News archive August 2015

Aug 13 2015

Native or not-so-native language?

Spending a few days on holiday in a foreign country usually means learning at least a few basic words to communicate. Our brains seem to be naturally predisposed to learn words in other languages, and knowing how to speak languages other than our own native tongue is a source of pride for those who are able to, and of fascination for those who are not.
Living for a few years in a foreign country is certainly one way to learn the language well, not have problems expressing yourself and be able to use your knowledge in the workplace too.

However, living for many years in a foreign country means not only learning the language very well, but also learning the way another culture thinks and sees the world. Our perception of the world also comes through the grammatical and syntactical constructions of the language we speak. By way of example, in Italian, to express likes and dislikes there is a unique construction in which the object being liked or disliked is the grammatical subject of the sentence, while the person doing the liking or disliking is expressed through an indirect object pronoun: “Mi piace Lexilab”. In English, as we know, it is quite the opposite: the subject of the Italian sentence (the thing being liked or disliked) becomes the direct object and the indirect object becomes the subject: “I like Lexilab”. This is much more than a grammatical rule; it represents an outlook and a way of viewing things which has an impact on our brains and, therefore, on the way we express a concept.

Growing up bilingual or learning one or more languages as an adult therefore has positive effects that are both linguistic and cognitive, such as better knowledge of the structure and functioning of language, improved skills for learning a third or fourth language, and better awareness of the fact that other people may see things from a different perspective, with notable benefits as regards people skills and interpersonal relations.
If, then, language reflects our way of thinking and has an impact on our identity, what happens in our brain when we learn a foreign language which uses different constructions with respect to our native language? Can we learn a foreign language and maintain the same level of knowledge of our mother tongue?
Or, looking at it the other way round, what happens in our brain if we are exposed to a language other than our native tongue for a long period of time and actively speak it? Does our native language remain perfectly intact or is it affected in some way? Do we start to forget our mother tongue?
Can we really be bi- or tri-lingual, or will one language always dominate over the others? If yes, which one? Will it always be the same one or could it change over time?
It is a fascinating topic, still yet to be fully explored. According to a new controversial theory, for example, the more our brain adapts to make room for a second or third language, the more it loses control over its native language.
Do you want to find out more? If you happen to be in Edinburgh on 15 August, do not miss Not so Native Now, a talk by Italian native speaker Antonella Sorace, Professor of Developmental Linguistics at the University of Edinburgh, who has been living in Scotland for over twenty years and is Director of the centre Bilingualism Matters.

Translations in August
Aug 04 2015

Translations in August? WE ARE OPEN!

August: beach, vacation, leisure, relax and … translations!

Do you still have those piles of manuals, pricelists and brochures waiting to be translated?

Don’t worry!

Send us your documents before leaving for vacation and you will find them ready and translated when you return to work. Relax and enjoy your time: we will take care of the translation jobs for you!

We will only be closed from August 17-22.

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