception of deadlines, students were given very few rules to follow. Of those rules, even fewer could be considered traditional class rules of punctuality or even location.

Community: This includes those who might have a peripheral effect on the activity and participants. This would include outside engineering, computer-programming specialists, other makers, interested observers, and in the case of our maker course, visiting faculty and students who were invited to (and often did) participate.

Division of labor: It would include those specialized roles performed by the participants, i.e. student, guide, assistant, the knowledgeable helper. These roles became more fluid as problems arose. Students who had previously solved a similar issue would become the knowledgeable helper and guide the students toward a resolution.

Mediating artifacts: These are defined as both real rules and theoretical ideas that are used to "support and guide decision making, ranging from rich contextually located examples of good practice (case studies, guidelines, etc.) to more abstract forms of representation which distil out the 'essences' of good practice (models or patterns) (Conole, 2009, p. 5). Examples were the tenets of the maker movement mentioned earlier (Jonassen & Rohrer- Murphy, 1999).

In the case of the maker course as CLE, the activity system reveals that a complex system functioned reasonably well with a high degree of interconnectivity between the various, necessary parts of the activity. In order for everything to work well, the subject needs to consciously interact in the activity environment. "Rather than learning before acting as traditional theories prescribe, activity theory believes a priori that the human mind emerges and exists as a special component of the interactions with the environment, so activity (sensory, mental and physical) is a precursor to learning (Jonassen & Rohrer- Murphy, 1999, p. 64).

Indeed, activity requires the subject's conscious interaction so that the object, the desired learning, can take place. Conscious interaction is critical, but how were students able to maintain and/or improve their level of English, especially if one of the goals of the activity was not to explicitly teach English?

Because the activity was based in English, as were the problems, and (many times) their solutions, students were compelled to rely on the help of their assistants or the teachers for scaffolded help. The zone of proximal development in this case was extremely narrow. This is also known as asymmetrical scaffolding, in which more knowledgeable peers and teachers impart their knowledge. However, the knowledgeable peers' ability to scaffold was impaired early on, and subjects were compelled to use symmetrical scaffolding, or increase their zone of proximal development. "Learning also occurs between students who have similar levels of conceptual understanding. That is, learning and development may also result from 'symmetrical' interactions (Fernández, Wegerif, Mercer & Drummond, 2001, p. 40). The symmetrical interaction was possible because teaching and learning in a foreign language classroom often times relies on collaboration and a lack of formal instruction, thus allowing for autonomous discoveries about language use (Donato, 2000). Because student autonomy was a necessary component of the makers class, students brought to bear their own learning experiences, technical expertise as well as their own interpersonal skill set. As Donato points out, in classrooms based on sociocultural theory (this would include those classrooms with constructivist learning environments and activity), "agencymatters" (Donato, 2000, p. 46). Donato, referring to the sociocultural theory-based class (of which activity theory is a subset), indicates that the collaboration involved between students and between students and teachers creates opportunities that afford many different zones of proximal development. In short, the collaborative nature of these courses allowed for collaborative negotiation of meaning allowing for a deeper learning experience than a traditional classroom (Donato, 2000). The structure of the maker course allowed for students to negotiate meaning and mediate their own learning. Admittedly, they would have to take charge of their own learning since their teacher did not actively seek to teach them any grammar or structure. Where they did confront the language was in their interaction with the learning materials and their student assistants.

Looking again at the activity system map, one might correctly conclude that the learning material and the student assistants formed parts of the tools and signs, as well as mediating artifacts, and as part of the community and the division of labor, respectively. An aspect of the CLE that may seem obvious to discuss but wasn't mentioned in much of the literature about sociocultural theory or activity theory is the situation of learning, or where and in what condition learning took place. In this place, this community, students (future engineers) participate peripherally in the tasks at hand. Essentially, the students learn the ropes of the business, as they might in an apprenticeship or an internship. Jean Lave and Etienne Wenger (1991) refer to this as "Legitimate Peripheral Participation" (LPP). As with the previous constructivist theories that have been mentioned, LPP "provides a way to speak about the relations between newcomers and oldtimers, and about activities, identities, artifacts, and communities of knowledge and practice. It concerns the process by which newcomers become part of the community of practice" (Lave & Wenger, 1991, p. 29). The community of practice in the case of the makers course required those who did not know how circuitry and fabrication worked to become part of the class community, which just happened to be in an English-speaking context. The two assistant students were indispensable in their role as 'oldtimers', and again referring to the activity map, these 'oldtimers' were mediating influences on the learning. They were instrumental in maintaining the 'situatedness' of the learning both in terms of technical expertise, and the linguistic context of the activity system. Finally, while the structure of the class did perform well as an activity system, and all the pieces for self-mediation and symmetrical scaffolding were in place and there were abundant zones of proximal development in place for students to take advantage of, one might be left to wonder what motivated the students to continue learning, even when they were faced with the dual frustrations of difficult to follow or missing programming and dealing with that issue in a second language? What kept these students engaged to the point of skipping break times and staying late after class to finish their work? The answer lies in experiential learning.

According to David A. Kolb (1984) in Experiential Learning: Experience as the Source of Learning and Development, Experiential learning theory can be traced back to Lewin, Dewey, and Piaget, and their work resulted in the theory that experiences that occur to a learner inform their learning. The learning is made possible by meaningful review of the experience that informs the next action which leads to the next experience, (Kolb, 1984). Kolb states that learning is a process full of tension and conflict:

New knowledge, skills or attitudes are achieved through confrontation among four modes of experiential learning. Learners, if they are to be effective, need four different kinds of abilities--concrete experience abilities (CE), reflective observation abilities (RO), abstract conceptualization abilities (AC), and active experimentation abilities (AE). That is they must be able to involve themselves fully, openly and without bias in new experiences (CE) they must be able to reflect on and observe their experiences from many perspectives (RO). They must be able to create concepts that integrate their observations into logically sound theories (AC) and they must be able to use these theories to make decisions and solve problems (AE). (Kolb, 1984, p. 30)

Conclusion

To conclude, Kolb adds that learners must go from a concrete experience to theorizing about possible solutions to problems, and it's in this push and pull that experiential learning takes place. The experience, at least in the terms of the makers course was student-driven in that students chose their own projects to do. The richness of the experience became noticeable as problems arose. Kolb offered a particularly apt quote from Hegel that summarizes exactly what a learning experience should be: "It's in the interplay between expectation and experience that learning occurs. In Hegel's phrase, 'Any experience that does not violate expectation is not worthy of the name experience'" (Kolb, 1984, p. 28). It's at this juncture, between expectation and experience where the activity system of the makers course could function efficiently and allow for an uninterrupted flow of learning unobtrusively in the second language.

Students brought their previous experiences in second language use, and these experiences were immediately and personally put to use in a second language use context. The challenge then becomes twofold when one considers the student's previous knowledge or lack thereof. The motivation here is provided by their exposure to a problem, participation in collaboration to solve a problem, internalizing of information and corrective action, as well as disseminating their knowledge (Knutson, 2003). In the second language classroom, rapid feedback in problem solving both increases learning and confidence in the use of the target language. In the case of the makers course, students helping each other using their own experience in language use and their technical expertise were much more rapid in how they corrected errors in use or meaning than in a traditional language class.

Far from a traditional class, the English for Makers experience proved successful on several fronts. It allowed students to explore a new topic in a novel way through the use of new tools, new methods, and all in a second language learning context.

In general, the course performed beyond expectations, but it remains to be seen if the course could be used in an independent setting where there may be limited resources and with learners who might have extensive gaps in their language learning or who might not have competent, capable instructors. The next iteration of the course will include more components such as the use of a Moodle LMS and student designed feedback systems to enhance the autonomy of the course for teachers, students, and limited-resource communities. Additionally, the next course iteration will include less costly learning objects and projects that will accomplish some of the same objectives that were achieved in the maker course. Finally, in order to meet expectations of the more traditional teaching oriented professionals, a language guide will be developed to reflect vocabulary, technical English, specific idiomatic expressions and collocations, though given the theoretical data and the information gathered in this experiment, the guide will be more likely useful to the teacher rather than the student.

References

Conole, G. (2009). The role of mediating artefacts in learning design. In L. Lockyer, S. Bennett, S. Agostinho & B. Harper (Eds.), Handbook of research on learning design and learning objects: Issues, applications, and technologies (pp. 188-208). Hershey, PA: IGI Global.

Donato, R. (2000). Sociocultural contributions to understanding the foreign and second language classroom. J. P. Lantolf (Ed.), Sociocultural theory and second language learning, (pp. 27-50). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

Engeström, Y. (2001). Expansive learning at work: Toward an activity theoretical reconceptualization. Journal of Education and Work, 14(1), 133-156. doi: https://doi.org/10.1080/13639080020028747

Fernández, M., Wegerif, R., Mercer, N., & Rojas-Drummond, S. (2001). Re-conceptualizing "scaffolding" and the zone of proximal development in the context of symmetrical collaborative learning. The Journal of Classroom Interaction, 36/37 (2/1) 40-54. doi: https://www.jstor.org/stable/23869224

Hatch, M. (2013). The maker movement manifesto: Rules for innovation in the new world of crafters, hackers, and tinkerers. New York, NY: McGraw Hill Professional.

Haught, J. R. (2006). Activity theory and second language teaching and learning. Paper presented at the ANUPI Conference Towards Greater Professionalization in Language Teaching. Retrieved from https://issuu.com/anupi.conference.proceedings/docs/anupi_2006

Jonassen, D. H., & Rohrer-Murphy, L. (1999). Activity theory as a framework for designing constructivist learning environments. Educational Technology Research and Development, 47(1), 61-79. doi: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02299477

Knutson, S. (2003). Experiential learning in second-language classrooms. TESL Canada Journal, 20(2), 52-64. doi: https://doi.org/10.18806/tesl.v20i2.948

Kolb, D. A. (1984). Experiential learning: Experience as the source of learning and development. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Lantolf, J. P. (2000). Introducing sociocultural theory. In J. P Lantolf (Ed.), Sociocultural theory and second language learning (pp. 27-50). Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

Lave, J., & Wenger, E. (1991). Situated learning: Legitimate peripheral participation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.

Ram, P., Ram, A. & Sprague, C. (2004). A web-based system to bring PBL into your classroom. In R. Ferdig, C. Crawford, R. Carlsen, N. Davis, J. Price, R. Weber & D. Willis (Eds.), Proceedings of SITE 2004--Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference (pp. 3007-3012). Chesapeake, VA: Association forthe Advancement of Computing in Education (AACE). Retrieved from https://www.learntechlib.org/primary/p/13309/

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Making English Speakers: Makerspaces as Constructivist Language Environments

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A makerspace is a constructivist learning environment (CLE) where learning takes place by creating objects. This paper describes a makerspace applied to second language learning in a university context. The course design and operation, along with its results were analyzed based on activity theory.

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As the great Ms. Frizzle says, take chances, make mistakes, GET MESSY!

The same rings true when using a makerspace in your classroom. You name it, it's possible in a makerspace.

If you aren't familiar with a makerspace, it is a place where students can create, problem solve, and collaborate. One of the greatest benefits of implementing a makerspace is that it shakes things up from your normal routine. It gives your students the chance to get silly and creative while giving you the gift of seeing your kids in a totally different light. Not only does it foster learning through inquiry, but it also helps to build overall classroom community.

One of my favorite projects that I've done with my students was creating tone bottles to help them analyze the tone shifts in pre-selected passages from The Great Gatsby. The project itself is a bit silly, but the results were powerful in watching my students become more careful and close readers than they ever were before.

Your makerspace doesn't have to be organized in a meticulous or beautiful way. It should be full of odds and ends, most of which you probably have lying around your house. No matter what you include, your kids will find a way to use it! Consider:

Making your space mobile and shared. Find an abandoned cart and team up with a few other teachers to fill it with bits and bobs and slowly grow your supply stash over time.

This 3-tier rolling cart is awesome - I used it for a classroom library at school and now it's a Makerspace cart for my toddlers at home!

Consider purchasing a green screen for anytime you want students to create something to film (reenacting a scene, a parody of a character, etc.)

Fabric scraps

Scrapbooking paper

Hot glue and glue sticks

Things with glitter. And maybe some actual glitter. That's up to you.

The makerspace project that students create doesn't need to be immediately rigorous, challenging, or even totally purposeful. Lean into the fun, frivolous, and silly for the project itself. We have the (good) tendency to want to make sure every single part of our instruction lines up neatly with skills and standards, but trust me, if you let go of the reins a bit in the "making" portion of this assignment, you'll get a beautiful bang out of the analysis and reflection portion of the assignment.
WHAT TO MAKE?

A renactment of a scene using Legos (or headless Barbies, finger puppets, old socks, whatever)

An old-school diorama

A shoe box themed and filled to answer a question

A recreation of an important element of setting

A recreation of a motif or symbol

HOW TO ANALYZE?

What did you select in the creation of _________?

Why/how do these items accurately reflect ________?

How does this scene/symbol/object further contribute to your understanding of our Essential Question?

Given the limited supplies you had, why did you make x, y, and z choices?

Did you create your project based on your own interpretation (lens) of the text or did you attempt to recreate the author's intention? Why?

Valerie A. Person's blog post inspired me to give this a shot in my AP Lang classroom. With her ideas in mind, I decided to challenge my students to select a passage from chapters 4 & 5 of The Great Gatsby and create a tone bottle that reflected the shift in tone from the beginning of the passage to the end of the passage. I then ALSO asked them to find a poem that had a similar tone or tone shift so that we could explore them as a pair.

It's important to note that although this is a "makerspace project", something that will involve obscene amounts of baby oil and glitter, the project begins and ends with textual analysis of TONE. I'm not trying to trick my kids here, but the reality is, we're spending more time than they realize on the analysis part. Even the messy, maker part of the process is dependent on their initial analysis - they won't even know what to put into the bottles if they haven't analyzed (and reread and checked in with me!) the passage in the first place.

I'm happy to share my interpretation of this idea with you all. Here are a few pictures of how the project went, the sample I wrote for students, and a form to complete that will allow me to send over everything I have!

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How to Use a Makerspace in the ELA Classroom - Mud and Ink Teaching

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If you aren't familiar with a makerspace, it is a place where students can create, problem solve, and collaborate. One of the greatest benefits of implementing a makerspace is that it shakes things up from your normal routine.

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Opinion | We Need a New Word for ‘Plagiarism’

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Copying boilerplate language is not the same as stealing another person’s ideas or fine prose.

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Do you have TikTok voice? (Credit: Getty Images)

People on TikTok have developed a specific accent - would you recognise it if you heard it?
Before I switch on the ringlight, even before I've loaded my battery into my camera, I already know what I'm going to say. I press record, look at the lens, and deliver my script. In about seven minutes it's all done - a new video for TikTok. Afterwards, I think no more about the words that I've said, and certainly not the way I delivered them. At least, until now.

It turns out there may be a "TikTok voice". It apparently includes "uptalk" - a rising intonation on declarative sentences - and "vocal fry": a soft creak as you speak.

What does Tiktok voice sound like?

So, if "TikTok voice" really is a thing, how did it emerge, and who tends to use it?

The phenomenon of " influencer speak" predates TikTok - linguistic quirks have emerged on YouTube or Instagram for well over a decade. But the app's low barrier to entry has created significantly more creators. And crucially, more of them are female than male.

In a media interview last month, Christopher Strelluf, an associate professor of linguistics at the University of Warwick, suggested that TikTok voice is particularly associated with young women - who are often linguistic innovators. "The way young women use language is the future of the way language evolves. So any changes we hear by young women are probably the future of English," he told NationalWorld, a British news publisher.

Research has consistently found this to be the case; several studies have suggested men have historically lagged behind women by a whole generation when it comes to linguistic change.

Christian Ilbury, a lecturer in sociolinguistics at the University of Edinburgh, suggests that these speech patterns may have emerged because it allows creators to "hold the conversational floor".

In my experience as a TikTok creator, uptalk can sound more persuasive and personal. "Sociolinguistic research shows that the speaker is using uptalk as a rhetorical device to keep you engaged in the discourse," says Ilbury. A low-pitched, declarative monotone, by contrast, would be flatter and less engaging. (This echoes a tip I once heard when I was training for radio broadcasting earlier in my career: I was advised to 'never sound like you're finishing a sentence'. The idea is that the listener is encouraged to stay tuned in.)

Do you have TikTok voice? (Credit: Getty Images)

Yet one of the curious elements of this style of speaking is that both uptalk and creaky voice are wildly vilified. Some people seem to associate uptalk with uncertainty or a lack of authority. And when I looked up a definition of vocal fry online, one of the first Google search results from a website called Voices told me "vocal fry is demeaning, condescending and aloof. It's the perfect vocalisation for an unlikable character."

Some commenters on the video I made for TikTok about it were also not fans. "Vocal fry seems to be getting worse in the US for sure," said one. "The rising intonation implies a question or ignorance," said another.

It's not quite true that vocal fry is getting more prevalent. A systematic review in 2020 actually found that "widespread claims of its recent increase among young American women have not been empirically confirmed".

"In the case of vocal fry, teenage girls in English-language speech communities might use vocal fry more than other groups of people," says Strelluf, but "findings in academic research are mixed".

There is the catch: women may be pioneering in a linguist's eyes, but research suggests they are more likely to be perceived negatively when using linguistic patterns like vocal fry or uptalk compared with men. In one small study, people rated female speakers with vocal fry as less attractive and intelligent than female speakers without it. They didn't distinguish between men who spoke with different "fries". Another study showed that vocal fry hurts women's career prospects. And a third found that women with vocal fry were perceived as more neurotic than those without.

It's definitely just prejudice, nothing to do with content. There is nothing wrong with the way young women's voices sound - Deborah Cameron

Strelluf says that once people decide a linguistic feature has a sociolinguistic feature - that uptalk sounds indecisive, for instance - they then start to notice it more. It is textbook confirmation bias.

Deborah Cameron, a linguist at the University of Oxford, says: "It's definitely just prejudice, nothing to do with content. There is nothing wrong with the way young women's voices sound".

In her upcoming book Language, Sexism and Misogyny, Cameron writes that criticisms of uptalk almost exclusively focus on women, and that this can have damaging consequences. "Women can and do push back against this kind of criticism," she says, "but for every woman who gives it 'zero priority', there will be others who internalise the message that the way they speak is a problem, and that by not addressing it they are 'holding themselves back'."

Cameron ends her analysis of criticisms of uptalk and vocal fry by saying: "This is the paradox at the heart of advice telling women to speak with confidence: the more women are told that the way they speak is holding them back, the less confident they will feel."

Strelluf agrees that language judgements are usually personal. "Our evaluations of language are almost always really evaluations of people," he says. "For instance, we often say that French sounds 'romantic'. But there's nothing inherently romantic about French - half of French vowels are said in the nose, which should be decidedly unromantic."

TikTok has developed its own language patterns in terms of word choice too (Credit: Getty Images)

Another way that TikTok is influencing language is through the choice of words people use. In his research, Ilbury describes the sorts of speech patterns we encounter on social video as "digital style", which has different mimetic subgenres. If you want to make a video about what you ate today, for example, an experienced TikTokker knows to say "What I ate in a day" right at the top of the video. If you want to talk about your family home's distinctively Mexican memorabilia, you know to start the video by saying: "Things in my Mexican family home that just make sense."

"In order for it to be recognised, there are stylistic and semiotic things you have to do, and if you think about TikTok videos as organised into meme genres, they have to have certain elements you recognise as belonging to that genre," Ilbury says. "One of those things is language."

So, TikTok creators are not only deploying linguistic features known for driving engagement; their words and intonations are building out entire meme genres too.

Discovering all this, I'm now aware that I might have developed a touch of TikTok voice myself. But if someone comments negatively about that on my own videos, I'll remember that it says a lot more about them than it does about me.

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How TikTok created a new accent - and why it might be the future of English

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People on TikTok have developed a specific accent - would you recognise it if you heard it?

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The United States may lack an official language, but a road trip across the country reveals dozens of different accents and dialects of English that serve as living links to Americans' ancestors.

What's the difference between these two linguistic terms? Accents center on the pronunciation of words, while dialects encompass pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar. They both often vary by region.

"Even Americans, most of whom speak only English, usually know more than one dialect," notes the Linguistic Society of America. Consider, for instance, how an individual might speak to their boss versus a stranger who just rear-ended their car.

Dialects are rooted in the same system, but "their partly independent histories leave different parts of the parent system intact," according to the society.

Myriad factors influence variations among American accents and dialects, including waves of settlement in a region, geographic location and class differences.

"There's never [just] one accent in a given place," says Teresa Pratt, a sociolinguist at San Francisco State University. "There's so much variation, even in one particular region."
Learn more about the accents and dialects featured in this article by exploring this interactive map.
Regional differences

The U.S. is commonly divided into distinct regions: the West, the Midwest, the Southwest, the Southeast and the Northeast. But broad accent categories based on these regions are more accurately broken down into diverse dialects across different localities.

Dialects in the Deep South -encompassing Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, Georgia and South Carolina-are distinct from those in Texas, a large state that's home to several linguistic varieties, as well as a mix of Spanish and English (nicknamed Spanglish) closer to the U.S.-Mexico border.

"The South gets stereotyped as a monolith, which is really unfair," says Nicole Holliday, a linguist at Pomona College.

The many variations in the American South include South Midland, Ozark, Coastal Southern, Virginia Piedmont, Gullah, Cajun English and Gulf Southern.

The popularity of specific dialects is often tied to regional history. When English colonists first arrived in North America in the early 17th century, they landed on the East Coast, establishing English-speaking communities in the North and the South. The French, the Dutch, the Spanish and other European powers also introduced their own languages as they colonized different parts of the continent. Speaking styles in different colonies remained distinct because travel opportunities were limited at the time, says Jessi Grieser, a linguist at the University of Michigan. "Historically, it's about migration and who went where," she adds.

English settlers succumbed to competing influences when they came into contact with Native Americans and colonists from other countries, all while isolating themselves from England. Centuries of settlement on the East Coast resulted in more linguistic variation among the region's cities because English was spoken there longer, Holliday says.

Colonists' ways of speaking were also influenced by the trans-Atlantic slave trade, which brought individuals kidnapped from Africa to North America.

Within the Black community, the mixing of West African languages and English resulted in different linguistic quirks, too. Some academics argue that this coupling created African American Vernacular English (AAVE), a speaking style alternatively defined as a dialect or language. Common English words potentially rooted in AAVE include banana, yam, okra and gumbo; distinct features of the linguistic variety include using "ain't" instead of "haven't" as a negative and stressing the first syllable in words like "hotel" and "July." Today, AAVE is spoken throughout the U.S., particularly in cities. When the formerly enslaved and their descendants migrated to the North during both Reconstruction and the civil rights era, they brought their regional vernacular with them.

Westward expansion also influenced the development of the U.S.'s accents and dialects. In the 19th century, white settlers migrated inland from the East Coast by the millions, spreading their regional dialects. Because travel was easier in the American West, dialects mixed more freely there, producing "something slightly more homogenized," says Grieser. As such, she calls the differences in Western varieties of English "a little bit more subtle" than in the North and the South.

Language ideologies

Today, dialects affect Americans on a largely subconscious level, through a phenomenon known as language ideology. The term refers to "the connections we make in our heads between the language features a speaker uses and our social perceptions of what that speaker's like," Grieser explains.

American dialects map according to linguist Robert Delaney: http://t.co/TrsJOw6PB0 pic.twitter.com/0rBw7QPYLp
- Michigan Language Assessment (@MichiganTests) September 12, 2015

These perceptions can result in positive stereotypes, like the American perception of British accents as " posh." But language ideologies can also perpetuate social stigmas. Individuals criticized based on the way they speak are "usually speakers who have less power," such as African Americans, Latinos and women, Grieser says.

Southerners, too, can fall victim to negative stereotypes that unfairly paint them as "backward and uneducated and poor," Holliday says. Some of these judgments are linked to the region's loss in the Civil War.

Below, learn about three areas in the U.S. that offer helpful context for understanding the complex tapestry of American accents and dialects.

California

The untrained ear may not detect a discernible accent used by Golden State natives, but California's dialects are thoroughly studied by linguists as byproducts of history.

California was first settled by Native Americans, then colonized by the Spanish in the 18th century. Spanish missionaries operated throughout the region, with the goal of converting hundreds of Native American tribes to Christianity. Spanish became the region's lingua franca, with English only gaining popularity in the mid-19th century, when the California Gold Rush brought English-speaking miners and prospectors to the area.

"Even the mainstream, white English that's spoken here sounds a little bit like Spanish," Holliday says. She credits this trend to both regional history and the modern coexistence of English and Spanish in the state.

California became a state in 1850, shortly after the discovery of gold at Sutter's Mill. Many 49ers, as the fortune seekers who flocked to the region were nicknamed, initially hailed from Mexico, Chile and China. The U.S.'s first Chinatown was established in San Francisco, and in 1852 alone, 20,000 Chinese immigrants settled in the state.

The Gold Rush eventually attracted prospectors from all corners of the globe, including Europe, Australia and New Zealand. This international influence is evident in San Francisco, where Irish settlers shaped the " Mission Brogue," a vocal pattern in which "coffee" is enunciated as "CAWfee."

In the 1930s, California's Central Valley, a swath of land spanning Redding to Sacramento to Bakersfield, welcomed an influx of migrants from Oklahoma, Arkansas and other Southern states devastated by the Dust Bowl. These settlers brought their regional dialects with them. Today, the speaking styles of the valley's residents reflect Southern dialects, even if an individual's ancestors weren't part of the Dust Bowl diaspora, Pratt says.

Today, one linguistic trend that's synonymous with the state is the California vowel shift, which occurs when a person pronounces words differently by moving their vowels forward in their mouths. ("As with strangers in an elevator, one vowel shifts to keep its distance when another enters the space," PBS explains.) "At its most extreme," says Grieser, "that's the thing we think of as that ' Valley girl ' accent."

According to Atlas Obscura, in the California vowel shift, "'kit' becomes 'ket,' 'dress' becomes 'drass,' and 'trap' becomes 'trop.'"

From Kansas to Michigan, more Americans are picking up the California vowel shift, because it connotes a cool, urban variety of English, Grieser adds.

Appalachia

In the eastern U.S., the Appalachian Mountains run from as far north as Canada to as far south as Alabama. But Appalachia itself is a cultural region encompassing all of West Virginia and parts of a dozen other states, including Kentucky, Virginia and North Carolina.

First populated by the Cherokee Nation, Appalachia welcomed its first European visitors in 1540. Waves of white immigrants-among them English, Scottish, Irish, Welsh, Dutch, German and French settlers-followed over the next three centuries.

Prior to the Civil War, which started in 1861, many immigrants came to Appalachia to escape political revolts and crop failures in their homelands-chiefly China, Germany and Ireland.

The region's geographic isolation influenced the development of its language dialects, including the predominant Appalachian English. "In Appalachia, people were isolated, because there were riverbeds and mountain ranges," says Karen Adams, a linguist at Arizona State University. Many subvarieties exist within this dialect, but its chief features include using extra prepositions ("on up around on" instead of "on"); adding the "-iz" sound to the end of plural words, like "deskes" and "ghostes"; and pronouncing "-ow" as "-er" at the end of words like "hollow," "potato" and "window."

The Scots-Irish, a group of lowland Scots who relocated to Northern Ireland in the 17th century and to Appalachia in the 19th and 20th centuries, had a long-lasting influence on their new home region. Modern remnants of the Scots-Irish dialect include "pronouncing 'pen' and 'pin' the same way and referring to valleys as 'bottoms,'" according to Lees-McRae College.

JSTOR Daily describes Appalachian speech as "quite different from standard American English," in part because of the historic vocabulary still in circulation. For instance, "britches" refers to "pants," while "poke" is used for "bag." Present-day Appalachian grammar is also reflective of Scots-Irish heritage.

New Orleans

Founded more than 300 years ago by the French, the city now known as New Orleans was originally inhabited by the Chitimacha Tribe. As early as 1719, slave traders in the port city sold Africans kidnapped from their homes as enslaved laborers.

New Orleans changed hands in 1762, when the Spanish took control of Louisiana, bringing enslaved people from the Benin and Congo regions with them. The U.S. subsequently purchased the territory in 1803.

Other immigrant populations soon began to call New Orleans home, including Haitian refugees at the turn of the 19th century and German and Irish settlers in the middle of the century. The Irish served as a source of cheap labor following the U.S.'s 1808 ban on the importation of enslaved people. In the aftermath of the Civil War, the Crescent City saw an uptick in Jewish, Croatian and Chinese immigrants.

Another major immigrant group, the Italians (mostly hailing from Sicily), settled in the city's French Quarter in droves after fleeing corruption in their native country in the 1880s. They expanded the pre-existing Italian enclave established under the French.

This medley of distinct cultural influences created about seven different dialects tied to different neighborhoods throughout New Orleans, including the Cajun and Yat varieties. Commonly spoken in the city's Ninth Ward, Yat is originally tied to French settlers and other immigrants from Europe. Its name is derived from the expression "Whe y'at?," replacing the phrase "Where are you?"

Rhoticity-"the linguistic term for whether or not you pronounce 'r' sounds after vowel sounds," according to dialect coach Erik Singer-serves as a differentiator among accents. The working-class accents of New York City and Boston are non-rhotic, meaning speakers drop the "r," as are some of the old-fashioned Southern accents, including Yat. In these variations, "water" is pronounced as "watah," "quarter" as "quatah" and "where" as "whe"-the latter dropping the last consonant.

