by Juhyae Kim and Anya Slepyan
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Juhyae is a junior linguistics major and education minor at Swarthmore College. Anya is a freshman and potential major in Russian, also at Swarthmore College. Watch their video essay below.

While this difference may seem insignificant, it made her think about the variations in language across college campuses, and how the unique slang and language varieties helped build campus identities. As a freshman, Anya was especially aware of the fact that she had entered Swarthmore knowing none of the appropriate and community-specific language, but had quickly picked the slang and jargon necessary to navigate the specific semiotic landscape of our college campus. This made her curious to explore the different school-specific language used on various colleges, and to explore how language use may differ at schools of different sizes, types, and geographic locations. At the conclusion of our research together, we found that the existence of campus-specific vocabulary results in unique speech communities on each campus, which is an essential factor that forms campus identity...

by Sophia Moore and Xena Wang

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. 

Just two days ago, I was on my way home after spending an exhilarating long weekend in London and Amsterdam with researchers of language, linguistics, and culture (at Baraza at SOAS), when I found myself totally turned around in Manchester Airport. Which way to go after passport control? To transfer to another flight? The signage was confusing.

Ordinarily, I would've felt pretty lame about it, but then I also noticed another person angling back and forth between the signs/words printed on doors 1 and 2, with a look of confusion similar to my own. I turned to ask him where if he was on the same flight as me. When he didn't vocalize in reply, but instead used a variety of Sign Language, and gestured to show me a message he'd typed in English into the Notes feature on his iPhone,  I realized that not only was he from my same flight, but that he was also Deaf.

It also dawned on me that this same guy had earlier just been at the Passport Control desk adjacent to me in line, when we had thanked the UK Border Force officer with by gesturing his hand away from in mouth in a sign I recognized as "thank you." Now that we both stood in the airport between doors 1 and 2, the task became about how we would both get to our next flight, as both of us were heading stateside. My new friend tapped his wrist, as if pointing to the time, and indicated that we had only a short while before our next flight. Uh oh. With only limited time, how would we communicate to solve our problem?

There's so much to be learned from listening to the voices of others. This past semester and summer, I was fortunate enough to have been part of an interdisciplinary team that prepared 17 undergraduate students for field research in Cuba. For nearly all of us, this was our first time to the island. For some of us, this was our first experience on an airplane, or outside of the U.S. Together, we represented studies in anthropology, Black Studies, linguistics, cultural studies, economics, environmental studies, Spanish, sociology, and visual and performance arts. ​This was a tremendous experience in intercultural learning and bilingual communication. 

All throughout our 10-day research and study trip, I conducted intermittent video interviews with students, my teaching partners at Swarthmore College--a team of faculty and administrative leadership. I created this video to chronicle our individual and connected reflections on multiple dimensions of our field experiences.

Biggest of all, this was our students' first experience speaking with Cuban people in Cuba about the enduring importance of the Cuban Revolution, the history of African enslavement in the Caribbean, the transformation of economic, education, and medical sectors, and the continuing traditions of African religion, dance, philosophy, and values across the island nation.

By speaking with Cuban professionals, mothers, doctors, museum directors, proprietors, artists, community activists, and makers of all kinds, students learned how to formulate meaningful and localized questions, connect with speakers of Cuban Spanish, and challenge their own assumptions about what is universally important to cultures other than their own. 

Our trip was generously sponsored through support from several partner organizations and departments across the College, and we are grateful!