I have been interested in languages for my whole life. I was raised speaking both English and French, as my mother is French-Canadian. My parents moved around often due to my father’s research work as a historian of the Middle East, so I picked up a smattering of Arabic and Turkish when I was young.  When my family moved to Berlin for a year when I was in fourth grade, I was put into a public German school. I did not speak German, but although it was socially and academically challenging at first, I managed to pick up the language and was fluent by the end of the year. Three years later, I returned to Germany with my father for a month and was placed into a German high school in Leipzig. I had lost most of my German, but I figured it out and the language came back quickly. Through these experiences, I learned to navigate situations in which I felt uncomfortable and like I didn't fit in. I was able to make friends and learn about and immerse myself in the language and culture of the place I was in. In high school, I took Mandarin and Latin and really enjoyed both experiences. I have taken both French (Intermediate 2 and Composition & Stylistics) and Swahili (Beginning 1-Intermediate 2) at UF.

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 I took Swahili in order to better communicate with my interlocutors in Tanzania. I was particularly interested in how the Swahili language is used to describe pain, and so as much background in Swahili as possible was helpful. I was analyzing and writing about my research throughout this past year, so continuing my education in Swahili provided me with more skills to do so. Since the interviews I conducted in Tanzania were recorded, I was able to go back over them as I learned more Swahili to make interesting connections. I am not sure where my academic and career goals will take me, but I imagine that the experience I had in Tanzania may lead to future work in Tanzania or at least in Swahili-speaking East Africa, and so achieving fluency in Swahili is an important goal for me in the next years of my life. I took French in order to improve my grammar and writing abilities in a language I am conversationally and socially comfortable in, which will be useful as I plan on moving to Montreal in June.