No shame in loving language!

Free yourself from perfectionism!

Perfectionism leads to shame because perfectionists can never live up to their own standards.  Not trying and rationalising lack of action cause less pain than trying and failing.  When people start learning languages they often think of their current level of their native language as the level they should be at.  The task seems so daunting to many that they don’t start.  Yet some still start.  Naturally, after many months and years, they still do not reach the level of their native language.

Often they feel bad about not knowing a language fluently.  They might feel lazy, they might feel stupid–in other words, they feel shame.  In spite of earning a reputation for monolingualism, most Americans I know have learned another language in some capacity, whether Hebrew at synagogue or Spanish on “Sesame Street.”  But they feel shame, they hate themselves because they’re bad at the language.  Excuses begin.

I can help you.  I think you probably know a little of a language, and that’s great.  People often rationalise the reason why they don’t know more.  I’ve included in this post three of the most common rationalisations I’ve heard–and cures for them.  Enjoying what you know and taking yourself a little less seriously will help cure your language perfectionism.

I only know a little–not very much

“All I can say is ‘uno, dos, tres.’”  “I can pronounce the words, but I don’t know what I’m saying.”  “I learned a little in school, but that was a long time ago.”  Phrases like these belie underlying shame for not being good enough at a language.  The one who says it feels like they should know a language better, but just never got around to learning it better.

People seem to think that their “limited” exposure does not measure up to what it should be.  Fluency or nothing seems to lie at the core.  Since they can’t communicate everything they want in the language, they won’t bother.  The language is to have conversations; without that ability, their language knowledge may as well not exist.

Language serves a lot of purposes besides full conversations, namely, to connect people.  If I only know “¿Cómo estás?” then I can use it when I run into a Spanish-speaking person at work.  (If the person answers in Spanish, refer to the next point, below.)  If you say you can only read Hebrew or Arabic and not understand, look again–you probably understand a smattering of words that you can use.  Two words are better than nothing.  A friend of mine went to China with a coworker, and they only learned “hello” and “handsome man.”  They broke the ice in a lot of situations by bringing smiles to people’s faces.  A handful of words won’t carry a whole conversation, but can bring people together.

I can’t understand when people respond

I’ve heard the story many times: I really hunkered down and studied my language.  I took classes, I bought Rosetta Stone, I listened to my language on-line.  Finally, I got the chance to go to the country.  When I took my Coke to the cashier, the lady spoke so fast that I couldn’t understand a single word.  I asked her to repeat, so she said it louder, and I still didn’t get it.  I smiled, showed her my money, and she picked out the right amount.  Humiliated, I realized I am no good at languages and I will no longer try.

Language-learners resemble children in adult bodies.  They look like adults, but you have to talk to them like they’re little kids.  They can’t understand the simplest things!  The tension is unavoidable.  You know what you want to say, and you want to be respected like an adult.  Now it sounds like the adult you’re talking to in your language is yelling at you, scolding you.

I think we can revel in this disconnect.  Rather than feel the shame of a naughty child, we can laugh at the funny man-child (or woman-child) we have suddenly become.  My friend told me about his friend–I’ll call him Jack–in France.  Jack came to France to look for work, but his French was barely existent.  He kept his chin up in this difficult reality.  When he saw quizzical responses on people’s faces, when he couldn’t make out the answer to his request, he laughed.  Because of Jack’s great attitude, he could have a whole boulangerie in stitches when he went to order a croissant; everyone had a good time.  Rather than feel shame for his French, Jack drew attention to his inability to speak “well” and everyone loved him because of it.

I really want to get good at this language before I start another one

A long time ago I was on a message board with folks who love languages.  One person was lamenting that she wanted to learn Russian and Greek, but she didn’t want to start yet because she wanted to get good at Spanish first.

The person held some unrealistic expectations that were holding her back.  First, the point at which one is “good” at a language eludes us–if it actually exists.  As a result, we are tempted to put off the starting point for Russian, Greek, etc, forever, since we can always convince ourselves that we are not yet “good” at Spanish.  Second, the need to wait exposes our tendencies towards perfectionism.  We need to be good first because people might think we’re no good at Spanish or we can’t finish what we’ve started.  Maybe we’ll lose the little Spanish we gained once we start Russian, and then we’ll sound more dumb than we were!