"Broadly speaking, coastal Southern accents were non-rhotic, and inland-especially mountain-Southern accents were rhotic," Singer says. "You can trace those back to the original settlers and where they came from."

Similarities still exist between New Orleans' Yat variation and Brooklynese, a dialect popular in New York City, because of the urban centers' shared Irish and Italian heritage. "There was a dialect in New Orleans that actually sounded very much like Brooklynese, because they had the same kinds of speakers move into those areas, and they developed varieties that actually sound alike," says Adams.

Ultimately, Adams points out that pronunciation shifts constantly throughout the U.S., and "changes are continuing to happen all the time." But one fact remains the same, she says: "Everyone speaks a dialect, and everyone has an accent."

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A Brief History of the United States' Accents and Dialects

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Migration patterns, cultural ties, geographic regions and class differences all shape speaking patterns

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This Language Was Long Believed Extinct. Then One Man Spoke Up.

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Blas Jaime has spent nearly two decades resurrecting Chaná, an Indigenous language in Argentina that he learned from his mother.

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When I visited Buenos Aires last year, I thought the six semesters of Spanish I took in school would pay dividends. The fast flow of Spanish from Argentinians quickly killed that delusion. I realized I had forgotten most conjugation rules and vocabulary, and I was able to formulate only simple, stilted sentences: "I can have a beer?"

So it was admittedly encouraging to hear that Arieh Smith, a New York City-based polyglot who runs the popular language-learning YouTube channel Xiaomanyc, didn't leave his first foreign language classes with much proficiency either.

"In high school, I was actually terrible at learning languages," he said. "I spent years learning Latin and Greek and Hebrew, and it just never clicked. I would be just very confused why, year in and year out, I would have no understanding of this material despite pretty good grades and, you know, continually doing the work."

It finally clicked when he entered a one-year immersion program, through Princeton University, to learn Chinese in Beijing. Students had to sign a pledge: If you speak English at any time during the program, you get kicked out (a policy that had been enforced at least once, he said). Smith eventually became fluent in Chinese, partly through the constant immersion in a Chinese-speaking environment, and partly through language-learning software that utilizes spaced repetition, a technique where review intervals are progressively increased to enhance long-term retention.

Practical phrases and comprehensible input

But neither of those is necessary for learning a language. Studying Chinese helped Smith develop more straightforward learning strategies he would later apply while learning dozens of other languages over the following years. One key strategy: Instead of memorizing a long list of random words, he studied practical phrases that he was likely to use in conversation, such as "Does this cost $1.50 or $2?" or "Do you have coffee?"

"[Words] don't have as much meaning as when they're put into useful, chunkable phrases that are relevant to you and your day-to-day life," Smith said. "It just hooks in with the way our brains naturally learn languages."

There is also the fact that the phrases you use in, say, the grocery store are probably pretty simple. Case in point: The Oxford English Corpus, the largest record of English words, contains more than 600,000 entries, but an analysis of thousands of English texts found that just 100 lemmas (the base form of a word, like "climb" is to "climbing") accounted for half of all words used in those writing samples.

Smith said he keeps a document of English phrases he commonly uses in conversation so he can translate them into whatever language he wants to learn when starting a new one. The idea is to start using these phrases in real conversations as soon as possible, not spending too much time learning vocabulary. "There's no way to get high fluency in a language without speaking," Smith said. "For practical purposes, it's impossible."

Still, fluency also requires learning vocabulary. One concept that has helped Smith and many others efficiently learn languages is comprehensible input, first developed in the 1970s by linguist Stephen Krashen. Comprehensible input refers to listening or reading the target language at a difficulty slightly above your current level of proficiency. It's a process that mirrors how children learn languages: They might not understand every word in a sentence, but they can use context clues to derive the meaning, and over time they accumulate more and more words.

The key is finding the sweet spot.

"I can't tell you how much time I've wasted [earlier in my language-learning career] trying to immerse myself in media that was way above my level," Smith said, bringing up the time he made a YouTube video where he tried to learn Japanese by watching hours of the TV show Naruto with Japanese audio and subtitles. "The end result of that was I learned almost no Japanese." (This, by the way, explains why the idea that you can learn languages in your sleep is a myth.)

What better helps you find comprehensible input is through conversation with a friend or tutor. "They're tailored to your level," Smith said. "You start from a basic point, you get more and more complex, and you build over time."

Misconceptions about learning languages

Smith said it is a misconception that learning new languages is only for smart people or those naturally gifted in linguistics. Natural talent does exist, but it's not everything. Smith brought up an analogy he heard from another language-learning YouTuber, Matt vs Japan, which is that learning a language is like losing weight: It's hard but not in the same way that learning calculus is hard. "Everybody can understand how a language works," Smith said. "It's not a problem."

Consistent effort is probably more important.

"If you're a person who's not that smart but really good at grinding, you're going to way outpace someone who is smart but not that good at grinding," he said.

I asked Smith about the awkwardness people might feel when speaking a new language with native speakers.

"I'm not really a natural extrovert, so it's also something I've had to overcome," he said. "One thing that I realized, even before doing any of this as a business, is also that people really appreciated it when I spoke even a little Chinese."

This phenomenon might not be universal: An American touring Paris probably won't amuse the waiter by ordering in French. Still, Smith said that learning languages, even on a very basic conversational level (which is his level of proficiency in most of the languages he has studied), helps you learn about the cultures in which they developed - both through the idiosyncrasies of the language and the people those languages enable you to speak with.

"It just forced me to, go to like, Little Haiti in Brooklyn and try to speak in Haitian Creole, which is probably something I'd have never done. And the same for Punjabi or Vietnamese."

As for whether some languages are inherently more useful or beautiful than others? "Personally I would say I prefer the sound of certain languages," Smith said, noting that Welsh, to his ears, is more beautiful than most other languages. "Ultimately, the way that I really see languages is as a tool... I've always been skeptical of the idea that some languages are better at communicating ideas. I think that, fundamentally, whatever any language can express has to be able to be expressed by another language."

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A polyglot explains the tips (and myths) of learning new languages

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Arieh Smith, a New York City-based polyglot who runs the YouTube channel Xiaomanyc, talks language-learning with Big Think.

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As Vladimir Nabokov revised his autobiography, Speak, Memory, he found himself in a strange psychological state. He had first written the book in English, published in 1951. A few years later, a New York publisher asked him to translate it back into Russian for the émigré community. The use of his mother tongue brought back a flood of new details from his childhood, which he converted into his adopted language for a final edition, published in 1966.

"This re-Englishing of a Russian re-version of what had been an English re-telling of Russian memories in the first place, proved to be a diabolical task," he wrote. "But some consolation was given me by the thought that such multiple metamorphosis, familiar to butterflies, had not been tried by any human before."

Over the past decade, psychologists have become increasingly interested in using such mental metamorphoses. Besides altering the quality of our memories, switching between languages can influence people's financial decision-making and their appraisal of moral dilemmas. By speaking a second language, we can even become more rational, more open-minded and better equipped to deal with uncertainty. This phenomenon is known as the "foreign language effect" and the benefits may be an inspiration for anyone who would like to enrich their mind with the words of another tongue.

People hate the prospect of losing - but they hate it less in a foreign language

Boaz Keysar

The foreign language effect should not be confused with the older concept of "linguistic determinism", which proposes that the specific words and grammar of a language can change the way we perceive the world. In this view, people's colour perception should change according to the terms that we use to divide the rainbow, while people's perception of time may be influenced by the grammatical tenses they use.

You may be familiar with this idea from the film , in which the aliens' language mysteriously shapes their experience of the world. Whether this happens in real life, however, is still a matter of considerable scientific debate. The foreign language effect does not depend on the particular features of the language that someone speaks; instead, it is concerned with the general experience of moving from a first to a second language. How will my thinking change, for example, when I move from English, which I absorbed in my cot, to Italian, which I have painstakingly studied as an adult?

Influencing moral reasoning: the 'trolley problem'

For Prof Boaz Keysar at the University of Chicago, who pioneered this research, the inspiration was personal. He grew up in Israel, and has now lived in the US for more than three decades, but still finds that Hebrew has more emotional resonance than English. Driving home from work one day, he started to wonder whether this might influence our moral reasoning, which is often driven by our gut feelings rather than logical reasoning.

Imagine, for instance, that you are standing on a footbridge when you see that an oncoming train is about to kill five people walking on the track. The only way to save these five people is to push a heavy man off the bridge in front of the train. He will die but the impact will prevent the train from hitting the other five people. This is considered the "utilitarian" choice in a version of the thought experiment known as the "trolley problem". Many people feel such strong revulsion at the idea of pushing the man to his death that they would prefer to take no action at all, even though that means that many more lives will be lost.

In a preliminary experiment, Keysar's team asked participants who had learned Spanish as a second language to consider this dilemma in either their native or adopted tongue. As he had hypothesised, they were far more likely to make the utilitarian choice when they used Spanish compared with English. The effect was so big that Keysar delayed publishing the results. "I just didn't believe the data," he says. A later collaboration with Albert Costa at the Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, however, documented the same results across diverse participants from the US, Europe and Asia. In one sample, participants were twice as likely to choose the utilitarian option when speaking a second language.

Amy Adams in Denis Villeneuve's 2016 sci-fi drama Arrival. In it, she plays a linguist recruited by the US military to find a way to communicate with aliens who have come to Earth. Photograph: TCD/Prod.DB/Alamy

In the meantime, Keysar had turned his attention to the classic cognitive biases such as "myopic loss aversion". Previous experiments showed that people are unwilling to risk losing a small amount of money for the chance of winning a bigger sum, even if the odds are tipped in their favour. If you give people a 50% chance of winning £2.50, for example, or offer them the opportunity to take £1 for sure, most people go for the guaranteed money. This may pay off in the short term, but when you have made many such decisions, it severely limits your profits.

Myopic loss aversion is a serious problem for investors, but Keysar found that this tendency was much less pronounced when the bets were presented in a foreign language. "People just hate the prospect of losing," says Keysar. "But they hate it less in a foreign language." Further experiments have shown that speaking a foreign language can also reduce the framing effect, which is our tendency to be swayed by the particular phrasing of information, and the sunk cost effect, which is our reluctance to leave a failing endeavour.

One of the most intriguing recent studies tested the "bias blind spot" - the expectation that we are less susceptible to error than the average person. "We believe that other people are stupid, and we are not," explains Michał Białek, an associate professor at the University of Wrocław, Poland. In line with Keysar's findings, he found that speaking a foreign language punctures this egotistical way of thinking.

It is now 11 years since Keysar published his first paper on the foreign language effect. Over the same period, many psychological findings have crumbled under scrutiny - but not the foreign language effect. "It's consistent and replicable," says Simone Sulpizio, an associate professor at the University of Milano-Bicocca, Italy, who conducted a recent meta-analysis examining the evidence to date, though both he and Białek emphasise that we need more research into the mechanisms behind the effect.

The memory game

Psychologists have also started to explore how the foreign language effect may touch many other areas of our psyche. Consider memory, the topic of Nabokov's musings. We encode our recollections with verbal narratives, particular words triggering specific associations attached to an event. As a result, a childhood memory may seem less vivid when someone recalls it using a language that was acquired later in life. That may be a disadvantage for someone writing a memoir in a foreign tongue. On the plus side, it could help people to process painful events. People who recalled a childhood trauma in a second language showed less emotional distress than those recounting the event in their native tongue.

Keysar's latest study, led by his PhD student Leigh Grant, has shown that the foreign language effect can discourage the creation of false memories. In one experiment, the participants were first given a list of connected words, such as "dream", "snooze", "bed" and "rest". When their recall was tested later, many people mistakenly remembered hearing the word sleep, which was not on the list. This is a standard technique to test people's tendency to form false memories, and it was considerably less likely to happen if they performed the task in their foreign language.

In a follow-up experiment, the team showed participants two clips of robberies from the films The Pink Panther and Rififi, before playing them audio narratives of the same events that contained some false details. This can muddy people's memories so that they begin to incorporate the misinformation into their own recollections. Once again, participants managed to avoid more of those errors when they heard the descriptions in their second language.

Keysar suggests that people employ more careful and deliberative thinking when using their foreign language: "You need to make sure that what you say, and how you understand things, is correct." And they apply the same attention to the monitoring of their memories, leading them to question the accuracy of their recollections rather than simply recounting the first thing that comes into their heads.

The foreign language effect may even stretch to elements of our personality. Silvia Purpuri at the University of Trento, Italy has examined "tolerance of ambiguity", which concerns people's appreciation of uncertainty, and their willingness to enter unfamiliar situations. This can influence our behaviour in a changing workplace. "Those with high levels of tolerance of ambiguity display more flexibility and adaptability, leading to a more harmonious working environment and overall successful performance," explains Purpuri. By allowing people to entertain new ideas, tolerance of ambiguity can improve people's creative problem-solving. Recruiting Italian-English bilingual speakers, Purpuri and her colleagues found that people naturally score more highly on this trait when primed to use their second language.

In today's increasingly globalised world, many people regularly use two or more languages in their day-to-day lives, yet they may be completely unaware how that may influence their thinking. "People need to realise that if they choose to use one language over the other, that will have a systematic effect on the process and outcome of what they do," says Keysar.

We still need much more research examining the limits of the foreign language effect and the cases where it may backfire. But in certain situations, it could be a useful tool to switch mindsets, allowing us to be a little more detached, objective and flexible in our thinking. You could deliberately swap to your second language when investigating important investments, for instance, so that you can more rationally appraise the risks. Or, when facing a personal upset, you may find that describing the situation in your second language helps to calm some of your fears or anxieties. And if you are considering a controversial new environmental policy, you might try to read about it in a foreign newspaper: the research suggests that this may render you more open-minded to the facts at hand and less easily swayed by your immediate gut reaction.

For those who already speak another language, this may be an unexpected payoff for all your studies. For those who do not, such benefits may offer an extra incentive to pick up your old French textbooks, sign up for a night class in Spanish, or download Duolingo. Nabokov's experience may have been exceptional, but we may all undergo a mini-metamorphosis as we immerse our minds in the words and idioms of another culture.

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How thinking in a foreign language improves decision-making

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Research shows people who speak another language are more utilitarian and flexible, less risk-averse and egotistical, and better able to cope with traumatic memories

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Several years ago, my father died as he had done most things throughout his life: without preparation and without consulting anyone. He simply went to bed one night, yielded his brain to a monstrous blood clot, and was found the next morning lying amidst the sheets like his own stone monument.

It was hard for me not to take my father's abrupt exit as a rebuke. For years, he'd been begging me to visit him in the Czech Republic, where I'd been born and where he'd gone back to live in 1992. Each year, I delayed. I was in that part of my life when the marriage-grad-school-children-career-divorce current was sweeping me along with breath-sucking force, and a leisurely trip to the fatherland seemed as plausible as pausing the flow of time.

Now my dad was shrugging at me from beyond- "You see, you've run out of time."

His death underscored another loss, albeit a far more subtle one: that of my native tongue. Czech was the only language I knew until the age of 2, when my family began a migration westward, from what was then Czechoslovakia through Austria, then Italy, settling eventually in Montreal, Canada. Along the way, a clutter of languages introduced themselves into my life: German in preschool, Italian-speaking friends, the francophone streets of East Montreal. Linguistic experience congealed, though, once my siblings and I started school in English. As with many immigrants, this marked the time when English became, unofficially and over the grumbling of my parents (especially my father), our family language-the time when Czech began its slow retreat from my daily life.

Many would applaud the efficiency with which we settled into English-it's what exemplary immigrants do. But between then and now, research has shown the depth of the relationship all of us have with our native tongues-and how traumatic it can be when that relationship is ruptured. Spurred by my father's death, I returned to the Czech Republic hoping to reconnect to him. In doing so, I also reconnected with my native tongue, and with parts of my identity that I had long ignored.

While my father was still alive, I was, like most young people, more intent on hurtling myself into my future than on tending my ancestral roots-and that included speaking the language of my new country rather than my old one. The incentives for adopting the culturally dominant language are undeniable. Proficiency offers clear financial rewards, resulting in wage increases of 15 percent for immigrants who achieve it relative to those who don't, according to economist Barry Chiswick. A child, who rarely calculates the return on investment for her linguistic efforts, feels the currency of the dominant language in other ways: the approval of teachers and the acceptance of peers. I was mortally offended when my first-grade teacher asked me on the first day of school if I knew "a little English"-"I don't know a little English," was my indignant and heavily accented retort. "I know a lot of English." In the schoolyard, I quickly learned that my Czech was seen as having little value by my friends, aside from the possibility of swearing in another language-a value I was unable to deliver, given that my parents were cursing teetotalers.

But embracing the dominant language comes at a price. Like a household that welcomes a new child, a single mind can't admit a new language without some impact on other languages already residing there. Languages can co-exist, but they tussle, as do siblings, over mental resources and attention. When a bilingual person tries to articulate a thought in one language, words and grammatical structures from the other language often clamor in the background, jostling for attention. The subconscious effort of suppressing this competition can slow the retrieval of words-and if the background language elbows its way to the forefront, the speaker may resort to code-switching, plunking down a word from one language into the sentence frame of another.

Meanwhile, the weaker language is more likely to become swamped; when resources are scarce, as they are during mental exhaustion, the disadvantaged language may become nearly impossible to summon. Over time, neglecting an earlier language makes it harder and harder for it to compete for access.

His death underscored another loss, albeit a far more subtle one: that of my native tongue.

According to a 2004 survey conducted in the Los Angeles metropolitan area, fewer than half of people belonging to Generation 1.5-immigrants who arrive before their teenage years-claimed to speak the language they were born into "very well." A 2006 study of immigrant languages in Southern California forecast that even among Mexican Americans, the slowest group to assimilate within Southern California, new arrivals would live to hear only 5 out of every 100 of their great-grandchildren speak fluent Spanish.

When a childhood language decays, so does the ability to reach far back into your own private history. Language is memory's receptacle. It has Proustian powers. Just as smells are known to trigger vivid memories of past experiences, language is so entangled with our experiences that inhabiting a specific language helps surface submerged events or interactions that are associated with it.

Psychotherapist Jennifer Schwanberg has seen this firsthand. In a 2010 paper, she describes treating a client who'd lived through a brutal childhood in Mexico before immigrating to the United States. The woman showed little emotion when talking about events from her early life, and Schwanberg at first assumed that her client had made her peace with them. But one day, the woman began the session in Spanish. The therapist followed her lead and discovered that "moving to her first language had opened a floodgate. Memories from childhood, both traumatic and nontraumatic, were recounted with depth and vividness ... It became clear that a door to the past was available to her in her first language."

A first language remains uniquely intertwined with early memories, even for people who fully master another language. In her book The Bilingual Mind, linguist Aneta Pavlenko describes how the author Vladimir Nabokov fled the Russian revolution in 1919, arriving in the United Kingdom when he was 20. By the time he wrote his memoir Conclusive Evidence in 1951, he'd been writing in English for years, yet he struggled writing this particular text in his adopted language, complaining that his memory was tuned to the "musical key" of Russian. Soon after its publication, he translated the memoir into his native tongue. Working in his first language seems to have prodded his senses awake, leading him to insert new details into the Russian version: A simple anecdote about a stingy old housekeeper becomes perfumed with the scents of coffee and decay, the description of a laundry hamper acquires a creaking sound, the visual details of a celluloid swan and toy boat sprout as he writes about the tub in which he bathed as a child. Some of these details eventually made it into his revised English memoir, which he aptly titled Speak, Memory. Evidently, when memory speaks, it sometimes does so in a particular tongue.

Losing your native tongue unmoors you not only from your own early life but from the entire culture that shaped you. You lose access to the books, films, stories, and songs that articulate the values and norms that you've absorbed. You lose the embrace of an entire community or nation for whom your family's odd quirks are not quirks all. You lose your context. This disconnection can be devastating. A 2007 study led by Darcy Hallett found that in British Columbian native communities in which fewer than half of the members could converse in their indigenous language, young people killed themselves six times more often than in communities where the majority spoke the native language. In the Midwestern U.S., psychologist Teresa LaFromboise and her colleagues found that American-Indian adolescents who were heavily involved in activities focused on their traditional language and traditions did better at school and had fewer behavior problems than kids who were less connected to their traditional cultures-in fact, cultural connectedness buffered them against adolescent problems more than having a warm and nurturing mother. Such benefits appear to span continents: In 2011, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reported that aboriginal youth who spoke their traditional language were less likely to binge drink or use illegal drugs.

Why is a heritage language so conducive to well-being? Michael Chandler, one of the authors of the suicide study, emphasizes that a sense of cultural continuity makes people resilient by providing them with a cohesive self-concept. Without that continuity, he warns, aboriginal youth, who have typically experienced plenty of turbulence, are in grave existential danger. They risk losing "the thread that tethers together their past, present, and future."

As my siblings and I distanced ourselves from the Czech language in our youth, a space widened between us and our parents-especially my father, who never wore English with any comfort. Memories of our early family life, along with its small rituals and lessons imparted, receded into a past that drifted ever further out of reach. It was as if my parents' life in their home country, and the values that defined that life, didn't translate credibly into another language; it was much easier to rebel against them in English. Even the English names for our parents encouraged dissent: The Czech words we'd used- Maminka, Tatinek-so laden with esteem and affection, impossible to pronounce with contempt, had no corresponding forms. In English, the sweet but childish Mommy and Daddy are soon abandoned for Mom and Dad -words that, we discovered, lend themselves perfectly well to adolescent snark.

I watched as my father grew more and more frustrated at his powerlessness to pass on to his children the legacy he most longed to leave: a burning religious piety, the nurturing of family ties, pleasure in the music and traditions of his region, and an abiding respect for ancestors. All of these became diluted by the steady flow of new memories narrated in English, laced with Anglophone aspiration and individualism. As we entered adulthood and dispersed all over North America into our self-reliant lives, my father gave up. He moved back home.

For the next two decades, I lived my adult life, fully absorbed into the English-speaking universe, even adding American citizenship to my Canadian one. My dad was the only person with whom I regularly spoke Czech-if phone calls every few months can be described as "regularly," and if my clumsy sentences patched together with abundant English can be called "speaking Czech." My Czech heritage began to feel more and more like a vestigial organ.

You lose the embrace of an entire community. You lose your context.

Then my father died. Loss inevitably reveals that which is gone. It was as if the string section of the orchestra had fallen silent-not carrying the melody, it had gone unnoticed, but its absence announced how much depth and texture it had supplied, how its rhythms had lent coherence to the music. In grieving my father, I became aware of how much I also mourned the silencing of Czech in my life. There was a part of me, I realized, that only Czech could speak to, a way of being that was hard to settle into, even with my own siblings and mother when we spoke in English.

After my father's death, my siblings and I inherited a sweet little apartment in a large compound that has been occupied by the Sedivy family since the 1600s, and where my uncle still lives with his sprawling family. This past spring, I finally cleared two months of my schedule and went for a long visit, sleeping on the very same bed where my father and his brothers had been born.

I discovered that, while I may have run out of time to visit my father in his homeland, there was still time for me to reunite with my native tongue. On my first day there, the long drive with my uncle between the airport and our place in the countryside was accompanied by a conversation that lurched along awkwardly, filled with dead ends and misunderstandings. Over the next few days, I had trouble excavating everyday words like stamp and fork, and I made grammar mistakes that would (and did) cause a 4-year-old to snicker. But within weeks, fluency began to unspool. Words that I'm sure I hadn't used in decades leapt out of my mouth, astounding me. (Often they were correct. Sometimes not: I startled a man who asked about my occupation by claiming to be a savior- spasitelka. Sadly, I am a mere writer- spisovatelka.) The complicated inflections of Czech, described as "character-building" by an acquaintance who'd learned the language in college, began to assemble into somewhat orderly rows in my mind, and I quickly ventured onto more and more adventurous grammatical terrain. Just a few weeks into my visit, I briefly passed as a real Czech speaker in a conversation with a stranger. Relearning Czech so quickly felt like having linguistic superpowers.

Surprised by the speed of my progress, I began to look for studies of heritage speakers relearning childhood languages that had fallen into disuse. A number of scientific papers reported evidence of cognitive remnants of "forgotten" languages, remnants that were visible mostly in the process of relearning. In some cases, even when initial testing hinted at language decay, people who'd been exposed to the language earlier in life showed accelerated relearning of grammar, vocabulary, and most of all, of control over the sounds of the language.

One of the most remarkable examples involved a group of Indian adoptees who'd been raised from a young age (starting between 6 and 60 months) in English-speaking families, having no significant contact with their language of origin. The psychologist Leher Singh tested the children when they were between the ages of 8 and 16. Initially, neither group could hear the difference between dental and retroflex consonants, a distinction that's exploited by many Indian languages. After listening to the contrasting sounds over a period of mere minutes, the adoptees, but not the American-born children, were able to discriminate between the two classes of consonants.

This is revealing because a language's phonology, or sound structure, is one of the greatest challenges for people who start learning a language in adulthood. Long after they've mastered its syntax and vocabulary, a lifelong accent may mark them as latecomers to the language. Arnold Schwarzenegger was the star of many American movies and the governor of the country's biggest state, but his Austrian accent is a constant reminder that he could never run for president. The crucial timing of exposure for native-like speech is evident in my own family: I can pronounce the notoriously difficult "ř" sound in Czech-as in the name of the composer Dvořák-but my brother, born three years after me, in Vienna, cannot.

Phonology's resistance to both attrition and later learning may be due to the fact that the sound structure of a language is fixed in a child's mind very early. Before 6 months of age, infants can distinguish most subtle differences in speech sounds, whether their language makes use of those distinctions or not. But over the second half of their first year, they gradually tune their perception to just the sounds of the language they hear around them. Children who hear only English lose the ability to distinguish between dental and retroflex sounds. Children learning Japanese begin to hear "r" and "l" as variants of the same sound. Linguist Pat Kuhl, who has studied this phenomenon for decades, describes the process as one of perceptual narrowing and increasing neural commitment, eventually excluding native-like perception of other languages.

One of the most striking examples of the brain's attunement to native sounds is apparent in languages such as Mandarin, where varying the tone of an utterance can produce entirely different words. (For instance, the syllable ma can mean "mother," "hemp," "horse," or "scold," depending on the pitch contour you lay over it.) When Mandarin speakers hear nonsense syllables that are identical except for their tones, they show heightened activity in the left hemisphere of the brain, where people normally process sounds that signal differences in meaning-like the difference between the syllables "pa" and "ba." But speakers of non-tonal languages like English have more activity in the right hemisphere, showing that the brain doesn't treat tone as relevant for distinguishing words. A recent study found that Chinese-born babies adopted into French homes showed brain activity that matched Chinese speakers and was clearly distinct from monolingual French speakers-even after being separated from their birth language for more than 12 years.

he brain's devotion to a childhood language reminds me of a poem by Emily Dickinson:

The Soul selects her own Society-
Then-shuts the Door-
To her divine Majority-
Present no more-

Unmoved-she notes the Chariots-pausing-
At her low Gate-
Unmoved-an Emperor be kneeling
Upon her Mat-

I've known her-from an ample nation-
Choose One-
Then-close the Valves of her attention-
Like Stone-

Those of us who received more than one language before the valves of our attention closed may find, to our surprise, that our earliest language lingers on in our soul's select society, long after we thought it had faded.

I've become aware of the deep sense in which I belong to the Czech language, as well as the extent to which my formative memories are tinged by its "musical key." For me, the English phrase "pork with cabbage and dumplings" refers to a concept, the national dish of the Czechs. But hearing the Czech phrase vepřo-knedlo-zelo evokes the fragrance of roasting meat, pillowy dumpling loaves being pulled steaming out of a tall pot and sliced with sewing thread, and the clink of the nice china as the table is dressed for Sunday dinner, the fulcrum of every week.

Since coming back from the Czech Republic, I've insisted on speaking Czech with my mother. Even though it's more effortful for both of us than speaking in English, our conversation feels softer, more tender this way. English was the language in which I forged my independence, the language of my individuation-but it was in Czech that I was nurtured, comforted, and sung to.

It has also gotten easier to hear the timbre of my father's voice in my mind's ear, especially when working in my garden. It's no accident that many of my conversations with him, and more recently with my uncle, have been on the subject of horticulture. My father's family has lived for centuries in the fertile wine and orchard region of Moravia, and on my recent visit, I saw my relatives gaze out at their land with an expression usually reserved for a beloved spouse or child. Throughout my own life, I've given in to the compulsion to fasten myself to whatever patch of land I happened to be living on by growing things on it, an impulse that has often conflicted with the upwardly and physically mobile trajectory of my life. It's an impulse I submit to once again, living now in the lee of the Rocky Mountains; neither grapes nor apricots will thrive in the brittle mountain air, but I raise sour cherries and saskatoons, small fruits native to western Canada. As I mulch and weed and prune, I sometimes find myself murmuring to my plants in Czech as my father did, and the Moravian homestead doesn't seem very far away.

My newly vocal native tongue, and along with it, the heightened memory of my father's voice, does more than connect me to my past: It is proving to be an unexpected guide in my present work. I've recently left my job as an academic linguist to devote more time to writing, and I often find myself these days conjuring my father's voice by reading a passage in Czech. Like many Czechs I've met, my father treated his language like a lovely object to be turned over, admired, stroked with a fingertip, deserving of deliberate and leisurely attention. He spoke less often than most people, but was more often eloquent. I may never regain enough of my first language to write anything in it worth reading, but when I struggle to write prose that not only informs but transcends, I find myself steering my inner monologue toward Czech. It reminds me of what it feels like to sink into language, to be startled by the aptness of a word or the twist of a phrase, to be delighted by arrangements of its sounds, and lulled by its rhythms. I've discovered that my native language has been sitting quietly in my soul's vault all this time.

