Las Acacias at the Pickford

Las Acacias is a lovely film coming to PFC this weekend, and it's all in Spanish (with English subtitles). Las Acacias starts this Friday, November 2 at the Limelight and shows daily through next Wednesday.

"Exhilarating and moving. This is a very satisfying love story." Peter Bradshaw, Guardian

Rubén is a lonely truck driver who has been covering for years the motorway from Asunción del Paraguay to Buenos Aires, carrying wood. However, today's journey will be different. This morning, in a motorway stop near Asunción, Jacinta shows up an hour later to begin a journey by track which is going to take her to Buenos Aires. Wath's more, Rubén finds out at that very moment that little Anahí, who's 8 months old, will travel with them- It is not the best beginning. As kilometres go by, th relationship between Rubén and Jacinta will grow. they will slowly meet and sip into each other's soul. None of them talks much about their lives. None asks much either. It's a few word journey but it is not a silent one.

Register now for late fall/winter Spanish classes!

To view complete Spanish classes for adults, kids and health care professionals, go to www.SaludSpanish.com or open attached pdf.

If you need help selecting a class, contact Sarah at 360-383-7002 or sarah@saludspanish.com.

Hope to see you soon!

FallWint12-13Sched.pdf Download this file

Fall Spanish Classes Start Next Week!

Register now for Fall Spanish Classes beginning next week:

• Spanish classes for adults
• Spanish classes for children
• Spanish classes for health care
• Private and semi-private classes
• Tutoring for middle and high school students
• Early-release elementary school programs
             . . . and more! 

Go to www.SaludSpanish.com to view schedule and to register online!

If you need help deciding which course to take, contact Sarah at 360-383-7002 or Sarah@SaludSpanish.com.

¡Hasta Pronto!

2-Week Beginner Spanish 1 Course starts next week!

What: 2-Week Beginner Spanish 1 Course 

When: Mondays/Wednesdays/Fridays, 5:00-6:30pm, July 23-August 3

Where: Salud Language Center, 1315 11th Street, Bellingham

Cost: $170/person

Register: Click here

To view entire summer and fall schedule, go to www.saludspanish.com.

Local undocumented students relieved by Obama’s deportation decision

Local undocumented students relieved by Obama’s deportation decision

By ERINN UNGER

Skagit Valley Herald Staff Writer

MOUNT VERNON — One student wants to be a doctor, another a chef, and still another hopes to go to college. All say they’re relieved by President Obama’s decision last week to sign an executive order halting the deportations of young people like them.

A group of 13 students gathered Monday afternoon at a local church to talk about how the president’s decision and the Department of Homeland Security’s policy change toward the children of illegal immigrants could affect their futures.

“It’s going to change my life,” said student Maria Macedo of the policy change. Now, if she is approved and receives a work permit, she will help her parents and, she said, “…have the opportunity to complete my dreams.”

Macedo and the others openly told their stories Monday evening while smiling over two handwritten signs reading: Unafraid, Undocumented. Their openness was in stark contrast to a 2010 gathering when local students advocating for the Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act covered their faces with bandannas to conceal their identities.

The DREAM Act would allow people who grew up in the United States and graduated from high school to gain temporary residency and then possible permanent residency after six years.

Though the DREAM Act has stalled in Congress, President Obama and Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano announced Friday that young people eligible for the provisions of the DREAM Act can currently receive relief from deportation on a case-by-case basis. The new mandate would not lead to citizenship, but participants could receive a work permit good for two years, subject to renewal.

“I couldn’t really believe it,” said student Marceina Mendoza about hearing the news. “…I just feel so much relief.”

This new mandate calls for young people to satisfy certain requirements for relief from deportation and approval for a work permit. Participants must have come to the U.S. before the age of 16 and be 30 or younger, have lived in the United States since at least June 15, 2007, and be currently enrolled in school, have graduated, earned a GED or been honorably discharged from the military.

A clean record also is a must. The mandate will allow Homeland Security to focus resources on higher priority cases, including illegal immigrants with felonies, according to a memo from Homeland Security.

