lunes, abril 27, 2009

Retiro Lo Escribí

En mi blogpost el 22 de abril, escribí que "les permitiré a mis niños mejorar la lengua tagala" en vez de la castellana. Recibí varias reacciones, pero la mayoría me dijeron que no debo rendir. No hay problema mejorar el tagalo. De todos modos, es la lengua dominante de Filipinas. Es nuestra lengua. Y tenemos en nuestras venas la sangre tagala.

Además de los comentarios en el dicho blogpost, también recibí las siguientes reacciones del Círculo Hispano-Filipino:

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1) De: "frandenuevo"
Hola, Pepe:
Acabo de dejarte un mensaje en el blog, pero además, se me acaba de ocurrir una estrategia que te puede servir. Deja que tus hijos se expresen de la manera que mejor les vaya, y aprovecha los momentos adecuados para el español. Mira, como tus hijos son pequeños, cuando se vayan a dormir les cantas algo en español y triunfarás.
Fran L.
P.D. En cuanto a tu señora, te digo lo mismo o parecido. Piensa en la cantidad de canciones de amor que hay en español.

2) De: "Ceferino Benedicto, Jr."
José,
Why should your household decision stop you from writing to us in Spanish? I find it odd that one should limit a child's learning of various languages as they are like sponges, and can learn easily.
Rather than fight over it. It is a matter of you causing the matter, and your way of being. How were you being that your wife resents your effort to your daughter's learning the Spanish language?
I would think that your wife would have a change of mind should she be able to see the advantage of learning Spanish... as well as many other languages.
Ken


3) De: "tamisalat"
Living in an English speaking country, having a restrictive language policy might not sound like a good thing. My eldest daughter grew up speaking Tagalog; we knew that English was something she would learn without difficulty at school and among school mates. She actually spoke Tagalog until about 6 months before entering Kindergarten. She even spent a few weeks in some kind of transition class designed for non-English speaking immigrant kids. Now she would never speak in Tagalog. Her main language is English although her mother tongue was Tagalog. What's the point in all these? She might not speak Tagalog now but her comprehension of the language is about 75 per cent of that language. The five years I spent teaching her my language was not at all wasted. She's a champion not only in singing English songs, but Tagalog songs as well, without the weird gringo vocalization. Here at home, I still speak my mother tongue, and I am thankful that most of the time, I would be understood. This skill is just a listening skill, but it is halfway there. The most difficult component in learning a language is in listening with understanding. My French teacher once told me that he had a student whose father was a teacher of French, but could not even understand the native French speakers when they spoke. And this is very true. So all is not lost. Your kid might not speak that language, your wife even or anybody else, but really that shouldn't matter. Speak Spanish to your kid, if Spanish is your passion. You will be teaching her something precious. One day she might decide to do further studies in that language. Keep in touch with people who speak the language. Let it be your prayer to one day live in a Spanish speaking country, or at least one with a lot of Spanish speakers. Where I live there are also a lot of Latinos, but you have to seek them out and establish relationships. Fortunately, I now even belong to a Spanish-speaking church community. And in this church I serve, although I never asked for any role, I have actually been approached by them to serve their church.
Tamisalat


4) De: "Adelbert, Adelbert Batica, Batica"
'panyero -
I have the same struggle. La esposa usa ingles, ingles, demasiado ingles! She doesn't mind, though, that I push our kids to learn and deepen their knowledge of castellano. She has no objections to my teaching the grandkids castella, castella, massa castella. But she herself refuses to learn! Darn!
Ingles, ingles, demasiado ingles! Nino, que vamos a hacer?!
El Comandante Jarabas de Samar