My response was: embrace your inner debutante!  Learn a little bit of Russian while you learn your Spanish.  Find a Spanish textbook on how to learn Greek.  Memorize “hello” and “good-bye” and “I love your language!” in Russian, and then go back to Spanish.  Listen to Greek radio on-line while you memorize your Spanish words.  No chef perfects beef before moving on to chicken–he does both.  He doesn’t have to be the best at both, but he can still learn how to adapt.  Learning is always good.

Perfection is not attainable

Perfectionism lies at the root of our language shame.  We don’t speak enough, we don’t understand others, we shouldn’t start being imperfect at another language–all come from perfectionism.  When we don’t attain that perfection, we feel guilty.

Laughter is the best medicine, and it can cure perfectionism.  Trot out your three words of Spanish, smile when you don’t understand, and love learning a few phrases of a language you’re not focusing on right now.  Any language you can learn will help you–and will help the one you are speaking to.  When our attitude shifts away from our shame towards love and connection, speaking languages will continually bring us–and everyone around–delight.

Photo credit: danorbit. / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

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How to re-start learning a language

Get ready to get back on the horse!

It’s easy to get off track in one’s language learning (unless you’re one of the lucky few who gets paid to do so).  Work projects become demanding, kids’ schedules take up time, and the spring cleaning needs to get done somehow.  I found myself in this situation over the past couple months; I got off track.  But languages always pull me back.  Fortunately, I’ve thought for a long time about methods for learning languages, and a few of my favorite on-line language-lovers offer good advice that got me going again.  The two pieces of advice that helped a lot: 1) work a little every day and 2) passive learning is important.

No shame in falling off the horse

I admit that I got out of the daily habit of setting aside time for my languages.  This happens to everyone.  I am not independently wealthy, so I spend a lot of time working.  I do not work professionally with languages, so I have to find the time amidst my spare time.  As we all know, spare time ebbs and flows; we have little control over how much we have.  Many voices call out for our spare time, as well.  Family, community, and relaxation all require some of our time–and that’s after coming home from work.

Nevertheless, I want back up on the language horse I fell off of.  I needed to find a way to work on my languages amidst all these demands.  So I recalled some great things I’ve learned from the web.

Everyday language-learning

Aaron Myers at the Everyday Language Learner site constantly reminded me via his Twitter feed (@aarongmyers) to do something every day.  I love the name of his blog because the double-meaning fits me perfectly.  I need to learn languages “every day,” plus I’m a simple, garden-variety “everyday” language learner with cares, demands, and responsibilities like everyone else.

Finding 30 minutes to figure out what exercise I should do, though, was more than I could do.  Learning every day was too much.  So I was hardly learning anything.  This was demoralizing and out-of-character for me.  I had to learn how to do something every day, even if it was 5 minutes.

Passive learning jump-started my active learning

Passive learning allowed me to start up right away with little concentration and commitment, and then it led me easily–and unexpectedly–to more active study.  Steve Kaufmann, who blogs and vlogs about language-learning, advocates passive language input, which will aid language-learning when one turns to more active methods.  While I’m not beginning my language, I thought taking a passive-learning approach for now would help.

The BBC offers a one-hour daily news digest in Farsi, and I challenged myself this week to listen to the whole thing every day.  It’s certainly over my head, but it’s well-produced and discussing topics I already know a little about.  I listened a little in the morning while brushing my teeth, during my commute, and during some of my workouts.  Though I didn’t make it all the way through every episode, and on a couple days I listened to the last few minutes while I was falling asleep at night, I still benefited.  I was remembering words I thought I had forgotten and I looked up words occasionally.  My mind turned again towards Farsi–exactly what I’d hoped for!

On Saturday, then, I started using the great learning app, Anki.  This app soups up my old flash cards.  It offers universal accessibility–platforms for PC (Windows and Linux), Android, and on-line–and keeps track of what words I know best.  It also reminds me when it’s time to study.  Creating new cards I find the hardest, but the application makes it easy to cut and paste from emails, articles, or Google Translate.  I can also tag the source of my word.  Thanks to Anki, I spent 10 minutes in bed this morning reviewing some words, in addition to the 25 minutes (so far today) of listening to the BBC.  I’m back!

Quantity, not quality

Of course, the quality of your language-learning materials are important, but quantity got me back up into language-learning.  Doing something–anything–every day not only helped my language knowledge but also my motivation.  It’s easy to lose focus when life is busy, but 10 minutes that’s over your head is better than nothing.