Julie Sedivy has taught linguistics and psychology at Brown University and the University of Calgary. She is the co-author of Sold on Language: How Advertisers Talk to You and What This Says About You and more recently, the author of Language in Mind: An Introduction to Psycholinguistics.
This article originally appeared on Nautilus, a science and culture magazine for curious readers. Sign up for the Nautilus newsletter.

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The strange persistence of first languages

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What happens when you lose the language you grew up in? And what memories might you access if you learn it again?

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I immigrated from Mexicali, Mexico, when I was 10 years old, the child of farm laborers. I was still learning English when my high school teachers advised me to forgo any college dreams.

But there in the Imperial Valley of southeast California, I forged ahead as a full-time night student, picking up what wages I could during the day. The goal of breaking cycles of poverty possessed me. I managed to earn an associate's degree from Imperial Valley College. After transferring to San Diego State University's Imperial Valley Campus, I earned my bachelor's in psychology among scattered trailers and temporary classrooms.

My single-minded focus was not on self-discovery but intergenerational mobility. Like an arduous hike from a valley up to a mountain summit with a beautiful vista, that first-generation diploma changed the trajectory of my family. I went on earn a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia and take on administrative roles that opened up higher education to more students like me.

The notion that college is not worth it is deeply inequitable. Georgetown researchers predict that within a decade, nearly three-quarters of jobs will require some education or training after high school.

"Jobs for people without college degrees that pay over $130,000 a year make up 1 percent of the American economy," Anthony Carnevale, director of Georgetown's Center on Education and the Workforce, recently told CNBC .

Admittedly, college is expensive. But it remains the best way to break cycles of poverty, and I am disturbed by the flippant, harmful cynicism of prominent college critics like Elon Musk (college is "basically for fun" and "not for learning") and Bill Maher , who called college "a giant scam."

I am here to provide the college counternarrative. The truth is there are educational attainment inequalities in our country. Those who say that education isn't for everyone tend to be white, rich and educated - and they surround themselves with other white, rich, educated people. A college degree helps members of underrepresented groups get their break.

If one looks at the current arguments that college is not worth it from a sociocultural perspective, one has to ask who is promoting that message? Interestingly, those who amplify that message have college degrees, and so do their family members. As someone who was academically tracked to not go to college and instead encouraged to go to a technical school, I find the messaging abhorrent. Black, Latino and poor white students in my high school were consistently placed in remedial courses and vocational courses such as small engine repair, auto repair shop and wood shop. Meanwhile, white students from the affluent part of our little town enrolled in college prep courses.

I clearly recall when I finally met my high school advisor and I told her that I wanted to go to college. She looked at me with a blank stare, as if to say, "pobrecito," and told me bluntly that college was not a viable choice for me.

White kids received the opposite message; they were told that college was the only option for them. College was a right for them but a privilege for the rest of us. This messaging keeps marginalized students living in poverty and reinforces the vicious cycle of poverty. On the other hand, white students going on to college ensures that they can replace their own in those positions of power and authority while pulling the ladder up behind them.

I was the only one in my group of friends at my high school who refused to listen to the guidance counselor who told me that college was "not for me." From a recent New York Times podcast episode to a much-cited Gallup poll showing a drop in Americans' confidence in higher education, too many students from marginalized communities are hearing the continual drumbeat of the same message I heard decades ago. Now, these same marginalized students and their families are hearing from the media that college is "not for you." The message that I heard in a one-to-one meeting with my guidance counselor is now being amplified by national news outlets endlessly sharing stories of how the general public now perceives college as not worth it.

Why are we urging marginalized students and their families not to waste their time and money, that college is not worth it, that they don't want all that debt, that they will do fine without a college education, and to pursue training at a trade school instead? I and many others know from lived experience that earning a college degree is a right for marginalized students and can break the cycle of poverty. We know that a college degree leads to better health outcomes, a more engaged and responsible citizenry, that we collectively generate more tax revenue, that we become life-long learners, that our families and our communities are transformed, and that we have more control over our careers.

These "not for you" messages cause harm to the next generation of diverse college-going students. I, for one, will not remain silent as I view silence as complicity to this injustice. It is up to all of us to rise up and challenge that harmful narrative.
Jose Luis Alvarado, Ph.D., has been the dean of the Fordham Graduate School of Education since 2021. For the latest news, weather, sports, and streaming video, head to The Hill.

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The deep inequity of the anti-college movement - NewsBreak

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I immigrated from Mexicali, Mexico, when I was 10 years old, the child of farm laborers. I was still learning English when my high school teachers advised me to forgo any college dreams. But there in the Imperial Valley of southeast California, I forged ahead as a full-time night student, picking up what wages I...

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The Most Spoken Language in Every U.S. State (Besides English and Spanish)

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While 78% of Americans speak only English at home, between 350 and 430 languages can be found in the United States.

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Riddle Of The Indo-European Language - Which Of The Two Hypotheses Is Correct? - NewsBreak

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AncientPages.com - The languages in the Indo-European family are spoken by almost half of the world's population. This group includes a huge number of languages, ranging...

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For Tiya Miles, girlhood reading was "my escape and joy"

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For Tiya Miles, Girlhood Reading Was 'My Escape and Joy'

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"My favorite author was Madeleine L'Engle," says the National Book Award-winning historian, whose new book is "Wild Girls: How the Outdoors Shaped the Women Who Challenged a Nation." "In middle school I would ride the city bus to the public library and check out L'Engle's novels for teens."

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Do machines understand Africa? This is the question Meta started answering this month when it published a research paper (pdf) that details plans to improve the accuracy with which AI algorithms decode African languages.

The plan, expected to look into 55 of Africa's marginalized languages and improve how AI machines translate them on Facebook, Instagram, and Wikipedia, could boost technological inclusion in the creation and adoption of tech solutions for Africa.

Chief executive Mark Zuckerberg published on his Facebook profile that his company will be using a supercomputer to lead the translations through advanced Natural Language Processing (NLP) capabilities.

"We also work with professional translators to do human evaluation too, meaning people who speak the languages natively evaluate what the AI produced. The reality is that a handful of languages dominate the web, so only a fraction of the world can access content and contribute to the web in their own language. We want to change this," he explains.

Meta: No language left behind

Currently, about 4 billion people are locked out of internet services because their languages are marginalized and do not speak one of the few languages content is available in. Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for 13.5% of the global population but of global research output largely due to language barriers.

"AI models require lots and lots of data to help them learn, and there's not a lot of human translated training data for these languages. For example, there's more than 20 million people who speak and write in Luganda but examples of this written language are extremely difficult to find on the internet," Meta says in the paper.

The company hopes human translators will help it develop a reliable benchmark which can automatically assess translation quality for many low-resource and marginalized languages.

The open-sourced AI model will also translate 145 more languages across the world which aren't supported by current translation systems.

"We call this project No Language Left Behind. To give a sense of the scale, the 200-language model has over 50 billion parameters, and we trained it using our new Research SuperCluster, which is one of the world's fastest AI supercomputers," Zuckerberg says.

That will enable more than 25 billion translations every day across Meta's apps, and will help Meta's AI machines show the most interesting content on social media in local languages and recommend more relevant ads.

Breakthrough for social media platforms

This could also be a breakthrough in areas that social media platforms such as TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, and WhatsApp have struggled with such as taming political hate speech, bullying, body shaming, disinformation, human trafficking, sexual exploitation, and fake news in Africa as videos, text, and audio are published in vernacular languages.

The lack of high-quality translation tools for hundreds of languages in Africa means millions of people today can't access digital content or participate fully in online conversations or digital marketplaces in their preferred native languages.

"Africa is a continent with very high linguistic diversity, and language barriers exist day to day. In the future, imagine visiting your favorite Facebook group, coming across a post in Igbo or Luganda, and being able to understand it in your own language with just a click of a button," Balkissa Ide Siddo, public policy director for Africa at Meta.

In May this year, Google added 10 new African languages to its Google Translate tool, even as Africans keep on Wikipedia's language problem.

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Meta's AI will translate 55 of Africa's marginalized languages

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The plan is expected to look into 55 of Africa's marginalized languages and improve how AI machines translate them on Facebook, Instagram and Wikipedia

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October 13 is International Plain Language Day.

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What does it mean to have 'crispy R's'? - NewsBreak

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Many TikTokers have suddenly found out that their speech pattern is different from others because they have "crispy R's.". People who speak with crispy R's emphasize...

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As a girl in Austria, Evy Mages was confined to a mysterious institution in Innsbruck. Decades later, she learned why.

I-The Pale-Yellow House

One night in March, 2021, Evy Mages, a photojournalist in Washington, D.C., opened her laptop and, with trembling fingers, typed into Google the address of a villa in Innsbruck, Austria. For decades, Evy, who was fifty-five, had been haunted by memories of the house, where she had been confined for several months, starting when she was eight. She could still picture its pale-yellow exterior and the curved staircase and dark-wood panelling inside, but she'd kept what happened there a secret-even from a therapist whom she'd credited with saving her life. Evy's memories of the place had become dreamlike, simultaneously vivid and vaporous.

She remembered being wrested from bed in the middle of the night at the home of her foster family, in the Alpine valley of Kleinwalsertal. She was hustled into a stranger's car and driven through the mountains to Innsbruck. Nobody told her what kind of place the villa was, or how long she'd stay. Perhaps two dozen children were living there. Adults in white lab coats regularly administered shots and pills, and when it was time to eat the children were required to use weirdly abbreviated language: "bitte, Löffel" ("please, spoon"); "bitte, Gabel" ("please, fork"). In the morning, Evy attended school in the villa. At night, she had to sleep with a blanket pulled tight under her armpits, her arms ramrod straight by her sides, to insure that her hands couldn't wander. She was terrified of wetting the bed, because whenever she did the white coats would awaken her, even from deep sleep, and march her to the bathroom for an ice-cold shower; she would then have to stand in a corner for the rest of the night. She'd be shivering and it would be dark, except for the murky green light from a fish tank, which she was forbidden to look at.

Children at the villa were issued thick, bloomer-like underpants. Shrill alarm bells rang day and night. Orders blared from loudspeakers that hung over doorways; to Evy, the voices seemed to belong to all-seeing powers. Sometimes she was summoned to recount her dreams to an adult. This unnerved her: she could tell that there was considerable peril in the exercise, though she didn't understand why. She felt clever when she told her interrogator that she couldn't recall any dreams, but the result was punishment: she had to sit alone in a room until she came up with something. Once, she was shown a set of farm animals and told to assign to each one the identity of a person in her foster family. Evy agonized-surely it was the wrong choice to make her foster mother the pig.

One day, she and some other children were told to line up in front of a closet to receive a treat. When the person in charge dropped dates into Evy's skirt, which she had dutifully held out, she saw that ants were crawling on the fruit. Evy shook her skirt frantically, jumping up and down. White-coated adults carried her to the bathroom, where they held her down on the tile floor and administered a shot.

The pervasive sense of shame and surveillance had created a blurring effect. Evy could recall almost nothing about the children who had slept alongside her, in one big room, perhaps because talking to one another was largely banned. A yellow dot had marked her bed and the location of her toothbrush, and the color had perturbed her ever since. As an adult, she reminded herself that yellow was a happy shade, and tried to overcome her aversion by bringing home sunflowers.

When Evy was twenty, she moved to the United States. She settled first in New York City, where she eventually got a job at the Daily News; in 1998, she married a reporter she'd met there, Paul Schwartzman. They relocated to D.C. and had three children, Sammy, Stella, and Lily. She and Schwartzman later divorced, but over the years Evy amassed a tight circle of friends in D.C. and built a close relationship with each of her kids. In middle age, she felt more grounded than she had ever been. It was time to turn the key she'd been carrying around for decades-she'd never forgotten that the villa was on Sonnenstrasse-and enter those rooms again.

Nothing about Evy's childhood had been easy, so in some ways it puzzled her that the months on Sonnenstrasse loomed so large in her mind. She was born in 1965 in an Austrian town called Feldkirch, to a twenty-two-year-old single mother who was staying in a Catholic home for women. She relinquished Evy to foster care. A family took in Evy when she was three, with an eye to adoption, but the mother, Anni, seemed to quickly turn on her. Anni ran a bed-and-breakfast in the family's home, a stucco chalet with carved wooden balconies, tucked into a steep mountainside. Her husband, Erich, was a postman, making deliveries on skis in the winter and often retreating to a hut that he'd built, farther up the mountain. Managing the B. and B. put a strain on Anni, who once described herself to a doctor as "nervous." She soon became convinced that any bit of wear and tear-a scratch on a wall, a chip on a plate, a spot of missing paint on a crucifix-was an act of malice by Evy. As Evy remembers it, Anni would point out the damage, and if Evy didn't take responsibility for it Anni would hit her until she did. As punishment, Anni would send Evy to the cellar or lock the door to the bathroom so that she couldn't use it. Anni told Evy that her mother had been a whore.

If Evy didn't like the treatment she was getting, Anni warned, she could always go to a "worse place." Although Evy was afraid of Anni, she yearned for her love, and dreaded being sent away. Anni and her husband had a biological daughter, who was a year older than Evy. This girl was well behaved and shy; Evy was tomboyish, exuberant, and a little clumsy-the kind of kid who always had a banged-up shin or a skinned knee. At school, a priest sometimes scolded her, mournfully, for giving her delicate foster mother such a hard time. When Evy was sent to the villa, it confirmed her worst fear: nobody wanted her.

After a number of months in Innsbruck, Evy was abruptly sent back to Kleinwalsertal. But Anni soon became impatient with her again, and shipped her off to an orphanage in Kempten, Germany, run by nuns. There, Evy forged bonds with her fellow-orphans, who walked to school together in donated clothes and weren't allowed to participate in after-school activities. (The nuns told Evy that people like her were "gutter trash.") As a teen-ager, she began looking after the younger orphans-teaching them to tie their shoes, combing lice from their hair-and this came to feel like a sweet responsibility. Growing up, Evy told me, she'd trusted that God would eventually punish the cruel adults in her life. Then, one day, she saw a priest chase away a poor, mentally ill woman who was trying to give him some flowers-and she began to lose her faith.

As an adult, Evy couldn't bring herself to tell her kids about Sonnenstrasse, but she did talk about the orphanage. When her affectionate and empathetic youngest child, Lily, became a teen-ager, she was fascinated to hear about her mother's life at that age. The nuns, Evy recalled, sometimes yanked her hair or slapped her. Once, she'd been hit after using a pen as eyeliner-makeup was forbidden.

Evy aged out of the orphanage at sixteen. She attempted a second return to Kleinwalsertal, where she began studying hotel management at a nearby school, but Anni still couldn't abide her. Evy was on her own. For a while, she worked at another local guesthouse, whose owner let her stay in a room upstairs, then moved to Vienna, where she felt lonely and unmoored. One day during that period, she drove to Innsbruck with an older friend, Jimi, a free spirit who'd run a bar in Kleinwalsertal and had watched out for her there. During the road trip, they sang along to a cassette of "The Threepenny Opera." When they arrived at Sonnenstrasse, they knocked on the villa's arched front door. A panel slid open, and a face appeared. Evy tried to ask about her stay there. The panel closed, with a clang.

When Evy scrolled through her search results for the Sonnenstrasse villa, which were in German, she noticed an unusual word: Kinderbeobachtungsstation, or "child-observation station." She'd always assumed that the villa had been some sort of psychiatric facility. It had seemed like "a transfer hub," as she recently put it-a place where children were monitored, classified, and then sent to other institutions. From the search results, Evy learned the name of the woman who'd headed the place: Dr. Maria Nowak-Vogl, a psychologist at the University of Innsbruck. Typing Nowak-Vogl's name into Google, she learned that the villa had indeed been a psychiatric facility, of a very peculiar kind. In 2013, an expert commission under the aegis of the Medical University of Innsbruck had issued a damning report about the facility, saying that Nowak-Vogl had perpetrated systematic abuse under the guise of dealing with "difficult" children. The report came three years after a muckraking Austrian historian named Horst Schreiber published a book that reported on Nowak-Vogl, " In Namen der Ordnung " ("In the Name of Order"). Schreiber had interviewed dozens of Nowak-Vogl's victims and had publicly demanded that the Austrian government offer them apologies and financial compensation. The government, Evy learned, was now doing so.

A news article about the commission's findings described the villa as a combination of "home, prison, and testing clinic." The commission had reviewed medical records and reported something shocking: children had been injected with epiphysan, an extract derived from the pineal glands of cattle which veterinarians used to suppress estrus in mares and cows. Nowak-Vogl, a conservative Catholic, had wanted to see if epiphysan would suppress sexual feelings in children, as well as discourage masturbation, thus rendering her charges more "manageable." Masturbation-among both adolescents and young children, who use it to self-soothe-was a preoccupation of Nowak-Vogl's. So was bed-wetting. Her staff was instructed to keep charts documenting urination and bowel movements, and to check children's underwear "with the eyes or the nose." Schreiber described her as being "on a crusade against masturbation and sexual excitedness."

The villa's staff, Evy learned, hadn't focussed on treating individual children. As Michaela Ralser, a University of Innsbruck professor who worked on the commission's report, wrote, Nowak-Vogl's goal was "protecting society from psychologically conspicuous children and adolescents." Ralser described the villa as "a closed system . . . characterized by the authoritarian leadership style of its unrestricted leader." As Evy later discovered, there was a pronounced Nazi lineage to the practices of child psychiatry in Austria that shaped Nowak-Vogl's approach. The story of the Innsbruck child-observation station, and other places like it, was entwined with the history of postwar Austria and its deeply flawed de-Nazification.

Nowak-Vogl had started housing children on Sonnenstrasse in 1954, under the sponsorship of the Tyrolean government, and had overseen the operation until 1987. At least thirty-six hundred children, most of them between the ages of seven and fifteen, had been confined for up to several months at a time. Nowak-Vogl, who had close ties to Austria's child-welfare system, determined each child's next placement. Some kids went to orphanages; others, to reformatories, where they often had to work in laundries or otherwise provide free labor. Nowak-Vogl also sent children to work with farming families. Occasionally, a kid got to go home.

Evy felt a rush of validation. All of us have childhood memories that sporadically pop into our minds, like slides in a randomly organized carrousel, and it can be hard to make sense of these fragments. But most of us can check our recollections against those of parents, siblings, cousins, childhood friends. Evy hadn't been able to speak with anyone about the villa. Now, as she scrolled through articles and reports about it, she confirmed, and clarified, many bewildering aspects of her experience. Staff members, she learned, had been alerted to bed-wetting by alarm-bell sensors lodged in children's mattresses-and sometimes in their bulky underwear. Evy had correctly recalled the consequence: a freezing shower. The commission report noted that the silence pervading the villa had been easy to maintain in part because the children had frequently been given psychotropic drugs and tranquillizers, often in response to "disciplinary difficulties." Medical records showed that they had also been dosed with potent sedatives, including Rohypnol. Only a small percentage of the children were given epiphysan. Evy wondered if she'd been one of them.

The commission report also mentioned "bans on speaking" and a "criminalization of feelings" when residents tried to socialize. Schreiber, who contributed to the report, wrote, "Friendships and expressions of affection for other children and young people were frowned upon and prevented, often interpreted as sexualized behavior."

The report included a document that listed Nowak-Vogl's house rules from 1979 and 1980. Twelve pages long and printed in a tiny font, it is perverse in its despotic specificity. Personal belongings, including books and dolls, were taken away upon arrival. Children had to clean their plates scrupulously: "Only bones, cartilage, and bay leaves may be placed to the side." Unfinished food was to be presented at the next meal, and the next, until it was eaten. "Romping, whistling, screaming, and singing" were forbidden. "There is absolute silence when the soup is served," the document noted. "Even marginal remarks or seemingly justified questions are not allowed to pass." Staff members were instructed "to make mealtimes as short as possible and not to sit down with the children out of inertia." The monitoring of toilet habits was described in exhaustive detail, and there was even a rule about how toothpaste should be "sparingly pushed between the bristles" of a child's brush.

The more that Evy read, the angrier she became. Nearly four thousand children? Until 1987? Eight or so similar facilities had operated in Austria after the Second World War. How many thousands of children had spent time in repressive psychiatric institutions like hers? At all the facilities, confused children were brusquely evaluated for "misbehavior." But only the Sonnenstrasse villa was so consumed with stamping out sexuality.

In September, 2021, Evy approached me to see if I'd look further into her story. We had been friendly acquaintances for years. Our kids had attended the same elementary school, in Northwest D.C., and I'd occasionally run into her in the neighborhood, or at a demonstration that we were both covering. Evy was high-spirited, flaxen-haired, and casually glamorous, with a wide, dazzling smile. Her accent, full of trilled "r"s and "v"-like "w"s, reminded me of the Velvet Underground's Nico. In a D.C. milieu crowded with former student-council presidents, she stood out. Sometimes I'd see her in the middle of the day leaning into deep conversation with a friend at the local Starbucks; it was as if she'd transformed the place into a Viennese coffeehouse, the way dropping a colorful scarf over a motel-room lamp can make the drab space look dramatic.

Though we hadn't had many one-on-one conversations, I'd been struck by Evy's emotional directness and impetuous generosity. "The outside matches the inside with Evy" is how her friend Keltie Hawkins, a therapist, put it. I'd noticed, too, that Evy genuinely liked and fiercely defended kids. More than almost any parent I knew, she was comfortable around defiant teen-agers. When my daughter was in middle school, with purple-streaked hair and an emotional intensity that discomfited some adults, Evy made a point of telling me how great she was. I learned later that Evy would take in her kids' friends, and friends of her kids' friends, when they had conflicts with their own families. Hawkins called Evy's house "the wayward station." She recalled seeing Evy cross a playground to tell a man who'd hit his daughter, "How dare you-that's your child, not your property." And Evy had once confronted some cops who'd caught friends of her teen-age children shoplifting at a local store. "I've known these kids since they were this tall," she told the officers. "They're good kids." The teens got off with a warning. Evy liked to describe herself as "deeply anti-authoritarian," and the more she told me about her past the more sense that made.

A few days after Evy learned about Nowak-Vogl, she e-mailed one of the commission's lead researchers, Elisabeth Dietrich-Daum, a professor at the University of Innsbruck. "Never did I imagine there would be a reckoning," Evy wrote, adding that she was "overwhelmed with gratitude to you and your team for . . . bringing these atrocities to light." In another e-mail, she wrote, "I am immensely grateful that I somehow had the strength to create a life after growing up in Austria as a freak, a reject, and a test object." Dietrich-Daum replied to Evy, noting that she could apply for financial compensation from the State of Tyrol's office for Opferschutz, or victim protection. She could also obtain her medical records.

By the time Evy told me about the Kinderbeobachtungsstation, she'd reached out to other scholars and had submitted testimony to the commission. She was moved when she received a letter of apology from Gabriele Fischer, a Tyrolean official in charge of youth welfare. Fischer said that Evy was entitled to an immediate payout of fifteen hundred euros; upon turning sixty, she could receive a pension of three hundred euros a month. "What happened to you should never have happened," Fischer wrote. "I can only promise to learn from your story."

Evy requested a copy of her medical file from the villa. Her stay had lasted from December 27, 1973, to April 17, 1974. (Her foster parents must have thought they'd been kind to wait until after Christmas to ship her off.) The file was chilling, Evy told me, and she'd only begun delving into it. It included a small photograph of her at eight, smiling brightly under ragged blond bangs. One reason she'd been reluctant to revisit her mistreatment at the villa, she explained, was that "having been in a mental institution just comes with a stigma, no matter how unjust it is." But learning that so many other kids had been abused there had "totally blown the lid off," and she now wanted to "know everything." Who was Maria Nowak-Vogl, and how had she exercised unchecked tyranny for so long? What ideas and training had shaped her views of children's minds and bodies? How had Evy ended up under her power? Had Evy been given epiphysan-and, if so, were there long-term effects? How many victims knew about the restitution program?

We agreed to travel to Austria together. There were people-officials, researchers-whom Evy wanted to meet in person. She was also considering going to the villa. The trip wouldn't be easy: Evy hadn't been back to Austria for more than twenty-five years and had not planned to return. The country felt claustrophobic to her-a cold basement crammed with detritus from her past. Although Evy remained fluent in German, she'd pointedly avoided speaking it for decades. In America, she told me, she'd built a new life, which "did not translate into the life or language of my mother tongue." She'd undergone therapy in English; she'd raised her children in English, picking up phrases of comfort and nurture that her American friends used. Evy was a natural as a mother, but, given the deprivations of her childhood, she had to learn the lingo. (When she heard a friend in D.C. say, "Aw, kiss the boo-boo" after her toddler scraped his knee, Evy added that to her repertoire.) Eschewing her native tongue wasn't a therapeutic method that anyone had recommended, but she'd found it a balm. I understand some German, but we agreed that, whenever possible in Austria, we'd conduct our inquiries in English. In April, 2022, we met up in Innsbruck, for the first of two trips that we'd make together.

Innsbruck is a pretty university town whose backdrop of snow-cloaked peaks can make a visitor feel dizzy. Many buildings are painted in sugary Habsburg pastels; the Inn River, a tributary of the Danube, rushes through the city center, where students crowd cafés and beer gardens. For Evy-whose every minute in Innsbruck was a Foucauldian nightmare-none of this felt familiar. Neither did the people we were meeting there. They seemed like representatives of a new Austria, unafraid to reckon with the darkest periods in their country's past.

Ina Friedmann, whom we saw on our first morning, had become one of Evy's heroes. A historian of medicine at the University of Innsbruck, Friedmann had worked on " Psychiatrisierte Kindheiten" ("Psychiatrized Childhoods"), a 2020 book of essays about Nowak-Vogl's child-observation station. Evy was delighted to discover that Friedmann, who is thirty-eight, looked like an avatar of alternative Austria: her hair was indigo, she wore a metal-studded jacket, and she carried a tote bag emblazoned with the English phrase " only anarchists are pretty." Friedmann's academic writing was careful and restrained, but in person she was warm and expressive. She and Evy hugged for a long time, like old friends.

We sat down for coffee in the courtyard of a café-it was chilly, but Friedmann could smoke cigarettes there-and discussed what Evy had learned about epiphysan. Her chart hadn't mentioned the drug, but, given all the shots she remembered, she suspected that she'd received it. Her chart noted that she'd been caught in class with "her finger up her nose or her pen in her mouth, and her hand down her pants while she masturbated." (I told Evy that I had to applaud her ability to multitask self-comfort in such an environment.) Moreover, Evy was a bed-wetter and a child born out of wedlock-categories that Nowak-Vogl associated with deviance. Friedmann said it was certainly possible that Evy had received epiphysan. Nowak-Vogl had been administering the extract since at least the early fifties; in a 1957 paper on "hypersexuality," she'd written about giving epiphysan to an unspecified number of children. Epiphysan had been tested on humans once before: in the nineteen-thirties, male prisoners in Vienna were given the drug, which appeared to temporarily curb the impulse to masturbate. But Nowak-Vogl was the first to administer it to children. She said that it suppressed "physical and mental restlessness." In 2015, Friedmann had reviewed some fourteen hundred medical records, identifying nearly thirty cases in which Nowak-Vogl had documented giving minors epiphysan-more girls than boys, and most of them between the ages of seven and eleven. But records of the medication were erratic, and there was evidence suggesting that Nowak-Vogl had ordered its use in less controlled settings, including private homes.

Nowak-Vogl claimed that epiphysan was to be given only to children who were overcome by "instinctuality," not to those who masturbated because of "neglect" or "neuroticism." It wasn't clear how children were sorted into these idiosyncratic categories. Patients-who were told little, if anything, about epiphysan-often regarded the shots as a punishment. At least one child understood that the extract was meant to suppress sexual urges, and refused it: In a report to a local youth-welfare office from the early sixties, Nowak-Vogl described, with frustration, a girl who had "countered the onanism treatment with a determined and conscious resistance." The girl had insisted that she wouldn't stop touching herself, because it "made her happy and otherwise she had it bad." Nowak-Vogl lamented, "The known effect of epiphysan is by no means so strong that it could compensate for such an attitude."

Nowak-Vogl, Friedmann told us, was willing to prescribe epiphysan even though almost nothing was known about its side effects. From what I'd read, Nowak-Vogl saw the drug as especially valuable for addressing social problems caused by female sexuality, including abortion and children born out of wedlock. Ideologically, her preoccupations placed her in the mainstream of postwar cultural attitudes in Austria, especially among traditional Catholics. Bodily shame has plagued many a childhood, but if the literature of Austria is any indication, that country was particularly thick with it in the twentieth century. The writer Thomas Bernhard, in his 1985 memoir, " Gathering Evidence," describes being humiliated when his mother hung his urine-stained sheets out a window overlooking the street, "to deter other children, and show them all what you are! " The work of the Nobel Prize winner Elfriede Jelinek plumbs the psychosexual depths of Austrian child rearing; in her 1983 novel, " The Piano Teacher," the fiercely repressed protagonist, who is in her thirties, still sleeps in bed with her mother.

