Entry 2

For this blog entry, I decided to interview my childhood friend, Gabriela (Gaby) Estrada. She is bilingual and speaks both English and Spanish, English being her second language. We began our conversation by reflecting on our years in middle school. A memory that I always refer back to is when she would switch to speaking Spanish if she was either angry or talking to someone else that knows the language. We laughed at this because I always wished I could do the same and would try to mock her exact words. Unfortunately, I could never quite get the hang of it.
I then began to ask her my interview questions. The first being what age she learned to speak English? Her response was that she recalled really getting the hang of it and using it more often at the age of 5. Her parents used both languages interchangeably, but spoke Spanish more often to be sure that she could always refer back to it.
My second question was what aspect of her native language influenced her speaking English the most?
Her response was that her accent more often than not transfers over when she speaks English. According to Gass and Selinker, “It has always been assumed that, in a second language learning situation, learners rely extensively on their native language” (Gass, 2013, p. 89).  Based on this assumption, Gaby made it clear that not only did her accent interfere with her second language, but also the ability to identify similarities between both languages and use that to her advantage.
From this interview, I definitely learned the benefits of having a second language and how it could bring about several relationships that possibly could’ve never happened had the second language not been learned. I say this because if Gaby had not learned English, I’m not sure if we’d ever would have been able to meet and truly get to know one another.

Gass, S. (2013). Seconds language acquisition: An introductory course. Routledge.