Another thing I learned was that searching for quality input is important, but can’t stand in the way of practice.  When I’m looking for material more than I’m praticing, I’ve lost my balance.  I can tend to be a perfectionist, so I have to beware of this balance.  “Just do it!” has to be my motto.

This coming week, I’m going to try more of the same.  I’ll listen to the Persian BBC podcast as well as work my Anki cards as much as possible.  We’ll see where I end up.

Are you languishing in your language-study?  Did you fall off the horse?  What’s one thing you can do–even for one day–in the next day or two to work on your language?  Tweet this article and help spread the encouragement!

Photo credit: Eduardo Amorim / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

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Language, space, and motion: Russian, Georgian, Somali, ASL

How do we depict space and motion using language?

Ever since I started learning Russian, the specific ways that language creates space and moves within it fascinates me.  We had to learn 10 verbs that could be translated “go,” each with a different nuance in how the object moves through space.  Then I found that motion and space play an important part in every language.  This displays the utility of early language: to describe who and what went where.  Languages across the world show an amazing level of specificity when describing space and motion, and our primordial ancestors probably benefited from it.

Russian

As I began above, Russian manifests a complex way to express motion.  (Other Slavic languages express motion in a similar way.)  First, going verbs distinguish whether one is going by foot or by conveyance.  Second, they distinguish between motion with or without a particular end-point.  So we begin with four basic going verbs: idti (by foot, specific endpoint), xodit’ (by foot, no specific endpoint), exat’ (by conveyance, specific endpoint), ezdit’ (by conveyance, no specific endpoint).  I will also note that there are four verbs for carrying something with the same distinctions.

Then one can add a prefix to specify the path more specifically, namely, into (v-), out of (vy-), towards (po-), away from (u-), up to the edge of (pod-), away from the edge of (ot-), through (pro-), and around (ob-).  One can add any of these prefixes to any of the above verbs.  So I can walk up to something: poiti.  I can drive around with no endpoint: obezdit’.  I can walk away from something, with no endpoint in mind: uxodit’.  This ability to combine paths and endpoints results in very specific verbs.

Georgian

Georgian (completely unrelated to Armenian, or any Slavic or Semitic languages) focuses more on the speaker’s position relative to motion.  Unlike Russian, it does not distinguish the means of motion (by foot vs. by conveyance) or a general endpoint.  Rather than look at the endpoint of the motion as a generic point, it focuses on whether the endpoint is the speaker or hearer.  If the endpoint is the speaker or hearer, you may add a prefix, mo-.  (If you don’t add this prefix, you don’t have to add anything.)

In addition to this endpoint, you can also specify the path by adding one of a multitude of prefixes (called “preverbs” in traditional Georgian linguistics) like you can in Russian: up (a-), out (ga-), in (sha-), down into (cha-), across/through (garda-), thither (mi-), away (c’a-), or down (da-).  This precedes the endpoint marker.  So “up towards me” would be amo-.  So, motion fills a space where the interlocutors occupy the central space, and the path of motion may or may not interact directly with them.  (Georgian information from B. G. Hewitt, Georgian: A learner’s grammar, 2005, p. 29.)

Somali

Somali looks at motion with similar relationships among the involved entities.  The speaker is one reference point, and the other entities are another reference point.  These relationships appear as mandatory adverbs (not connected to the verb per se).  Entities may move towards each other (wada), away from each other (kala), to the speaker (so), or away from the speaker (si).  So the verb “separate” is kala durka; “go in [away from the speaker]” is si gal, and “come in [toward the speaker]” is so gal.  Somali thus emphasizes the relationships of entities to one another as they cross each other’s paths, and details whether the speaker finds himself or herself on that path.  (Somali examples come from John William Carnegie Kirk, A grammar of the Somali language: With examples in prose and verse and an account of the Yibir and Midgan dialects, 1905, pp. 73-74.)

American Sign Language

American Sign Language (ASL) uses space and motion in a unique way.  A speaker can use space for pronouns.  For example, if you tell a story about a dog and a bone, you can sign “dog” and place it in space — say, to your left — then sign “bone” and place it to your right.  As you mention the dog in your discourse, you can point to the left space, and referring to the bone, point to the right space.  You can do this with multiple objects.