But, even in this context, the measures that Nowak-Vogl took were extreme. To justify the use of epiphysan, she relied on a panopticon-like system of surveillance that made it virtually certain every child would be caught touching herself. The squeak of a bedspring triggered reprimands over the loudspeakers, with the "culprit" made to stand in the hall for the rest of the night. (Nowak-Vogl was vexed that self-stimulation was hard to police in private homes, writing, "With little possibility of supervision, and possibly with the special skill of the pupil, there is a risk of overlooking this condition.") Nowak-Vogl's quest for an antidote to onanism was too haphazard to qualify as research, and she seems to have determined almost nothing concrete about epiphysan's effects or complications. It would have been reasonable to wonder if the extract might damage a human's pineal gland or interfere with puberty. Nowak-Vogl appears to have adopted an anecdotal, after-the-fact approach to information-gathering. Friedmann told us that, as late as 1980, Nowak-Vogl was asking former patients and their doctors if they'd noticed any health effects from the epiphysan that she'd administered years earlier.

Whatever risks the shots entailed were worth it, Nowak-Vogl wrote in her paper on hypersexuality. Without epiphysan, the only options for a girl who couldn't stop masturbating were "accommodation on one of those very lonely, sometimes childless mountain farms, where all residents could be informed and reassured about the girl's condition," or placement in a sanatorium, which entailed "renunciation of further schooling." As a chapter in "Psychiatrized Childhoods" notes, Nowak-Vogl acknowledged having performed an experiment on humans, but she clearly thought that she was improving society by eliminating undesirable behavior in children. Kids who didn't explore their own bodies, or wet the bed, or talk or laugh or cry or run around too much, would grow up to become socially compliant workers. In a country whose economy had been shattered by the Second World War, her approach, however brutal, had its utility for the authorities.

To this day, there has been no systematic research into the long-term effects of epiphysan, but the expert commission reported that the extract has a short half-life, and is therefore unlikely to cause health issues in later adulthood. "Transmission of viruses" from bovine material can't be ruled out, though nothing of the kind has been reported. In any case, Nowak-Vogl's actions were certainly unethical, for she proceeded without the informed consent of either the children or their parents. Evy told me she was relieved that she hadn't known of the epiphysan experiment until recently; it might have led her to avoid getting pregnant, for fear of complications or birth defects.

I asked Friedmann how influential Nowak-Vogl had been beyond the hermetic world of the child-observation station. It turned out that she had published and lectured widely, and had written popular advice manuals about child rearing. The Catholic Church awarded her a papal medal for her service in ecclesiastic marriage courts, which can grant annulments. "She really was respected," Friedmann told us. "She was a full professor at the university." Because Nowak-Vogl was also a consultant to the youth-welfare office, she could enter state-run orphanages and "recruit patients from there." For nearly forty years, Nowak-Vogl's beds were consistently full.

II-Curative Pedagogy

Nowak-Vogl was born, as Maria Vogl, in 1922 in Kitzbühel, a medieval town near Innsbruck which is popular with skiers. Her father, Alfred, was a juvenile-court judge. When the Nazis occupied northern Italy, from 1943 to 1945, Alfred presided over a Sondergericht, or special court, in Bolzano. Nowak-Vogl never wrote about her childhood, but, given her father's role in the regime, she was likely steeped in Nazi conceptions of aberrance. Gerald Steinacher, a historian of Austria at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, told me that the Sondergerichte existed to intimidate the populace and stamp out resistance, whether it be "a negative comment about the local Nazi leader or listening to Radio London." Such courts, Steinacher said, "made a mockery of justice," briskly issuing harsh sentences, including death.

During the war, Nowak-Vogl attended a Nazi-run teacher-training school. She studied medicine at the University of Innsbruck, and went on to receive a doctorate in educational philosophy there, in 1952. Six years later, she obtained a Habilitation-the highest academic qualification in many European countries-in the field of Heilpädagogik, or curative pedagogy. Throughout the German-speaking world in the early twentieth century, Heilpädagogik was an influential approach to treating "difficult" children. The goal of the field, which relied on close collaboration among medical experts, the courts, the state, the police, and the youth-welfare system, was less to help individual children feel understood than to turn them into productive, rule-abiding, sexually regulated members of society. Heilpädagogik had stressed biology from the beginning-inherited traits and inborn constitutions were seen as important reasons that children became resistant-but the Austrian school of curative pedagogy, which developed in the thirties, placed a particular emphasis on the hereditary component.

The celebrated physician Hans Asperger, known for his pioneering research on autism, became curative pedagogy's leading exponent in Austria. Evy and I visited Herwig Czech, a medical historian in Vienna who, in 2018, revealed Asperger's complicity in the Nazi regime's eugenics policies. Heilpädagogik experts in Austria, Czech told us, had been eager to demonstrate the field's compatibility with National Socialism, and also with the "strong authoritarian current" of Austrian Catholicism. Asperger had referred the most troublesome and mentally handicapped children to a Viennese institution, Am Spiegelgrund, where patients deemed "incurable" were killed.

Nowak-Vogl's villa, Czech said, embodied the tenets of the Austrian school of curative pedagogy, with its relentless inculcation of "good" habits in children burdened by supposedly hereditary predispositions to alcoholism or crime, and with its unflinching willingness to remove kids from environments deemed undesirable. (Writing last year in Profil, an Austrian news magazine, the journalist Christa Zöchling decried "the disastrous history of curative pedagogy in Austria," with its "dehumanization of children as 'hereditary failures' because they wet the bed or were left-handed, stuttered, or had learning difficulties or nervous conditions.")

Nowak-Vogl shared with Heilpädagogik an unforgiving mentality toward sexuality-including toward children who had been sexually abused. According to Czech, the leading figures of curative pedagogy in Austria "turned against the victims somehow, by assuming that there was a kind of biological predisposition to being abused." The idea was that a defective "personality trait led girls-mostly girls-to be practically seducing their abusers." In 1952, Asperger wrote that young female victims of sexual violence often possessed "an endogenous willingness to experience" such assaults; some were " 'passive lure types' who, above all, lack the natural protective mechanism of shame." For such girls, he recommended a "long-term change of milieu, preferably placement in a good institution."

In 1967, Maria Vogl married a psychiatrist in Innsbruck, Johannes Heinz Nowak, and hyphenated her name. They had no children. The couple apparently shared an interest in the rather grim wooden religious sculptures of a local folk artist. In the only video I've seen of Nowak-Vogl, from "Problemkinder," a 1980 Austrian TV documentary about the abuse of children in institutions, she wears a starched white medical uniform and has her hair in a low bun. Leaning back in her chair and speaking in an emphatic tone, she defends her insistence on silence at the table: "There are quite a few children who, at home, aren't allowed to talk with their parents at the table. There it is said, 'Eat your meal first, then talk.' So I think we are within the customary framework of the country."

In Vienna, Evy and I met with Ernst Berger, a prominent Austrian child psychiatrist in his late seventies. He told us that, between 1975 and 1985, he'd often see Nowak-Vogl at psychiatry conferences. He described her as a "conservative woman, with her coiffure held back like this"-he mimed a bun. "She was very serious. And in dinner situations it was not very nice to talk with her." Once, he said, after he'd finished a conference presentation of a paper criticizing the youth-welfare system, Nowak-Vogl had approached him in anger. "I didn't know your work was so bad," she said. Berger, laughing nervously at the memory, told us, "I was so frightened!" He had been aware that Nowak-Vogl ran a child-observation station in Innsbruck, but he'd never visited it. He didn't know anyone who had.

Several months later, Evy and I tracked down someone who knew Nowak-Vogl's child-observation station from the inside. In the winter of 1968, when Sylvia Wallinger was a nineteen-year-old psychology student at the University of Innsbruck, she began working at Nowak-Vogl's institution. She had learned that it was headed by a distinguished academic who lectured on a subject that interested her: measuring concentration and memory in children. Wallinger stayed for about a year. She was looking for a thesis topic and had been told that she could conduct research under Nowak-Vogl's auspices. Moreover, the child-observation station was around the corner from the house where Wallinger lived with her family.

When Evy and I contacted Wallinger, who is now a psychoanalyst, she was in the Canary Islands, where she lives part time, but she agreed to speak to us on Zoom. She wore pink lipstick and dangly earrings; shoulder-length silver hair framed her face. Though Wallinger is a practicing Buddhist, she didn't seem particularly detached. She was clearly troubled by her memories of the child-observation station and expressed worry about upsetting Evy. Her empathy made Evy cry-the only time I ever saw her do so in an interview.

"The ice-cold showers-it was absolutely terrible," Wallinger said. "When I did it myself, I used warm water. I was reported, and Nowak-Vogl threatened me, 'Do what you're told or just get lost.' "

The stories of two girls in particular had stayed with Wallinger: "The smallest had two thumbs cut-the tops were cut off. She was maybe five. Her father was a gynecologist who'd caught her masturbating, and he'd amputated one thumb and then the other." The second girl, about eight, had accused her father of sexual abuse. "Because no father would think of doing something like this, it was she who was a compulsive liar," Wallinger said, bitterly. "And, because she was a compulsive liar accusing her father, she was brought to Nowak-Vogl's institution."

Sometimes, when Wallinger worked at night, she'd hear girls crying in the communal bedroom, and she'd slip in and discreetly comfort them. But she typically took the morning shift, arriving at work in her white uniform just before the wake-up routine. "If a bed was dirty or wet," Wallinger recalled, other children had to "stand around and make fun" of the miscreant. In the early twentieth century, a punitive approach to bed-wetting was common, including in America. Most experts gave little credence to the many developmental, physical, and emotional issues that cause a substantial minority of children to wet their beds past the toddler stage. Instead, children were sometimes thought to do it intentionally, out of laziness or defiance. Inventions such as the bed-wetting alarm could exacerbate the problem, waking up an entire household and shaming the unfortunate child. By the time that Nowak-Vogl was practicing her humiliating techniques, however, stigmatizing treatments were being discredited. She was a holdout.

When Wallinger worked at the child-observation station, Nowak-Vogl's sister, Elisabeth, oversaw the kids' schooling. Another figure in charge was a man called Höllebauer-Wallinger couldn't remember his first name. She described him as "a brute" who enjoyed beating girls: "He was a physical sadist, and Nowak-Vogl a psychological one." (During those years, a man named Robert Höllebauer, who had earned a Ph.D. in psychology in 1949, with a thesis building on Nazi racial theory, served as Nowak-Vogl's deputy.)

Nowak-Vogl sometimes hit the children, too. "I saw it at least once," Wallinger recalled. "A girl. She hit her around the face, and she fell." But what troubled Wallinger most was Nowak-Vogl's coldness: "She hated the children. She hated children. That's why she did it. In a certain way, she wanted to destroy childhood in the children. She wanted to make them robots."

When Evy told Wallinger about being forced to recount her dreams, Wallinger scoffed and said, of Nowak-Vogl, "Of course, that was not because she had any idea about psychoanalysis!" What had motivated her was "the inquisition-the intruding."

Wallinger told friends about the horrible treatment of children at Sonnenstrasse. And then she confronted Nowak-Vogl, even though she knew that it would mean the end of her thesis and, possibly, of her academic career: "When I told her, 'You cannot beat the children,' she asked me, 'Have you ever been at the B.D.M.?' That was the Bund Deutscher Mädel-the Nazi organization for girls. They wore the brown jackets and the swastika."

Wallinger protested: "Come on-I was born in 1948!"

"Oh, yes," Nowak-Vogl said. "But if you had been in the B.D.M. you would understand what I am doing."

A day or two later, Wallinger quit.

Throughout history, sadistic personalities have found cover-and even power and prestige-by directing their viciousness toward the furthering of a society's goals. A psychiatric theory that sanctions ruthlessly authoritarian child rearing with the aim of producing biddable workers can license, and even glorify, the person who implements it. Nowak-Vogl exercised cruel dominion over children, but she always did so within the framework of academic expertise.

It was convenient for Nowak-Vogl that her commitment to repressiveness, sexual and otherwise, dovetailed with many of Austria's anxieties after the Second World War. Authorities feared that war casualties had created a "surplus" of single women-a problem that seemed likely to worsen, given that divorce rates were climbing. Equally alarming was the thought that more women were having sex outside marriage. Politicians and journalists publicly fretted about venereal disease, particularly among women who had betrayed the fatherland by sleeping with Allied soldiers.

Austrians also worried that the deprivations of the war and its aftermath had fostered misbehavior in children. In an essay in "Psychiatrized Childhoods," the political scientist Alexandra Weiss writes, "Absent fathers, difficulties of everyday survival, poverty, unemployment and bombed-out houses stood in the way of a carefree childhood and youth. . . . Parents were busy organizing everyday survival, children had to contribute to it and sometimes participated in semi-legal activities, such as the black-market trade."

In the fifties and sixties, as Austria focussed on rebounding economically, the government of Tyrol placed more children in state institutions than during any period before or since-sometimes simply because a kid had a working-class single mother. In an e-mail to Evy and me, Horst Schreiber, the historian, described Nowak-Vogl as the kind of "inwardly frozen" figure who seemed to answer "a great social need" in postwar Austria: she was a credentialled expert implacably devoted to identifying the "rotten apples" of the lower classes and turning them into "proper bourgeois subjects, mothers and housewives, well-behaved family breadwinners who live the Catholic sexual morality, go to work, are not deviant, respect the authorities, love the homeland, and respect property."

Even when Nowak-Vogl wrote about the importance of sleep for children, she managed to sound fascistic. In a 1964 essay published in English, she warned that children who tried to delay bedtime with mischief, or even thought of doing so, were guilty of "socially undesirable" behavior. By the seventies, Nowak-Vogl was also presenting her hypervigilant approach as an antidote to student-protest movements. In a contribution to a 1972 essay collection in which medical thinkers pondered the irksome question of why so many young people wanted to "revolt against society," Nowak-Vogl suggested that a major answer was Vehrwahrlosung-neglect. In the framework of Heilpädagogik, the word implied more than social deprivation: it implied that a person had a moral or personality defect that made her vulnerable-for example, to sexual recklessness and sexual abuse. As Michaela Ralser, the University of Innsbruck professor, put it to me, this pseudo-diagnosis "transformed the child in difficulty into a 'difficult child.' " A "neglected" youth, Nowak-Vogl wrote, was inclined "to oppose any trace of the old order, because it fails to completely indulge his overwhelming physical urges." She warned that it was insufficient to discipline only youths who actively rebelled; more passive types could also become dangerous, unless "educational or therapeutic measures" were employed to thwart their opposition toward society.

Nowak-Vogl never expressed interest in one of the biggest sources of anger among young Austrians: cultural amnesia about the country's Nazi past. In Germany, a reckoning with Nazism was hard to shirk, but many Austrians evaded responsibility by portraying their country as an Opfernation -victim nation-rather than as an enthusiastic participant in Nazi annexation. In fact, the Nazi movement had taken firm root in Austria: when Hitler's troops marched across the border, in March, 1938, crowds welcomed them with flowers.

Immediately after the war, some Nazi war criminals did face justice in Austria-so-called people's courts initiated tens of thousands of prosecutions and executed thirty perpetrators. Austrians who'd joined the Nazi Party-about ten per cent of the population-temporarily lost voting rights and, in some cases, jobs or property. But by the mid-fifties the people's courts had been dissolved, and the Austrian government had abandoned de-Nazification programs. There was no substantive restitution for Austrian victims of Nazi atrocities, and the U.S., which was more concerned about Communism than about resurgent Fascism, stopped pressuring the country to ferret out war criminals.

The Opfernation mythology endured until 1986, when Kurt Waldheim, a former Secretary-General of the United Nations, ran for President of Austria. Journalists and historians uncovered evidence that, as a lieutenant in the Wehrmacht, he'd been attached to units that had sent thousands of Greek Jews to death camps and had executed Yugoslav partisans and civilians. Waldheim was elected despite these revelations, but the excuses that he'd offered-that he'd only been doing his duty, that he hadn't understood the scale of the atrocities-repulsed many young Austrians in particular. In the mid-nineties, the government finally began compensating victims of Nazi war crimes.

By then, though, former Nazis had held positions of power for decades. Among them were doctors and psychiatrists who had run Am Spiegelgrund, the Viennese institution where Hans Asperger had consigned children and adolescents with disabilities. At Am Spiegelgrund, more than seven hundred children who suffered from psychiatric, behavioral, or physical conditions that the Nazis considered "incurable" were killed. The American historian Edith Sheffer, in her 2018 book, " Asperger's Children: The Origins of Autism in Nazi Vienna," wrote, "In Nazi psychiatry, a child needed to demonstrate conformity, 'educability' and 'ability to work.' " She noted that "family and class factors played a role" in a child's survival: "Chances of death were greater if the child was born out of wedlock, had an absent father, or a mother suspected of being unable to cope, with other children at home."

Under the Reich's T-4 program, the killing of institutionalized adults with disabilities had happened in gas chambers-the first instance of their use. But the "euthanasia" of children was accomplished slowly, by the very doctors and nurses caring for them. Children, Sheffer wrote, were "starved or given overdoses of barbiturates until they grew ill and died, usually of pneumonia."

In 1946, a people's court sentenced to death Ernst Illing, the head of Am Spiegelgrund, after he confessed to direct involvement in the killings of some two hundred children. His deputy, Marianne Türk, spent six years in prison. But these were exceptions. Hans Bertha, a key medical adviser to the T-4 program, was never called to account, and he became the dean of the medical faculty at the University of Graz. Hans Krenek, the "pedagogical director" of Am Spiegelgrund, later directed Vienna's youth-welfare department.

If anything, Nazi psychiatrists, including those who sanctioned the murder of children, found themselves in a privileged position after the war. Many Jewish practitioners, including Sigmund Freud, had fled Austria in the thirties, and few of them returned; this exodus had opened up professional opportunities for Nazi scientists, many of whom, in addition to their ethical failings, were mediocrities in their fields. "Psychiatry, neurology, and pediatrics all had a high proportion of Jewish academics and practicing doctors," Herwig Czech told me. "They left a huge gap."

One survivor of Am Spiegelgrund remembered a physician named Heinrich Gross doing morning rounds in his Nazi uniform, handing out "sweets to some of the children, mainly the bed-wetters or the slow ones," before they were taken away. In 1950, Gross was convicted of manslaughter by a people's court, but the Austrian Supreme Court overturned the verdict for procedural reasons, and the case was never reheard. Gross became the director of his own neurological institute, where he conducted research on the preserved brains of children killed at Am Spiegelgrund.

He also became a highly paid court-appointed psychiatric expert. In 1976, Gross was hired to assess Friedrich Zawrel, an Austrian accused of stealing from a supermarket. Zawrel had been held in Am Spiegelgrund as a ten-year-old, mainly because he came from an impoverished family. Recognizing Gross, Zawrel said to him, "I know people who have committed crimes hundreds of thousands of times worse than mine. They are respected citizens." When Gross appeared confused, Zawrel said, "Herr Doktor, you have a very bad memory. . . . Didn't you hear the little children crying on the balcony? You never heard it-those who were murdered?" Gross took his revenge: he successfully recommended that Zawrel be confined to an institution for incorrigible offenders. From behind bars, Zawrel managed to unmask Gross to the Austrian media. In 1981, Zawrel was released, and prosecutors eventually brought murder charges against Gross. But he was deemed unfit to stand trial, and in 2005 he died a free man, at the age of ninety.

If Austrian psychiatrists who oversaw the murder of children were allowed to climb the professional ladder unimpeded, was it any wonder that Nowak-Vogl was, too? One of the child-observation facilities in Austria was run by Franz Wurst, a pediatrician who'd boasted of being the youngest doctor in the Reich. Wurst sexually abused children in his care; in the past two decades, hundreds of victims have come forward. But when he was finally arrested, in 2000, it wasn't for this abuse-it was for his role in the murder of his seventy-eight-year-old wife. She had been suffocated, at his behest, by his nineteen-year-old godson, whom he'd molested over a period of years. (Wurst was sentenced to seventeen years in prison but was released after four years, for health reasons.)

Nowak-Vogl didn't go wholly unchecked in the decades before Horst Schreiber and the University of Innsbruck researchers launched their investigations. Students protested her lectures because she brought in child patients and presented them to classes as case studies. In 1980, a director named Kurt Langbein made "Problemkinder," the TV documentary, which exposed some of the disturbing practices at the Innsbruck villa, including the administration of epiphysan. The film was broadcast over the protests of conservative Tyrolean politicians.

Langbein, who is sixty-nine, grew up around concentration-camp survivors; his father, Hermann Langbein, an actor turned resistance fighter, was a political prisoner at Auschwitz and later wrote several books documenting his experiences there. Evy and I visited Kurt Langbein at his office, in Vienna, and he told us that, in making the film, he'd wanted to expose Austrian institutions "where the old Nazis were still working," adding, "It was baggage from my father that I tried to carry properly." His documentary had triggered some reforms at the Innsbruck institution. Nowak-Vogl had a new supervisor, Kornelius Kryspin-Exner, who ordered an end to the use of epiphysan (which, Kryspin-Exner acknowledged, "does not have any medical indication") and to the restrictions on speaking ("the psychological value is zero"). But Nowak-Vogl remained an esteemed academic. Though she officially retired in 1987, she continued lecturing at the University of Innsbruck-on such subjects as "behavioral biology as a guide to educational crises"-until just before her death, in 1998, at the age of seventy-six.

Nowak-Vogl's child-observation station remained in operation for seven years after "Problemkinder" aired, and it wasn't subjected to further investigation until the two-thousands. Nevertheless, a new generation of mental-health professionals, some of whom had come of age with the student and feminist movements of the sixties and seventies, helped reshape the field of child psychiatry in German-language countries. Heilpädagogik was eclipsed by more child-centered, humane, and psychotherapeutic approaches. Closed institutions like Nowak-Vogl's fell out of favor. The people who'd been trapped in them, however, still bore their scars.

III-Other Victims

On our first trip to Austria, Evy hadn't wanted to meet other former patients of the Innsbruck child-observation station. She was determined to keep her memories of the villa distinct-and she didn't want to speak German. But the more that her own recollections were validated the less fragile she felt. Learning the facts, she told me, gave her something powerfully "concrete": "It's not just Evy overreacting. It's not just me making up stories, imagining things, lying-all the things I was told I did as a kid."

When we returned to Austria, three months later, Evy was ready to meet, and offer help to, other victims of the psychiatric regime that had harmed her. We made plans to gather with some women who had been institutionalized under Nowak-Vogl. Austrian privacy laws-and a lingering atmosphere of shame-made it hard to find people who'd been confined at Sonnenstrasse. Many residents had spent the rest of their youths in orphanages or other institutions, and weren't eager to revisit their pasts.

Horst Schreiber first heard about the child-observation stations from students he taught in an adult-education program, in the mid-two-thousands. The victims he met were initially reluctant to discuss their experiences, but, after he built a rapport with them, some agreed to be interviewed for his book. He offered to introduce three of them to us. Schreiber, who is sixty-two, has specialized in writing about uncomfortable aspects of Austrian society-the Nazi era, poverty, the children's homes-and he has the merrily pugnacious air of a veteran gadfly. He rode a bicycle everywhere and talked so volubly that, at the Innsbruck café where we first met, one meal melted into another. His laugh was a torrent of high-pitched giggling that reminded me of Tom Hulce in "Amadeus."

Schreiber nodded vigorously when Evy told him of the shame that she'd felt at "having been in a mental hospital like that." She added, "You don't even realize how strong it is, until finally a day comes when the tables are turned, and it's 'No, shame on you.' "

"This was the purpose of this institution-to shame," Schreiber said. "And speaking in public-that helped a lot of people to not be ashamed any longer." He took his scholarly obligations as a historian seriously, but he was just as serious about his moral obligations to the people whose stories he'd documented. He'd helped victims of Austrian institutions obtain their medical charts, organized commemorative events where victims could speak, and pushed for the creation of the expert commission that recommended reparations for former Innsbruck-station patients. One of them, Christine, was so appreciative of Schreiber's work that she'd got a tattoo depicting the cover of his book.

Christine was among the three former patients who'd agreed to meet us and Schreiber for lunch, at a restaurant at the foot of a mountain west of Innsbruck. She and the other two, Heidi and Hanni, had become friends, and in front of the restaurant the women greeted one another warmly. Then they did the same with Evy.

We sat down at a long table outside a traditional whitewashed building with dark-wood shutters and beams. Below us was a green meadow bright with sunshine. Rivulets of melted snow ran down the craggy mountains, glittering like silver chains. We stayed there all afternoon, alternating between beers and coffees, spätzle and salads. Christine was funny and outgoing and fidgety. She wore a rainbow-striped sleeveless top and bright-blue eyeliner. She showed off her book-cover tattoo-it was on her right leg-and warned me against a Tyrolean specialty on the menu, unappetizingly described as gray cheese, which she then ordered.

Like Evy, the three women had, in addition to the child-observation station, spent time in other harsh institutions and in foster care. With truncated educations and traumatic upbringings, they'd had challenging lives. But each woman said that the villa had particularly haunted her. All three remembered the suffocating imperative of silence, the minute monitoring of their movements, the enforced lifelessness so inimical to a community of children. Heidi told us that she'd come from a lively, loving home; her mother, who was Romani, was not "a typical Austrian hausfrau in an apron"-she'd strung up fairy lights in their back yard, played the mandolin, and loved to dance. One day when Heidi was eight, she came home from school and found that her mother had forgotten to leave a key under the doormat. Night fell, and she and her older brother went to a police station for help. Child-welfare officials immediately picked them up and separated them; she didn't see her brother again for twenty-seven years. In a recording that Heidi had made with Schreiber, she said that the worst thing about Nowak-Vogl's institution was the "complete ignoring of the inner life-the soul-of the child."

Hanni, who wore a flowered dress and pearls, had short gray hair and a soft, sympathetic face. At seventy-one, she was the oldest of the three, and she said that she'd been confined at the child-observation station multiple times-starting at the age of two. When she had difficulty learning her colors, Nowak-Vogl beat her. She remembered voices booming out of the loudspeakers the instant a child spoke: " Quiet! Quiet! "

Christine said that she'd never seen a loudspeaker before arriving at the villa, at the age of six, and had believed that the voices were ghosts.

Evy leaned toward each woman in turn, placing a consoling hand on hers. She had switched to German-none of them spoke English, and it was worth it to her to communicate directly. They all had children, and shared the kids' names and ages. Wind rippled the shimmering leaves on birch and aspen trees. Fat bees buzzed around the sudsy glasses on the tables. One stung Schreiber on the mouth as he sipped beer, and Christine dug around in her tote bag for a salve. Somebody asked about nightmares and flashbacks. Heidi, who wore a moss-green dress and smoked cigarette after cigarette, volunteered that Christine had suffered the most flashbacks, because "she doesn't have the peace she needs to mentally work through everything." Christine then explained that the stigma she'd internalized as a child made her feel responsible for troubles her own children were now experiencing.

They talked about their medical charts, which were a confusing business. Nowak-Vogl had devised her own diagnostic code, using letters, and nobody had completely cracked it. Notes on the charts were a mixture of harsh judgments (kids were deemed "lazy" or "sneaky" or "slobs") and psychological jargon, some of it imported from psychoanalysis (children had "neurotic" or "Oedipal" tendencies). Evy's chart identified her as suffering from a jealousy of her foster sister which could be either "psychopathic or neurotic." She was also deemed a "gossip" who sucked her thumb, wet her pants, and lifted her skirt to fix her underwear. It was noted that she had once spilled water on another girl's bread, and had "probably bent a tulip" in a garden but "didn't admit to it."

When we'd come across the line about the tulip, Evy said, "There was no winning in that environment." The tiniest act was turned into a negative "judgment on your character." Any errant behavior that Nowak-Vogl observed was attributed to inborn deficiencies. The institution was seen as an objective diagnostic machine, and nobody in charge seems ever to have reckoned with the distorting behavioral impact of ripping children from their homes and dropping them, without explanation, into a frightening new reality. Instead, the researchers condemned Evy for her "clinginess."

A consistent theme in Evy's chart was her torment over being abandoned. A typical entry observed, "She wants to be noticed and is always afraid that she'll be forgotten at home." The chart noted that Anni, Evy's foster mother, hadn't sent letters or packages regularly.

Most victims who reviewed their charts couldn't help but be rattled by them. One woman had told Schreiber that reading hers had been "shocking" because it made her seem, at four years old, like a "sex monster." Georg Kaser, another former resident at the child-observation station, who met with Evy and me on a Zoom call, had ended up at Sonnenstrasse when he was ten. He came from a happy home, but he had developed anxieties-panicking, for example, when he sensed that his heart might be beating strangely. At the villa, he was miserably homesick, but this was construed as yet another indicator of constitutional weakness; his chart noted, with evident distaste, that he cried at night and was "always seeking attention with his loud voice," or else staring "straight ahead," looking "depressed." Outwardly, Georg could make a good impression, but in secret he was "always up to something," and had "a craving for validation."

Georg is now an actor who runs his own theatre company. He has three adult children, and he proudly showed us photographs of them. He wore hip yellow glasses, and seemed charming and at ease on the Zoom call, though he said that he had suffered from anxiety throughout his life. He had been curious to get his chart, but reading it had taken him aback. All the things that he remembered as most salient about the place-being locked in the cellar, being forced to eat bits of fat he'd left on a plate, watching a boy who had difficulty dressing himself be paraded around and humiliated by the staff-went unnoted.

Evy's file didn't mention therapies. The authors of "Psychiatrized Childhoods" argue that the "most striking" quality of the charts is that "treatments were rarely named" and "their success or failure hardly reported." The charts create "the impression of a certain arbitrariness." Talk therapy certainly wasn't offered. Hanni and Christine said their records indicated that they'd been given epiphysan. Georg's chart mentioned that he had been given barbiturates, but noted nothing about their effects.

