M Thomas Apple Author Page

Which languages do you speak and how did that impact your life?

I studied French from junior high through first year undergraduate.

I can’t speak it. I tried, but my teacher (MA from Tunisia) had to use a book based on Parisien French, even though my hometown is a stone’s throw from Québéc (not Paris!).

After failing to learn how to speak French, I switched to German in second year college. Borrowed money to go to Germany for a month that summer and met long-lost relatives.

Kinda could speak German. Forgot how to do so after leaving college. Nobody to talk to (and no reason to use it).

In my MFA program, I got bored by the “creative writing workshops” (wherein my classmates enjoyed sniping each other’s works). So I took up Irish Gaelic. Borrowed money (again) to visit An Gaeltacht (Conamara) near Galway, Ireland.

Marginal fluency. For a year. Forgotten just as quickly.

Two years later, I moved to Japan. Studied Chinese characters and Japanese grammar on my own primarily, with help occasionally from a Japanese colleague where I taught and a Japanese friend I made who ran a private English cram school.

After over 26 years, by far my strongest “second” (fifth) language.

So. How has language learning affected my life?

How has it not?

I am a language teacher. I am also a failed language learner. This has made me acutely aware of how hard it is for my Japanese students of English to use English, when on a daily basis they really have no need to do so. I respect them to no end.

Learning another language is hard. It’s especially hard when there’s no real reason to do so, when there’s no one to talk to in that language.

When it’s not really a part of who you are, as a person.

I had thought that, given my ancestry, French, German, and Irish would be good to learn. Turned out that wasn’t enough. I needed a real reason.

Someone to talk to.

I am now married to the love of my life, a Japanese woman who, like me, loves learning and teaching language. We have two wonderful daughters who likewise enjoy learning language.

Because we have a reason to learn them. People.

It’s all about people. Language is people. Not translation software, not AI. People.

Talk to me!