Ask Harriet and Grace

No matter how long we have been raising our children bilingually and biculturally, each stage in our children’s development brings new questions and concerns. Multilingual Living Magazine’s resident experts, Harriet Cannon and Grace Libardo Alvarez, are here to help! This month’s questions come to us from Belgium and Germany...

FROM METHODLESS IN BELGIUM:

Dear Harriet and Grace,

Growing up in America, the USSR and France may have prepared me for living abroad later in life, but I never dreamed I’d have to contend with Flemish. The guttural g’s, guttural and rolling r’s, schizophrenic w’s (is it a v or a w?), and amazing breadth of vowels make it, to me, the most sensual of languages. Perhaps I wish to believe that people who can make sounds I can only approximate have the ability to experience that which I can only approximate, but Flemish is a feast for my ears. Unfortunately it’s a largely incomprehensible feast. French is much easier to follow, but it’s like listening to a brook instead of the ocean. Now that my 13 month-old Flemmican is beginning to acquire Flemish words, it’s a challenge for me to hear and model them properly. So far she has: *Mama (Mama), Mamam (Oma), *klok (clock), ‘ess (fless- milk bottle), jas (jacket), daaida (bye), *koek (cookie), aai (stroke gently), oor (ear), aardbei (strawberry), tut (pacifier), *baby, *’nan (banaan- banana) *These are the basically the same word in English. She also has: shoes, juice, no-z (noisy), eyes, hat, Dada (all men), and Daddy (just hers).

My Belgian partner and I don’t have a set method. We both speak English to her. Only rarely will he speak Flemish to her although he consistently sings to her in Flemish. I read to her in (bad) Flemish and in English. I name things in both languages. We watch Flemish TV. When we’re out in public, she’s immersed in Flemish culture. Likely the saving grace is that she spends one day a week with her Flemish Oma, soaking it in. It’s disconcerting how she uses some words for many things. For example, hat not only means anything on your head-- from a hair band to a hat to spectacles-- it also means “yes.” (Unless she’s saying something I can’t make out.)

For example,
Kaia:”Koek!”
Mama: “Kaia, so you want a koek?”
Kaia: “Hat” and runs to cupboard.
Or
Mama: “Sleepy, Boo? Do you want to go to sleep?”
Kaia: “Hat” and she rests her head on my shoulder.

I’ve read in a psychology text that overgeneralization is a normal part of language acquisition, so that her stating (over and over and over) that spectacles and bowler hat are both “hats” is understandable. But is using “hat” for “yes” normal? Is this a sign that I should stop trying to speak Flemish to her?

-Methodless in Belgium

ANSWER FROM HARRIET:

Dear Methodless in Belgium,

From the psychological side of parenting I am hearing a couple of questions:
First: What is normal? With all this input of languages, will my child learn the language development she needs? Yes, she will and yes, there may be some delays as she learns where to use which language, but it will all come together as she develops the cues of who is speaking which language when. With a first child parents are often concerned about language development as they compare their child with what books tell you and what you see in other children of like ages. There is tremendous variety in development the first 3 years of life, especially language development, even when everyone is speaking the same language. Bi-and trilingual children always have some early language issues.

Second: Cultural differences and culture make more impact on a couple/family after children are born. The literature on multiculturalism talks a lot about language and its importance as a connection to relatives and the culture of each parent. Most mixed cultural families find they have to put a great deal of energy into talking about HOW they as a couple want to raise their child with 2 (or more) languages. It works best if you make a conscious decision and plan (which will evolve as your family grows and evolves). All of us have emotional attachments to certain things (books, songs, etc.) from our own language and culture which we want to pass to our children. You and your partner have to be honest about what is important to each of you. To ignore this will invite big problems later on. There are some books listed on my web site under resources (www.harrietcannon.com).

Third- You have some comments about Flemish language and its difficulty. I don’t know how long you have been living in Belgium. One question you have is about the difficulty of the sounds which will improve as you live there longer, yet you may always have a heavy accent. The other question which I hear between the lines is feeling you may have been a very obvious foreigner without facility for the new language. One of the poignant things about moving overseas later in life is you never assimilate like children and even like college-age students do. You are more emotionally formed as well and immigration type adaptation will always be more challenging to those past 30. This can be a huge surprise (and blow to the self esteem) to folks who remember the ease of integrating internationally as children. There are many grieving issues to address as you raise children in a culture other than the one you were born in. You have to find your way to connect your child to the things you hold most dear in your language and culture. Reading books by and about other people who have immigrated as adults is very grounding. Also finding a community of native English speakers will be helpful if you have not already done so. I hope this is helpful.

Best regards,
Harriet
www.harrietcannon.com

ANSWER FROM GRACE:

Dear Methodless in Belgium,

First I recommend you start by reading an article I wrote about bilingual development for the Bilingual/Bicultural Family Network: www.biculturalfamily.org/may06/achildsjourney.html. I think that it addresses many of issues you are dealing with in your decision to raise a bilingual child.

It seems to me that there are two points that are most relevant to your situation.

1. When you speak to your child, you not only provide a language model for her, but you impart and affect values which come from your heart. So it is most important to speak in the language that comes naturally, the language in which you are most proficient.
2. Since Flemish is the language of the majority (e.g. community, school, etc) and English is not spoken widely, she will need lots of English exposure to acquire it and continue its development (e.g. home use, community activitites, bilingual school program, etc). You do not mention your partner’s language dominance, but assuming it is Flemish, he/she should use it when addressing your child and encourage Flemish responses by providing a model if she responds in English.
   Regarding the overgeneralization issue, it is likely that she will sort things out, but you can facilitate this by consistently providing the correct label without requiring her to correct her utterance (ex. Are you sleepy? “hat” as she rests her head on your shoulder...Yes (child’s name) is sleepy.

I hope this provides some guidance. Feel free to forward more questions as they arise.

Sincerely,
Grace

Harriet Cannon, M.C. is a Licensed Marriage and Family Therapist and Consultant with over 20 years experience specializing in working with clients in life transitions; career, international relocation, bicultural and multicultural relationships and family issues. Ms Cannon has lived and worked in the United States and internationally for both the American Foreign Service and Puente Bretagna, a Chilean group of psychologists and Psychiatrists. Currently Harriet Cannon has her counseling and consulting office in Seattle, Washington. She consults throughout the Puget Sound to groups, international organizations and businesses. Most recently Ms Cannon was invited to present her research on the life stories of multicultural mothers and daughters at the International Family Therapy Conference in Washington DC in June 2005. For more information visit her web site at www.harrietcannon.com. If you have a question for Harriet, send it to her at: harriet@harrietcannon.com.

Grace M. Libardo Alvarez is a speech-language pathologist who specializes in working with children and families who are culturally and linguistically diverse. Her interest in this area stems from her own upbringing. She and her family emigrated from Argentina when Grace was five years old. The primary language of her home was Spanish, but she was immersed in other languages as well, including Italian, her father’s first language. For the past eleven years she has been helping children and their families deal with the very difficult task of distinguishing between language disorders and language differences. She works as a bilingual speech-language pathologist in many capacities: as a therapist in schools and private practice, a consultant for a bilingual school, and providing in-services to schools and professional organizations. Please send your questions to Grace at: grace@biculturalfamily.org!

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