The mandate is a step in the right direction, said Carol Edward, an immigration attorney associated with the Washington State Chapter of American Immigration Lawyers Association.

“It doesn’t help students very much if they don’t have a way to work and support themselves,” she told the crowd Monday.

But under the happiness and relief lingers uncertainty, and some fear that this opportunity could be taken away.

“Now (Obama’s) saying specifically that the dreamers are not going to be deported, but how it’s going to play out is not clear,” said the Rev. Jo Beecher of the Skagit Immigrant Rights Council that sponsored Monday’s gathering along with several other immigrant advocates.

Though there are certain guidelines, the procedures will not be known until August, she said. Information from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services advises people not to apply yet, as the process is not yet ready.

The mandate is not a change in law, so there’s the risk that the order could be rescinded by another administration, and also the chance that undocumented students seeking deportation relief could be hurt by unscrupulous or incompetent people offering help, Beecher said.

The Skagit Immigrant Rights Council and its allies are planning workshops and meetings to help answer questions and assist people through the process.

“It’s really the kids,” Beecher said. “They’re willing to take the risks and be out there and say, this is the right thing.”

 

IMPORTANT IMMIGRATION REFORM NEWS

6/15/12  ICE FACT SHEET - DEFERRED ACTION PROCESS

Effective immediately, certain young people who were brought to the United States through no fault of their own as young children and meet several key criteria will no longer be removed from the country or entered into removal proceedings.

 

Over the past three years, this Administration has undertaken an unprecedented effort to

transform the immigration enforcement system into one that focuses on public safety, border

security and the integrity of the immigration system. As the Department of Homeland Security

(DHS) continues to focus its limited enforcement resources on the removal of individuals who

pose a danger to national security or a risk to public safety, including aliens convicted of crimes,

with particular emphasis on violent criminals, felons, and repeat offenders, DHS will move to

exercise prosecutorial discretion to ensure that enforcement resources are not expended on low

priority cases, such as individuals who were brought to this country through no fault of their own

as children, have not been convicted of a felony offense, a significant misdemeanor offense, or

multiple misdemeanor offenses, and meet other key criteria.

Effective immediately, certain young people who were brought to the United States through no fault of their own as young children and meet several key criteria will no longer be removed from the country or entered into removal proceedings.

Those who demonstrate that they meet the criteria will be eligible to receive deferred action for a period of two years, subject to renewal.

Only those individuals who can prove through verifiable documentation that they meet these

criteria will be eligible for deferred action. Individuals will not be eligible if they are not

currently in the United States and cannot prove that they have been physically present in the

United States for a continuous period of not less than five years immediately preceding today’s

date. The use of prosecutorial discretion confers no substantive right or pathway to citizenship.

Only the Congress, acting through its legislative authority, can confer these rights.

While this guidance takes effect immediately, USCIS and ICE expect to begin implementation of

the application processes within sixty days. In the meantime, individuals seeking more

information on the new policy should visit USCIS’s website, ICE's website, or DHS’s website.

Beginning Monday, June 18, individuals can also call USCIS’ hotline at 1-800-375-5283 or

ICE’s hotline at 1-888-351-4024 during business hours with questions or to request more

information on the forthcoming process.

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Who is eligible to receive deferred action under the Department’s new directive?

Pursuant to the Secretary’s June 15, 2012, memorandum, in order to be eligible for deferred action, individuals must:

1.) Have come to the United States under the age of sixteen;

2.) Have continuously resided in the United States for at least five years preceding the date of this memorandum and are present in the United States on the date of this memorandum;

3.) Currently be in school, have graduated from high school, have obtained a general education development certificate, or are honorably discharged veterans of the Coast Guard or Armed Forces of the United States;

4.) Have not been convicted of a felony offense, a significant misdemeanor offense, multiple misdemeanor offenses, or otherwise pose a threat to national security or public safety;

5.) Not be above the age of 30. Individuals must also complete a background check and, for those individuals who make a request to USCIS and are not subject to a final order of removal, must be 15 years old or older.

Are individuals who receive deferred action pursuant to the new directive eligible for employment authorization?