5) De: "Juan Hernández Hortigüela"
Estimado Jose Mario: Pienso que tengo una solución para la enseñanza, de los niños, del idioma español.
Cuando yo me di cuenta, hace bastantes años, que mis tres hijos necesitarían hablar y escribir inglés en el futuro, entendí que lo mejor era enviarles a algún país de habla inglesa, durante sus vacaciones, 30 días, a CONVIVIR con una familia de ese país. Encontré una organización en Madrid, que se ocupaba de estos viajes y así lo hice, durante cinco años. Hoy comprendo que hice una buena inversión para ellos; hablan y escriben inglés muy aceptablemente. Claro está que en Madrid ellos seguían sus curso de inglés, pero le puedo asegurar que un mes en Estados Unidos, conviviendo con una familia equivalía a muchos meses de estudio en Madrid.
Por consiguiente, la solución de vuestros hijos es enviarlos de vacaciones a un país de habla hispana:México, o España, por ejemplo.
Nuestra "Asociación Cultural Galeón de Manila" tratará este asunto en próxima reunión y estudiaremos alguna solución para traer niños filipinos a España, para convivir con familias. Los niños deben tener, al menos, 10/11 años y no superar los 15: Creo que son edades idóneas.
Si encontramos alguna solución, le tendré informado. En cualquier caso, conviene pensar en ello. Ya se que es costoso el viaje, pero la estancia debe ser gratis viviendo con la familia.
Saludos

6) De: "flowerescent" (respuesta a "tamisalat")
what i find interesting about a lot of young latin-americans here in the bronx is their dislike for written spanish. when i give them bilingual forms, they usually just notice the spanish and protest if we have a copy in english. they're fluent spanish speakers.
jay


7) De: "Eduardo C. Alzona"
I will traslate this into English later, but here it is in Spanish. La politica de lenguas en la casa, segun lo que yo he leido de los expertos, es que cuando se trata de dos lenguas distintas, debese de hablar un padre exclusivamente en esa lengua, y la pareja en la otra lengua, sin mezclar y sin cambiar. Asi, los ninos no se confundiran, y podran hablar las dos lenguas con fluidez.
Mi propria experiencia ha sido esto. Yo vivi y crie a mi ahijado (Godson) viviendo junto con el y sus padres (mi hermano y su esposa compartiendo un apartamento) por las primeras cinco an~os de la vida del nin~o (hasta divorciarse los padres). Yo que soy mas fuerte y dominante en el ingles (es mi primera lengua) siempre hablaba a mi ahijado en ingles. Su mama en cambio en espan~ol, pues ella no hablaba ingles nada. El nin~o si tardo en hablar. Hasta pasar los dos an~os. Pero se dice que, y yo soy testigo de que, cuando comenzo a hablar, hablaba ingles bien y el espan~ol bien. Nunca se confundio, y sabia que hablar, y con quien.
La politica debe de ser la exclusividad de la lengua. Yo recomendaria que tardaran el ingles hasta llegar al colegio. Pues, si ustedes le van a mandar a una escuela en donde ensen~an ingles bien, sus nin~os rapido lo cogeran. Pues, el ingles es la lengua de nuestras cortes, la legislatura, nuestras investigaciones cientificas, nuestra tecnologia de informacion y el gobierno. Ademas del comercio, es lengua internacional. Es la lengua de la aviacion internacional – las torres de control hablan en ingles a las aereolineas de todos paises. Sin ello, no se puede tener exito profesional en Filipinas. Yo soy muy en pro del ingles, es mi primera lengua y reconozco su importancia mundial.
Sin embargo, siendo hispanista lamento su decision de abandonar nuestra lengua de cultura, historia y literatura. Ya veras que sus nin~os lo aprenderan mas facil si usted no cambia de una lengua a otra para usted mismo. Comenzaran a responderle en espan~ol. Lo que yo hacia era hablar a mi ahijado y traducir todo lo que el decia en espan~ol al ingles, haciendole repitirlo. Yo le obligaba a hablarme en ingles, y a los tres an~os el tenia capacidad en las dos lenguas, y a los cinco, habilidad normal y fuerte, ingles y espan~ol sin confusion.
Los nin~os son impresionables, no ha implantado nada en la cabeza de ellos de la importancia de nuestra lengua cerventina sino que no valia luchar por ella.
Segun Wikipedia, en terminos de la "totalidad de hablantes" (no solamente los hablantes nativos), las lenguas de mayor difusion son:
According to Wikipedia, in terms of "total speakers" (not just native speakers), the top eight languages in order are:
Mandarin – 1.05 billion
English – 1 billion
Hindi – 650 million
French – 500 million
Spanish – 430 million
Arabic – 300 million
Russian – 275 million
Portuguese – 235 million


