Wednesday, January 16, 2008

How did you learn languages?

In anticipation of those soon-to-arrive crazy days where a new baby in the house absorbs most of my free time, I'd like to have some blog posts in reserve that I can just add here now and then. I'm always curious to see how other parents are raising their children with more than one language, but at this point I've already accosted most of my in-person and Internet friends to complete a questionnaire! (You can read profiles of these families by clicking on the names in the right-hand margin--or click here to see most of them in a row.) But if I've missed you--or don't know you yet--and you'd be willing to let me profile you and your kid(s), please email me at babybilingual (at) gmail (dot) com, and I'll send you the questionnaire. We'd love to hear from you!

So I'm also considering creating a second questionnaire, this one for adults who learned other languages as children, asking them to reflect on why they grew up with more than one language, how it worked (or didn't work) for them, what they've retained, how it's affected their identity, and so forth. Would y'all be interested in reading about people who have been bilingual (or more) most of their lives? What would you like to know? Pretend you're the interviewer and please click on "comments" to submit some possible questions, and I'll add more in and then hit you all up to answer the questionnaire over the next few months while I learn how to take care of a baby!

4 comments:

  1. Such a good idea! It's going to be very interesting to read about other adult bi/multilinguals.

    Possible qs:
    1. Did you ever visit the country of the language? for how long? Did it influence your feeling towards the language?
    2. Did you ever reside in the country of the language? for how long? When did it happen? How much does it affect your feeling towards the language? Do you want to return living over there?

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  2. Thanks for getting the questions rolling, Santi! (You realize that you're one of the people I'm hoping will fill out the completed questionnaire, right?!)

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  3. Best of luck with the following weeks.

    I think finally Rémy is starting to understand some English - although he's at the Memememaaaa stage at the moment.

    It's all Maman and no Daddy...

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  4. I just stumbled upon your blog and I'd be thrilled to participate in your questionnaire. I'll email you. Oh and I think the fact that our blog titles are similar is cool!

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