Documentary Review of "First Language - The Race to Save Cherokee"

Hello, everyone and welcome back to my blog! I hope that you have all been having a good week so far. For this post, I wanted to switch things up. One of my New Year’s resolutions is to read more and watch more films and documentaries to inform myself more about problems that the world is facing. A few weeks ago, I had the desire to watch a language documentary, which lead me to the documentary called First Language - The Race to Save Cherokee.

This documentary intrigued me, given that it is about the urgency of preserving the Cherokee language. I have also recently been reading more about the active efforts that indigenous people have put forth to pass on their traditions and languages. I find the Cherokee language to be especially relevant in 2019, because many Cherokee speakers seem to be passing away every year. To our dismay, the Cherokee language is classified as an endangered language, having between 11,000-13,000 native speakers according to 2008 estimates. In North Carolina, where the documentary takes place, there are no more than 200 native Cherokee speakers left. This number made my heart sink, but even so, this short documentary gave me hope for a better tomorrow.

It’s truly inspiring to see native Cherokee speakers taking on the role of educators, especially in an immersion school designed to teach young Cherokee about their language and culture in Cherokee. Despite many obstacles that have come their way, including funding, support, and hiring qualified educators, there is now a new generation of Cherokee who is speaking Cherokee at a native level even though many of their parents do not know how to speak it fluently. What I found to be the most remarkable was how dedicated and passionate Cherokee teachers are. They realize that there are little to no textbooks, or resources that are published, or available in Cherokee, so they often spend sleepless nights creating original and translated material for their students in their native language.

Once you learn more about the devastation that the Cherokee have gone through for centuries due to boarding schools that many Cherokee were forced to attend to “learn the white man’s ways”, it makes you very upset. These children were given no choice but to stop speaking Cherokee in order to “perfect” their English, which was deemed to be the superior language. This led to the punishment and prohibition of speaking their “inferior” Cherokee language. Regardless of how you feel about this issue, I encourage you to have deep and meaningful conversations about this situation with your family and friends. I continue to believe that the best way to bring more peace to this world is through conversation. Words are much stronger and powerful than you would think.

Though this is a sad reality, many Cherokee children living in North Carolina are starting to speak Cherokee with the older generations after 60 years of not hearing many Cherokee children speak their so-called heritage language. Since this a documentary review, I don’t want to spoil anything else, so if this is of interest to you, make sure to watch it by clicking the video that I have attached to this post. Qué tengan un buen día!

Love,

Laura

How to Stay Motivated When Learning a Language

An obstacle that many language learners eventually face is a lack of motivation, or drive to continue learning a language. Oftentimes, many end up giving up learning their target language altogether, or put it off to the side for enough time, that they eventually end up forgetting everything that they had worked towards. My blog’s aim is to help you boost your confidence, and motivation by giving you tips on how to effectively approach learning a new language. Even though we all have different experiences and learning styles, most of my posts can help you reach towards whatever language learning-related goal that you have.

If you have felt that you have been learning a language for a while, but have made little to no progress with it, you are not alone. I know how frustrating it can be to not understand what someone else is saying, or to tell yourself “I only understand about twenty percent of what is being said on this show”. I have compared myself to others endless amount of times, and have felt stagnant process. That being said, there are easy solutions that can help you get back on track, and that can help remind you why you started learning your target language in the first place.

I am going to start off by mentioning the three tips that the famous hyperpolyglot Alex Rawlings gives in the video above, and will also give you some tips that I have found helpful over the years.

1. Have fun learning the language

Instead of learning a language the traditional textbook way, find television series, movies, books, YouTube channels, music, and other resources with which you can personally connect, based on your personal interests. If you are mostly interested in the cultural aspects of your language, then find resources that address cultural norms, issues, and customs. If you are lucky to have a friend who is a native speaker, then make sure to practice with him, or her. 

What is most important is to not make learning a language something to check off of a list. It should be part of your everyday routine, and should be enjoyable. If you are finding that your approaches are not effective, or are making you feel behind, then change them. It is never too late to change your approaches. In fact, it gives you more motivation to continue with a language if you are constantly finding new, interesting, and relevant materials that pertain to your goals, your personal interests, and your professional interests.

2. Treat yourself, travel if possible

After finishing studying for your French exam, or reviewing vocabulary, make sure to reward yourself with something that you like. I personally like to treat myself by watching YouTube videos for a study break, or by listening to some of my favorite international music, as it helps to relax me. By giving yourself incentives, you are more likely to want to put a certain amount of study, and effort in your target language.

As time goes on, and as you start improving in all aspects of the language, you can start thinking about traveling to a country in which your target language is spoken. When you feel comfortable enough to do this, you can more easily see the significant progress that you have made by interacting with a culture that is associated with that language, and by interacting with locals, and native speakers. This is incredibly rewarding, especially if you are not learning a common language. Locals love it whenever you take the time to thank them, or speak to them in their native languages. In my opinion, and in many polyglots’ opinions, traveling is the best way to completely immerse yourself into another culture with the help of a strong foundation in its language. Who knows? You might end up meeting some friends along the way.

3. Set realistic goals

This is one of the most important pieces of advice that I will give you. We should set realistic goals that can be met by a specific time of the year. The more specific your goals are, the more likely it is that you will be able to meet them. An example of an unrealistic goal would be wanting to become fluent in a language after one year. Although that is a very nice thought, you cannot expect yourself to master all aspects of a language in the beginner, intermediate, and advanced levels after one year. You can definitely make a lot of progress in that amount of time, but it is not the same as being fluent. On the other hand, examples of realistic goals would be wanting to understand children’s books with minimal help from a dictionary, or having a basic conversation with a native speaker after a few weeks of intensive study. Once you think that you have successfully met your goals, you can eventually make your goals more difficult, and more specific to continue to push yourself to become a better learner.