8) De: "Ceferino Benedicto, Jr." (respuesta a "Adelbert, Adelbert Batica, Batica")
No, creo que tu lío es distincto del José. In your case, your wife does not object even if she herself refuse to learn. That's her way of being and being the cause of the matter not learning Spanish.
In José's case, the wife objects to his efforts to teach his daughter Spanish.
Your wife sees the importance of the language, but it is her way of being that makes her incapable of learning the language. José's wife on the other hand may not yet see the importance of the language such that she may find José's effort as a waste of time.
Ken


9) De: "Ceferino Benedicto, Jr." (respuesta a "Adelbert, Adelbert Batica, Batica")
Another thing.... since you are Waray, and living in the US, I presume you and your family are beyond the clutches of the Tagalista.
In José's case, I can see the Tagalista ideology working. It worked on me when I was younger, and it worked on my wife's family.
My wife spoke fluent chavacano until they moved to Manila. And her dad made an effort to speak to them, while their mom objected, and put a stop to the absurdity since they are in the Philippines, and should be speaking Tagalog to be Filipinos.
Ken


10) De: "tamisalat" (respuesta a "flowerescent")
The problem could be related to the different kinds of register. Most of the written Spanish would tend to be more formal, whereas spoken Spanish has a lot of informal and colloquial registers. I have met a lot of native Spanish speakers or those who live with Spanish speaking families who are very bad in reading Spanish, they would read haltingly. This has surprised me a lot because reading Spanish has never been a problem for me, even with less than two years of studying the language.
Tamisalat


11) De: "flowerescent" (respuesta a "tamisalat")
maybe it's also an issue of phonetics. those kids are so used to reading the non-phonetic english that reading spanish becomes difficult. i know for myself when i'm speaking english, i 'see' the words in me head, whereas in tagalog that doesn't happen. it's because i learned english through a lot of reading. tagalog, on the other hand, i learned through osmosis.
jay


12) De: "Guillermo Gomez-Rivera" (respuesta a "Juan Hernández Hortigüela")
Estimado D. Juan:
Gracias por esta idea de enviar a los niños a paises de habla hispana. En Filipinas se podría empezar con enviar a niños a vivir con familias de habla chabacano en Zamboanga. Eso para empezar. Luego, su envío a España sería una culminación.
Abrazo.
Guillermo Gómez Rivera

13) Mi respuesta a "Juan Hernández Hortigüela"
¡Gracias, Sr. Juan! Es una gran idea, menos los gastos, ¡jajaja! De acuerdo, la inmersión de mis niños en un país de habla castellana es la mejor solución para hacerse hispanohablantes. Pero ahorita, no es posible. Es que nuestro presupuesto no nos permitirá hacerlo :'( Pero esperaré por ese proyecto que Usted está trabajando para mejorar el español de mis tres niños.
Por ese proyecto, Usted es un bayani para los filipinos jovenes de hoy.
¡Hasta pronto!
José Mario "Pepe" Alas

14) De: "Fernando Zialcita" (respuesta a mí y a los Srs. Hernández y Gómez)
Es lo que quisiera hacer: Enviar mi hijo menor a España para que aprenda el idioma -- o por lo menos este expuesto. Un verano ayudaría en despertarle. Ya lo practica conmigo pero estando en España -- o en México -- producirá resultados.
Saludos,
Fernando