Heidi said her chart noted that she'd talked back to Nowak-Vogl, demanding to know why she was there, how long she'd be there, and where her brother was. Reading her file, she felt that she had been disparaged for being a child nicht auf den Mund gefallen -a blabbermouth. Though Nowak-Vogl grudgingly noted Heidi's intelligence, she recommended that she be sent to a Catholic home, where she ended up working in the laundry instead of attending school. (Despite this, Heidi managed to have a rewarding career, as a legal secretary.)

Ina Friedmann, the historian of medicine, told me in an e-mail that the sedatives appear to have served mainly to "guarantee the functioning" of the child-observation station from day to day, by preventing " 'wild' behavior." Again, neither Nowak-Vogl nor her colleagues seem to have noticed that their scientific observation of children was being tainted by the constant drugging of their charges.

When it was time to head back down the mountain, Evy thanked each woman. Remembering Sonnenstrasse had been such a lonely experience for so long, she said. Evy told them that she wanted the Tyrolean government to make a bigger effort to find people who were entitled to an apology and to reparations. There had been a flurry of attention in Austria a decade ago, when the commission report came out, but evidently many victims had missed the news. Why wasn't there a comprehensive Web site that laid out all the necessary information, including ways for victims to connect with one another and with therapists? If the government wouldn't create one, Evy decided, she would do it herself. To date, four hundred and fourteen former patients at Nowak-Vogl's institution-less than twelve per cent of the total-have come forward to report being abused.

IV-Family Secrets

Learning the truth about the villa soon led Evy to other discoveries, about her family and Austrian history. She hadn't expected so much to fall into place, and I sometimes saw her shake as if an electric current were running through her-from the force of revelations and memories, and from anger at officials who tried to withhold information or questioned the value of revisiting the past.

As Evy now recognized, she had once taken refuge in this attitude herself. She'd left the country the year after graduating from hotel-management school, in 1984, and had never considered returning home. For seven months, she worked as a wine steward on a cruise ship in the Caribbean. But she tired of all the drunk tourists, and when the ship was docked in San Juan she and a co-worker decided to quit their jobs and fly to Miami. When they got to the airport, the last flight for Miami had already taken off, but there was one leaving for New York. Evy got on it.

She instantly felt comfortable in the city: for the first time in her life, she wasn't relentlessly "judged for being different." She was just shy of twenty-one and didn't know Manhattan from Brooklyn or Queens. But she cobbled together a new life, loving the anonymity offered by a city as big as New York, where your past didn't have to trail you like the clattering cans on a newlywed couple's car. She initially stayed at the Y.M.C.A. on Forty-seventh Street and worked random jobs: scraping plaster for an apartment renovation, waiting tables in the Village. She once waited on Uli Edel, the German film director, who was then making "Last Exit to Brooklyn," and they dated for a while. She befriended a bald, bearded man because she thought that he was the writer Shel Silverstein; he wasn't, but over diner breakfasts he told her stories about the gay S & M scene.

One day, Jimi, the bar owner from Kleinwalsertal, and her husband, Andi, had the inspiration to send Evy a camera as a gift. Evy had never had one before, but she loved it right away, and roamed the streets taking pictures. She signed up for classes at Parsons and at the International Center of Photography, and became a devotee of Dorothea Lange. Her first published picture, of striking workers at LaGuardia Airport, ran in a leftist New York weekly called the Guardian. "I thought it was very much like Dorothea Lange!" she said, laughing.

She started freelancing for Agence France-Presse, then got a job with Reuters. In 1993, the Daily News hired her. It was a boys' club, but a friendly one. She'd receive a gruff directive-"Go to the East River, there's a floater"-and bicycle across town to get the shot. She won recognition for her work, and in 2000 she was named photographer of the year by the New York Press Photographers Association. One evening, on assignment for the paper, she was flying over the Brooklyn Bridge in a helicopter at sunset. The East River was glowing orange, and as she leaned out to get some shots she began sobbing: "I thought, I'm in New York-I've made it. But I couldn't tell anybody how far I'd come."

Though she was determined to escape her past, it kept resurfacing. "I was just haunted," she told me. "I couldn't sleep with the lights off." Sometimes she became so panicked on the subway that she had to run off the train wherever it stopped next. The photographer Greta Pratt, who was her boss at the Reuters bureau in New York and became a close friend, told me that Evy was vivacious and driven but also "secretive, because she was so hurt inside." Pratt recalls that Evy would "just sort of turn and walk away" from anything that conjured upsetting associations. When Evy was in her twenties, she developed a profound eating disorder-she sometimes passed out from hunger. But her experience of psychiatry in Austria had been so horrific that seeing a therapist felt impossible.

During this time, however, she began dating her future husband, Paul Schwartzman, a New York native who came from a family of therapists. He encouraged her to seek help, and she began seeing a specialist in eating disorders, who warned her that she might die in her forties if she didn't stop starving herself. With the therapist's coaching, she stopped. When I asked Evy why she hadn't been able to confide in the therapist about the villa, she said that the pain "was way too deep," and that her mentality at the time was "You're just trying to patch yourself up so you can walk down the street."

Evy had long accepted that she had no family-she'd never tried to track down her biological parents. But one day in 1995 she received a phone call from a sister she hadn't known she had. Her name was Barbara Wespi-her friends called her Barbarella-and she was a year younger than Evy. They had different fathers, and Barbarella had met their mother only a few months earlier. Their mother was named Evy, too. The sisters agreed to meet in Switzerland, where Barbarella lived. At the airport in Zurich, Evy was so nervous that she didn't want to get off the plane, but once she caught a glimpse of Barbarella-whose smile was as wide and radiant as her own-they stood pressing their hands on either side of a glass dividing wall, weeping.

Their relationship with the woman they soon dubbed Evy, Sr., started off promisingly, too. Evy, Sr., said she was overjoyed to finally have her daughters in her life. She explained that Evy's father was a young man with whom she'd had a short relationship in 1964, when she was twenty-one and working at a restaurant in Salzburg. Evy, Sr., had gone to the city hoping to be an extra in the summer opera's production of "Elektra"; the young man was studying art at the School of Seeing, an avant-garde institution founded by the Austrian painter Oskar Kokoschka. Evy's father had been sweet and intelligent, with curly chestnut hair and beautiful eyes. He had also been determined, tough, and energetic-qualities that Evy, too, seemed to possess. Barbarella's father had been a one-night stand whom Evy, Sr., had met while working at a train-station restaurant in Switzerland. She said, apologetically, that she couldn't remember either man's name.

Evy, Sr., told her daughters that she had been born in Innsbruck in 1943. Her father had been a Jewish wholesaler of shoes. In 1949, he died. In those immiserated postwar years, her mother, overwhelmed by the need to make a living, sent little Evy, Sr., and her brother, Jürg, to live in a convent school outside Paris. She died not long afterward. Evy, Sr., lived briefly with her grandmother, then in group homes. In her late teens, she became itinerant. When she was still a minor, the police in Marseille arrested her for prostitution-a false charge, she insisted-and sent her back to Innsbruck, where she was institutionalized for a time. Her life had continued to be peripatetic, but now she was settled down, in a village in the Italian Alps, with a retired Italian construction worker.

Evy was openhearted and curious about her mother, and felt connected by their shared experience of orphanhood. But their connection soon faltered. Evy, Sr., visited Evy and Paul in New York, but to Evy she seemed detached and unenthusiastic. After returning to Italy, she sent letters, but they often consisted of bland comments about the weather, and she evaded further questions about their family history. "It drove Barbarella and me crazy, because we wanted some real answers," Evy told me. "And it didn't feel like she had true curiosity about us. I'm sure it came from a lot of pain. She was a very hurt person, and that's how she dealt with her trauma."

Evy let their correspondence lapse, and by the early two-thousands she'd stopped communicating with Barbarella, too. In 2018, Evy received a call telling her that her mother had died.

By the time Evy and I began investigating her personal history, her adventurous older daughter, Stella, had just started college, in Paris, studying art, and she had expressed an interest in meeting Barbarella, whom Evy hadn't been in contact with for years. Evy began tentatively e-mailing and texting Barbarella, saying that she was sorry to have been such a disappointing sister. "You're the sister I want," Barbarella told her. Evy asked to communicate in English, and Barbarella agreed. "That opened up the opportunity completely," Evy told me. "Just to be accepted like that. And I think, in a strange way, if I'm totally honest, it helped when I found out the truth about Innsbruck. It was, like, 'Maybe if I share this with my sister, she'll understand why I've acted so fucking weird.' And she did."

Evy, Stella, and Barbarella met up in Paris in November, 2021. Barbarella, who is gay and has no kids, turned out to be an ideal long-lost aunt: she was affectionate and funny with Stella, and, like Evy, she was unfazed by teen-agers' roiling emotions. Barbarella had worked as an art restorer and as a club d.j., and now owned an interior-design business in Zurich, where she had a close-knit crew of friends.

As a baby, Barbarella had been adopted by a Swiss couple in Horn, a small town on Lake Constance. The couple, who had previously adopted another daughter, soon divorced. The older girl had schizophrenia and was at times violent, and Barbarella had found it impossible to sustain a relationship with her. When Barbarella had first got to know Evy, all those years ago, she'd said to herself, "Oh, it wasn't my mother I was looking for after all. It was you." She told me, "Finding and losing Evy was difficult to understand. I tried to lock my heart and walk away, but it wasn't possible. My heart told a different story."

Barbarella joined Evy and me on our two trips to Austria. The first time I met her, in Innsbruck, she ambled over wearing red plaid stovepipe pants, black Converse high-tops, and an oversized sweater bearing the phrase " Je ne sais quoi." On the second trip, Sammy and Stella, who were on summer break from college, and Lily, who was in high school, came, too. After gathering in Innsbruck one afternoon in July, we headed to a building that houses the Tyrolean state archive.

The archive had a fat file on Rudolf Mages, the maternal grandfather of Evy and Barbarella. Their mother's portrait of him was false. Rudolf hadn't been Jewish-he had been a Nazi, and such an eager Party member that he'd signed up in 1931. He'd gone to prison at least twice for Nazi political activities during the period between 1934 and the Anschluss, when Party membership was illegal in Austria. He'd fled to Munich when there was a crackdown on Nazis, and had been extended refugee status in Germany. Rudolf had held one of the highest honors the Party accorded-membership in the Blutorden, or Blood Order-for his devotion to the cause. In 1938, he and his wife, Herta, had "Aryanized"-taken over-an Innsbruck shoe store belonging to a Jewish proprietor, Richard Graubart. Later that year, during the November pogroms that broke out across the Reich, S.S. men found Graubart at home with his wife and four-year-old daughter, and stabbed him to death. These were bewildering discoveries. Had Evy, Sr., been lied to? Or had shame led her to conflate her father's identity with that of a Jewish man he had victimized?

With horror, Evy realized that the course of her childhood was partly attributable to the fact that her troubled mother had been raised by active Nazis. It was not a hereditary burden, of the kind that Nowak-Vogl had believed in. It was a historical burden.

She kept going through the archive's sepia-toned pages, as Sammy looked over her shoulder. In 1943, the file revealed, Rudolf had served a short time in prison for war profiteering-selling shoes without the proper ration certificates, and hoarding goods. Evy sighed in exasperation and said, "This is 1943, right? And you don't go to jail for murdering people, or for stealing somebody's whole life and property. But you do go to jail for selling shoes without a voucher."

Evy and Barbarella held out hope that Herta, Rudolf's wife, had been at most a reluctant participant in all this. Their uncle Jürg was still alive, in Germany, and Barbarella was in contact with him. He believed that Herta had divorced Rudolf after the war because she no longer wanted to be married to a Nazi. It wasn't clear to Jürg, though, why Herta had sent him and his sister to the convent school outside Paris. Perhaps she had been shielding them from their father's ignominy?

A few months later, we got closer to an answer. Evy, who had asked another Innsbruck archive if it had anything on Herta's family, received a reply from a historian and archivist named Niko Hofinger. Evy's timing had been fortuitous: in the basement of the city's police headquarters, somebody had just discovered a bunch of files from the Nazi period. The cache included a file on Herta. Evy might not like what she learned, Hofinger warned.

Evy asked to see a copy, and a PDF arrived in her in-box. It painted a picture of a woman out of Fassbinder's postwar trilogy: tough, cunning, and alluring. Like Maria Braun or Veronika Voss, Herta seemed to have traded on her looks, curried favor with Nazi leaders, and aggressively worked the black market. In 1936, according to an account that she'd given to the Innsbruck police, she'd lost her job as a salesclerk at a Viennese jewelry shop because of work she'd been doing for the then illegal Nazi Party: printing Party newspapers, making explosives. She married Rudolf, who was fourteen years her senior, in 1937, when she was twenty. A bookkeeper for the shoe store that the couple Aryanized described Herta as a "charming" woman whose "morals were not exactly impeccable," adding, "It was well known that she had several lovers. She had nothing left for her children. They were a burden." Herta, the bookkeeper said, had a "close connection" with Franz Hofer, the region's highest-ranking Nazi, and could call him at any time on a secret number. Rudolf used his wife's connections to Nazi officialdom to finesse business matters.

After the war, Rudolf was held in an Allied prison. Herta divorced him, and placed their kids in the French convent school. She moved into an apartment in Kitzbühel, where neighbors resented her lively parties and lavish life style. She travelled often to Milan and to Paris, where she sometimes visited her children. Police records indicated that state and border police had monitored Herta for suspected smuggling of furs (including a "monkey-skin cape"), paintings, antiques, and, possibly, cocaine.

In 1949, Rudolf killed himself, slashing his wrists in a guesthouse in Innsbruck. Herta died three years later, at thirty-five, apparently of a heart attack.

Evy shared the file with Horst Schreiber, who said that Herta came across as, if nothing else, a "clever" woman who had "seized favorable opportunities by the scruff of the neck." Still, Evy could find nothing to suggest that Herta had cared much for her kids.

Negligent parents come in all ideological stripes. And Evy, Sr., might have struggled psychologically wherever and whenever she was born. But her childhood had clearly been warped by her parents' Nazi activities-and by her mother's decision to send her to a foreign country. Evy found herself feeling more compassion for her mother than she had when she'd known her.

Moreover, they had both been abused by doctors. After Evy, Sr., was arrested in Marseille, she had undergone electroshock therapy at a hospital outside Innsbruck. Electroshock was widely practiced in Europe and the United States in the postwar years, though it was usually indicated for intractable depression or schizophrenia, not for young women who might have been engaged in sex work. Evy, Sr.,'s memories of the experience had been unusually detailed. She'd described waiting her turn and seeing other patients convulse as electricity was administered. She remembered a Dr. Rodewald and a Dr. Simma, noting that Simma had a wide mouth that reminded her "of a toad's." (Official records indicate that psychiatrists named Hermann Rodewald and Kaspar Simma worked at Valduna, a hospital near Innsbruck, after the war.)

Evy and I tracked down a journalist named Hans Weiss, who, as a psychology student conducting research at Valduna in the seventies, had known both doctors and had witnessed electroshock procedures. He confirmed that patients awaiting treatment could see and hear what was in store for them. Patients were supposed to be given anesthesia, Weiss said, but some weren't-apparently as punishment.

Shortly after we returned from our first visit to Austria, Evy learned that her foster mother, Anni, was still alive. She was in a nursing home in Kleinwalsertal, and in her nineties, but, according to Evy's contacts in the town, she was able to receive visitors. Evy had decided to confront her on our second trip. She initially hesitated about including her kids in this particular encounter. But they were growing up, and they were curious. "It was always something I wanted to shield them from," Evy told me. "But then it's like you create secrets. And I don't want secrets." She concluded that treating the trip as "an investigation into something that happened in their family tree" might give them power over the story, and insight into the intimate ways that history works itself into us all.

To get to Kleinwalsertal, we took a train from Vienna to Munich, then a smaller train to Memmingen, a third train to Oberstdorf, and, finally, a bus over a mountain pass. It was high summer, and hikers with walking sticks passed through the town on their way into the Alps. We got cheese sandwiches at a café, then headed to the nursing home for an unannounced visit.

Anni sat teetering on the edge of a bed, a small, thin woman with lank white hair and a creaky, plaintive voice. But she seemed to recognize Evy, who knelt in front of her and said, "Anni, do you remember my childhood?"

"I have to think far back," Anni said. The conversation proceeded in fits and starts, with Anni looking into Evy's eyes and gripping her arm. "You rejected me," Evy said. "You didn't love me. You treated me terribly. You locked me in a cellar. I'm glad I get to tell you this."

"You can tell me everything-all the things I did wrong."

"It hurt me a lot, for many years."

"I am sorry," Anni said. "The sorrow is real."

For Evy, the encounter was draining and disorienting. The monster of her childhood had become a vulnerable, feeble woman who, for the first time in Evy's life, seemed to want her company. Evy briefly veered away from dark topics, informing Anni that she was now a photojournalist in the United States. They chatted about Anni's daughter, who now lived near Munich.

Suddenly, Anni wept, dabbing her eyes with her shirt. Evy turned to us and said, "Does somebody have a napkin for her?" She couldn't help but react with solicitude. Lily was kneeling next to her mother, with an arm around her. Sammy stood on Evy's other side, with his arms crossed across his chest, glowering. Stella sat at a distance, tears streaming down her face.

Evy asked Anni why she'd sent her to the villa. Anni replied that a doctor in the village had known of Nowak-Vogl's institution, and had recommended it. Evy said that Nowak-Vogl had been "very brutal," and asked Anni if she'd known her reputation. "No," Anni said. She told Evy, "We have both the same sorrow. You have it, and I have it. And we can't run away from it. That doesn't work." Evy and Anni hugged, crying.

Anni's daughter doesn't recall her mother being unkind to Evy. But that evening our group met up with Anni's nephew Heini, who had lived up the hill from Anni's B. and B., and he remembered vividly Anni's hostility toward Evy. He said that he wished his family had done more to stop it.

It wasn't clear how much of the nursing-home conversation Anni had taken in, but Evy felt some satisfaction in finally having the upper hand. By turning up with her "beautiful family," she told me, she had shown Anni that, despite her foster mother's mistreatment, she had thrived.

Stella put it more bluntly: "The best revenge Evy got was how great a mother she is."

Earlier this year, Niko Hofinger, the archivist in Innsbruck, informed Evy that a city archive likely contained a file documenting her time as a ward of the state. Evy successfully pushed for permission to see it. A letter from Robert Höllebauer, the brutal psychologist who worked alongside Nowak-Vogl, said Evy's stay at the villa had established that she was "neurotic," and that if she continued to create disturbances in her foster family she should be dispatched to one of the small children's homes known as SOS-Kinderdörfer. On these terms, she was returned to Anni, who, Evy recalls, made a point of telling other children in the village that she had just come back from a mental institution. Anni told a child-welfare official that, though Evy had been more restrained since her return from Nowak-Vogl's, she was still committing "malicious acts." Evy tried desperately to please Anni, but a letter from the official noted, "Her high spirit must constantly be dampened." If Anni had wanted a quiet playmate for her daughter and an efficient helper-both girls were expected to clean guest rooms and do other chores-Evy was not that.

The file also contained notes from a caseworker, which said that Evy wanted Anni's affection, and tried to do what was expected, but was rambunctious. As we read through the assessment, Evy told me that she had skied recklessly as a kid. Once, she was entrusted with bringing a tall votive candle home from church; she dropped the candle, breaking it. She resented being the butt of jokes, and hated certain local traditions, such as when the terrifying Krampus came to the door in December, threw "bad" children in his sack, and carried them out into the snowy night. Evy got upset when she was forced to sit on the "donkey bench" at school with the only other child deemed an outsider-a Turkish boy. The school's principal recommended that she be sent away again, as soon as possible, because she outshone Anni's daughter academically. This, apparently, is why Evy ended up in the orphanage in Germany: she had been too smart for her own good, and her high spirits had proved incurable.

In the file, Evy discovered a record of her birth, and on it was written something that she'd never expected to learn: a father's name. One morning, she texted me a photograph of a handsome, brooding man who bore a resemblance to the actor Joaquin Phoenix. "I think this is my father," she said. He was Othmar Zechyr. On the document, Evy, Sr., had provided his birth date, May 28, 1938, and his birthplace, Linz. Looking him up, we saw that, just as Evy, Sr., had told her daughter, he had studied at Oskar Kokoschka's art school, in Salzburg. Zechyr had become a well-known artist in Austria, with work in major galleries and museums. He had made moody, crosshatched pen-and-ink drawings-of knolls and haystacks, of fantastical machinery. Zechyr, who died in 1996, had three children. Evy is now in correspondence with one of them, an art historian in Vienna. She has broached the idea of confirming their mutual paternity with DNA tests, and of meeting in Austria.

At the end of the file was an official's assessment of Evy as a teen-ager: "The minor is courageous enough to assert herself in life."

Evy had Austria, and the German language, back in her life now. She had befriended advocates, historians, and former victims who were dedicated to an honest reckoning with the past. She had a renewed relationship with Barbarella. She had a probable candidate for her biological father, someone whose art she very much liked. She felt greater sympathy for her biological mother. There was only one more thing she wanted to face.

From the outside, the villa on Sonnenstrasse was basically as she remembered it: a rather grand and solid-looking structure from 1914, painted pale yellow. It was now divided into private apartments, with a locked front entrance, and to get inside we haphazardly pressed the buzzers. An older man named Peter, who lived on the top floor, let us in.

Nowak-Vogl's institution had moved to a new location in 1979, and afterward the villa sat empty for years. Trash piled up inside. Then, one day in 2003, the villa underwent a strange rebirth. A group of young punks started squatting there. They cleaned it up, showed movies and put on concerts, and took in anarchists, homeless people, and runaways, including kids fleeing abusive families from all over Europe. They nicknamed it Villa Kunterbunt, after the German name for Pippi Longstocking's house, where she lived on her own with her monkey, her horse, and her books.

One day, a young punk named Ingo spotted a man in his forties lingering in the garden, staring at the windows. The man explained that he'd been confined there as a child. Ingo invited him in and let him see his room. The man began trembling and crying. Ingo's room had once been the office of the institution's director, the man told him, and he had been so scared of her. Until that day, the squatters didn't know the villa's history, but they weren't entirely surprised. Although many of them had lived in more decrepit places, this one had the air of a haunted house.

Ingo now works for an organization in Innsbruck that helps homeless people. When Evy and I found him, we were back in the U.S., but he agreed to meet us on Zoom. He showed us photographs from his time in the villa. "It's amazing to see different images from what you hold," Evy told him. "It kind of pushes back against the bad shape of what happened there." Villa Kunterbunt hadn't been perfect-there were police raids and hand-to-mouth struggles, and in 2005 the young people were evicted. But they had cared for one another and had made a community whose spirit of love and freedom was antithetical to the rigidity and surveillance of Nowak-Vogl's institution. The transformation of the villa seemed to Evy like a benediction.

When Evy and I entered the building on Sonnenstrasse, she felt afraid but also ready. In the foyer, shafts of sunlight illuminated white walls and an imposing curved staircase, which looked very familiar. "I felt like a dragon slayer, going inside that building," Evy said the next day. "I never could have imagined doing that." On the villa's first floor, she looked up in silence. She touched the walls. Then we turned around and walked back out to the street, where her children were waiting. ♦

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The Villa Where a Doctor Experimented on Children

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As a girl in Austria, Evy Mages was confined to a mysterious institution in Innsbruck. Decades later, she learned why. Margaret Talbot reports.

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Companies Aren’t Talking About Black Vernacular and Dialect Bias in The Workplace. Here’s Why That Needs to Change. - NewsBreak

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One of the biggest strikes against Black workers in the United States isn’t always the way they look or dress, but it can often be something more subtle and ingrained: how they speak.

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Solomon, M. Z. (1993). How physicians talk about futility: making words mean too many things. Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics, 21(2), 231-237.

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Solomon, M. Z. (1993). How physicians talk about futility: making words mean too many things. Journal of Law, Medicine and Ethics, 21(2), 231-237.

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July 7 was a big day for Africa as it celebrated the first World Kiswahili Language Day. Citizens across Kenya, Tanzania, Zanzibar, South Africa, . This was the first official holiday since UNESCO designated July 7 as international Kiswahili language day in and the world marked the day with celebrations on the streets and online using the hashtags #KiswahiliDay2022 and #KiswahiliDay November 2021.

Marching celebrations

Kenyans marched the streets of the capital Nairobi to mark the celebrations in a processesion led by the country's Tourism and Wildlife Cabinet Secretary and head of the National Steering Committee of the World Kiswahili Language Day 2022, Najib Balala.

In Uganda, the national cabinet approved a motion to adopt Kiswahili as an official language following a resolution in February last year during the 21st summit of the East African Community (EAC), in which they agreed to adopt English, French, and Kiswahili as official languages of the community. The Ugandan cabinet also recommended requiring primary and secondary schools to teach Kiswahili in class. The EAC is a regional intergovernmental organization made up of seven Partner States: The Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republics of Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Sudan, Uganda, and the United Republic of Tanzania, with its headquarters in Arusha, Tanzania. Kiswahili is an official language in all six of Uganda's partner states.

Online, a video featuring South African opposition leader Julius Malema addressing the importance of teaching and learning Swahili as an international language and rallying Africans to embrace Swahili as Africa's lingua franca, prompted mixed reactions from netizens across Africa and revived an ongoing discourse among linguists and cultural advocates: can Swahili be Africa's primary language?

The South African and EFF leader, Julius Malema calling upon all #African countries to embrace #Swahili as their national #Language.#Kiswahili is spoken by over 200 million people.#SwahiliDay #KiswahiliDay #WorldKiswahiliDay #KiswahiliLanguageDay pic.twitter.com/vbWceGFmD8

- Wako Joel (@WakoJoel) July 7, 2022

Swahili: Among the top 10 most common languages

Despite Kiswahili becoming the first officially recognized African Language, ghosts of its checkered past still linger.

The language of violence in Uganda

The decision by the Ugandan cabinet to adopt Kiswahili as an official language and recommendation that it be mandatory in primary and secondary schools did not sit well with Ugandans, who have a complicated history with the language . In some ways, it represents the country's turbulent past as well as modern-day oppression. During Idi Amin's reign from 1971-1979, it became the official language of the military.

Kiswahili came to be seen as the language of violence since it was the official language of the army and was spoken by soldiers. Kiswahili had further collapsed following the fall of the Amin dictatorship, and it wasn't until the late 1990s revival of the East African Community and the new National Resistance Movement language policy that it was able to regain a (partially) key significance in Ugandan society.

The discussion around the use of Kiswahili and its place in Ugandan society has intensified since it was declared the official language of the African Community. However, Uganda's economic need for Swahili, combined with an increase in East African cultural contacts through music, migration, as well as political goodwill, suggests that the language should no longer be resisted. However, it's still too early to tell if the national push to embrace Kiswahili by making it a compulsory subject in schools will change Ugandans' perception and help them reconcile with their troubled past.

A threat to other African languages

The widespread adoption of Kiswahili across Africa has been viewed by some linguists and African language advocates as a threat to other African languages. Tanzania, for instance, has a discriminatory language policy that mandates the use of Kiswahili in rural districts where there is little to no knowledge of the language.

Such a risk exists because efforts to promote Kiswahili are not matched by attempts to promote other languages.

Development of Kiswahili language technology

Of all the sub-Saharan African languages, Swahili has the highest online presence by far. While the efforts to develop language technology in Kiswahili have been relatively slow, this has been changing. This month, Meta published a research paper that details how they plan to look into 55 of Africa's marginalized languages in order to improve the accuracy with which AI algorithms translate them on their social platforms.

, a Kenyan firm, has created a deep learning technology for natural language processing (NLP) that translates from major world languages to Indigenous African languages.

Currently, the deep learning model translates from most major international languages to Kiswahili and another Kenyan language, Kikuyu. The AI startup, which is now working to translate other Indigenous African languages, will start delivering its services to other African countries by the end of the year.

In addition, Nanjala Nyabola, a Kenyan scholar, political analyst, and Global Voices' Advocacy Director, has enabled Kiswahili-speaking people to voice and defend their digital rights. In joint collaboration with a team of Kiswahili experts, they translated key terms in technology and digital rights into the most frequently spoken African language producing 52 keycards that are free to download.

Why isn't Kiswahili Africa's primary language?

Despite all of these countries' external commitments to Kiswahili, there are some obstacles that jeopardize its success.

In 2018, South African opposition leader Julius Sello Malema pushed Africans to accept Swahili as the continent's lingua franca, claiming that African governments who have adopted Mandarin at the expense of African languages have "misplaced priorities."

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Why has Swahili not become Africa's unifying language?

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Despite all of these countries' strong intentions to make Kiswahili their motherland's lingua franca, geo-political differences and foreign influence remain as some of the obstacles that jeopardize its success.

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Once just an obscure island dialect of an African Bantu tongue, Swahili has evolved into Africa's most internationally recognised language. It is peer to the few languages of the world that boast over 200 million users.

Over the two millennia of Swahili's growth and adaptation, the moulders of this story - immigrants from inland Africa, traders from Asia, Arab and European occupiers, European and Indian settlers, colonial rulers, and individuals from various postcolonial nations - have used Swahili and adapted it to their own purposes. They have taken it wherever they have gone to the west.

Africa's Swahili-speaking zone now extends across a full third of the continent from south to north and touches on the opposite coast, encompassing the heart of Africa.

The origins

The historical lands of the Swahili are on East Africa's Indian Ocean littoral. A 2,500-kilometer chain of coastal towns from Mogadishu, Somalia to Sofala, Mozambique as well as offshore islands as far away as the Comoros and Seychelles.