Then with motion you can move among entities.  So if you add a cat to your discourse, you can put it in the middle.  The dog can go to the cat, or the cat to the dog.  The verb will change shape as it varies from a center-to-left motion or a left-to-center motion.  The speaker, the hearer, and others in the physical vicinity can become discourse objects as well.  So the left-side thing (dog) can carry the right-side thing (bone) to you, and the verb will move from the bone to the hearer.  The speaker sets up the space however he or she wants, and then the motion follows the speaker’s structure.

Space, motion, and our ancestors

Based on this sample of completely unrelated languages, depicting space and motion to an amazing level of detail plays an important linguistic role universally.  Moreover, this intricate system functions almost entirely on a subconscious level.  Language depicts space and motion effortlessly — as if made to do so.

It probably was made to do so.  Our ancestors had to describe quickly and effortlessly where prey and predators were and where they were headed.  Those humans who used the tool of language survived and humanity evolved such that complex yet efficient depiction of space and motion existed universally in language.

How does you language depict space and motion?  Does your language do anything cool with space or motion? (Probably!)  Tweet this and continue the conversation!

Photo credit: Sprengben [why not get a friend] / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-SA

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Agape Vespers: The church service for language-lovers

A Greek Orthodox Church–and home of a polyglot feast (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The church service I went to today caters well to language-lovers like me.  In the Eastern Orthodox tradition, the afternoon service on Easter day (technically called “Agape Vespers”) includes reading the gospel selection in multiple languages.   (The selection is John 20:19-25.)  At a minimum, the reading includes English, Greek, and Russian/Slavonic, but I’ve never seen the minimum only.  Even though today the service was lightly attended, I read Hebrew and my wife read Romanian alongside others who read the standards.  At a previous parish, I read Syriac every year.  I’ve heard all kinds of delightfully unexpected languages: Japanese, Mari, ASL, Old English, for example. A rare opportunity to hear some of these languages!

All the language geeks come out of the woodwork for this service, and I always enjoy it.  Since I know what the reading is, I like to try to figure out what words I can decipher from each of the languages.  On a more emotional level, the delightful music of all the languages, one after another, pleases me to no end.  I love practicing my part–my one chance all year to speak ancient Syriac aloud–and I love seeing the love of others to speak the language that they learned at some time.  Today’s service offers an opportunity that is rare in our society: a chance to hear multiple languages and to speak publicly in a language which one may not speak fluently.

Again I see the problem of calling Americans essentially monolingual, because I glimpse how many people from all over can read a foreign language aloud.  People enjoy speaking their language, too, and even the monolinguals seem to enjoy hearing all the languages.  Sometimes the readings are not expert; the reader clearly does not speak the language fluently.  But they feel that they can read well enough and are willing to put work into preparing a text in a foreign language.

Now that I think of it, I realize I would like to see more venues where speaking a little bit of a foreign language was celebrated instead of a point of embarrassment.  Many folks I know lament that they don’t know Spanish/French/etc. “better,” rather than speaking and using what they know.  If these folks could practice whatever they know, just speaking it in public might give them some more motivation to learn a little better.  Rather than beating themselves up for not speaking fluently, they can enjoy speaking to the best of their ability.  For example, I know that I enjoy employing my rote-memorized Somali phrases in a few set situations.  Also, my young polyglot friend–of whom I’ve spoken before–speaks a little Greek.  So when he found out that his Spanish teacher knows some Greek, he brought it out for fun.  This church service manifests that such fun comes out for a lot of people–not just polyglots.

I think if we can make rote use of languages in public common, then we can all strengthen our language foundation, ultimately improving our chances of attaining fluency.  What are opportunities we see regularly or can initiate for people to speak publicly in their budding foreign language?  Comment, share on Twitter or Facebook–let’s see what ideas people have!

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A family Somali language teacher: Community and teamwork

Learning language and culture as a family

I’m ready to hire a Somali teacher now.  I need to find a way to keep me talking and progressing in my language, and I need some help.  Also, as my kids reach middle school, where the language offerings are slim, I want to help them develop their language abilities.  As we live in Minnesota, Somali is one of the most practical languages to learn.  A family Somali teacher will teach my kids foreign-language skills and motivate me in my language-learning.

