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I believe everyone has their own experience of how they have learned or are learning a Language. For me, my mother language is Urdu, which I have learned growing up. Though I moved to America at a young age, my parents made sure I don’t forget my language, culture and traditions. Urdu is a language that was created in the time of war, Farsi and Arabic speakers contracted through Urdu when India was invaded by the Persian and Turkic countries in the 11th century.
Urdu is a language that is written in Arabic calligraphy and is read right to left. Urdu is also spoken like Hindi, the language of India, the way this language was created makes this language very unique. I am from Pakistan, and growing up, I used to watch a lot of Indian shows, and because of my language, I can understand Hindi. Also, because Pakistan is a Muslim country, people in Pakistan can easily read the Qur’an in Arabic.
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Since moving to America I can speak English fairly well to cope with any everyday situations. I remember when first moving to America, I struggled to learn the language of English, words in Urdu are not even close to sounding anything in English. Even when we translate sentences in Urdu to English, the sentences don’t always sound right and seem out of context. In school, I have taken French, Italian and Spanish, but I barely remember these languages because when one learns a new language they need to physically involve themselves with native speakers of that language to fully understand and become fluent in that language.
Whenever I am in a conversation or listening to a lecture, I often find myself repeating those things spoken English, in Urdu. That’s just how I understand the world around me. Even when I have to speak, I often think of it in Urdu. Which influences the way I speak. An example, of this, is the English word “or” which is pronounced the same as the Urdu word that means “and” in English. Often times when I am struggling to understand a sentence or a paragraph written in English, I try to translate it in Urdu to get the exact meaning and a better understanding for myself. In an article “Developing a Tagset for Automated Part-of-Speech Tagging in Urdu” by Andrew Hardie contrast the language of Urdu in English, how words are used differently and how the language of Urdu has borrowed a lot of words from English. The author uses an example of English words like (do/be/have) which when used in Urdu translate to (can/may/will). English is a language that is spoken in a present tense while Urdu is more focused on the future tense.
Our cultural background and language also affect the way we think. In an article “How Language Shapes Thought,” Lera Boroditsky gives an example of bilingual speakers and how they change the way they see the world. In this research, Arabic-Hebrew bilinguals were asked to pick things under various conditions and categories. “In one condition if they saw a Jewish name like “Yair” or a positive trait like “good” or “strong,” they were in- instructed to press “M,”; if they saw an Arab name like “Ahmed” or a negative trait like “mean” or “weak,” they were told to press “X” (How Language Shapes Thought).” This research resulted in the pair picking the Arabic names. This research shows how naturally we pick things when they are related to our ethnic groups ard languages and how these things go hand-in-hand in people’s mind. Like people from a certain ethnic group would prefer their traditional clothes or food over foreign food and clothes, because that's just how our language and culture affects our minds. Education also has an impact on how we use our language. With education, people are able to use their language more appropriately. Education has helped us broaden our knowledge of grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary in Language. Languages change over time and more words are added to our vocabulary every day, which we are able to learn through Education. Because of education, we can read and write and even learn a language through a certain language. We can also broaden our knowledge of the language through socializing. Socialization has a big impact on how we speak our language, by socializing we are able to learn and speak a slang version of a language. I have noticed that whenever my family communicates through skype or other social media sites, they would write Urdu in Romanized English, this creates a whole different dimension on how we have started to use our language in this generation.
What Bilingual speakers struggle with the most are their accents. Accents are the way one shape their words and the way it influences the sounds of words or sentences. Many times when having a conversation with an English speaker, bilingual speakers have to repeat themselves as their message is not fully understood or because of mispronunciation. People with heavy accents, for example, my dad struggle on day to day basis when communicating in English. There is always space in his words because he has to think thoroughly if what he structured in his mind is actually right in English. In Pakistan, there are four provinces, so people have a dialect when speaking Urdu in certain regions. Even Americans have the dialect, dialects are when people speak differently in different parts of the country.
Often times, bilingual speakers tend to combine some English words into their sentences. For example, in my house, this sentence is used the most “ itna Tasty khana hai,” meaning the food is tasty. In this sentence, the base is in Urdu and the other language is English. Growing up in America, I have always hated my accent from a young age, I believe everyone has set standards for themselves and for me it was my accent. Writing this paper has made me realize that language has a great impact on our lives. Without Education, we can’t broaden our knowledge in a language and socialization plays an important role in how we speak. The language also impacts how we think, how we act, and the way we react to certain things and all of this goes back to our cultural background.
My Experience in Learning Of English Language. (2024, Feb 10). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/my-experience-in-learning-of-english-language-essay
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