This coastal region has long served as an international crossroads of trade and human movement. People from all walks of life and from regions as scattered as Indonesia, Persia, the African Great Lakes, the United States and Europe all encountered one another. Hunter-gatherers, pastoralists and farmers mingled with traders and city-dwellers.

Africans devoted to ancestors and the spirits of their lands met Muslims, Hindus, Portuguese Catholics and British Anglicans. Workers (among them slaves, porters and labourers), soldiers, rulers and diplomats were mixed together from ancient days. Anyone who went to the East African littoral could choose to become Swahili, and many did.

African unity

The roll of Swahili enthusiasts and advocates includes notable intellectuals, freedom fighters, civil rights activists, political leaders, scholarly professional societies, entertainers and health workers. Not to mention the usual professional writers, poets, and artists.

Read more: Hip hop and Pan Africanism: from Blitz the Ambassador to Beyoncé

Foremost has been Nobel Laureate Wole Soyinka. The Nigerian writer, poet and playwright has since the 1960s repeatedly called for use of Swahili as the transcontinental language for Africa. The African Union (AU), the "united states of Africa" nurtured the same sentiment of continental unity in July 2004 and adopted Swahili as its official language. As Joaquim Chissano (then the president of Mozambique) put this motion on the table, he addressed the AU in the flawless Swahili he had learned in Tanzania, where he was educated while in exile from the Portuguese colony.

The African Union did not adopt Swahili as Africa's international language by happenstance. Swahili has a much longer history of building bridges among peoples across the continent of Africa and into the diaspora.

The feeling of unity, the insistence that all of Africa is one, just will not disappear. Languages are elemental to everyone's sense of belonging, of expressing what's in one's heart. The AU's decision was particularly striking given that the populations of its member states speak an estimated two thousand languages (roughly one-third of all human languages), several dozen of them with more than a million speakers.

How did Swahili come to hold so prominent a position among so many groups with their own diverse linguistic histories and traditions?

A liberation language

During the decades leading up to the independence of Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania in the early 1960s, Swahili functioned as an international means of political collaboration. It enabled freedom fighters throughout the region to communicate their common aspirations even though their native languages varied widely.

The rise of Swahili, for some Africans, was a mark of true cultural and personal independence from the colonising Europeans and their languages of control and command. Uniquely among Africa's independent nations, Tanzania's government uses Swahili for all official business and, most impressively, in basic education. Indeed, the Swahili word uhuru (freedom), which emerged from this independence struggle, became part of the global lexicon of political empowerment.

The highest political offices in East Africa began using and promoting Swahili soon after independence. Presidents Julius Nyerere of Tanzania (1962-85) and Jomo Kenyatta of Kenya (1964-78) promoted Swahili as integral to the region's political and economic interests, security and liberation. The political power of language was demonstrated, less happily, by Ugandan dictator Idi Amin (1971-79), who used Swahili for his army and secret police operations during his reign of terror.

Read more: New Kiswahili science fiction award charts a path for African languages

Under Nyerere, Tanzania became one of only two African nations ever to declare a native African language as the country's official mode of communication (the other is Ethiopia, with Amharic). Nyerere personally translated two of William Shakespeare's plays into Swahili to demonstrate the capacity of Swahili to bear the expressive weight of great literary works.

Socialist overtones

Nyerere even made the term Swahili a referent to Tanzanian citizenship. Later, this label acquired socialist overtones in praising the common men and women of the nation. It stood in stark contrast to Europeans and Western-oriented elite Africans with quickly - and by implication dubiously - amassed wealth.

Ultimately, the term grew even further to encompass the poor of all races, of both African and non-African descent. In my own experience as a lecturer at Stanford University in the 1990s, for instance, several of the students from Kenya and Tanzania referred to the poor white neighbourhood of East Palo Alto, California, as Uswahilini, "Swahili land". As opposed to Uzunguni, "land of the mzungu (white person)".

Nyerere considered it prestigious to be called Swahili. With his influence, the term became imbued with sociopolitical connotations of the poor but worthy and even noble. This in turn helped construct a Pan African popular identity independent of the elite-dominated national governments of Africa's fifty-some nation-states.

Little did I realise then that the Swahili label had been used as a conceptual rallying point for solidarity across the lines of community, competitive towns, and residents of many backgrounds for over a millennium.

Kwanzaa and ujamaa

In 1966, (activist and author) Maulana Ron Karenga associated the black freedom movement with Swahili, choosing Swahili as its official language and creating the Kwanzaa celebration. The term Kwanzaa is derived from the Swahili word ku-anza, meaning "to begin" or "first". The holiday was intended to celebrate the matunda ya kwanza, "first fruits". According to Karenga, Kwanzaa symbolises the festivities of ancient African harvests.

Celebrants were encouraged to adopt Swahili names and to address one another by Swahili titles of respect. Based on Nyerere's principle of ujamaa (unity in mutual contributions), Kwanzaa celebrates seven principles or pillars. Unity (umoja), self-determination (kujichagulia), collective work and responsibility (ujima), cooperative economics (ujamaa), shared purpose (nia), individual creativity (kuumba) and faith (imani).

Nyerere also became the icon of "community brotherhood and sisterhood" under the slogan of the Swahili word ujamaa. That word has gained such strong appeal that it has been used as far afield as among Australian Aborigines and African Americans and across the globe from London to Papua New Guinea. Not to mention its ongoing celebration on many US college campuses in the form of dormitories named ujamaa houses.

Today

Today, Swahili is the African language most widely recognised outside the continent. The global presence of Swahili in radio broadcasting and on the internet has no equal among sub-Saharan African languages.

Swahili is broadcast regularly in Burundi, the DRC, Kenya, Liberia, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Sudan, Swaziland and Tanzania. On the international scene, no other African language can be heard from world news stations as often or as extensively.

At least as far back as Trader Horn (1931), Swahili words and speech have been heard in hundreds of movies and television series, such as Star Trek, Out of Africa, Disney's The Lion King, and Lara Croft: Tomb Raider. The Lion King featured several Swahili words, the most familiar being the names of characters, including Simba (lion), Rafiki (friend) and Pumbaa (be dazed). Swahili phrases included asante sana (thank you very much) and, of course, that no-problem philosophy known as hakuna matata repeated throughout the movie.

Swahili lacks the numbers of speakers, the wealth, and the political power associated with global languages such as Mandarin, English or Spanish. But Swahili appears to be the only language boasting more than 200 million speakers that has more second-language speakers than native ones.

Read more: What Kwanzaa means for Black Americans

By immersing themselves in the affairs of a maritime culture at a key commercial gateway, the people who were eventually designated Waswahili (Swahili people) created a niche for themselves. They were important enough in the trade that newcomers had little choice but to speak Swahili as the language of trade and diplomacy. And the Swahili population became more entrenched as successive generations of second-language speakers of Swahili lost their ancestral languages and became bona fide Swahili.

The key to understanding this story is to look deeply at the Swahili people's response to challenges. At the ways in which they made their fortunes and dealt with misfortunes. And, most important, at how they honed their skills in balancing confrontation and resistance with adaptation and innovation as they interacted with arrivals from other language backgrounds.
This is an edited extract of the first chapter of The Story of Swahili from Ohio University Press

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The story of how Swahili became Africa's most spoken language

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Once just an obscure island dialect of an African Bantu tongue, Swahili has evolved into Africa's most internationally recognised language. It is peer to the few languages of the world that boast over 200 million users.

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"Here lived Dolly Pentreath, one of the last speakers of the Cornish language, as her native tongue died December 1777." So says a faded granite plaque on an old stone wall in Mousehole, a fishing village in south-western Cornwall that heaved with holidaymakers on a hot summer's afternoon. I stopped to take in this momentous linguistic monument, then turned against the crowd and walked uphill along a sunken lane until a half mile later I stumbled into a graveyard.

Here, in the neighbouring village of Paul, a faded headstone commissioned in 1860 by Napoleon's nephew, the linguist Prince Louis Lucien Bonaparte, marks Pentreath's grave. A humble "fishwife" from Mousehole, Pentreath spoke Kernewek (or Cornish), a Celtic language older than English that all but disappeared after her death.

Cornwall's history, culture and language stretches back to the end of the Roman Empire in Britain. Although modern Cornwall is one of the United Kingdom's most beloved tourist spots, the region struggles with unemployment, a housing crisis and more, firing up calls for more independence from distant London amongst nationalist groups who are proud of their distinct heritage. A scholarly revival in the 20th Century brought Cornwall's indigenous language back from the dead, and now, as the number of speakers increases, Kernewekis helping Cornwall to cement its Celtic identity in modern Britain.

"Dalghus yw Kernewek avel tra yn gwirvos [Cornish is inclusive as a phenomenon]," said Will Coleman, the founder of Go Cornish, an educational project providing Cornish language teaching programmes to primary schools. " Dell vynnav, pub huni a drig omma yn Kernow dhe omglew bos an yeth rann poosek a'ga honanieth gonisogethek [And I want anyone who lives here in Cornwall to feel that the language is an important part of their cultural identity]."

The origins of Kernewekare found in Common Brythonic, a Celtic language spoken by native Britons that diverged into Welsh, Breton (still spoken in Brittany, France) and Cumbric (spoken mainly in northern England and southern Scotland until about the 12th Century) when Anglo-Saxon invaders pushed British kingdoms westwards - and even across the English Channel to Brittany - from the 5th Century CE onwards. In Britain's south-west, the isolated Cornish peninsula became a natural refuge for the language, and as many as 38,000 people (out of a total population of around 50,000) spoke Kernewekat its peak in the Middle Ages.

The number of speakers fell dramatically, though, when the Tudors imposed English in Cornish-speaking churches after the bloody 1549 Prayer Book Rebellion (a mass uprising against the English monarchy that left thousands across the south-west dead), and, by 1777, just a handful of Cornish speakers remained in far western holdouts. Pentreath's death came to represent the death of the language itself - until a Cornish scholar named Henry Jenner published A Handbook of the Cornish Language in 1904, which kickstarted a Celtic revival in Cornwall.

Kernewek, though, remained in the domain of academics and eccentrics for decades. "I only knew there was a Cornish language when I was growing up because we had this tea towel with these strange words that I didn't understand on it," said Coleman, who started Go Cornish - which now helps around 10,000 students learn Kernewek in 50 primary schools - as a response to the invisibility of his homeland's native language. "But the tea towel taught me basic words; like bara for bread, or chi for house. Then at secondary school, I could do a half-hour Cornish language club a week. But that was it."

" Dydh da," I heard as I walked into Kowsva, a Cornish-language bookshop located in the former mining town of Camborne, a 40-minute drive east of Mousehole. Copies of the Tin Tin comics translated into Cornish caught my attention, while stacks of English-Cornish dictionaries and medieval plays like the Ordinalia - an epic 14th-Century mystery written in Middle Cornish - filled the shelves.

I'd been greeted in Cornish on my way in and given a " meur ras" (thank you) and " duw genes" (goodbye) by the volunteers on my way out of the bookshop. Kowsva is one of the projects overseen by Kowethas an Yeth Kernewek (The Cornish Language Fellowship), a charity that also organises events like the Pennseythen Gernewek, a three-day "Cornish Language Weekend" that claims to be the largest annual gathering of Cornish speakers in the world.

Kowsva(which roughly translates as "talking place") is part of the wider " Heartlands" project, a repurposed mine site outside Camborne that's home to a mining museum and a "Diaspora Garden" exploring Cornish links across the world. Meanwhile, a formerly derelict brewery in the nearby town of Redruth is home to Kresen Kernow, a cultural centre housing the Cornish archives, which can be visited by anyone interested in the Cornish language and heritage. Both institutions are feeding the cultural demand of a Cornish "nation" that's hoping to flourish once more.

Kresen Kernow in Redruth is a cultural centre housing the Cornish archives (Credit: Richard Collett)

"In the five years that I've worked at the Cornish Language Fellowship, we've seen a massive shift towards people learning and speaking Cornish," said Emma Jenkin, the coordinator for Kowethas an Yeth Kernewek. "I was in the pub in Truro just last night, where our language group meets a few times a month to speak only in Cornish."

In 2010, Unesco reclassified Cornish from "extinct" to "critically endangered", as the language spread from academia into mainstream education and use. According to the Cornish Language Office, a local governmental organisation that aims to increase the use of Cornish as a community language, an estimated 400 speakers are at an advanced level and 2,000 are conversational, while many thousands more have some knowledge of the language. During the Covid-19 lockdown, Jenkin saw a surge in signups for the online Cornish language lessons offered by Kowethas an Yeth Kernewek, and now they have more demand than there are teachers.

The revival of the language is in full swing, but it's not been smooth sailing. Coleman explained how Cornish has been plagued by what he called the "spelling wars", a schism between different groups that promoted different versions and spellings of the language. Even the word Kernewekhas several different spellings, while the idea of a "Cornish revival" is even contentious.

"It was never extinct," said Kensa Broadhurst, a Cornish language teacher and researcher at the University of Exeter's Institute of Cornish Studies. "It was always critically endangered, but it was never extinct."

Was Dolly Pentreath, the fishwife whose story I'd searched out in Mousehole, really the last Cornish speaker? "No," said Broadhurst. "There were others after her that spoke Cornish, families that you can trace the link down through the 19th Century."

The language also survived in common use in Cornish names, place names and the numbers used by fishermen in places like Penzance and Mousehole, while academics continued to write papers and publish dictionaries that demonstrated an active use of the language after Pentreath's death. Jenner's A Handbook of the Cornish Language, published in 1904, is widely taken as the moment when the Cornish language was brought back from the dead, but according to Broadhurst, the extinction myth was emphasised to increase the allure of the "revival".

The distinction shows that Cornish is not simply a dead language made up again by 20th-Century academics, but a language that has a continual link to Cornwall's past. Broadhurst believes this not only helps push Cornwall's unique identity as what she called the "fifth nation of the United Kingdom" but could provide the credibility the language needs to be taught in secondary schools, rather than just nurseries and primary schools as it currently is.

For many, the language is a link to a lost Cornish heritage that was heavily Anglicised over the centuries. It's a heritage that's often difficult to describe in English terms. "It was always in me," said Esther Johns, a Cornish teacher who runs the Cornish language cookery show Kegin Esther (Cooking With Esther) on the An Mis television programme. "When I was growing up, my mother always told me that we weren't English. We were Cornish. So, we always had a feeling that something was missing."

The revival of the language is part of a wider cultural rally that in recent years has seen Cornish-language films, the release of albums sung entirely in Cornish by the Welsh singer Gwenno, and the performance of the Ordinalia plays with speaking parts in Cornish that were banned by the English monarchy and branded as heretical in the 16th Century. Johns recently released a Cornish language cookery book, too.

But Cornish has many challenges to overcome, including a lack of qualified teachers and competing demands for funding in a region that's consistently ranked as one of the poorest in Northern Europe.

Mousehole, the traditional fishing village where my journey in search of the Cornish language began, is beset by a lack of affordable housing driven by overtourism and high levels of second-home ownership. In a part of the United Kingdom where more than 22,000 people are on a social and affordable housing register, properties in Mousehole are often empty outside of the summer tourist season.

Broadhurst told me that Camborne, where she lives, is home to the largest food bank in Cornwall, with up to 15,000 local families receiving emergency food parcels every month. Poverty is rife in Cornwall, a situation which has led to regular demands for devolution, or even outright independence in Cornwall, which in turn fuels a desire for a national language.

Broadhurst believes that Cornish can be an economic as well as a cultural asset. "We can develop jobs where learning Cornish is useful," she said. "I'd love it if every pub in Cornwall had a menu in English and Cornish, and the bar staff can ask people what they want to drink in Cornish, and people can reply: " Pinta Korev, mar pleg" [a pint of beer, please]. That would be great."
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Why Cornwall is resurrecting its indigenous language

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As Britain redefines its modern identity, the Cornish are re-finding their place in the nation through their ancient language, Kernewek.

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The secret British language that was used to outwit the Nazis

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Very few people outside the island know that Jersey has its own language – or that it was cannily used as a clandestine code during German occupation in WW2.

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"You're acting white." This harmful statement is commonly directed toward people of color (POC) who hear it from their colleagues, friends and family.

"Acting white" is something that many people of color find themselves doing in order to survive a lack of diversity in the workplace. If the dominant culture is white, how else can the person get ahead in their career, connect with a colleague and make it in their industry?

This is also a form of code-switching . Code-switching, by definition, is when a person changes their language, dialect, behavior or appearance in order to fit into the dominant culture.

Code-switching is a common practice amongst POC who are cultural minorities in certain spaces. It's used as a survival tool to get ahead in business, life and personal relationships. Although it's become a common practice for many POC, code-switching isn't harmless. In fact, there are negative psychological effects of code-switching that may not be obvious to managers, executives and others in a person of color's life.

Here are some ways people code-switch, how it harms POC and some ways organizations can help eliminate the need for code-switching.

Why people of color code-switch

There are many reasons why people code-switch in their daily lives. People might code-switch for professional advancement. One study showed that people played down their race if they were a racial minority in order to get hired in corporate spaces. Others code-switched in order to increase their chances of getting a promotion , being considered for a raise or earning a high-profile assignment once they're employed.

POC can often distance themselves from racial stereotypes in the workplace in order to be seen as leaders in the eyes of their colleagues. They may downplay their dialect , like African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) , in order to sound more like the dominant culture. In fact, one study reported that 38% of Black Americans and 45% of Latinos felt judged for their language, accent or dialect in the workplace. Thus, code-switching helps alleviate the tension of being "othered" in the workplace.

Code-switching can also include changes to one's physical appearance. In particular, women with cultural hairstyles or headscarves may choose to wear their hair in a particular way to blend in with the dominant culture. Black women have been shown to be 80% more likely to change their hairstyle to meet societal norms at work with the goal of being seen as "more professional."

All of these cultural adaptations can have serious consequences for the individual. POC are mentally suffering from always having to change the outward manifestations of their cultures to adapt to what they perceive are the norms of their workplaces.
Related: Companies Aren't Talking About Black Vernacular and Dialect Bias in The Workplace. Here's Why That Needs to Change.
The psychological impacts of code-switching

Code-switching can affect a person's mental state and wellbeing in more ways than one. Research suggests that code-switching to avoid stereotypes can affect work performance over time. This can look like a POC not being as present or focused because they're too busy trying to avoid negative judgments or repercussions for how they look or speak.

Constantly code-switching has also been associated with feelings of burnout and exhaustion. At times, it can feel like the person is wearing a mask eight hours a day, without a break or time to express their authenticity.

One study suggested that those who are labeled as " acting white " may experience psychological damage later on down the road. People of color labeled in this way can often feel like they're not Black enough, Latino enough, Asian enough and so on. The effect is a long-term imposter syndrome where the person doesn't feel a sense of belonging in any group and can feel lonely and left out.

Overall, code-switching can worsen stress and feelings of anxiety , especially when the person is in a stressful situation or having to make difficult decisions. Constantly feeling pulled to be someone they're not, hiding their authentic self, and trying to fit into a dominant culture can be toxic emotionally and mentally for POC.
Related: 4 Ways to Cultivate Inclusion and Compassion In the Workplace
So how can we make code-switching a thing of the past and encourage authenticity and humanity in the workplace?

Make code-switching a thing of the past with an inclusive workplace

It all starts with cultivating a sense of belonging and bringing diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) to the forefront. Companies with very little diversity and who struggle with inclusivity may feel comfortable with the dominant culture and view the struggles of minorities in the office as invisible.

However, individuals in the workplace can make a conscious decision to pay attention to the ways their minority colleagues are having to shift who they are. They can practice better allyship and become a support system that encourages a person of color to feel a sense of belonging when embracing their authenticity.

Hiring managers also have a role to play when it comes to promoting DEI and curbing the effects of code-switching. Hiring managers can be mindful of hiring for culture "adds," not culture fits. Culture adds are people who add or contribute to the culture by bringing a different background, experience or perspective.
Related: 6 Ways to Offer Allyship to Black Entrepreneurs
Hiring for culture fits ensures that the dominant culture stays the same, and this practice can often push those who are different to the margins and result in code-switching. Hiring for culture adds helps open the door to diverse representation and can bring more development, innovation and inclusivity to the workplace.

It's also important to increase the cultural competency of all employees through DEI programming. This can look like hiring a full-time, in-house diversity officer or hosting a series of workshops and trainings with a diversity consultant to increase cultural competency and build strategies that support belonging, inclusion and safety for POC and minorities.

Final thoughts

Code-switching isn't just a problem for people of color, it's an institutional problem that should be on the radar of leadership. Every time a person of color code switches in the workplace, the company loses a valuable opportunity to promote inclusion, authenticity and belonging.

While creating the appearance that everyone is the same is appealing to some, it is actually an illusion that ignores and suppresses unique contributions. This results in less development and innovation in the long run.

Companies should work to increase their cultural competency and learn to accept diverse dialects, behaviors and perspectives in order to advance the overall well-being and health of the organization and its employees.

Code-switching is a health hazard for POC, in the short and long term. Companies can benefit from encouraging authenticity and honesty in the workplace and rewarding those who contribute their gifts while also expressing their authentic selves.

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How Code-Switching Hurts People of Color in the Workplace - NewsBreak

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When someone feels as though they can't be their real self at work, how they be productive in the long-term?

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African-American Vernacular English (AAVE), also known as Black Vernacular English (BVA) or ebonics, is a historic American English dialect that millions of people speak. It's a part of our cultural DNA and is a blend of words and ways of speaking rooted in various African cultures as well as the English spoken in Southern U.S. states, with additional contributions from Creole.

This way of speaking has long had negative connotations associated with it. People who speak AAVE are often seen as uneducated and not a cultural fit in workplaces managed by the dominant culture. Many Black people are penalized for a way of speaking that's deeply rooted in this country and yet, despite their education, accomplishments and accolades, speaking AAVE can significantly diminish their professional prospects.

This shouldn't be the case. Speaking a different dialect should not negate the professional impact, skills and value that a worker brings. Companies that claim to support diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) while simultaneously discriminating against language or dialect should reconsider their stance on the topic.

I am working to change that. I help organizations break barriers and integrate DEIB into their business frameworks with a human-centered approach. I will share how organizations like yours can be more conscious about language and dialect bias to do better on their DEI and inclusion goals.

Hire for a culture "add," not a culture "fit"

Many individuals who speak AAVE are often dismissed in the job interview process because they don't seem like a good cultural "fit." I've discussed the dangers of hiring for culture fit before, but it's worth noting that language or dialect should not invalidate a person's ability to contribute, add value or participate in work life.

Instead of assuming the status quo is the ideal culture in the company, consider the very real possibility that having folks who speak AAVE or another dialect or language on the team can truly "add" to the company culture. For example, perhaps someone speaking AAVE can bring a new perspective to company projects or dialogues. Or perhaps they can connect with diverse partners and stakeholders in a way that the dominant culture hasn't previously found successful. Think outside the box about how someone's language or dialect can actually enhance your company culture instead of "fit" into it.
Related: Avoiding the Sea of Sameness: How Hiring for Culture Improves DEI
Never judge a book by its cover

Although people who speak AAVE are often described as "ghetto," "loud," or "aggressive," it's often a misconception. A prime example is Angel Reese, a Louisiana State University basketball player who has skyrocketed in popularity in recent weeks. She's had to face dialect and gender bias in the public eye.

Angel said, "I'm too hood. I'm too ghetto. I don't fit the narrative and I'm ok with that. I'm from Baltimore where you hoop and talk trash. If I was a boy, y'all wouldn't be saying nun at all." Angel was referring to a culture of basketball that has a double standard for women, specifically for women who speak like her. While some are considered "ladylike" in the sport, others are called something very different.

Apply this same logic to the workplace. If a worker doesn't speak exactly like another colleague who represents the norm of the workplace culture , will they still be accepted and feel a sense of belonging? Why should language or dialect stand in the way of someone belonging in the workplace or prevent them from getting hired at all?
Related: Hire Like a Diversity Expert: 5 Key Qualities of Inclusive Employees
DEI extends beyond skin and gender. Dialect and language should not create a hostile atmosphere where Black workers are undervalued, demeaned or held down at lower rungs in the organization because of the way they speak.

Bias against people who speak AAVE hurts organizations, too

Did you know the fastest- growing entrepreneurial demographic in the United States is Black women? Black women aren't waiting for organizations that exhibit bias in their company culture to accept them - they've moved on to building their own empires.
Related: 5 Qualities of Black Excellence Overlooked in the Workplace
Organizations that consciously or unconsciously bias their employee pool based on the dialect of English the applicant speaks are losing out in the end. As mentioned, dialect does not equate to intelligence, talent or value. Choosing not to hire a qualified candidate because they speak AAVE only pushes them to take their talents elsewhere which can often leave organizations at a deficit in terms of intellect, innovation and growth.

In this sense, bias not only hurts the person who experiences it, but it hurts organizations, too. This type of bias holds everyone back. So, why not remove the barrier to access, create more empathy and understanding of the various cultures that live within the United States, and see candidates through the lens of value, character and contribution?

Final thoughts

Organizations are losing out every time they pass over a candidate that speaks a dialect of English that is not the cultural norm. Race, gender, ability and other identifiers are all seen as important parts of DEI that add to organizational growth and innovation. But why are dialect and language left out?

The people who experience some of the most bias are those who don't look or speak like those in the dominant culture. Sticking to the norm is not always the best or only way. I invite organizations to expand their definition of belonging and value and to create increased awareness around dialect bias.

Human Resources and other groups involved in the hiring process and people management functions should put into place bias guardrails that push on hiring managers who may be discriminating against potential employees based on their dialect of English. The financial and cultural costs are too high to ignore. AAVE is English and should be valued and seen as such within institutions.

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Companies Aren't Talking About Black Vernacular and Dialect Bias in The Workplace. Here's Why That Needs to Change. - NewsBreak

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One of the biggest strikes against Black workers in the United States isn't always the way they look or dress, but it can often be something more subtle and ingrained: how they speak.

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Auf SPIEGEL-Anfrage reagierte das Präsidium sofort und stellte ebenfalls ein Foto "aus einer Klasse" zur Verfügung. Das zeigt kein vorgefertigtes Arbeitsblatt mit gedruckter Überschrift, sondern ein komplett in Kinderhandschrift verfasstes Regelwerk, das die entsprechende Vorgabe zum Deutschsprechen enthält.

Zahlreiche Widersprüche in der Kommunikation

In der Kommunikation zwischen Schule und Eltern gibt es zahlreiche weitere Widersprüche, auf die auch der Anwalt in seinem jüngsten Schreiben verweist, weshalb er sich unter anderem eine Dienstaufsichtsbeschwerde gegen die Lehrerin vorbehalte. Dazu lag aber noch keine Rückmeldung der Behörde vor.

Das Regierungspräsidium äußerte sich zunächst nur zu der Deutschpflicht, die an dieser Schule nicht diskriminierend sei. Allerdings solle "die Kommunikation mit der Elternschaft auf diesem pädagogischen Feld" intensiviert und damit verbessert werden.

Für Tekinoglu und die betroffene Familie ist die Sache damit aber noch nicht erledigt. Er wolle sachlich geklärt wissen, ob eine solche Vereinbarung rechtens sei - oder ob sie einzelne Gruppen diskriminiere: "Würde bei Gebrauch der beispielsweise englischen Sprache oder lateinischen Sprache durch Schüler außerhalb des Unterrichts auf dem Schulgelände während der Unterrichtspause eine entsprechende Strafarbeit verfügt werden?", fragt Tekinoglu die Behörde.

Gilt Verbot auch für Englisch oder Latein?

Er habe Sorge, dass die Regel nur auf sogenannte migrantische Sprachen wie Türkisch oder Arabisch abziele, nicht aber auf die sogenannten Prestigesprachen. Die Deutschpflicht könne so populistisch instrumentalisiert werden, etwa indem die Schülerinnen und Schüler als Integrationsverweigerer dargestellt würden.

Das Thema wurde 2017 auch von der AfD-Fraktion im baden-württembergischen Landtag aufgegriffen. Das Kultusministerium antwortete auf den Fragenkatalog der Partei zu "Deutsch als verpflichtende Umgangssprache an Schulen", dasses nicht mit dem Grundgesetz vereinbar wäre, wenn der Staat vorschreiben würde, welche Sprache auf dem Schulhof zu sprechen wäre. Auch die schulische Regelung eines Verbots durch Schul- oder Hausordnungen wäre demnach nicht zulässig.

Einen Widerspruch zu der aktuellen Regelung an der Grundschule in Blumbergsieht das Ministerium aber nicht. Es sei "legitim und auch erwünscht, wenn sich Schulgemeinschaften oder einzelne Klassen Gedanken über den gemeinsamen Umgang und das Miteinander in der Schule machen", teilte die Pressesprecherin auf Nachfrage mit.

Tekinoglu zieht nun auch eine Klage nach dem Antidiskriminierungsgesetz in Betracht. Die Antidiskriminierungsstelle des Bundes hat sich schon mal mit einem ähnlichen Fall befasst , allerdings nicht an Schulen, sondern im Arbeitsleben. Demnach dürfen Arbeitgeber ihren Angestellten nicht vorschreiben, welche Sprache sie im Pausenraum sprechen.

Das gelte voraussichtlich auch, wenn es beispielsweise in der Vergangenheit zu Konflikten im Pausenraum gekommen sei, führt die Antidiskriminierungsstelle aus. Denn der Eingriff in die Privatsphäre der Mitarbeitenden, deren Muttersprache nicht Deutsch sei, sei demgegenüber wohl unverhältnismäßig.