Yes. Pursuant to existing regulations, individuals who receive deferred action may apply for and may obtain employment authorization from USCIS provided they can demonstrate an economic necessity for their employment. Information about employment authorization requests is available on USCIS’s website.

Does the process result in permanent lawful status for beneficiaries?

No. The grant of deferred action under this new directive does not provide an individual with permanent lawful status or a pathway to obtaining permanent lawful status. Only the Congress, acting through its legislative authority, can confer the right to permanent lawful status.

Why will deferred actions only be granted for two years?

Grants of deferred action will be issued in increments of two years. At the expiration of the two year period, the grant of deferred action can be renewed, pending a review of the individual case.

Does this policy apply to those who are subject to a final order of removal?

Yes. An individual subject to a final order of removal who can demonstrate that he or she meets the eligibility criteria can request a review of his or her case and receive deferred action for a period of two years, subject to renewal. All cases will be considered on an individualized basis.

This process is not yet in effect and requests should not be submitted at this time. In the coming weeks, USCIS will outline and announce the procedures by which individuals can engage in this process.

Beginning June 18, individuals may call the USCIS hotline at 1-800-375-5283, from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., with questions or to request more information on the new process. The hotline offers assistance in English and Spanish. Individuals seeking more information on the new process should visit USCIS’s website.

Does this Administration remain committed to comprehensive immigration reform?

Yes. The Administration has consistently pressed for passage of comprehensive immigration reform, including the DREAM Act, because the President believes these steps are critical to building a 21st century immigration system that meets our nation’s economic and security needs.

Is passage of the DREAM Act still necessary in light of the new process?

Yes. As the President has stated, individuals who would qualify for the DREAM Act deserve certainty about their status, and this new process does not provide that certainty. Only the Congress, acting through its legislative authority, can confer the certainty that comes with a pathway to permanent lawful status.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) when the application period opens USCIS website at http://www.uscis.gov.

Beginning June 18: USCIS hotline at 1-800-375-5283 (8a.m. - 8 p.m.; English and Spanish)

…have a case pending before the Executive Office for Immigration Review or a federal court. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) when the process for accepting requests is announced ICE website at: http://www.ice.gov.

Beginning June 18: ICE hotline at 1-888-351-4024 (9 a.m. – 5p.m.; English and Spanish)

…have never been apprehended or placed into removal proceedings.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) when the application period opens USCIS website at http://www.uscis.gov.

Beginning June 18: USCIS hotline at 1-800-375-5283 (8a.m. - 8 p.m.; English and Spanish)

Summer Spanish Classes for Adults and Kids-Register today!

Register today for Summer Spanish Classes!

There's a lot to choose from... adult Spanish classes, review workshops, Spanish classes for toddlers, summer camps for kids, Spanish for health care workshops, and AP Spanish prep classes!

To view schedule and register for Adult Classes, click here. 

To view schedule and register for Spanish for Health Care, click here. 

To view schedule and register for Kids Classes and Summer Camps, click here. 

To Create Your Own Class, click here.

To view entire schedule, go to www.saludspanish.com, or open attached pdf .

Call if you need help choosing a class. ¡Hasta pronto!

Sarah Rowan
Director, Salud Spanish Programs
360-383-7002
www.saludspanish.com

Volunteer Opportunities for Spanish speakers

The Grameen Foundation is an organization that provides microloans to the very poor throughout the world. They have a continual need for Spanish translations for their LAC program. If you are interested in volunteer work, it could be a very rewarding opportunity, and a great way to improve your Spanish language skills. The project description is found here: https://grameenfound.secure.force.com/apex/projectview?id=a0OA00000046mmEMAQ

The Grameen Foundation's website is http://www.grameenfoundation.org/.>

Summer Volunteer Opportunities with the Migrant Literacy Program

You may have been involved with or heard about this last summer, but the Whatcom Hispanic Organization’s  Migrant Literacy Program is gearing up for this summer.   

About the program:

+The program officially begins this year after the 4th of July and runs for 6 weeks.

 +We will again be volunteering at local migrant camps serving young children ages 4-10.

 +There is not a set curriculum.

 +You will be bringing/creating your own interactive and stimulating activities to do with the children to promote fun and English literacy.

