Language isn’t a genetic trait, but there is some expectation that children will inherit it from their parents. As many people born in multilingual families can tell you, however, this isn’t always true. In my household there are three languages spoken: English, the common language spoken by all of us and the only language my brothers and I know; Kikuyu, a regional language of central Kenya spoken between my mom and dad; and Swahili, the trade language of East Africa used only with our Tanzanian family friends. As a young child I was able to understand all of them, but entering school made the other languages take secondary priority to English, which left me after years only able to understand Kikuyu and not speak it. This would become a source of embarrassment for my parents between our relatives, mainly from older members of our family.
Nearly all of my extended family lives in Kenya, and until I entered high school my parents would take my brothers and me on family trips to visit our relatives every three or four years. My mother’s side of the family has mostly urbanized; only the elders still live in the countryside where her and her siblings grew up. My father’s side still lives in the same concrete and corrugated steel houses my grandfather built when he returned from WWII. On our most recent trip my family spent six weeks living with my various aunts and uncles, seeing the highs and lows of modern day Kenya. This culminated with large family reunions on each side of the family to send off their American-living relatives.
In Kenya, people from my parents’ generation and onward are taught English alongside the local languages in school, so the only miscommunications that happen between my extended family and I usually come from the differences between British and American English. We communicate regularly through texting and social media as any modern family would. However, without speaking the Kikuyu language communicating directly with my grandparents is impossible so I’ve learned to bond with them in other ways. Late in our last visit, my dad sent me to take a walk with my grandma and grand-aunt through a forested part of their land to see where he spent most of his childhood. They hadn’t been told that I could still understand Kikuyu so as we walked back they spoke candidly about what they thought about my father. In their rural accents they complained, “He didn’t teach them Kikuyu? What is he doing with those kids in America? What a shame!” It was a shock to hear my grandma talk about my dad that way.
All I could think about were scenes in high school television dramas where a group of judgmental kids picks on an outsider in a language they wrongfully assume he can’t understand. I almost turned around to angrily tell them it wasn’t true, but children that disrespect their elders only put blame on their parents in our culture, so showing any defiance only would have worsened the issue. My anger subsided when I realized that since Kikuyu was their only link to their family, tribe, and world, my father’s choice not to teach us the language denied them from ever getting to know their little American grandchildren. I sympathized with them and almost felt wronged by my parents for not trying harder.
I didn’t tell my mom and dad about the incident because it would have dampened the joy they got from meeting their own parents after many years. I also felt that they had received enough of that criticism here in the U.S. from other parents in the Kenyan community. They believed that without teaching children their native language, the rest of their customs would be forgotten too, which I don’t believe is true. Teaching about a culture’s foods, dances, and stories are all possible without doing it in the language that made them. Figuring out how to combine both their parents’ customs and those of the country they’re born in is a unique challenge for second generation immigrants.
Language an important connection between me and my heritage, and without it, a major part of my identity would be lost. The songs, jokes, and stories I’ve heard my parents tell in their native tongue over the years have given me deeper insight into their personalities and the nature of the country they come from. Even though I can’t actually speak the language, being able to understand it has given me the motivation to learn more about my culture.
