© 2024 WNIJ and WNIU
Northern Public Radio
801 N 1st St.
DeKalb, IL 60115
815-753-9000
Northern Public Radio
Play Live Radio
Next Up:
0:00
0:00
0:00 0:00
Available On Air Stations

Perspective: The Real Multilingual Heroes

Oli Lynch
/
Pixabay

Perspectives author Elsa Glover occasionally recruits fellow teachers or students to take over her regular slot in the schedule and share their opinions with WNIJ listeners. Today, we hear from Kaneland High School Spanish teacher Dylan Donley.

 

I’m an area Spanish teacher, a father of a two-year-old girl, and a lover of languages. Learning Spanish has been such a gift to me and I’ve decided that in spite of not being a native speaker I would still do my best to raise my daughter bilingually in Spanish and English.  

 

When I speak Spanish to her in public settings, strangers will sometimes make comments about how great it is that I’m imparting Spanish proficiency to her. They mean well and with affirming smiles and words, they tell me just how useful being multilingual will be in today’s global economy and the changing cultural and linguistic landscape of this country. And they aren’t wrong. 

 

But I stop to think and wonder if those same people step into the conversation of the Mexican parent, or the Polish parent, or the Korean parent working hard to keep their native tongue alive in the face of a reality where English penetrates nearly all aspects of their daily existence, and where their first language may not be respected, supported, and developed in academic environments.  

 

If the country and the world is changing in a way that increasingly values multilingualism, those in society’s minority groups should get special recognition for overcoming the challenges they face in preserving their cultural and linguistic heritage. Those parents should be praised for doing a job even more difficult than my own.  

 

I’m Dylan Donley, and that’s my perspective.