+The days and times you serve are totally flexible, but we ask that you consider committing to 1-2 two hour time slots per week roughly between the hours of 10am-8pm.

+For the safety and security of the children and the program, we try to visit the camps utilizing a “buddy system” and go in small groups of 2-5 volunteers at a time whenever possible.

 Also, please consider...

+Thinking about/gathering resources now to share at the camps ( fun and educational activities and projects, used books, crafts and games or basic equipment for group recreation). 

+You will need to provide your own transportation to an assigned camp usually located in the Lynden area.

+You are encouraged NOT to bring candy, food, gum, expensive toys, electronics, or anything else of high value.

+In order to be eligible to volunteer for this program we will need you to fill out a volunteer form for yourself (& for your children if they are age 13 or older) and we will need to do a background check.

More details about our kick off BBQ and volunteer forms to follow...

 

If you are interested or have additional questions, please contact: 

Kim & Jonathan Wiley - wileycoyote4@comcast.net

Whatcom Hispanic Organization

Summer Migrant Literacy Program Coordinators

Why Bilinguals Are Smarter

SPEAKING two languages rather than just one has obvious practical benefits in an increasingly globalized world. But in recent years, scientists have begun to show that the advantages of bilingualism are even more fundamental than being able to converse with a wider range of people. Being bilingual, it turns out, makes you smarter. It can have a profound effect on your brain, improving cognitive skills not related to language and even shielding against dementia in old age.

This view of bilingualism is remarkably different from the understanding of bilingualism through much of the 20th century. Researchers, educators and policy makers long considered a second language to be an interference, cognitively speaking, that hindered a child’s academic and intellectual development.

They were not wrong about the interference: there is ample evidence that in a bilingual’s brain both language systems are active even when he is using only one language, thus creating situations in which one system obstructs the other. But this interference, researchers are finding out, isn’t so much a handicap as a blessing in disguise. It forces the brain to resolve internal conflict, giving the mind a workout that strengthens its cognitive muscles.

Bilinguals, for instance, seem to be more adept than monolinguals at solving certain kinds of mental puzzles. In a 2004 study by the psychologists Ellen Bialystok and Michelle Martin-Rhee, bilingual and monolingual preschoolers were asked to sort blue circles and red squares presented on a computer screen into two digital bins — one marked with a blue square and the other marked with a red circle.

In the first task, the children had to sort the shapes by color, placing blue circles in the bin marked with the blue square and red squares in the bin marked with the red circle. Both groups did this with comparable ease. Next, the children were asked to sort by shape, which was more challenging because it required placing the images in a bin marked with a conflicting color. The bilinguals were quicker at performing this task.

The collective evidence from a number of such studies suggests that the bilingual experience improves the brain’s so-called executive function — a command system that directs the attention processes that we use for planning, solving problems and performing various other mentally demanding tasks. These processes include ignoring distractions to stay focused, switching attention willfully from one thing to another and holding information in mind — like remembering a sequence of directions while driving.

Why does the tussle between two simultaneously active language systems improve these aspects of cognition? Until recently, researchers thought the bilingual advantage stemmed primarily from an ability for inhibition that was honed by the exercise of suppressing one language system: this suppression, it was thought, would help train the bilingual mind to ignore distractions in other contexts. But that explanation increasingly appears to be inadequate, since studies have shown that bilinguals perform better than monolinguals even at tasks that do not require inhibition, like threading a line through an ascending series of numbers scattered randomly on a page.

The key difference between bilinguals and monolinguals may be more basic: a heightened ability to monitor the environment. “Bilinguals have to switch languages quite often — you may talk to your father in one language and to your mother in another language,” says Albert Costa, a researcher at the University of Pompeu Fabra in Spain. “It requires keeping track of changes around you in the same way that we monitor our surroundings when driving.” In a study comparing German-Italian bilinguals with Italian monolinguals on monitoring tasks, Mr. Costa and his colleagues found that the bilingual subjects not only performed better, but they also did so with less activity in parts of the brain involved in monitoring, indicating that they were more efficient at it.

