Posts by: Leslie
Today’s New York Times features a Room for Debate section about the need to learn multiple languages. Six panelists, including author Stacie Berdan, agree that it is crucial to learn more than one language to operate in the new, globalized world.
They all refute an assertion by Lawrence Summers, former president of Harvard University and former secretary of the Treasury (and a man with a history of making blanket statements), who wrote What You (Really) Need to Know.
The world is much more open, and events abroad affect the lives of Americans more than ever before. This makes it essential that the educational experience breed cosmopolitanism — that students have international experiences, and classes in the social sciences draw on examples from around the world. It seems logical, too, that more in the way of language study be expected of students. I am not so sure.
English’s emergence as the global language, along with the rapid progress in machine translation and the fragmentation of languages spoken around the world, make it less clear that the substantial investment necessary to speak a foreign tongue is universally worthwhile. While there is no gainsaying the insights that come from mastering a language, it will over time become less essential in doing business in Asia, treating patients in Africa or helping resolve conflicts in the Middle East. [emphasis mine, read more here]
This strikes me as arrogant and short-sighted. Even if more non-Americans are learning English and Google Translate is getting better, that does not negate the value of learning other languages.
Being able to speak more than one language has had an immeasurable impact on my own life.
I learned Spanish before the age of five, thanks to my wonderful Nana Petra. While my parents were working, she totally spoiled me with home-cooked Mexican meals, lacy white dresses, and games of Lotería. She drilled me on pronunciation (A, E, I, O, U) and taught me nursery rhymes.
This early exposure to Spanish paved the neural pathways in my brain to let me think in more than one language.
I continued to study Spanish all through school and all through college, including a year here in Chile.
When I graduated with a degree in Latin American Studies, I moved to China to teach English at a university near Shanghai. I’d never studied Chinese and never been obsessed with Asian culture, but I was able to quickly pick up the basics of child-like Chinese through conversations with vegetable vendors, security guards, and migrant workers on the train.
Over the next few years, I took many private lessons and small-group classes. Thank you Layla and Xiaofei for helping me elevate my Chinese skills from toddler level to that of a nine-year-old who likes to talk about wind turbine engineers and garbage incinerators. Learning Chinese gave me access to get beyond China’s single story, beyond the world of tour guides and textbooks, to take part in everyday life.
Now back in Chile, I use Chinese less. In the last month I’ve used it twice: at a restaurant and with a new Start-Up Chile entrepreneur from China. But linguistic crossover shapes the way I see the world.
Last week I led an entrepreneurship seminar at Casa de la Mujer, a community center in a poorer neighborhood of Santiago. The last day, fabulous Start-Up Chile video intern Javiera came with me to film the class and interview me and the ladies about our experiences. (The video will be ready soon!)
I talked about the course in English and it was SO HARD! You might be thinking, but Leslie, you’re AMERICAN. English is your first language. How can it be hard?
Since I taught and thought about the class in Spanish, explaining it in English felt distant, foreign, and even patronizing. I stumbled over words; I felt like English made the distinctions between myself and the ladies too dramatic. In Spanish it felt more communal, more egalitarian, more personal. My testimonial, of how leading discussions with these woman has inspired me as an entrepreneur, flowed with enthusiasm in Spanish, but in English it felt forced, hesitant. Good thing Javiera took lots of footage: there should be at least a few clips in which my English is fluent and confident.
Linguistic crossover has had such a profound impact on my worldview. It has given me a broader understanding of words and grammar, but more importantly the tools to navigate the world with flexibility and empathy.
I truly can’t imagine life in only one tongue. I wish every preschooler could have a multilingual headstart!
Here’s the latest update on last week´s cheery, bilingual posts on Chile-China cherry trade. It reads like a textbook case study in supply and demand, as well as a cautionary tale about the risks inherent in agriculture, exports, perishables, and trends in general.
From today’s El Mercurio: (translation and emphasis mine)
Oversupply of domestic exports to China cherries causes 50% drop in prices
Friday, January 27, 2012
Economy and Business
Miguel Concha M.
The rush for the fruit to land in China before the New Year holiday caused a collapse of the ports and sales systems of the Asian country. The price of Chilean cherries in China dropped by 50% in the past few days.
As explains Manuel Jose Alcaino, president of Decofrut, from January 23 fruit values were reduced from an average of U.S. $ 30 FOB per carton to U.S. $ 15 FOB.
The reason for the drastic fall is in response to an oversupply of cherries during the week before the Chinese New Year celebration, when by tradition many give gifts of fruit.
“We tried to get almost all the fruit to arrive before the celebration, which begins on January 23 and lasts for about a week. This stretched the country’s logistics system, making it collapse and causing a strong demand overload in a week, “said Alcaino.
The specialist added that a large proportion of the Chilean cherry sales in the Asian giant occur around Chinese New Year. In 2012 that date was earlier than in previous years, based on the location of the moon, so Chilean companies increased their efforts to make the cherries arrive in time for the celebration.
This resulted in three boats filled with about 700 containers, which together totaled about 14,000 tons of fruit.
“There were blocks and blocks of fruit trucks trying to enter the city through the port of Guangzhou. In addition, the market itself was also a mess because the volumes had exceeded sales opportunities in the city,” says Decofrut president.
