Blind Linguist
As I continue to make attempts to learn Nepali while living in the US, I am reminded that many have gone befoe me on the long road of learning another language. Within the last week I have gotten in touch with a couple of blind linguists who teach at the university level. Robert Englebretson has taught for 15 years at Rice Univeristy in the linguistics department, mastered a few languages while Sheri taught ESL overseas and is now teaching at Bowling Green State Univeristy. Tehse two have inspired me beyond imagination as I face blindness and language learning. Both of them are totally blind and have learned languages with no use of visuals. Remarkable.
It almost makes me believe that any cross-cultural worker who doesn’t make a valiant effort to learn language is a failure. . . or at least they don’t care enough. If Robert and Sheri have done it, despite eyesight, vsurely it can inspire us to push on.
Starting next month, Charity and I will be starting up Nepali again with a language tutor at the drop-in center with a couple of others. We are super excited for this. Our teammate Jeremy will be diving into Somali with a separate language tutor as we all try to deepen our roots to understand our neighbors.
Cross-Cultural Workers Learning Language in the States
There has been, for many years, the tendency for those doing ethnic ministry here at home to survive in English-based ministry. I’m not sure that we can afford to keep doing this if we’re really going to know and love our neighbors well. Though my 1st grade level Nepali might sound utterly foolish and it is an uphill battle as ethnic communities try to learn English as we try to learn Nepali, the grind is worth it. I’m confident as we stay at it over these next months, we can make some major progress.
Is it worth it?
A guy tried to throw his girlfriend out the window across the street from the drop-in center a couple weeks ago and a teammate called the police. This week a $250,000 drug bust took place a mile from my apartment. Last week a news article came out exposing an apartment complex in our neighborhood that was just ravaged with poor upkeep (bed bugs, prostitution, critters, damages, no maintenance whatsoever) and all were in danger of being evicted. So much pain. So much devastation. That then is compounded with friends who have been shielded off in refugee camps now being resettled in a pretty jacked up neighborhood. It is hard enough to figure out this world when you understand the language; it’s next to impossible without it. We’ve gotta talk to our neighbors. Of course it’s worth it. The only way to fight evil and help through the gauntlet is by doing good, showing Jesus. Let the language continue. Blind linguist
Yes. Do it. Show us the way. You’re sticking to what’s important here – touching people’s lives. I’m challenged to learn some spanish because of the huge chunk of my population from Mexico. It means so much more to someone to say “¿Qué puedo hacer por usted?” rather than “No habla espanol – but you need to get saved.” What’s sad is I don’t even know if that’s the correct way to say it – I just used Google Translate. God help me. And God give you speed.