Thanks, Hana! I’m glad you’ve encountered a new perspective here.

hello, Kate. I think your comments were interesting, Thank you for your interesting story.

I am currently studying in Korea. When I study Korean when I was young, I was shocked that there are many words composed mainly of Chinese characters. Also, in the case of Japanese, I notice that there are many foreign words derived from Japanese due to the historical background.
However, it seems very interesting that this kinds of parts are also found in Australia through your comments. I’m curious to know what cultural differences are there for indigenous people and how they affect the way people live in Australia today. I’m also curious about the unique bus stop logo with Latino and Australian identity that you mentioned before. Thanks for the interesting comments.

Thanks, XM! I still think no one should go around evangelising about the benefits of bilingualism to strangers 😉

Hi Thao, thanks for the sharing. I have the same feeling that it is a pity not to inherit our first language to our next generation. If I have a chance to encounter this situation, I would tell her the benefits of being bilingual in terms of learning and scaffolding. As a parent, the lady might have some worries over first language influence. But to my personal experience, children do not mix up with languages as easily as we thought. It depends how we teach. I would speak only one language at a time, but not mixing both languages in a sentence or even an idea to my children. That’s how I perceive a better way to develop their bilingual mind.

You are flattering me 🙂 … I’ve never been to Lombok but learned about Sasak from one of my former students, Kamaludin Yusra, who is now a professor at Universitas Mataram. Together with colleagues he has just published an article in Multilingua, which you might find interesting:
Yusra, Kamaludin, Lestari, Yuni Budi, & Juwaeriah, Yulia. (2022). Commodification of English and English-like structures in shop names in Lombok Island, Indonesia. Multilingua. doi:doi:10.1515/multi-2021-0151

I speak Sasak, spoken by people in Lombok. Peter. K. Austin says that my language is endangered. Have you been to Lombok? Do you know any words in Sasak? I notice in the class, you pronounce Sasak and Lombok exactly like how Lombok people do.

Thank you Ingrid, yes i’m an interpreter and i’m practicing at home with all of them.

thanks, Yoonie! You might find this article relevant – it provides further details on how the reform affects Mongolians in China and, I suppose, the situation of Korean is similar: https://languageonthemove.com/will-education-reform-wipe-out-mongolian-language-and-culture/

Dear Ingrid, thank you for sharing your insight.
I saw articles on Korean second generation both in Russia and China are struggling due to the recent change in the government policy. They cannot use Korean language at at school. In China, it was allowed to take a university entrance exam in Korean instead of China, but it is now banned. This would eventually mean that they are less likely to achieve a higher social status. This idea really got me worried when I saw the news.

Thank you, Logan! I haven’t read The Geography of Thought but these easy contrasts (“Asians are like this, Westerners are like that”) are bound to be wrong. This kind of essentialism does more harm than good. For instance, where would the three Hani women fit in? Or your own bilingual self?

Thank you, Qi! It’s fascinating how Mandarin is taking over other Chinese languages, even in the diaspora. What has your own experience with learning Mandarin been like?

Thank you, Kate! Are you following some a the news about Koryos ‘returning’ to S Korea in recent years? What are the experiences of those returnees?

Thank you, Nes! It’s really hard when parents and children speak different languages, particularly when there are difficult topics to talk about or when your parents reach old age … maybe you’ll have to act as interpreter between your parents and your brothers in such situations?

Thank you, Clara! First generation migrants often want to shield their children from their own difficult language learning experiences – without realising that for children growing up in Australia English is easy and Vietnamese hard …