later he started teaching this same course, which he found was the best way to practise and consolidate his knowledge. In the meantime, he was reading any newspapers (e.g., New York Times) he could get his hands on. Naseer had to borrow a dictionary to translate new words. Another secret he had was speaking English with himself. Teaching English proved to be the most efficient way to learn and that was how he gained a tremendous amount of knowledge.
The way general English courses are designed in Afghanistan is not satisfying.
Taking extra courses is costly and that is not something average Afghans can afford. Despite that, Naseer persevered and knowing that speaking English well would put him in a more privileged position in the society was what kept him going.
Apart from reading, Naseer started watching Hollywood films. He thinks that for the younger generation learning is somewhat easier, which is due to the big influence of the U.S. in the country. There are economic incentives to learn as good English is a prerequisite for a higher salary, but it works the other way around as well as qualified professionals with no sufficient English knowledge might find themselves having limited career prospects.
All the research that Naseer has been conducting in Public Health has been in English. On top of the country’s two national languages (Pashto and Dari), Naseer speaks Hindi, which is «the blessing of Bollywood films» and understands Arabic.
Naseer believes that the world is a «global village» and languages are there to enable us to understand and exchange cultures. He recounts running into an Arab-speaking person while visiting Jordan and not being able to have a full-blown conversation as his spoken Arabic wasn’t up to the mark. Looking back, Naseer wishes he had been able to speak better Arabic so that he wouldn’t have missed out on the opportunity to make a new friend.
Naseer feels more formal and polite while speaking English. In his two native languages he feels more friendly, while in Hindi he sounds more romantic.
Surprisingly, here in the U.S., despite his physical looks which
he thinks might suggest he isn’t originally from here, there have been no misunderstandings or biases. Being a student again feels like
an amazing break from his office activities back home. Contrary
to the popular stereotype, he found Americans not being arrogant at all. In fact, all of the people he’s met so far have been incredibly welcoming.
His main tip for learners is to try to listen to people and fine-tune your communication patterns accordingly. In this way, interactions will go smoothly even despite some language mishaps.
∞ Even during these initial stages of getting to know Naseer, I was already absolutely amazed by his wisdom which came through even when he seemed to be searching for the right word to say. We spent time together in the group of the other Montclair Fulbrighters and would meet for one-on-one chats as well. I was aware of how uptight Naseer must have felt about being surrounded by females here in the U.S., which he made a point of saying would be strictly forbidden back home. Despite these inhibitions, Naseer would always come up with very poetic and metaphoric ways of using English. We have been in touch ever since and all his comments and reactions on social media are always so flattering even though Naseer is sure his English words of admiration do not suffice to express his emotions fully. I wouldn’t agree with that…
Following the Taliban takeover, Naseer had to move to an English-speaking country after having held a few ministerial and embassy jobs in his home country. I am sure his resilience (this is what he and Sharif definitely share) and linguistic brilliance would help him build up a new life in a new country.
A fellow linguist on a thorny journey to English
(Julia, Hungary)
Languages spoken: Hungarian, English, German.
Field of study/career: Theoretical Linguistics and Syntax, Visiting PhD student, UMass Amhurst.
Over my first couple of days in the U.S. during the Gateway Orientation in Miami, Julia was my first roommate (or «roomie» as we have been calling each other ever since). All of us were matched with other Fulbrighters based on shared backgrounds. I was the first one to check in at the hotel and they wouldn’t tell us who our roommates would be beforehand. I remember hearing someone knocking the door a few hours after I had taken enough photos of the American flag, palm trees and high-rises of the Downtown Miami.
Me and Julia, a Fulbright Visiting PhD student in Generative Linguistics, instantly hit it off. I had visited her home country of Hungary a year before. We bonded over talks of the amazing Hungarian wine Tokaji which at that point was the best one I had ever had. Waking up on my first morning in the U.S. and saying «Good morning!» to Julia felt so authentic!
We stayed in touch and in December as Julia was just a couple of weeks away from leaving the U.S., she came down from Massachusetts to visit me in New Jersey. At that point this state already felt like home and having a friend over to host reinforced that. I showed Julia around the iconic spots of NYC. We had lots of conversations about patriotism, politics, national identities, etc. and simply laughs about some superficial stuff as well. I interviewed her at a Russian restaurant in Fulton Street, just a few blocks away from One World Trade Center.
It wasn’t until high school that Julia started learning English. Before that she would join her younger siblings who had private classes in a nearby village. Once the teacher gave all three of them a book in English as a present. Julia got one by Shakespeare and felt it was a beginning of her love for the language and literature. It was «quite a bit of a story», but at her new school she had to take beginner’s again as otherwise she would have had to start right with pre-intermediate English. As it was «a heavily language-oriented school», they had from 7 to 9 language classes a week. She was still doing both English and German, but now the focus was on the former. Julia didn’t quite like her first English teacher, but the second one was very inspiring. When she left on a maternity leave, Julia continued taking class with her privately.
After she got her English certificate at the end of high school, Julia started exploring her career options. She aspired to be a doctor, but her Mum disapproved and she had to think of something else. Some information on English major caught her attention as Julia was skimming through a website. She had already developed love for Literature, but she had no idea what linguistics was. However, she enjoyed Grammar (especially, rules and tables, i.e., «organizing stuff»). Julia decided choosing that career path could propel her into a translating job which could be potentially well-paid. So she started preparing for entrance exams which in Hungary back then involved a serious exam in Literature, History. Later it turned out Julia was not «a literary person» and not «a PhD material for Literature». So she decided to get into Linguistics instead.
Julia specializes in Generative linguistics which was developed by the famous American linguist Noam Chomsky. This branch of linguistics relies on the idea that all languages have a similar structure and they are biological or genetic things in our head which we master just as well as we do seeing, hearing, recognizing color, etc. The key term here is «universal grammar», which means that human brain has an innate mechanism allowing it to master grammatical categories and relations of a language that are universally understood by all of its speakers. As Julia points out, English is very well-studied in this respect as all the pioneering scholars in the field were English-speaking. Investigating more languages could shed light on this «universal grammar» and make the structures more «fine-tuned».
In tune with the fundamental ideas of generative linguistics, Julia believes that the way we learn languages is universal. For example if a child grows up surrounded by two parents who don’t share the same first language, he or she will end up being bilingual. That would be the case of the so-called balanced bilingualism