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Eltern wehren sich gegen Strafarbeit für Drittklässlerin

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Eine Grundschülerin in Baden-Württemberg sprach auf dem Schulhof Türkisch - und musste deshalb eine Strafarbeit schreiben. Zwischen der Schule und den Eltern ist nun ein Streit entbrannt.

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Barcelona Age Factor Project

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The study compared the performance of bilingual Catalan-Spanish learners who began a first and / or second foreign language (FL) at ages 4, 8, 11, 14, and 18+ years (N = approx. 2,000). Participants were drawn from a range of state schools (N = 30) and varying socio-economic areas.

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Noel Quiñones - "8 Confessions of My Tongue" @WANPOETRY

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Do you want to know a secret? A secret so shameful that I hid it for decades? It's only because of a chance conversation that I revealed it at all.

I was talking to a friend and colleague, Jacinta Nandi. She's an author, like me. Her father comes from northeastern India, like mine. Both of our fathers grew up speaking Bengali. Her father emigrated to England, and mine to Germany, where I grew up. Jacinta's father taught her a wealth of English puns - but, she says, "he never taught me a single word in Bengali". Like mine.

My father always spoke German to me. Of course I heard him speak Bengali: on the phone, or to the few Indian friends living in Germany. But I couldn't understand what he was saying. Even worse, my name, Mithu, is Bengali, but native Bengali speakers have told me that I don't pronounce it correctly.

Yes, that's right, I can't even say my own name.

Mithu Sanyal as a child, with her parents (Credit: Mithu Sanyal)

Up until my conversation with Jacinta I'd thought there was something seriously wrong with me. What kind of child doesn't learn their father's language?

Many of us, as it turns out.

Annick De Houwer is the director of the Harmonious Bilingualism Network and professor emerita of language acquisition and multilingualism at the University of Erfurt in Germany, and one of the world's leading experts on how and why some families lose their languages. In 2003, she published results from a survey of language use in 18,000 families in Flanders, a Dutch-speaking region of Belgium.

"I discovered how often it happens that bilingually raised children don't speak two languages," explains De Houwer, who is also the president of the International Association of the Study of Child Language. The survey and later studies by De Houwer and others across different countries and languages found that between 12% and 44% of children who grow up hearing two or more languages, actually end up speaking only one language. "Most babies start by learning words in both languages. But when they go to preschool they only continue with one. And why is that? Because suddenly there is only a focus on this one part of them and children soon sense that their other language is worthless. Worthless!"

Once I started thinking about it, I couldn't stop asking people how it felt not to be able to speak their family's language. Many opened up about feelings they'd bottled up all their life.

"My father was born in Lebanon but he spoke Arabic only on the phone or with visitors or in restaurants," says Andrea Karimé, a children's author and storyteller in Germany. "So as a child, I thought he was speaking a secret language. My father became a secret to me."

Emily Chowdhury, a Berlin-based artist, spoke of rejection: "When my parents discussed things we weren't supposed to hear, they switched to Bengali. Language was used to keep us out."

At the same time, and rather paradoxically, for those of us who inherited our ancestors' looks and names, there is often a wider social expectation that we would speak their language. When that is not the case, the reaction can be harsh. I love the poem " 8 Confessions of My Tongue". The poet Noel Quiñones, who was born and raised in the US, describes the experience of having Puerto Rican ancestry yet not being fluent in Spanish: "My last name an invitation to strangers who say: your parents should have taught you". Or: you should have made more of an effort, as if toddlers put their fingers into their ears as soon as their parents speak Spanish. Among non-Spanish-speaking Latinos, there is a common experience of feeling ashamed or having their identity questioned over their language loss, research suggests.

I think of these lost languages as our "othertongues". They are present in our ancestry and childhood memories, and yet, strangely out of reach, because we never learned them ourselves, or were encouraged to forget.

In my case, there were actually two losses. I didn't learn my mother's native language, Polish, either. When I was growing up, my parents were warned against teaching me Bengali or Polish. They were told that if children learn more than one language simultaneously, they won't learn any of them properly. As if their languages might contaminate the "real" language - in this case, German.

"That's not a thing of the past, unfortunately," says De Houwer, referring to the long-disproven idea that bilingualism might hold children back, or confuse them. In fact, research has shown that bilingual children's speech is not delayed, and their tendency to sometimes mix their languages (known as code-switching, or translanguaging) does not mean they are confusing the two. Rather, it is a sign that they are using their dual vocabulary resourcefully, picking the most appropriate words for any given context.

Mithu Sanyal as a baby, with her father (Credit: Mithu Sanyal)

Martha Bigelow, a professor for second language education at the University of Minnesota in the US, says there are still a lot of mistaken beliefs about language learning, "like it's better to not translanguage [mix languages], like it's better for some reason to know less than it is to know more". These beliefs have a concrete impact: "[In the United States] the advice is still that to learn English it's best to just speak English."

Even when it comes to second languages, there are clear distinctions in how society treats them. English is omnipresent in Germany, and considered desirable. My husband is British, and everybody speaks English to him even though his German is often better than their English. But other languages aren't welcomed in the same way. Turkish is one of the largest minority languages spoken in Germany, with a history that reaches back to labour migration from Turkey in the 1960s. And yet, Turkish speakers still face discrimination.

In 2020, a nine-year-old girl was reprimanded by her teacher for speaking Turkish to her friend in the playground of their school in Germany. As punishment, she was ordered to write an essay titled: " Why we speak German in school." The resulting essay included lines such as: "We are not allowed to speak our mother tongue. So that we improve our German". Her family made a formal complaint with the support of a lawyer, who questioned whether a child speaking English during breaktime would have been punished in the same way. There is a saying among Germans of Turkish ancestry: Turkish isn't a language you learn, Turkish is a language you forget as quickly as possible.

When my hometown in Germany, Düsseldorf, put up a street sign in Arabic as part of a celebration of multilingualism, it was smeared with racist graffiti, and attracted online comments demanding that "they" should learn German. While a street sign in Japanese that was put up at the same time was fine.

What explains this dramatic difference in how languages are valued?

Research suggests that it's often not about the languages at all - but about social attitudes, especially to immigration.

"[In Germany] immigration is still viewed as the exception to the rule, as not normal. Children who speak another language at home are seen as children who don't speak German at home," Mark Terkessidis, a well-known author in the field of migration and racism studies and member of the Academie der Künste der Welt, the academy of the arts of the world. "So when these kids come to school there's a focus on the deficit and not on the resource."

The resulting loss can have a profound impact on family relations. Parents may feel sad if their children do not speak their language. These feelings can go both ways. Janice Nakamura, professor of English at Kanagawa University in Japan, studied children in mixed families in Japan who could not speak the language of their non-Japanese parent. As adults, many felt angry with their parents. This is what Nakamura described as "language regret": the sense of a lost opportunity, because they didn't learn the other language.

De Houwer comments:. "So whichever way you put it, it's not good for family relations. It's really a very important thing to speak the languages of your parents: for the parents, for the children, for the family."

There are many things society can do to support this process, says De Houwer. One practical example is how multilingualism is treated in schools. "It is really necessary to actively - actively! - respect all the languages that children bring to the classroom and there are very simple ways of doing that. For instance, pronouncing a child's name correctly."

At this point in the interview I start crying, thinking of my own name and my inability to say it properly for so long. In De Houwer's view, such small steps could make a big difference, as could simply asking children how to say "hello" in the language they speak at home: "Important things like that. And then you can learn these," she continues. "And you can ask children to help you. And then all the children in the class are going to have to learn how to say hello to this new kid. To show an appreciation of all those different languages. It's a matter of paying attention to it. It's not a matter of money. It's a matter of changing attitude."

This appreciation, giving languages a more visible presence can also be helpful, says Bigelow. "It shouldn't just be a 'home language', it should be an 'everywhere language' that is legitimised in a lot of public spaces through language policies and signs in the streets."

On a personal level, there's of course one more way to fix language loss: by reclaiming the "othertongue" later in life. This can be a lot harder than it sounds.

Here is a recording of my dad trying to teach me a Bengali nursery rhyme, called "Ashmooli Pashmooli". Just to keep me on my toes, every time he translates it for me, the meaning seems to change a bit.

Mithu Sanyal wanted to learn her father's language

As an adult, I tried to learn Bengali again and again. And again. After years of effort, one of the few sentences I can say is: Ami Bangla tschiketschi. I'm learning Bengali. Which feels like a lie. The only thing I've learned is that it's simply too late for that now.

To my surprise, Bigelow disagrees. "It's not necessary to learn a language young. Younger is not always better." The so-called critical period of language-learning, during which we can learn to speak it fluently, is longer and more flexible than was previously thought, research suggests. Age is one of many factors that influence language-learning success, studies have shown, alongside other factors such as how much time you invest in learning the language, your motivation, and whether you have a community to share it with ( Read BBC Future's previous report on age and language-learning.)

Bigelow also suggests being more flexible in how we view multilingualism: "You don't have to be perfectly fluent, or as fluent in all your languages as you are in your strongest one. We shouldn't hold the bar so high." For some, multilingualism may mean occasionally using words or phrases from one of the family's languages: "There are many ways of being multilingual."

De Houwer says that thinking about your needs can also help you choose the right learning strategy. "If there's an emotional need to connect with your family, or with your origin, or one part of your origin, then don't start your language journey by learning to read and write in that other language. Start with learning to talk and have conversations. You want to make friends."

This idea of connection resonates. I still feel the pain of not being able to read the books my father loved when he was a child. But I also feel joy whenever I hear Bengali, recognising it on the street even from a distance. I can love Bengali even though I'll never be able to speak it properly. I can find meaning in its special features, like the fact that Bengali nouns and pronouns have no gender - or all genders. And my favourite one: Bengali has six grammatical cases, and the fourth case is just for an unconditional present that you don't have to give back. This is what I hope all our othertongues will be one day: presents that are freely given and received.

--
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'I can't say my own name': The pain of language loss in families

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Mithu Sanyal never learned her father's native language, Bengali, as a child. Is it too late to reclaim it?

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Students at the University of Amsterdam Photograph: Ian Dagnall/Alamy

As Britain voted to leave the EU, Dutch universities began offering more courses in English and foreigners streamed in.

But with 122,287 international students in higher education in the Netherlands - 15% of all the country's students - the government is proposing a cap on the number of students from outside the European Economic Area in some subjects and forcing universities to offer at least two-thirds of the content of standard bachelor's degrees in Dutch, unless a university justifies an exemption.

International students may also be required to learn basic Dutch , in an effort to increase their chances of staying in the Netherlands and injecting much-needed workforce skills .

"My starting point is that the language of education is Dutch," said the education minister, Robbert Dijkgraaf. "There can be room in the curriculum for another language, but my proposal is that it should not be more than a third. That means that most of your education is in Dutch, but if you want to give a few specialist subjects in English, that is allowed.

"Exceptions are possible, but will need special permission ... [For example] if you want to attract the best violinists in the world, it might help to offer this education in English."

This is a change of tone in one of the world's most internationally connected places, with widespread English proficiency and impressive digital skills.

Last year, in response to a housing crisis , some Dutch universities wrote to international students warning them not to come unless they had already secured accommodation . Dijkgraaf also asked institutions to stop actively recruiting abroad. Meanwhile, the mayor of Amsterdam, Femke Halsema, has suggested international residents should do more to learn Dutch.

"The current law says 'Dutch by default', there's a huge hole in the net and everyone swims through it," Dijkgraaf said. "So we have to formulate the exceptions precisely. It might look like you allow more exceptions, but I think it's the other way around."

His bill, to be published shortly, followed by a summer consultation, would come into force in September 2024. But it has already received mixed reactions.

David Schindler, an associate professor of economics at Tilburg University, pointed to research suggesting international students gave back more financially than they cost - up to €17,000 (£14,500) for a European student and between €69,000 and €94,000 for non-European students, because a quarter stay on after completing their degrees. He called the proposals "truly insane".

"Universities should teach what is most helpful to their students but mandating this top-down is going to kill a substantial part of Dutch academia," he said. "What concerns me most is the drop in research quality I foresee, while research and innovation are some of the biggest drivers of economic growth."

Jeanet van der Laan, an MP for the liberal D66 party, said high-level Dutch language skills needed to be preserved but voiced concerns about the bill. "Conservative parties are proposing to force all international students to follow part of the curriculum in Dutch," she said. "This high threshold would make ambitious, international talents think twice before registering in our country, so we will miss out on talent we want."

The Universities of the Netherlands Association, however, believes local students should improve their Dutch and international students should learn it. "There are still possibilities for English-language education," said its spokesperson, Ruben Puylaert. "But we do believe this national control ... interferes with the autonomy of universities."

More Dutch students could also study abroad, according to Saoradh Favier, a researcher at the Nuffic organisation for internationalisation. "We expect [the] planned measures will allow universities to bring student numbers more in line with capacity, while maintaining the positives of internationalisation," she added.

Aziza Filal, the chair of Amsterdam's ASVA student union, said: "If [more] bachelor's [degrees] are in Dutch, they won't be accessible to internationals any more, which is a shame. On the other hand, if you stop 'Englishing' degrees, the stream will be far smaller. You see, internationals can't get houses and often go back to their home country after sleeping for months in hostels, having lost a lot of money."

Fewer students could mean a better university experience: research suggests international students are most likely to suffer from study stress and, according to Dijkgraaf, once aspiring students had moved to the Netherlands "we need to take care of you properly".

There could be positives elsewhere, Schindler added: "A few people have posted that this will be a great opportunity for British or Swedish universities!"

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'Dutch by default': Netherlands seeks curbs on English-language university courses - NewsBreak

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Education bill to require two-thirds of content for standard bachelor's degrees to be in Dutch

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Shutterstock/Sophie Dover

We are witnessing a resurgence of Indigenous knowledge and growing acknowledgement of its scientific value worldwide.

In Aotearoa, there's been some progress, including the introduction of a public holiday to mark Matariki , the beginning of a new year in maramataka - the Māori calendar based on the phases of the Moon, the movement of stars and the timing of ecological changes.

But progress has not been straightforward, with some scientists publicly questioning the scientific value of mātauranga .

At the same time, Māori scientists have drawn on and advanced mātauranga and continue to make space for te reo, tikanga and honouring Te Tiriti o Waitangi in research.

Our recent publication explores pūtaiao - a way of conducting research grounded in kaupapa Māori.

In education, pūtaiao is often simplified to mean science taught in Māori-medium schools that includes mātauranga, or science taught in te reo more broadly. But science based on kaupapa Māori is generally by Māori, for Māori and with Māori.

Our research extends kaupapa Māori and the important work of pūtaiao in schools into tertiary scientific research. We envision pūtaiao as a way of doing science that is led by Māori and firmly positioned in te ao Māori (including mātauranga, te reo and tikanga).
Read more: Indigenous knowledge offers solutions, but its use must be based on meaningful collaboration with Indigenous communities
Pūtaiao as decolonising science

Pūtaiao privileges Māori ways of knowing, being and doing. It is a political speaking back for the inclusion of te ao Māori - mātauranga, te reo, tikanga and Te Tiriti o Waitangi - in science.

Conducting research this way is not new. Many Māori scientists have drawn on mātauranga and kaupapa Māori in their research for decades. Our conceptualisation of pūtaiao is an affirmation of the work of Māori scientists and a pathway for redefining and transforming scientific research for future generations.

Decolonising science is at the heart of pūtaiao. It challenges and critiques the academy and disciplines of Western science. Decolonising science requires a focus on histories, structures and institutions that act as barriers to mātauranga, te reo and tikanga.
Read more: Racism, exclusion and tokenism: how Māori and Pacific science graduates are still marginalised at university
We argue that decolonising science is a necessary step before we can Indigenise science.

Like mātauranga, pūtaiao is embedded in place and in the people of those places. It centres, prioritises and affirms Māori identity in the context of scientific research and science identity.

The importance of the researcher in pūtaiao

How we identify as Māori - tangata whenua or rāwaho (people not related to the hapū or whānau), ahi kā (people who keep the home fires burning) or ahi mātaotao (people who may have been disconnected to the land through lack of occupation over generations) - fundamentally changes how we interact with people and place through research.

To practise pūtaiao effectively, researchers are required to understand who they are and how that informs the research questions asked, the research relationships formed, the location of the research and the way research is conducted.

Kaupapa Māori, as articulated by distinguished education scholar Graham Hingangaroa Smith, requires two approaches to decolonisation: structuralist and culturalist .
Read more: Building bridges between scientific and Indigenous knowledge
Culturalist approaches centre te reo, mātauranga and tikanga. The groundbreaking work led by professor of marine science and aquaculture Kura Paul-Burke , using mātauranga to enhance shellfish restoration , is an excellent example of a culturalist approach to decolonising science.

A structuralist approach means paying attention to and dismantling the structures within science which continue to exclude Māori knowledge and people. It encourages us to think about the colonial roots of science and how science has been used to justify colonial violence and oppression of Māori.

Captain Cook's "scientific voyage" to Aotearoa is a great example of how colonisation occurred under the guise of science .

Challenging the status quo

Pūtaiao reframes the conversation around the inclusion of mātauranga Māori in science. It considers the relationship between te ao Māori, the researcher and science to imagine how to decolonise, Indigenise and transform science.

We understand science not simply as scientific knowledge but as a knowledge system that spans research, education, academia, scientific practice and publications, as well as the evaluation and funding and access to science, its legitimacy and its relationship to policy and government .

There has been much research on Māori experiences within the science system, including the cultural double shift when Māori scientist are expected to lift their colleagues' understanding, racism and the difficulties of inclusion . A lone Māori scientist is often tasked with upskilling their colleagues, representing Māori on committees and leading cultural practices in addition to standard loads of supervising, teaching and research.

To challenge the status quo, we explored different ways of creating ecosystems or "flourishing forests" of Māori scientists to advance pūtaiao. This includes creating networks of Māori staff in science by establishing research centres such as Te Pūtahi o Pūtaiao and the Centre of Indigenous Science .

It also means creating research projects that move beyond the siloed disciplines within the science system. In this way, pūtaiao enables Māori to see themselves and be seen within science.

Pūtaiao offers a practical foundation, connecting Māori science leaders to transform science. Whether this happens through new university courses, academic programmes, research centres, institutions or regional and community hubs remains to be seen.

It is certain, however, that pūtaiao, conceptualised as kaupapa Māori science, offers many pathways for Māori scientists to continue to draw on and advance more than mātauranga to decolonise and, ultimately, redefine science into the future.
The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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Indigenous knowledge is increasingly valued, but to fully respect it we need to decolonise science - here's how - NewsBreak

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We are witnessing a resurgence of Indigenous knowledge and growing acknowledgement of its scientific value worldwide. In Aotearoa, there's been some progress, including the introduction of a public holiday to mark Matariki, the beginning of a new year in maramataka - the Māori calendar based on the phases of the Moon, the movement of stars and the timing of ecological changes.

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The unsolved mystery of Europe's oldest language - NewsBreak

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The Basque language, also known as Euskara, is unique in Europe. Linguistically, it bears no resemblance to the Indo-European tongues that pepper the continent. Though its...

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Travel to Miami, and you might hear people say 'get down from the car' instead of 'get out of the car.' Miami Herald/Getty Images

(MIAMI) "We got down from the car and went inside."

"I made the line to pay for groceries."

"He made a party to celebrate his son's birthday."

These phrases might sound off to the ears of most English-speaking Americans.

In Miami, however, they've become part of the local parlance.

According to my recently published research , these expressions - along with a host of others - form part of a new dialect taking shape in South Florida.

This language variety came about through sustained contact between Spanish and English speakers, particularly when speakers translated directly from Spanish.

When French collided with English

Whether you're an English speaker living in Miami or elsewhere, chances are you don't know where the words you know and use come from.

You're probably aware that a limited number of words - usually foods, such as "sriracha" or "croissant" - are borrowed from other languages. But borrowed words are far more pervasive than you might think.

They're all over English vocabulary: " pajamas " from Hindi; " gazelle " from Arabic, via French; and " tsunami " from Japanese.

Borrowed words usually come from the minds and mouths of bilingual speakers who end up moving between different cultures and places. This can happen when certain events - war, colonialism, political exile, immigration and climate change - put speakers of different language groups into contact with one another.

When the contact takes place over an extended period of time - decades, generations or longer - the structures of the languages in question may begin to influence one another, and the speakers can begin to share each other's vocabulary.

One bilingual confluence famously changed the trajectory of the English language. In 1066 , the Norman French, led by William the Conqueror, invaded England in an event now known as " the Norman Conquest ."

Soon thereafter, a French-speaking ruling class replaced the English-speaking aristocracy, and for roughly 200 years, the elites of England - including the kings - did their business in French.

An 18th-century illustration of the Battle of Hastings, which initiated the Norman Conquest of England in 1066. Heritage Images/Hulton Fine Art Collection via Getty Images

English never really caught on with the aristocracy, but since servants and the middle classes needed to communicate with aristocrats - and with people of different classes intermarrying - French words trickled down the class hierarchy and into the language.

During this period, more than 10,000 loanwords from French entered the English language, mostly in domains where the aristocracy held sway: the arts, military, medicine, law and religion. Words that today seem basic, even fundamental, to English vocabulary were, just 800 years ago, borrowed from French: prince, government, administer, liberty, court, prayer, judge, justice, literature, music, poetry, to name just a few.

Spanish meets English in Miami

Fast forward to today, where a similar form of language contact involving Spanish and English has been going on in Miami since the end of the Cuban Revolution in 1959.

In the years following the revolution, hundreds of thousands of Cubans left the island nation for South Florida, setting the stage for what would become one of the most important linguistic convergences in all of the Americas.

Today, the vast majority of the population is bilingual. In 2010, more than 65% of the population of Miami-Dade County identified as Hispanic or Latina/o, and in the large municipalities of Doral and Hialeah, the figure is 80% and 95% , respectively.

Of course, identifying as Latina/o is not synonymous with speaking Spanish, and language loss has occurred among second- and third-generation Cuban Americans. But the point is that there is a lot of Spanish - and a lot of English - being spoken in Miami.

Cuban refugees on the island of Cay Sal wait for the U.S. Coast Guard to take them to Florida in 1962. Lynn Pelham/Getty Images

Among this mix are bilinguals. Some are more proficient in Spanish, and others are more skilled English speakers. Together, they navigate the sociolinguistic landscape of South Florida in complex ways, knowing when and with whom to use which language - and when it's OK to mix them.

When the first large group of Cubans came to Miami in the wake of the revolution, they did precisely this, in two ways.

First, people alternated between Spanish and English, sometimes within the same sentence or clause. This set the stage for the enduring presence of Spanish vocabulary in South Florida, as well as the emergence of what some people refer to as " Spanglish ."

Second, as people learned English, they tended to translate directly from Spanish. These translations are a type of borrowing that linguists call " calques ."

Calques are all over the English language.

Take "dandelion." This flower grows in central Europe, and when the Germans realized they didn't have a word for it, they looked to botany books written in Latin, where it was called dens lionis , or "lion's tooth." The Germans borrowed that concept and named the flower " Löwenzahn " - a literal translation of "lion's tooth." The French didn't have a word for the flower, so they too borrowed the concept of "lion's tooth," calquing it as " dent de lion ." The English, also not having a word for this flower, heard the French term without understanding it, and borrowed it, adapting "dent de lion" into English, calling it "dandelion."

A new lingo emerges

This is exactly the sort of thing that's been happening in Miami.

As a part of my ongoing research with students and colleagues on the way English is spoken in Miami, I conducted a study with linguist Kristen D'Allessandro Merii to document Spanish-origin calques in the English spoken in South Florida.

We found several types of loan translations.

There were " literal lexical calques ," a direct, word-for-word translation.

For example, we found people to use expressions such as "get down from the car" instead of "get out of the car." This is based on the Spanish phrase "bajar del carro," which translates, for speakers outside of Miami, as "get out of the car." But "bajar" means "to get down," so it makes sense that many Miamians think of "exiting" a car in terms of "getting down" and not "getting out."

Locals often say "married with," as in "Alex got married with José," based on the Spanish "casarse con" - literally translated as "married with." They'll also say "make a party," a literal translation of the Spanish "hacer una fiesta."

We also found " semantic calques ," or loan translations of meaning. In Spanish, "carne," which translates as "meat," can refer to both all meat, or to beef, a specific kind of meat. We discovered local speakers saying "meat" to refer specifically to "beef" - as in, "I'll have one meat empanada and two chicken empanadas."

And then there were "phonetic calques," or the translation of certain sounds.

"Thanks God," a type of loan translation from "gracias a Dios," is common in Miami. In this case, speakers analogize the "s" sound at the end of "gracias" and apply it to the English form.

Examples of unique expressions that have emerged in Miami.

The Miami-born adopt the calques

We found that some expressions were used only among the immigrant generation - for example, "throw a photo," from "tirar una foto," as a variation of "take a photo."

But other expressions were used among the Miami-born, a group who may be bilingual but speak English as their primary language.

In an experiment, we asked Miamians and people from elsewhere in the U.S. to rate local expressions such as "married with" alongside the nonlocal versions, like "married to." Both groups deemed the nonlocal versions acceptable. But Miamians rated most of the local expressions significantly more favorably than folks from elsewhere.

"Language is always changing" is practically a truism; most people know that Old English is radically different from Modern English, or that English in London sounds different from English in New Delhi, New York City, Sydney and Cape Town, South Africa.

But rarely do we pause to think about how these changes take place, or to ponder where dialects and words come from.

"Get down from the car," just like "dandelion," is a reminder that every word and every expression have a history.
This article is republished from The Conversation , an independent nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts. The Conversation is trustworthy news from experts, from an independent nonprofit. Try our free newsletters .
It was written by: Phillip M. Carter , Florida International University .
Phillip M. Carter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

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Linguists have identified a new English dialect that's emerging in South Florida - NewsBreak

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It came about through sustained contact with native Spanish speakers who directly translated phrases from Spanish into English, a form of linguistic borrowing called 'calques.'

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New Mexico Is Losing a Form of Spanish Spoken Nowhere Else on Earth

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A dialect from the state’s earliest Spanish-speaking settlers has endured for over 400 years in the state’s remote mountain villages. But its time may be running out.

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Musician Toty Sa'Med can't say more than a few words in the Angolan language of Kimbundu but he insists on writing his songs in the language. He explains why.

My great-grandmother was the last person I knew personally who spoke only Kimbundu.

She died 15 years ago.

It's a local language in Angola, spoken in the area surrounding the capital Luanda. That's where I was born and brought up but, even so, I can only speak a few words.

I hear street hawkers in Luanda speaking Kimbundu among themselves. They come from the countryside and they are very connected to their culture.

So when I buy something off a street hawker, sometimes I greet them in Kimbundu. Almost everyone can at least say hello. I even greet some of my friends in Kimbundu.

But when I ask to buy something, I have to switch into Portuguese because I don't know how to say much more in Kimbundu.

The seller responds in Portuguese because almost everyone who speaks Kimbundu knows how to speak Portuguese too.

I don't know anyone who solely speaks Kimbundu.

We still hear the language every day because we mix some of the words in with our Portuguese. Friend, for example is Kamba.

But we don't know how to construct sentences because we haven't had the chance to learn it properly.

Prejudice

When I was a teenager my headmaster decided to put Kimbundu in our timetable at school. This was unusual - it wasn't on the curriculum in Luanda but I went to a private school.

As a 13-year-old I didn't realise that it was important - it was the lesson we used to chat through and disrupt.

Some Kimbundu phrases

Hello, how are you? - Wazekele kyebi?

I am fine - Ngazekele kyambote

What is your name? - Dyjina dye?

My name is Toty Sa'Med - Eme Toty Sa'Med

Please - Nga ku diondo

Thank you - Ngasakidila

Goodbye - Nde kiambote

I had some prejudices about Kimbundu. We were taught by society that the language wasn't beautiful or civilised.

We dismissed it because we thought it was a language for savages.

When the Portuguese colonised Angola, they tried to diminish the value of Kimbundu and other local languages. Suppressing the culture made it easier to colonise us.

They took away our local names and now almost everyone in Angola has Portuguese surnames.

That caused us as teenagers, all those generations later, to despise the language and to find it embarrassing to speak in Kimbundu.

Then things changed for me.

I started travelling around the world to perform.

When I saw other successful African artists, I started to value my culture more.

Discover Angolan music

Hear more from Toty Sa'Med and six other Angolan artists on Global Beats in Luanda.

Broadcast times on the BBC World Service:

14:06GMT on Saturday 17 March 2018

20:06GMT on Sunday 19 March

I realised that I have all these foreign influences but I don't bring anything new to the scene. I played like other people and I sang like other people.

I started to gain consciousness about my own culture and started to value it.

I decided it was time to use my art to influence people of my generation and encourage them to learn our languages.

I covered a song by a singer called Artur Nunes from the 1970s which we heard playing on the radio when we were growing up.

I already knew all the words but I didn't know what they meant.

Purge

The song was called Kizua Kingui Fuá which means The Day I Died. It talks about how he wants people to act when he dies. He doesn't want any sadness, just joy.

At that time he would have had to speak to the elders in Kimbundu - in the 1960s his mother probably would not have known Portuguese.

Singers back then, when they sang about politics or social matters, they sang in Kimbundu.

But in 1977 there was a purge and most of those Kimbundu singers were killed or imprisoned and they lost their careers and their reputations were ruined.

I think that purge had a detrimental effect on how much Kimbundu was spoken.

But it wasn't the only thing that has led to fewer people speaking the language.

Joss Stone sings Kimbundu

When Angola gained independence in 1975 it was followed by a long war which led to a massive exodus from the countryside to the big cities.

We have over 25 local languages in Angola so when people moved to the capital Luanda they used Portuguese as the language to communicate.

