Jamie A. Thomas
  • About
  • Portfolio
    • Digital Storytelling
    • Ethnography + Language
  • Teaching
    • AfroLatinx Podcast
    • [ZOMBIES REIMAGINED]
  • Blog
  • Connect With Me

#languagestory blog

Video & perspectives on communication, intercultural learning & the impact of anthropological research.

Speaking Halal in Philadelphia

12/23/2017

1 Comment

 
by Kyle Martin and Arielle Pinto
​
​Kyle is a senior at Strath Haven High School looking forward to choosing a college major in the coming year.  Arielle is a junior at Haverford College, where she is a Philosophy major. Listen to their #LanguageStory here, which includes a contribution from Swarthmore College junior Erick Gutierrez.

Listen: Arabic in Center City.

Arabic is the fastest growing language in the United States. According to a recent study by the Pew Research Center, “the number of people ages 5 and older who speak Arabic at home has grown by 29% between 2010 and 2014 to 1.1 million speakers, making it the seventh most commonly spoken non-English language in the U.S”[1]. Indeed, the presence of the Arabic language is palpable in the streets of Philadelphia, particularly in Center City, where Halal food trucks adorned with some Arabic signage are widely dispersed.
Picture
What began as an attempt to research the semiotic landscape created by these trucks turned into an investigation of the use of the Arabic language in Philadelphia, following an interview with Mr. Amine Helali (an operator of one such truck). From here, we spoke with Professor Benjamin Smith, an Arabic professor at Swarthmore College. We asked them questions about the languages they use in different contexts, and they told us about what they gathered from their own experiences. From both of these interviews, it seemed to us that English has a considerable importance in this community.

Amine Helali is an Algerian food truck vendor who works on the Avenue of the Arts, a largely cosmopolitan, dynamic and artistic neighborhood in Center City. After reading about the French street artist JR’s mural of Ibrahim Shah, a Pakistani food truck vendor,  whose image formerly stood on one of the facades of the Graham Building in Center City[2], one of us got inspiration, and decided to further investigate the people working in this business. Amine told us about his multilingual background in Arabic, French, Spanish and English. In his work, he uses all of those languages, but for different purposes...


Read More
1 Comment

You Are How You Speak

12/19/2017

0 Comments

 
by Melanie Ackerman & Emily Williams 
Picture
When asked to investigate instances of language diversity on our college campuses as an assignment for an Introduction to Linguistics course, we conducted surveys to explore how knowledge of a secondary language affects one’s primary mode of speech. We compiled survey responses regarding Swarthmore College students’ acquisition of new languages with responses from members of the Bryn Mawr College athletics department about the differences in their slang and terminology across varying sports and jobs. Our findings reflect how influential learning a second language or being part of a secondary speech community can be in forming a better understanding of a primary language or speech community.


Read More
0 Comments

Diversity in Communication and Bilingualism

11/29/2017

0 Comments

 
by Sophia Moore and Xena Wang

So Many Languages.

Picture
With over thousands of languages in existence, it is no surprise that many individuals speak more than one. Sociolinguist Carol Myers-Scotton, in her book Multiple Voices, defines bilingualism as ​“the ability to use two or more languages sufficiently to carry on a limited casual conversation”. [1] In order to investigate the different implications of bilingualism with regards to the self and others in a social context, we conducted two surveys within the college-aged community of Swarthmore College.

​In this post, we explore how bilingualism affects linguistic diversity: variations in all aspects of languages, including grammars, vocabularies, dialects, and languages themselves. Our study looked at the relationship between thought and speech patterns, and the different ways in which bilinguals’ speech styles differ depending on the language used. We examined the diverse ways people process language with the self (internally) and with others (externally), and how these differences contribute to linguistic diversity as a whole. By contributing to the overall diversity of the human population, linguistic diversity helps with the formation of new ideas or solutions to problems in relationships or larger societal issues, and aids in forging a unique identity within a community of language speakers. 


Read More
0 Comments

    Main Author

    Jamie A. Thomas is a sociocultural linguist and digital media producer. Her forthcoming book Zombies Speak Swahili is all about the undead, videogames, and why language and communication matter. She teaches at Santa Monica College.

    Archives

    September 2018
    February 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    March 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    August 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    October 2015
    September 2015
    August 2015
    December 2014
    November 2014

    Categories

    All
    Afterlife
    Art
    Beginnings
    Bilingualism
    Body
    Borderlands
    Cinema
    Collaboration
    Colloquial Speech
    Communication
    Communicative Competence
    Context
    Creation
    Cuba
    Cultural Exchange
    Digital Humanities
    Diversity
    Election 2016
    Emoji
    Engaged Research
    Gender
    Gentrification
    Hashtag
    Ideology
    Idioms
    In-N-Out
    Intercultural Learning
    Interpersonal Communication
    Intersectionality
    Linguistic Inequality
    Local
    Mexico
    Modality
    Museums
    Participation
    Philadelphia
    Project Goals
    Public Ethnography
    Public Memory
    Race
    Saturday Night Live
    Semiotics
    Sexuality
    Sign Language
    Speech Community
    Stereotypes
    Storytelling
    Study Abroad
    Video
    Women
    Zombies

    RSS Feed

Proudly powered by Weebly