A connection to the community

I’m looking for someone who can teach my kids a foreign language and connect them to a broader community in our area.  My idea is to find 1-2 teachers in the local Somali community who can come to my house 1-2 times per week to teach language, and who could help get us acquainted with the Somali community here.  I would love to expand these sessions to meeting at the malls and community centers in the city.  These experiences will help broaden the horizons of my children as they learn a language.

So I’m looking for a particular type of language teacher: one who focuses on teaching the basics and getting us out there to talk.  We need engagement above all.  Games, songs, action, and fun need to play an important role.  Field trips need to play a part, too.  (Somali restaurants anyone?)  I don’t think too much grammar will keep my family engaged, although some grammar explanations help crystallize understanding.

In my experience, playing with kids in a foreign language works best.  When the kids were younger, we had a great young Russian woman (Olya) teaching them.  She was in her early 20s, and she liked to play games inside and outside with them.  My kids’ favorite memory of Olya was when her family came to town from Russia, and they got to play with Olya’s younger sister who was about their age and spoke almost no English.

Since my kids go to school with plenty of Somali kids, and the Somali community leads lots of activities in our area, I hope that a sense of play and a love of another community will help motivate my kids’ language-learning.

Motivating myself

These days I’m not progressing in my languages well on my own.  I feel like I should be able to do it on my own, though; I feel like hiring a teacher indicates I’ve given up.  At the same time, I feel like a teacher may breathe new life into my studies.  The funny thing is, I’m so used to being the teacher that needing a teacher is uncomfortable.  I don’t want a teacher to take over my learning for me, but to help motivate me.

Work takes up so much of my energy these days, but it teaches me the importance of a team.  The project I’m working on is intense, but it will move into a less intense phase this coming week. So I will get more energy back.  I’m grateful for this project–so different from anything I’ve done in academia–because it taught me how working in a team motivates me so much more than working entirely on my own.  As a team, we regularly articulate goals, check up on one another’s progress, and encourage one another.  A language teacher will get me working on a team again in my language study to improve how I articulate goals, am accountable to others, and get encouragement.

I see many ways that teamwork helps language study.  The famous Youtube polyglots (eg, Benny Lewis, Moses McCormick, Richard Simcott) create videos, and the responses from their audience help motivate them.  Skype friends help create times when I can speak in my languages.  A friend of mine who’s learning Spanish, conscripted his brother to talk to him twice a week on the phone entirely in Spanish.  No language exists in a vacuum; we need a team.  I’m just looking to adjust my configuration of teammates.

Family tutor: Involving my kids, expanding my team

By bringing in a Somali tutor, I’m expanding my kids’ community and my own language-learning community.  Languages are social, so speaking requires lots of people.  New languages requires new communities, so we’re venturing into new areas of our city and our world.  I hope we make new connections and learn new skills.

Have you ever hired a language teacher for your kids and/or family?  How did you find him or her?  What criteria did you use for selection?  What have you found a language tutor does for you that you can’t do for yourself?

Photo credit: Jim Boud / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

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American multilingualism?

Is he monolingual? (“Chinese-american man 1″; Photo credit: Wikipedia)

I heard a common joke once again today: What do you call someone who speaks three languages? Trilingual.  What do you call someone who speaks two languages? Bilingual.  What do you call someone who speaks only one language? American.  Not only does most of the world hold this view, but so do many Americans–an American was telling the joke this time.  Much of my blog targets the shortcomings of monolingual Americans confronting a multilingual world.  The stereotype of the monolingual American, surprisingly, does not hold for a large minority of the US population.

While Americans are known universally as adamant monolinguals, many know at least one language other than English.  Over 20% of American speak a language other than English at home.  Significantly, under 13% of Americans were not born in the US.  One can conclude that many of these “other language” speakers learned them in the US.  (Data come from the US census.)

I believe the numbers are actually higher, maybe closer to 25-30%, because I believe in the controversial idea that African-American Vernacular English is a distinct dialect/language from standard English.  Native speakers of African-American Vernacular English (AAVE) speak a distinct dialect of English that is not completely comprehensible to Standard American English speakers.  AAVE differs in phonology, syntax, morphology, and vocabulary–all the categories in which we find language variation.  Because these speakers have to be conversant in Standard American English, they must be bilingual.  If speakers of this dialect are only 5% of the US population (just an estimate: over 13% of the US population is black and over 2% are multi-racial and not all speakers of AAVE are black), then the proportion of Americans who know a foreign language fluently rises to at least one-fourth.