On top of this, the people in power after independence didn't care about Angolan languages. This affected our culture deeply.

Which language in Angola?

The Portuguese arrived in Angola in 1483 and left in 1975

Portuguese remained Angola's official language after independence

Angola has around 42 local languages

The most widely spoken are Fiote, Kikongu, Kimbundu, Kwanyama, Mbunda, Nganguela, Nyaneka, Tchokwe and Umbundu.

So now I think it is important we make an effort now to learn the language.

I decided that I can do my bit to keep the language alive by writing songs in the language.

The problem is that I can't construct a sentence.

So I asked my friend to help. I wrote the lyrics in Portuguese and she translated them.

Her mother was born and raised in the Kimbundu-speaking area Kwanza-Sul. She heard her mother and grandmother speaking Kimbundu when she was growing up so she is already is familiar with it.

Even so, she didn't speak it much and had to take lessons.

The title of my first song in Kimbundu is Zakukina Neme, which means Come Dance With Me.

I sing about dancing all the way from the house to the city centre.

The British soul singer Joss Stone got in touch and asked to do a duet with me as part of her Total World Tour. Her aim is to play a concert in as many countries in the world as possible.

She has a brilliant ear.

She listened to my song and wrote down the words as she heard them and memorised them without knowing what they meant.

The next stage for me is to learn how to construct sentences for myself so I've enrolled at Kimbundu school.

I've already persuaded my girlfriend to go to the classes with me and I want some of my friends to register as well so we can speak the language together.

If we start now, maybe 60 years from now we will speak Kimbundu, with a few words of Portuguese, rather than the other way round.

Global Beats Angola is broadcast on BBC World Service at 14:06GMT on Saturday 17 March 2018 and 20:06GMT on Sunday 19 March 2018.

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Why Angolan singer Toty Sa'Med writes songs in Kimbundu

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Musician Toty Sa'Med can't say more than a few words in the Angolan language of Kimbundu but he insists on writing his songs in the language. He explains why. My great-grandmother was the last person I knew personally who spoke only Kimbundu. She died 15 years ago.

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The ground is colored red at the Caddo Nation dance grounds where Leonard Kionute sings a traditional Caddo song.

" Hayah'nah weneko, Hayah'nah weneko," he chants. Kionute says the song is an ode to all things on earth.

He's the cultural director for the Caddo Nation's child care program. He's tasked with passing on the culture and language to new generations of Caddo.

It's a task that's absolutely crucial for the Caddo.

"We're talking about having fewer numbers that are fluent speakers, it's gonna be really tough," Kionute said. "But that's what we're here for."

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, citizens of the Caddo Nation took part in a community-wide survey for people who could speak the language fluently. They found seven people could speak the language, also known as Hasinai.

But during the pandemic, the tribe found that five of the seven fluent speakers had died.

"That was extremely devastating for us," said Alaina Tahlate, the language revitalizationist for the Caddo Nation's language preservation program. "It brought our count to two speakers."

The program is part of a decades-long effort to preserve the language. Tahlate was officially hired by last summer by the tribe to lead the program.Now, she's working with one of the last fluent speakers - a 93-year-old elder named EJ - to document, preserve and pass along knowledge of the language.

The Caddo have strong roots in Texas. In fact, historians have traced the word "Texas" to the Caddo word "tay-sha," which means friend.

Today the Caddo largely reside in Binger, Oklahoma, far from their ancestral lands. The Caddo are native to East Texas and parts of what's now Louisiana, Arkansas and Oklahoma. About 7,000 people are enrolled in the Caddo Nation today. Most live in and around Southwest Oklahoma.

And despite hundreds of years of colonization, the tribe continues to preserve its culture, including its language.

"Our language helps us to be able to access our history and our knowledge of who we are as people and one of the aspects of our culture that is uniquely ours," Tahlate said.

Like many Native American tribes, the Caddo lost much of their language and culture as a result of violent federal policies that destroyed many aspects of tribal culture. Those policies included boarding schools where Native children were discouraged from speaking their Indigenous language.

Between disease and attacks by settlers and other tribes the Caddo were reduced to a few hundred people in the 1800s, according to Phil Cross, one of the foremost historians of the tribe.

Cross is working on a book that traces the tribe's displacement from their homelands up to their resettlement in southwest Oklahoma. Before colonization, he said, the number of Caddo people was at least in the tens of thousands.

"We had our language and, you know, a hierarchy of people," he said. "That's how we existed. Farming, there was some hunter-gathering and often around a mound that was for [ceremonies] and served too, as burial platforms."

Cross documented 10 different relocations of Caddo people since the early 1600s. He's also done extensive research on the Caddo's time on a reservation in North Texas - once known as the Brazos Reservation in present-day Young County.

It was a dangerous time for the tribe because of hostile white settlers, Cross said. The Caddo also shared the reservation with other tribes including the Wichita, Tonkawa and Comanche.

"When that reservation was established, because it was so dangerous, they felt we were gonna get wiped out," Cross said.

After threats from a violent mob of white frontiersmen, a federal agent by the name of Robert Simpson Neighbors evacuated the Caddo and other tribes from the reservation to their present-day home near Binger, Oklahoma.

When Neighbors returned to Texas after the successful evacuation, he was shot and killed by a white man. Some Caddo still visit Neighbors' grave to this day to honor him for saving their tribe, including Tahlate and her family.

In the years since the tribe's relocation, the Caddo have worked hard to preserve what's left of their culture.

In nearby Hinton, Oklahoma, the Caddo Nation bought a property next to a creek and a forest of evergreen trees. That's where the tribe hopes to teach the next generation of Caddo about the culture and language they've worked so hard to preserve.

Chairman Bobby Gonzalez, the tribe's elected leader, says the Caddo have been working on bringing back the language for decades.

"We are in this together," Gonzalez said. "We are doing everything we can to provide all the tools and the resources tuned to our language program, our culture programs, our traditions, all the programs that we have, because it's all tied together, one way or the other."

Gonzalez remembers learning Caddo at an early age from his elders.

" Hok-to-de ani-Bo-is-a-bola-buh-nuh' - Once upon a time, I was a little boy," Gonzalez recalls. "I heard them say that - ' daconah hah-see-eh-nay' - 'Talk Caddo. We're going to talk Caddo - listen to us, pay attention to us, one of these days, we may not be here.'"

Gonzalez says while the Caddo language may not be spoken widely as it once was, the tribe hopes to save what it can.

And through the Caddo Nation's efforts, he says the culture - and language - will live on.

"I think the most important thing is that we're still alive," Gonzalez said. "We're alive and well. We're an ancient tribe, and we're going to be here time immemorial."
Got a tip? Email Pablo Arauz Peña at parauzpena@kera.org KERA News is made possible through the generosity of our members. If you find this reporting valuable, consider making a tax-deductible gift today. Thank you.

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Only 2 people alive can speak the Caddo language fluently. They hope a new program can save it

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The ground is colored red at the Caddo Nation dance grounds where Leonard Kionute sings a traditional Caddo song. " Hayah'nah weneko, Hayah'nah weneko," he chants. Kionute says the song is an ode to all things on earth. He's the cultural director for the Caddo Nation's child care program.

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At the Hideaway on Lee, a bar and music venue in Lafayette, Louisiana, Cedric Watson belted out the lyrics to "Oh, Bye Bye" in Louisiana French. The tune never fails to get the crowd up on its feet, dancing the spirited two-step everybody here seems to know as intuitively as how to peel a crawfish.

Watson squeezed his Hohner accordion and stomped out the beat as his band, Bijou Creole, scraped the washboard (also called a frottoir) and strummed a buoyant guitar rhythm. Soon, cowboy hat-clad dancers swirled around the floor like a pot of gumbo getting a good stir. As the Grammy-nominated musician slowed the pace with a bluesy version of "Ma Petite Femme", the dancers launched into a graceful waltz. Watson swapped the accordion for a fiddle, and changed languages from Louisiana French to the endangered Kouri-Vini.

Today, Watson is one of the brightest contemporary talents in American zydeco music. Zydeco is the traditional music of Louisiana Creoles of colour - the historical ethnic group describing mixed-race people born to European settlers and Africans in the colonial US. It blends elements of blues, R&B and soul and relies heavily on percussion techniques that reflect its African American and Afro-Caribbean roots. In addition to English and Louisiana French, it is also sung in Kouri-Vini.

Watson is part of a grass roots resurgence to revive Kouri-Vini, a historical name for the Louisiana Creole language that has been reclaimed to prevent confusion with other things "Creole", such as ethnicity, musical styles and culinary traditions.

Watson's next album, slated for release this summer, will be sung mostly in Kouri-Vini. Today, the language has fewer than 6,000 speakers, but at the beginning of the 20th Century, it was spoken by much of the Creole population in the 22-parish region of south-west Louisiana known as Acadiana.

This unique cultural pocket of the US is sometimes called Cajun Country, but long before the arrival of the Francophone Acadians, or Cajuns, from Nova Scotia in 1755, there was a much larger population of French-speaking Creoles - people with roots in Europe and Africa born in Louisiana.

Thanks in large part to a generation of musicians devoted to preserving it, a Kouri-Vini renaissance is underway. Watson, who performs all over the world, considers himself an ambassador of Creole culture and language.

"When I joined this band in 2011, I just identified as African American, but now, through years of travel and learning, I also identify as Creole," said Desiree Champagne, the washboard player in Watson's band. "The importance of preserving the culture and identity is to understand who you are and where you come from, what you are part of."

Kouri-Vini originated in Louisiana, but in the early 1900s, it spilled over the border to eastern Texas, Watson's native state, and he grew up hearing elderly relatives exchange neighbourhood news in the language. As they died, Watson, who is African American, realised that his ancestral language was dying with them. He began using his stage as a platform to revitalise this language that is deeply rooted in the trans-Atlantic slave trade.

In the early 18th Century, newly enslaved people created an amalgam of their native West African languages and the French that colonists used to communicate on the Louisiana sugar and indigo plantations where they toiled. "It's the first language all these Africans coming from different tribes and caste systems would speak when they were enslaved," Watson said. "They had these pidgin languages they would speak for a couple of generations, but it eventually became an organised language, which is Creole (Kouri-Vini)" - whose name comes from the Creole pronunciation of the French verbs " courir" (to run) and " venir" (to come).

Watson not only keeps the language extant through his live performances, but on La Nation Créole, the radio show he hosts on Lafayette's KRVS-88.7. He spins Creole grooves from Louisiana as well as from across the French Creole-speaking world, such as Haiti and Guadeloupe.

Until recently, Kouri-Vini was disparaged as an inferior language spoken by the uneducated. "Most of society's opinions about languages and language varieties are actually opinions about the people who speak them," said Marguerite Justus, a linguist and Community Development Specialist at CODOFIL (Council for the Development of French in Louisiana). "If the people who speak a certain language or dialect are perceived as low status, then we are inclined to perceive their way of speaking as low status."

Interestingly, not all Kouri-Vini speakers were people of colour. During the 19th and 20th Centuries, whites - especially white children - picked up the language from servants in their household. In Alfred Mercier's 1880 "Study on the Creole Language in Louisiana", the Louisianan poet and playwright explained that he spoke Kouri-Vini exclusively for much of his childhood because it was the language of his caregiver. His parents, however, disapproved of him speaking it.

The decline of Kouri-Vini started with the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. When the Louisiana territory was acquired by the nascent United States, non-English speakers felt pressure to learn the language and culture of the new government, and it only increased with statehood in 1812. Kouri-Vini took another blow during World War One when speaking any language other than English was considered unpatriotic.

Today, Louisianians are eager to reclaim this minority heritage language, and from students to distinguished scholars, there are movements to resurrect it.

For the past decade, a growing number of adults and children have been learning Kouri-Vini online. The Louisiana Historic & Cultural Vistas offers online Kouri-Vini classes that fill up quickly, partly because young people who grew up hearing their elders speak the language want to become fluent.

A new generation of speakers are also making podcasts, hosting TV shows and even writing books in Kouri-Vini. Though only 20, the self-proclaimed language activist Taalib Auguste started LA Créole Show on Télé-Louisiane, an online media channel in Lafayette, that promotes Creole culture. He even wrote a book in Kouri-Vini called Koushma (nightmare), inspired by the story of an enslaved man he heard from his grandparents.

Since Kouri-Vini was traditionally passed down orally, there are challenges to writing the language. There wasn't a comprehensive approach until the Guide to Louisiana Creole Orthography was published online in 2016.

Oliver Mayeux, a linguist and research fellow at the University of Cambridge, contributed to the guide and has been a key player in the resurgence of Kouri-Vini. His father's background was Louisiana Creole, so he's passionate about preserving the language that is so closely tied to Creole identity.

"The genesis of a new language on the plantations of colonial Louisiana is testament to the fact that those enslaved people were just that, people. People with their own culture and traditions, hopes and dreams," Mayeux said. "The language is a living link to that point in time. The stories of its speakers must be kept alive. Their words must be remembered."

Mayeux and a group of colleagues collaborated on Ti Liv Kréyòl ('Little Book of Creole'), the first book for Kouri-Vini learners published in 2020. It was illustrated by Jonathan Mayers, a Kouri-Vini speaker, artist and poet who works to elevate Creole culture and language.

These days, zydeco music is one of the best ways for travellers to encounter Kouri-Vini in south-west Louisiana. The feel-good tunes spill from front porches and backyard crawfish boils.

Flannery Denny loves zydeco music so much, she moved to Louisiana from Upstate New York. "Music brings people together across lines that tend to divide people," Denny said. "On the dance floor, age, geography and politics don't matter. People are engaged in enjoying the moment."

Corey Ledet, lead singer in the band Corey Ledet & His Zydeco Band, is another Grammy-nominated African American musician devoted to keeping Kouri-Vini alive. He can be spotted around Lafayette performing at the Feed & Seed or the Blue Moon Saloon, literally bending the accordion to his will, while simultaneously thumping a kick drum to produce the African-derived syncopated rhythms at the heart of zydeco dance tunes.

Growing up in Texas, Ledet often visited family in Parks, Louisiana, who spoke Kouri-Vini, but he was not encouraged to learn it. To become more proficient, he takes lessons from Herbert Wiltz, one of the founders of C.R.E.O.L.E Inc, (Cultural, Resourceful, Educational, Opportunities and Linguistic Enrichment Incorporated), a non-profit organisation that preserves and promotes Creole culture. Ledet attends Wiltz's La Table Kreyol (Creole Table), which offers opportunities for learners to practice conversing.

"My goal is to become fluent enough to not only speak it, but to read and write it, so I can offer it to other people free of charge," Ledet said. "It's that important to keep it going, because it's definitely a part of Louisiana." His next album, Médikamen (Medication), is entirely in Kouri-Vini. He channels the late Clifton Chenier, the "King of Zydeco", who made several recordings in the language.

"Music is my medication," Ledet said. "Whenever I'm feeling down, it picks me up. When people hear zydeco, it doesn't matter what's going on in their life; it puts a smile on their face." He hopes it will also put a few Kouri-Vini phrases on their tongue.

CORRECTION: A previous version of this story incorrectly attributed a quote to US President Theodore Roosevelt.
Rediscovering America is a BBC Travel series that tells the inspiring stories of forgotten, overlooked or misunderstood aspects of the US, flipping the script on familiar history, cultures and communities. If you liked this story, sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter called "The Essential List". A handpicked selection of stories from BBC Future, Culture, Worklife and Travel, delivered to your inbox every Friday.

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Kouri-Vini: The return of the US' lost language

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It was born from the horrors of the trans-Atlantic slave trade and then slowly disappeared. Now, its speakers are reclaiming it as part of their identity.

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Why Language Matters: Inequality Perceptions Among the Sami in Norway and Sweden

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Why Language Matters: Inequality Perceptions Among the Sami in Norway and Sweden

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International Mother Language Day: UNESCO calls on countries to implement mother language-based education

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On 21 February, International Mother Language Day, UNESCO calls on countries to pursue a policy of multilingual education. The Organization advises children are taught in their mother tongue during the earliest years of their schooling, which can be combined with the official language of instruction…

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For the first time since 2020, the annual Mother Tongue Film Festival will return to the National Mall for in-person events Feb. 23-26. The festival, hosted by the Smithsonian's Recovering Voices initiative, centers around the International Mother Language Day to celebrate cultural and linguistic diversity. Now in its eighth year, the festival will feature 27 films in 23 languages from regions across the globe.

"This year's theme, 'Coming Home,' will focus on ideas of home, asking viewers to consider what makes a home, why people remain rooted there and what it takes to return home after a long time away," said Amalia Córdova, festival co-director and museum curator of world cultures at the Smithsonian's Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage.

"We are delighted to come back to being in person and to share an incredible array of large and small films from around the world that explore the many dimensions of home," said Joshua Bell, curator of globalization at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History and festival co-director.

A schedule of screenings and events and registration information can be found on the festival's website. All screenings and events are free.

The festival's highlights include:

Returns: Opening Ceremony and Daughter of a Lost Bird Film Screening
Thursday, Feb. 23; 6:30 p.m.
Ring Auditorium at the Hirshhorn Museum
Following opening remarks from Smithsonian organizers, the festival's first screening is the feature documentary Daughter of a Lost Bird. Brooke Pepion Swaney, the film's director, and Kendra Potter, the film's producer and protagonist, will discuss the documentary after the screening.

Youth and Language Documentation: Sakha Media School in Russia
Friday, Feb. 24; 3:30 p.m.
Q?rius at the National Museum of Natural History
Participants will take a deep dive into Sakha, an Indigenous language of the Subarctic Sakha Republic, Russia. The program includes a screening of three youth-directed shorts made in the Smithsonian-sponsored Sakha Media School, short panel discussions and a pre-recorded conversation with one of the youth participants in the city of Yakutsk, Russia.

Faya Dayi Film Screening
Saturday, Feb. 25; 3 p.m.
Baird Auditorium at the National Museum of Natural History
The feature documentary Faya Dayi tells a series of intimate stories linked to the trade of Ethiopia's most lucrative cash crop: khat. Inspired by an Ethiopian legend about khat and the search for eternity, Faya Dayi is a divine journey into the highlands of Harar. Director Jessica Beshir will participate in a Q&A session following the screening.

Roots of, and Routes to, Home
Saturday, Feb. 25; 6:30 p.m.
Baird Auditorium at the National Museum of Natural History
Home in Oceania is shaped by ancestral, historical and contemporary migration routes. The three films in this screening-the music video Dodge the Bullet, the short film Like a Mighty Wave: A Maunakea Film and the feature film Whetū Mārama/Bright Star -will explore the ways communities in Papua New Guinea, Hawai'i and Aotearoa (New Zealand) are calling out the injustices of settler colonialism and asserting their sovereignty. The film screenings will be followed by a director Q&A.

Night Raiders Film Screening
Sunday, Feb. 26; 2 p.m.
National Museum of the American Indian
Set in a dystopian future, Night Raiders is a female-driven sci-fi drama paralleling the experience of the Indigenous peoples of North America. The feature film follows a Cree woman who joins a vigilante group to rescue her daughter from a military regime. Following the film screening, director Danis Goulet will present a brief Q&A about the film.

Dreams/Vaychiletik Film Screening
Sunday, Feb. 26; 7 p.m.
Ring Auditorium at the Hirshhorn Museum
Dreams/Vaychiletik is a documentary film that follows one musician's journey to heed a gift from the gods, bestowed upon him through dreams. After the film screening, participants are invited to a Q&A session with director Juan Javier Perez.

he Mother Tongue Film Festival is presented by Recovering Voices. This program received additional support from Arenet, the Embassy of New Zealand, Ferring Pharmaceuticals, Georgetown University Department of Anthropology, Planet Word, The Elizabeth and Whitney MacMillan Endowment, Wick and Bonnie Moorman, Embassy of Mexico to the U.S., and Mexican Cultural Institute in Washington, D.C.

About Recovering Voices

Recovering Voices is an initiative of the Smithsonian founded in response to the global crisis of cultural knowledge and language loss. It works with communities and other institutions to address issues of Indigenous language and knowledge diversity and sustainability. Recovering Voices is a collaboration between staff at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, National Museum of the American Indian, Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage and Asian Pacific American Center.

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SI-37-2023

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Smithsonian Presents the Mother Tongue Film Festival, "Coming Home" | Smithsonian Institution

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For the first time since 2020, the annual Mother Tongue Film Festival will return to the National Mall for in-person events Feb. 23-26. The festival, hosted by the Smithsonian's Recovering Voices initiative, centers around the International Mother Language Day to celebrate cultural and linguistic diversity.

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subscribe to Short Wave podcast

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Where are you really from? It's a question immigrants of color - and their descendants - get asked over and over. But the answer is often complex, and not just about a place on a map.

In a new video and audio series called Where We Come From, immigrants of color across generations tell their stories conversation with family members, friends, and experts.

This episode features host Emily Kwong. She's a third generation Chinese American, but she's never spoken her family's heritage language.

Now, at age 30, she's trying to learn Mandarin Chinese for the first time, and unpacking why she never learned it in the first place.

Christopher Kwong, Emily's father, stopped speaking Mandarin when he was five years old. His parents - Emily's grandparents - didn't want him to fall behind in school at the time. In conversation together, Christopher and Emily process what it means to stop speaking a language - the generational cost of assimilation.

Emily will also explore how being 'Chinese enough' gets tied up in language fluency and the feeling of racial imposter syndrome, in conversation with sociolinguist Amelia Tseng. She discovers how language is a bridge that can be broken and rebuilt between generations - as an act of love and reclamation.

You can find more Where We Come From stories here.

Anjuli Sastry created and produced 'Where We Come From' with additional editing and production by Julia Furlan and Diba Mohtasham. Video reporting, production, and editing by Michael Zamora. Fact checking and research by Candice Vo Kortkamp. Our director of programming is Yolanda Sangweni.

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'Where We Come From': Emily Kwong's Story : Short Wave

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Nearly 1 billion people speak Mandarin Chinese. But Short Wave host Emily Kwong is not among them. As a third generation Chinese American, Emily's heritage language was lost through the years when her father, Christopher Kwong, stopped speaking the language at a young age in order to adjust to life in the U.S.

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Nigeria says it wants primary school teachers to conduct lessons in local languages instead of English, which is currently used. But how practical is that in a country where more than 600 different tongues are spoken?

Kareem Abiodun Habeebullah, whose mother tongue is Yoruba, was just a secondary school student when he was whipped in class for not speaking in English.

"When I was growing up, I was struggling to speak English," he tells the BBC. "There was a particular class," he says, recalling the incident in 2010. The teacher called him up to answer a question, and he was stumped.

"I know the answer but I can only respond with my mother language," he remembers saying.

The teacher replied "no way", came to where he stood, and then the beating began. Corporal punishment is still common in some Nigerian schools, although moves have been made to eradicate it.

"She gave me one stroke of [the] cane," and sternly reminded Mr Habeebullah that he was not allowed to speak Yoruba in class, he says.

His was not an isolated incident he says, and other students at his school received harsh reprimands for daring to speak in Yoruba instead of English.

More than 60 years after independence from Britain, English remains Nigeria's official language, and is used in public settings such as schools, universities, government and many work places.

But the political tide appears to be turning. In November, Education Minister Adamu Adamu announced the National Language Policy which stipulates that the first six years of primary education should be taught in the children's mother tongue.

He said the changes were necessary because pupils learn better when they are taught in "their own mother tongue."

Currently, primary school children are taught in English, with teachers in certain communities mixing local languages with English for ease of comprehension.

However, it is unclear how the new policy will be rolled out because - in a country where government estimates say 625 different languages are spoken, and with people moving around the country - many Nigerian children live in areas where their mother tongue is not the dominant local language.

Teaching in the mother tongue was in fact first put forward as a national policy in the 1970s, but because of difficulties rolling it out in such a linguistically diverse country, it was never put into effect, as the government wishes to do now.

The policy is already facing stiff opposition. Despite his own experience, Mr Habeebullah, who is now a school teacher, does not think teaching in local languages is a good idea.

"If you were to take a look at Nigeria as a country, we have more than 500 languages, which will make it very hard" to implement.

He questions how classes could be taught properly in a local language when it may contain students who speak different tongues at home. In his own class in Sabongidda-Ora, in the southern Edo State, five different languages are spoken, he says - Igbo, Yoruba, Hausa, Ora and Esan.

Although he is supposed to teach in English, there are times when he has to explain things in Pidgin English, so all the pupils can understand.

"There's no point in teaching them something they cannot decipher, it would be very wrong."

However, "I can't be teaching students in their local language" he insists, because he simply does not know how to speak all the various tongues spoken by his students.

Furthermore, if they don't speak English in primary school, they will find it difficult later on, he adds.

'Too little too late'

For many middle-class Nigerians, especially in the south, English is now their mother tongue and some may not speak any local languages. This is partly a result of marriages between members of different ethnic groups, and people moving to cities, where English is the lingua franca.

Tayo Adeyemo, 46, from Lagos State agrees that teaching children in their local language at primary school is impractical.

Lagos' local language is Yoruba, but as it is the country's commercial hub, people who speak other languages have also moved there and still speak their mother tongue.

"I don't think it's a very good idea," the father of a nine-year-old primary school student tells the BBC.

"For many years now English has been used. I used English in my primary school, many, many years ago. So for them to bring such a policy now, I don't see it as something that would work."

Despite English and Pidgin being the lingua franca in the ethnically diverse city of Lagos, education ministry spokesperson Ben Goong confirmed to the BBC that Yoruba would be the language of instruction in the metropolis.

At first glance the new policy sounds positive because the government "is trying to bring back the culture" of local languages, Mr Adeyemo says.

But his children speak English at home so he doesn't think his youngest son would even understand classes taught in Yoruba: "There's this increasing trend of people speaking more of English. It's the lingua franca anyway," he says.

It "just seems easier" to speak English at home because that is the language the children are taught in at school, he says.

Although he would like his son to speak Yoruba, he thinks "it's too little, too late" now.

"Unfortunately, you are unable to let them understand both languages at the same time."

'Failing the children'

However for the many Nigerian children who don't speak English at home, being taught in a language they don't necessarily understand very well from an early age puts them at a disadvantage at school.

Senior education specialist at the World Bank, Dr Olatunde Adekola, tells the BBC the current teaching setup is "failing the children".

Some parents who speak their local language at home complain that their children are "not learning fast" enough in schools, says Dr Adekola, who is from Nigeria. He blames this on the language barrier - namely, teaching in English.

When the language spoken at home is completely different to that taught in schools, it creates confusion and a "disconnect" he says.

It is not necessarily the role of the school to teach primary school children how to speak English, but to boost their literacy by teaching them how to read and write in their first language - whether that be Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Pidgin or another Nigerian language, he says.

"If any school is going to be meaningful in Nigeria" it must "start from the language the children speak to their parents, irrespective of where your parents come from".

Dr Adekola adds that the key to whether the new way of learning succeeds is how it is put into practice.

Another huge stumbling block is that many current teachers simply cannot read and write at a high enough level in a local language to teach it to students, Dr Adekola warns.

"If you go to university now, how many teachers are reading bachelor's in education, or diploma in education in languages and how to teach children in their languages?" he asks.

"So, you need to first equip the teacher to know about the language so they will be well-equipped on how to teach the children."

The education minister, Mr Adamu, admitted at the time of the announcement that it would be a challenge to make the changes. He said it would "require a lot of work to develop materials to teach and get the teachers" who have the skills in local languages.

He said that the language used in each school should be the tongue spoken in whichever local community the school is located.

"We have 625 languages at the last count and the objective of this policy is to promote, and enhance the cultivation and use of all Nigerian languages," he added.

The policy will not be limited to teaching in just Nigeria's three major local languages - Yoruba, Hausa and Igbo - but once it is "fully operational" there will also be teaching in the hundreds of other tongues spoken across the country.

The government says the children will also have the chance to learn a second Nigerian language as well as receive teaching in a foreign language such as English, French or Arabic at a "certain stage".

However, it is not entirely clear when the policy will be put in action.

As for Mr Adeyemo, he admits that he wishes his children were fluent in their local language, despite speaking to them in English at home. But he is clear in his reasoning behind this choice.

"English, being the lingua franca, would always have an edge".

Additional reporting by Olivia Ndubuisi in Lagos

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Nigerian schools: Flogged for speaking my mother tongue

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Nigeria wants local languages to replace English in primary education, but some say it's not practical.

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I remember feeling very alone when I moved to Montreal in 2013. Moving about the city, I also felt the loneliness in the strangers around me. The harm isolation does to our mental well-being is well documented, but in a world full of people, finding someone to emotionally connect with seems like an impossible task.

Two years ago, as the pandemic caused even more isolation, I discovered Tel-Aide Montreal, a call center with the mission to listen without judgment to those who need to talk. From my first meeting with the organization's volunteers, I was struck by their capacity to listen to others with great care and empathy.

This short documentary captures what it means to be in a position of empathetic listening, as the volunteers work through the different learning stages of their training. We live in an epidemic of loneliness, and the importance of vigilant ears cannot be overstated.

Sarah Baril Gaudet is a director and cinematographer based in Montreal.
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Opinion | In a Lonely World, They're Here to Listen

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I remember feeling very alone when I moved to Montreal in 2013. Moving about the city, I also felt the loneliness in the strangers around me. The harm isolation does to our mental well-being is well documented, but in a world full of people, finding someone to emotionally connect with seems like an impossible task.

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The Pandemic Erased Two Decades of Progress in Math and Reading

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The results of a national test showed just how devastating the last two years have been for 9-year-old schoolchildren, especially the most vulnerable.