4. Remind yourself why you started to learn the language

Whenever you are feeling unmotivated, or upset with your progress, or with what you are teaching yourself, remind yourself why you started to learn that language in the first place. This will help give you a goal to work towards, and reasons to continue learning it. Some common reasons are to connect with other cultures, to connect with family members or with friends, to increase global understanding, to travel, or to be able to read books, or watch books in their original languages. If your original intention changes, then make sure to either make a mental note of why you are currently continuing to study the language, or write it down, so that you have a constant, or a daily reminder about your new intentions.

5. Interact with speakers of the language

I cannot stress enough how rewarding it is to be able to have advanced conversations with friends who have spoken your target language for their entire lives. Even if you make mistakes as you are speaking it, or have to ask them to repeat words if you cannot hear them well, the ability to express yourself in a sophisticated, and in a complete way allows you connect to others’ hearts. It helps you understand parts of their culture that could not be as easily conveyed in English, or in languages other than in their mother tongues. Since I can personally connect with international students whose first language is not English, I prefer to speak to them in their native languages if I speak them. This has made them feel at home, and has made them be appreciative of my efforts to take the time and learn more about them.

All in all, no matter which kinds of roadblocks or problems you are facing in your language-learning journey, there are fixes for them that can help you have a fresh start, and a new mindset. Getting rid of all of the negative energy, and pessimism will help clear your brain, allowing you to make more progress. Remember that what matters is not how fast you progress, but rather reaching your personal goals at your own steady pace.

Being Afraid of Making Mistakes in Another Language

Ironically, I believe that what hinders, and discourages most people from continuing to make progress with a language is making the mistake of not making mistakes. By the end of this post, I hope to convince you that what has kept you from moving from one level of language learning to the next is the fact that you have been too scared of being wrong. Believe me, I used to be one of the shyest girls in my grade, and rarely voluntarily raised my hand to volunteer, or to ask questions. Many people often discourage others to raise their hands, or to ask questions unless they know the right answers. In school, I always wanted to be right, and wanted to impress my classmates by answering complex questions.

This is where I went wrong. I was always expecting perfection. I gave myself unrealistic, and high expectations. I would easily become frustrated, and would tell my parents that 10, or more years of French had been useless. If this situation sounds similar to yours, do not be worried. Luckily, I have learned that we cannot expect perfection, not even those of us who are OCD, or are perfectionists. If we expect to not make any mistakes when speaking, or dealing with aspects of our target language, we will automatically fail. Even though I am technically considered a native English speaker, English was my second language, and I rarely ever speak it at home, putting me at a disadvantage from most of my classmates. But even so, I have clarified grammar points, or how to spell words to people who are native English speakers. This shows that even native speakers can make mistakes. That is the beauty of being human: learning from our mistakes, and pushing ourselves to our limits.

Instead, what I encourage you to do is to try to speak every time that you get a chance to do so. If you have not already done so, and have studied a language for years, it is never too late to start doing so. What Benny Lewis (the famous polyglot that I have already mentioned) has said is that language is used to communicate and to share ideas with others. If you can write, and read in a language well, that is impressive, but if you cannot understand its native speakers, or speak it, then you have failed to do what a language is meant to do. Let’s compare languages to math (a subject that I was never good at). If you memorize an equation and know for what it is used, but you cannot apply it to real-world situations, then it is as if you did not know the equation. Language-learning requires you to step out of your comfort zone, and to learn from your mistakes.

Being a native Spanish speaker, there have been many times in which my friends have wanted to practice their Spanish with me. In my opinion, those who have done so successfully are not the ones who had perfect grammar, or who used complicated vocabulary to try to impress me. Instead, those who made grammar or vocabulary mistakes, or who translated words literally from English to Spanish are the ones who were brave. Why? The reason is simple. They were willing to say what they knew, and spoke to me in a natural way. Native speakers also pause, and sometimes have to think about what they want to say the way that they want to say it, but that is part of communication. What matters is that you are trying, that you are willing to learn from your mistakes, and then correct them. Being fearless is what separates bad language-learners from exceptional ones.

Before ending this post, I will share a small anecdote to hopefully inspire you to start speaking your target language as often as possible, even with native speakers. I started taking German I as a sophomore in high-school, and had hopes to someday reach the AP level. At the time, I was trying to do this on a whim, and forgot about this goal for a long time. When I went to a language immersion camp for a month-long high-school credit program, I was attempting to learn enough German in order to skip German II, and move on to Honors German III as a junior. At first, the task was daunting. I was placed into the third level out of six after only taking German for a school-year, and having little to no writing or speaking practice.

There were several people in my group who had taken German for 2 years, a girl who had taken it for 4 years, and a boy who had gone to the camp for 3 years. I was definitely the underdog in the group, but pushed myself out of comfort zone every day. I asked my teacher clarification questions, and used the little vocabulary, and grammar that I knew. By the end of the session, I had only spoken in German from breakfast through dinner time for 10 days (a language pledge that you could choose to do), something that I would have never imagined of accomplishing. How did I manage to learn so much in such a short amount of time? I was fearless. I was brave, and made many mistakes. I conjugated verbs incorrectly, and blanked on words, but could not freely express myself, and used what I knew.

I had girls in my cabin who had had years of practice with the language, which only pushed me to keep on learning more. The first day of camp, I could barely formulate a sentence. One of my friends claims that she could not understand what I was trying to say that day. However, by the end of the camp, I could easily communicate with girls who had gone to the camp for 10 years. This shows that speaking is the most important aspect of a language. Do not worry, and take a few deep breaths. Speaking is not as scary as it seems. Native speakers are not trying to look down upon you. Instead, we want to encourage you to keep on striving to reach your language-learning goals.