Yet monolingual Standard American English speakers judge these speakers of multiple languages by one question: How good is their (Standard) English?  Accented English is considered less “good” than “pure” Standard English.  The stigma spreads to those who work with these people; our society does not value those around us who speak multiple languages.  English as a second language teachers and hospital interpreters will never become rich.  Working in a bi-lingual world in the US means that you are working with poor, uneducated people.

I repeat: our society does not value those who speak multiple languages.  Americans’ focus on English ability prevents them from seeing the value of all the languages spoken around them.  The Mexican landscaper and Vietnamese nail salon worker are “uneducated,” “imperfect” speakers of English.  The co-worker or offshore helpdesk employees speaks “passible,” though “frustrating,” English.  The occasional multilingual international business-person will shine through, but he or she will not begin high up; the language skills are soft skills usually considered a “benefit” but not often “required” for the job.

If Americans want to become the next great power, they will need to operate in a multi-lingual, multi-cultural global marketplace, and they must value multilingual abilities.  We can see the value already in those who know another language.  Once you learn a language, the next comes more easily, especially if the next is related to a previous one.  For example, if one learns the Chinese language of Cantonese (the most widely-spoken Chinese language in the US), learning Mandarin will come much more easily.  Rather than spending thousands of dollars on Mandarin, one can learn Cantonese by eating more often at Chinese restaurants and interacting with you neighbors.

As Americans, we are surrounded by people with valuable skills.  Everyone who speaks with an accent, who struggles to converse in English, speaks another language.  They are the ones who will lead the majority of Americans who are monolingual into the global marketplace of ideas and commerce.

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Cultural intelligence and offshore success, part 2

Cultural intelligence keeps communication from getting stiff.

This week I had an opportunity to help mediate between a company and its offshore help desk.  A friend invited me to participate on a conference-call with overseas managers of their offshore help desk.  I wrote previously about how internal cultural intelligence allows companies to overcome cross-cultural challenges arising from off-shoring work.  I helped my friend’s company by explaining US culture to the overseas managers and I showed my interest in their culture by speaking their language. By speaking two words of their language, I showed my genuine interest in overcoming our communication gap.

The teleconference I attended included some of my friend’s management and the managers from the offshore help desk.  Negative customer feedback–among other reasons–prompted the call.  People who were used to calling the US help desk (back before it was offshore) complained that they could not understand the new help-desk staff and that they felt that the help-desk staff didn’t understand them.  And these people often expressed their sentiments rudely.

I tried to comfort the offshore managers that they were not to blame, even though the comments sounded awfully personal.  I explained to the overseas managers that many Americans did not understand the challenges of cross-cultural communication.  In the context of these managers, many people conducted daily life in more than one language; in the US, most of our people could not do so, even if the opportunity arose.  Many Americans go through their days speaking only English and hearing English entirely from native speakers.  As a result, accented English sounds to them very strange, unfamiliar, and even threatening.

While the meeting continued on in a standard, formal manner, the end took a turn as I spoke a few words of the staff’s language.  During the call, I had brought up the page from Omniglot.com with common phrases in their language.  I ended the call with simply, “Thank you.  Good-bye,” in their language.  The formality loosened as they all smiled (presumably) and laughed (audibly).  My friend said this was the sound of a hug; if this had been a face-to-face meeting, they would have hugged me.  One American speaking two words of their language advanced our mutual goodwill tangibly.

As a side note, I coincidentally started that same day speaking French with the same results. The company I work for has an office in Quebec.  I had called someone who had been having some trouble and had reached her French-language voicemail message.  After I sent her an email in French, she emailed back in French.  So I called her up, but this time I left her a voice mail in French.  When she finally called me back, I let her decide what language we would speak in, and she decided on English.  Nevertheless, I could hear her smile over the phone that *she* got to decide what language to speak.  How often does a Quebecois decide which language to speak with someone from the States?

Has your language skills or interests helped lighten a difficult situation?  Have you seen where cross-cultural communication helps a difficult situation?  Have you worked with off-shore help desks?

“Like” this post if you’re ready to have Omniglot at the ready next time you make your next overseas phone call!

Photo credit: Alba Soler Photography / Foter.com / CC BY-NC-ND

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