The problem faced by exporters in the world’s second largest economy is not small, when you consider that is the main market for cherries. In fact, Asia accounts for about 60% of total shipments of the fruit.
Moreover, in recent years, exports of Chilean cherries to China had experienced a real boom: growth of 91%. Prices hit more than U.S. $ 40 FOB per box.
According to data from the Fruit Exporters Association (Asoex) in the 2010-2011 season a total of 7211 tons of cherries arrived in China , versus 3772 tons in 2009-2010.
Alcaino adds that part of the reason for the haste why this large amount was sent, was in response to the high expectations they had for exporters this year, based on the strong growth in previous years.
Students at work! Photo courtesy of Fundación EcoScience
Do you remember doing hands-on science experiments?
When I was a sophomore in high school, for a chemistry project, I studied baking. I decided to research the chemical properties of flour, sugar, eggs, butter, baking powder vs. baking soda, etc. I then ignored printed recipes and attempted to create tasty treats. The first few were far from delicious: a cake chock-full of chalky cocoa powder, concave lemon cupcakes, a mushy cake with too much mint extract. Eventually, by cake number 25 or so, I had created two real recipes: mint chocolate chip cake and apricot muffins.
Why am I telling you this?
Because it’s one of the few school lessons that I can remember in detail.
Why do I remember that baking soda is a base, and it needs to be combined with acidic ingredients like lemon or buttermilk or cream of tartar in order to produce the carbon dioxide bubbles that enable the cake to rise?
Because I didn’t just read this in a book; I discovered it with my own hands and nose and tastebuds.
I believe that hands-on science education is absolutely critical for the next generation of citizens, everywhere in the world. One must have a fundamental understanding of ecology, biology, and other disciplines to be able to make good decisions about food, transportation, and the world in general, but students will only truly remember those lessons if they discover them with their own hands!
My friend María Cuellar is developing a fabulous science education project here in Chile. It’s a bus specially equipped with science experiments, and it will travel to underprivileged schools throughout the country, to reach 10,000 kids per year. I love the name: Con = with, Ciencia = science, and ConCiencia sounds the same as conscience.
María’s enthusiasm is contagious; here’s her description of the project.
Dear friends,
I’ve told you a little bit about this before, but I’ll explain it again briefly. I am part of a group of scientists and entrepreneurs working on a project called el Bus ConCiencia, a mobile laboratory on a bus that will take scientific experiments to the most remote and impoverished schools in Chile.
Although we have enough funding for the investment part of the project (i.e. the bus, the laboratory modification, the development of the experiments), we still need to find funding for the operational costs for 2012 (i.e. gasoline, materials for experiments, teacher trainings, printing costs, etc.). So, we launched the Bus ConCiencia fundraising campaign! It’s on a lovely Argentinean website called idea.me: http://idea.me/
proyecto/89/busconciencia What we want to achieve with the website is crowdfunding. This means that we are interested in having lots of donations, even if they are small. So, if you want to donate 20 or 5 dollars, that’s really helpful!
Here are the instructions, just in case:
1. You go to this website: http://idea.me/proyecto/89/busconciencia?siteLang=en_US
2. Click on the green button that says “I WANT TO SUPPORT!”
3. Go down and click on your “Reward”, that is, how much you want to donate.
4. Choose whether you want to pay for the shipping cost (for us to mail your reward).
5. Go down and click on “CONTINUE”.
6. Write down your information for ideame (this is what we will use to send you your rewards).
7. Click on “I have read and accept the ideame terms and conditions.” Then “SAVE”.
8. Choose your payment method (I highly recommend PayPal).
9. Write down your information and pay with a credit card.Please share this link with your friends!
Thank you!!
xoxo,
Maria
Yesterday I tweeted:
So far this link has been shared, retweeted, and favorite’d 15 times, which is a lot more than most of the links, pictures, and observations I share on Twitter.
Why this tweet? I have some ideas.
1) Clear Audience. I addressed this tweet towards China-philes. This is a relatively broad, inclusive, and self-defined category, and there are a lot of China-philes on Twitter.
2) Specific Keywords. A grad student friend once referred to Harvard as the H-bomb. This name catches people’s attention!
3) Immediate Benefit. The course is available online. It’s free. A Harvard education for anyone with an internet connection and the attention span to sit through a lecture (or 37!)
What do you think? When do you find that your tweets get a lot of attention?
We asked women aged 13-70, from the Casa de la Mujer Huamachucho´s Escuela de Verano, about their motivations for entrepreneurial endeavors. This is what they said.
With several Start-Up Chile entrepreneurs, I am leading a five-day seminar at Casa de la Mujer Huamachuco, a community center in one of the poorest areas of Santiago, in the comuna of Renca. Soon I will write more about this experience.
For now, here is a translation of the list scribbled above:
Motivations for Entrepreneurial Activity (emprender is the verb form of “start something, as an entrepreneur.” Perhaps the best translation is “bootstrap.” If you have a better translation, let me know!)
- occupy free time
- generate resources
- grow more
- feel more useful — don´t depend on husband
- feel good about yourself at any age
- surge in life, be something
- be independent, own schedule
- teach values to the children
- develop as a person
- have your own money
What a list! What else would you add?
I'm Leslie and I connect entrepreneurs in Chile, China, California, and beyond — especially through translation, training, and trade. More about me.
