english

I finally filled out and turned in all the registration forms required for my daughter to enter Kindergarten this fall. After getting over the fact that she’s about to reach this humongous milestone, I also had to come to terms with the fact that she won’t be going to a dual language school — at least not for now. I can’t lie. It was an extremely difficult decision to make, but at this time in our lives, I’m confident it’sRead More ...

When thinking about Spanglish, I usually think about the words we use day-to-day.  Phrases like “Want your agua?” pass through my lips all the time. I keep trying to remind myself to speak en Espanol, not in English, but lots of the time what comes out is our familiar old friend, Spanglish.  Something I’ve only recently started to think about is the body language that accompanies my Spanish-speaking Latinidad and my English speaking American identity.  They are very different, andRead More ...

A couple of days ago, I overheard my daughter speaking in English while she was playing by herself with her My Little Pony collection. I made it a point to observe her a bit more intently – without her knowledge, of course – just to make sure she wasn’t just saying a few words in English, as she’s done in the past. I don’t know why it surprised me, but the whole time the ponies were speaking English to eachRead More ...

“Estoy terminado,” is what my son says every time he’s done eating.  Not, “he terminado,” or “ya terminé.”  When he wants to know what something’s for, the question is, “¿Qué es eso para?” And it drives me absolutely crazy.  Because both examples are such direct translations from English.  I am finished.  Estoy terminado. What’s that for?  ¿Qué es eso para? As I do whenever my boys say something that’s not quite right, I correct them gently without quite correcting themRead More ...

Last week I was pretty taken aback when I heard someone say that “el Spanglish es una aberración” (literally an aberration, an outrage). The craziest thing is that this person — an old colleague and friend of my husband’s who is Argentinian, but has lived in Miami for a long time —  said this as he admitted to using it himself! Then I realized I got exactly what he meant because I used to be one of them: the anti-Spanglish,Read More ...