Editor’s note: Mother’s Day is this Sunday and we decided to celebrate a las madres de las madres–las abuelitas. This week we have two posts focusing on grandmothers as providers of cultural identity and a link to our heritage language. Today’s post is by Dominican/American mother of four, Angélica Perez-Litwin, who just launched Modern Familia-an read more ...
When I was ten years old, after eating breakfast and saying good-bye to my older siblings who headed out for high school, it was time for Spanish dialogue class with my dad. He had a book of dialogues he had used while learning Spanish to be a missionary in Mexico. We memorized dialogues and I read more ...
The following is a guest post by Carolina Gomez founder of 1-2-3 Spanish Together. We are a bicultural family living in Boston, MA. My husband is from the United States, and I am originally from Colombia where I grew up and lived for the first two-thirds of my life. We are both bilingual, and although read more ...
The following is a guest post that came about after a conversation my cousin, her husband and I had over Christmas when they were visiting from Mexico. (I wrote about their visit here and here.) Anyhow, this is a topic I’ve been wanting to write about for some time—especially after having that interesting conversation last read more ...
The following is a guest post from Angélica Pérez. I remember growing up in a very cultural, Latino home. We spoke only in Spanish; we listened, sang and danced only Spanish music; watched Spanish-speaking television networks; had primarily Spanish-speaking friends; lived in a Dominican neighborhood; and enjoyed a Latino existence. I remember early Saturday mornings read more ...
The following is a guest post by bilingualism expert, Dr. Fred Genesee, Professor of Psychology at McGill University in Canada. There are many good reasons for raising children bilingually. First and foremost are personal and family reasons. If members of the immediate family or extended family include people who speak other languages, then it is read more ...
When I meet new people, I often try to slip into the conversation that I’m Mexican-American. You can’t tell by looking at me (I’m the whitey-whitest in a family of fairly white Mexicans) and you can’t tell by talking with me because my Spanish is terrible. I love my culture and I’m so proud to read more ...
This is the continuation of yesterday’s post. We first learned about Susan McKinney de Ortega through a message she sent to let us know about her own blog and how she occasionally writes about raising two bilingual and bicultural teenage girls in San Miguel de Allende, México. The more we read about her and her read more ...
Although this is the first time we’re doing this, both Ana Lilian and I are so sure you’re going to so thoroughly enjoy the following essay, that the decision to post it was not hard to make. We first learned about Susan McKinney de Ortega through a message she sent to let us know about read more ...
As a German mother living in Scotland with a Scottish husband I’m attempting to bring our 2 1/2 year old daughter up bilingually. We are encountering a situation where our daughter understands German, the minority language, perfectly, but most of her utterances are in English. She needs a lot of positive encouragement to even say read more ...
My baby is finally starting to use his sign language with me! It is so exciting to have him let me know his wants and needs through signs. I had used sign language with my first son, and it was a wonderful way to communicate before he could speak. We stuck to the basics—milk, more, read more ...
I come from a long line of atypical Latin American women who don’t really know how to cook. (My mom won’t be happy I’m divulging this information. Sorry mamita, I still think you’re an amazing woman!). I don’t have pangs of nostalgia for my grandmother’s arroz con pollo or for my tía’s empanadas. Growing up, read more ...
Most of us have been affected one way or another by the economic woes this country has been through in the last couple of years. And, although children might be too young to understand all the implications and repercussions of a bad economy, they are not blind to the changes these bring about in their lives. Yet, at least for read more ...