The bilingual experience appears to influence the brain from infancy to old age (and there is reason to believe that it may also apply to those who learn a second language later in life).

In a 2009 study led by Agnes Kovacs of the International School for Advanced Studies in Trieste, Italy, 7-month-old babies exposed to two languages from birth were compared with peers raised with one language. In an initial set of trials, the infants were presented with an audio cue and then shown a puppet on one side of a screen. Both infant groups learned to look at that side of the screen in anticipation of the puppet. But in a later set of trials, when the puppet began appearing on the opposite side of the screen, the babies exposed to a bilingual environment quickly learned to switch their anticipatory gaze in the new direction while the other babies did not.

Bilingualism’s effects also extend into the twilight years. In a recent study of 44 elderly Spanish-English bilinguals, scientists led by the neuropsychologist Tamar Gollan of the University of California, San Diego, found that individuals with a higher degree of bilingualism — measured through a comparative evaluation of proficiency in each language — were more resistant than others to the onset of dementia and other symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease: the higher the degree of bilingualism, the later the age of onset.

Nobody ever doubted the power of language. But who would have imagined that the words we hear and the sentences we speak might be leaving such a deep imprint?

The New York Times

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/18/opinion/sunday/the-benefits-of-bilingualism...

Yudhijit Bhattacharjee is a staff writer at Science.

 

How Not to Get Beheaded in Mexico

How Not to Get Beheaded in Mexico
by Douglas Anthony Cooper

I can't even remember when I last experienced the beheading of a close friend. Everyone assumes it must be a weekly, or even a daily event: after all, I live in Mexico. The truth, however, is that you are as likely to have your head removed against your will in my town -- Oaxaca -- as you are to be murdered by roving, machete-crazed gangs in Martha's Vineyard.

You protest: slavering butchers are thin on the ground in Martha's Vineyard. Ah, but we do not have beheadings in Oaxaca. To be honest, they're unconscionably lax about slaughtering tourists in this city. It just doesn't happen. There are whole great swaths of Mexico -- some 95% of the country -- that are untouched by the drug war. In these places, tourists are annoyingly safe.

Take out a map. Mexico is rather large. To avoid all of Mexico because you fear drug violence, is like cancelling your trip to the Napa Valley because you hear that people are flying airplanes into towers in New York City. (I'm sure a lot of Europeans did just that.)

The homicide rate in most Mexican cities is simply not very exciting. People who read newspapers -- they are legion -- will tell you that Mexico City is Elm Street on steroids. No way they're taking their family anywhere near the Mexican capital. Yet these same people do not think twice about hauling their beloved brood to Disney World.

Disney World is in Orlando. Orlando, Florida.

What, you're not trembling? The rate of violent crime in Orlando is really something. At the theme park itself you might not encounter drooling gangs with machetes, but the likelihood of getting slaughtered is much higher in the city of Orlando than it is in Mexico City. The homicide rate in Mexico City is sub-terrifying: 8.3 out of 100,000. The rate in Orlando? Honey, you don't want to know.

If you're truly bent on living dangerously, hit the French Quarter for a shot of faux absinthe. New Orleans is leveling humans at a rate of 58 per 100,000. To be fair, that's an improvement upon the homicide record set in 1994: an awe-inspiring 85.8. No doubt champagne is flowing at the tourist board.

Don't get me wrong: I worship New Orleans. It's a lot safer than it used to be, and I
would not hesitate to visit. Still, Mayor Mitch Landrieu admitted -- when discussing a local high school -- that for part of last year, "a student attending John McDonogh was more likely to be killed than a soldier in Afghanistan."

Funny that people are not dissuaded from visiting New Orleans -- or Disney World -- by travel advisories that read like torture porn.

Oh, you do want to know that Orlando statistic? That would be 11.7  ((28 homicides, in a population of 238,300). Which is better than New Orleans or Baghdad, but way higher than Mexico City. Ironically, Orlando receives the same kind of hyperventilating press in the UK that Mexico suffers in Canada and the US: to Brits, Orlando is The Mouse That Roared, Then Indiscriminately Dismembered.

