Dear Friends:
This is an excellent article which New York Times adopted from the
International Herald Tribune today (19 03 2012).
It is an appropriate subject for twitters. My opinion is that the knowledge of
any other language other than your mother tongue is beneficial
whether you know them well or not. The more you know means you benefit more. I
should know as I have been struggling with both French
and Spanish for more than twelve years. I stop here because I really didn't
like to comment.
-bhuban
Rendezvous
Always knew 'Bilinguals are Smarter'
PARIS — Of course, we already knew this, those of us who are bilingual: We are
smarter than other people.
Still, it was nice to have an article in The New York Times Sunday
Reviewconfirm it:
“Being bilingual, it turns out, makes you smarter. It can have a profound
effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language and
even shielding against dementia in old age,” Yudhijit Bhattacharjee wrote.
“The collective evidence from a number of such studies suggests that the
bilingual experience improves the brain’s so-called executive function — a
command system that directs the attention processes that we use for planning,
solving problems and performing various other mentally demanding tasks.”
An article in August 2010 quoted Ellen Bialystok, a noted neuroscientist and
the author of “Bilingualism in Development: Language, Literacy and Cognition,”
stating bluntly that bilingualism “doesn’t make kids smarter.”
“There are documented cognitive developments,” she said, “but whatever smarter
means, it isn’t true.”
I choose to believe Yudhijit because my children have had a Mandarin-speaking
nanny since they were four months old, even though neither I nor my partner —
both Americans — speak Chinese.
And I have only spoken French to the children since they were born, though I’m
from New Jersey.
Let me explain.
I never actually thought my children being multilingual would make them
smarter. (And I’m still not sure. Like Dr. Bialystok, I think there are a lot
of ways to measure “smart.”)
But long before I had children I decided that they would speak a foreign
language if I had anything to do with it.
For me, it just made sense in our globalized world. From a purely practical
point of view, by the time my children graduate from high school, China will
likely have the largest economy in the world. (When I told DealBookeditor at
large Andrew Ross Sorkin my reasoning, he got his kids a Chinese nanny, too.)
We are not alone among New Yorkers — or even Americans!
I once tried to embark on learning Chinese, but one course in college taught me
how unlikely that dream was. On the other hand, experts said that if my
children heard Chinese all their lives (and we will immerse them in it whenever
and wherever we can), then there was an excellent chance that they would speak
the language.
The other reason I wanted my children to speak another language, or two, was
the joy I took from becoming fluent in French. As a poor kid from Trenton,
learning French changed my life.
But whatever your background, or language, the benefits of speaking more than
one are obvious. You have to do nothing more than read “La Peste,” Albert
Camus’s novel, “The Plague,” in English translation and read it in the original
to see that what is lost in translation: everything.
Or ride a Paris subway, or fight with a French cab driver, or any number of
other pursuits, and you will find that they are far finer when done in the
original.
I wanted my children to have those gifts: the gift of the author’s original
words, and the gift of communication and understanding across geographic
borders.
Of course, I always say, “Le français c’est pour s’amuser, le chinois c’est
pour travailler.” French is for fun, Chinese is for work.
The odds are, that will be the reality of the global economy in the middle of
the 21st century, where my children will work.
But — right now at least — I can honestly say it doesn’t matter to me if my one
of children uses his Chinese to become a busker in the Shanghai subway or the
CEO of a multinational corporation. Though, I suppose this may change . . .
Likewise, I assume there are many Mandarin speakers who would say there is just
as much fun to be had in Chinese as there is in French.
What do you think? Are bilinguals “smarter,” and what does that mean? How are
you handling raising multilingual children? And are there drawbacks as well as
benefits?
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