15) Mi respuesta a "Ceferino Benedicto, Jr."
Hi Ken! I think there must have been a slight misunderstanding. I did mention in my article that me and my wife have been quarreling over my "Spanish-only" policy in our home. But the main reason why we quarrel is because I easily get angry at her whenever she speaks Tagalog to our children. Basically, I confess that it's my fault. I pressure her to learn Spanish, but the only problem is that she doesn't share the same zeal that I have for the Spanish language. Besides, she's not into scholarly or patriotic stuff.
I keep on telling her that if she doesn't know anything that she has to say in Spanish to our children, all she had to do was ask. Most of the times, she doesn't. Yes, she believes that it is important for our children to learn Spanish. She agrees with me that Spanish is a Filipino language and that our children should really learn it. But it appears that she's nonchalant about it.
The bottomline is, my wife doesn't really object to our children learning this noblest Filipino language of all. She wants them to learn it. It's just that her interest to learn the language herself in order to communicate with our children is just not there. And that's what irritates me. I would like to apologize to all of you if I have made any confusion with that blogpost that I wrote.
José Mario "Pepe" Alas


16) De: "Juan Hernández Hortigüela" (respuesta a "Fernando Zialcita")
Estimado Fernando: El asunto del aprendizaje del idioma español por los niños filipinos, es fundamental para el futuro de nuestro idioma en Filipinas. Personalmente, pienso trabajar dentro de la A.C.G.M, por este proyecto. Por mi edad (67 años) posiblemente ya no pueda ver muchos resultados, pero de lo que sí estoy seguro es que si no trabajamos con los niños por nuestro idioma, el futuro se me antoja lejano...
Todos sabemos que los niños asimilam las enseñanzas de una manera espectacular; es el momento del adecuado aprendizaje. No debemos desaprovechar su dulce edad.
Paso a paso se anda el camino...
Un abrazo

17) De: "Raymundo E. Rodríguez M." (respuesta a "Fernando Zialcita")
Don Fernando Zialcita
Dígale a su hijo que con mucho gusto puede contactar a este servidor, ya sea añadiéndome al messenger de yahoo (raye_rodriguezm@ yahoo.com. mx); hotmail (re_rmx@hotmail. com); o a las redes sociales de facebook y/o hi5; inclusive si viene a México podríamos conversar.
Disculpe la vez pasada si no le pude ver personalmente en la Ciudad de México, pero estaba pasando por una mala racha económica.
Saludos desde México
Mil gracias!!
RR

18) "Patricio Iglesias" (respuesta a "Fernando Zialcita")
Estimado Fernando:
Por supuesto que puede también añadirme al Messenger de Hotmail (esta misma cuenta) con mucho gusto. ¿No cree que le podría interesar el Círculo?Saludos
Patricio Iglesias

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Pues, continuaré a hablar con mis hijos en español. Y sólo el Sr. Dios me puede parar...

¡Viva la Hispanidad!

2 comentarios:

josé miguel dijo...

I too want to learn Spanish because it is our original uniting national language. Some of us may speak Tagalog, Ilongo or Ilocano which is good if we want to preserve our regional character. I prefer we should.

It was the Americans who imposed their language in our already independent and sovereign nation when they invaded us in 1899. This imposition cost us 500,000 to 900,000 Filipino lives. I have references if asked.

That is the reason why today, I as well as millions of us Filipinos can not speak Spanish. I do not believe the information that the reason we Filipinos in general did not learn Spanish is because the Spaniards systematically imposed a Spanish Language blackout in the Philippines.

What we should do Pepe is to lay the ground work for Spanish language to regenerate in the Philippines. This is a social situation. This phrase I have been hearing many times: "Let us start with ourselves to realize our goals..." have often been misappropriately and incompletely applied.

You seem to have the potential to contribute to that move to recover our inheritance left by our forefathers. They fought for it with their blood when the Americans attacked us in 1899. Our warrior fathers fought to keep our nation which was just newly born in 1898. That was our nation- whole, pure and Filipino.

Israel was able to reclaim their land in the 1940s after 2000 years of being scattered stateless around the world. How did they do it? A group of Jews consolidated information about the history of the Jews and developed a format for the regeneration of the Jewish state with a homeland based on history of their nation. They were able to preserve and recover their identity which facilitated the reuniting od the Jews into the present Israel.

Why don't all of us who have the aspiration to recover that nation taken away from us also unite, pool our resources and coordinate towards that direction?

We can. We can finally come home and speak the tongue many of our forefathers used when they courted the mothers of our parents!

josé miguel dijo...

Tenemos a preservar nuestra vida rural.