The internet too offers exquisite advice regarding Orlando. Somehow, I suspect this is hyperbole: "Don't be surprised if your sleeping child has been taken right out of their hotel bed in the wee hours of the morning." I mean, come on. You have my permission to be surprised.

In fact, the capital of America is a much more dangerous place than the capital of Mexico: You are 10 times more likely to get beheaded on a school trip to the Lincoln Memorial than you are strolling through downtown Mexico City.

Okay, I'm lying. You are ten times more likely to be murdered in a drug-related crime. (The rate of actual beheadings is suppressed by travel agents on both sides of the border.)

People ask me, regularly, how they can travel safely to Mexico. Here I have impeccable advice: follow this, and you're pretty much guaranteed to keep your head. Taking notes? Good.

Do not, under any circumstances, take a job with a major drug cartel. Just say no. You do not want to be a hit man, or a mule, or even middle management -- that's how people get killed.

I mean it: that is how people get killed. Sunbathing, on the other hand, is oddly uneventful. Yes, there are a few places in Mexico that I would avoid, unless I were applying for that gig (which I urge you to reconsider). Most border towns are not the destination of choice, except I suppose when brothel-hopping, in which case I'm told a soupçon of danger is bracing (and well-deserved). Acapulco too has declined. It was once a town in which you had a good chance of having a bad time. It is now a town in which you have no chance of having a good time.

And Mexico City, while not particularly murderous, is somewhere to be very careful: petty crime is rife, and not-so-petty crime (kidnapping) is a real issue. I travel through Mexico City all the time, and even chose to live there fairly recently, but I take the usual precautions -- I restrict myself to taxis from official taxi stands; I don't use bank machines on the street; and I suppress the urge to wave my arms around and yell, "Rob the Canadian!" (If you would like to give it a shot, that would be: "¡Saqueen al canadiense!")

Lots of really nice cities are getting a bit hairy: Guadalajara, for instance. The San Francisco Chronicle has a useful list of places to avoid -- mostly areas on the American border, and south along the Pacific Coast to the state of Guerrero. The Washington Post has another useful list: they add to this the entire state of Veracruz (which is very sad -- it's lovely). These two guides will steer you clear of all the places you have been reading about, including the very few resort towns that have become dangerous: Mazatlán, for instance, and Acapulco.

Again, however, this is a tiny part of Mexico. "Of 2,500 municipalities (what we call counties), only 80, or fewer than five per cent, have been affected by the drug war."

Graphic anecdotes are hard to ignore, by design, but they are useless when trying to grasp the nature of a country that is not simply vast, but immeasurably diverse. You know how Los Angeles doesn't have a whole lot in common with an Amish community in Pennsylvania? Well, multiply that difference a thousand-fold when comparing Ciudad Juarez (a genuinely dangerous place) to a Maya village in the state of Yucatán.

In fact, you are quite a bit safer in this state -- which includes the ruins of Chichen Itza and Uxmal -- than you are in Canada. The national homicide rate in Canada is 1.85 victims per 100,000. Sorry, kids, but that's a war zone relative to Yucatán: the second most dangerous city in Canada? "Butchart Gardens" must be Canadian slang for "the place where people get butchered."

So our family turns elsewhere. Hmm. Probably best to avoid "Edmonton's Murder Belt." Aiee. We'll go east. Regina? Are you out of your mind? "Saskatchewan reported the highest Crime Severity Index, followed by Manitoba." How about the East Coast? Not if our worried Mexican family cares about that crime severity thing: "St. John's had the largest increase." This is awful.

At last, after carefully considering Prince Edward Island, our sensible family decides it is just not worth the risk. (After all, homicide in PEI has skyrocketed.) You would have to be a fool to leave Mexico.

All right, all right. The beyond-exponential increase in homicide associated with Prince Edward Island -- when looked at closely -- is not really that alarming. One whole person was killed in 2011. As opposed to zero, in the five preceding years. Prince Edward Island is hilariously safe. The Mexican government has been decent enough to refrain from issuing travel advisories, despite the crime rates in Abbotsford and Thunder Bay. Level heads have prevailed.

The truth is that most of Canada is almost as safe as Yucatán.

Now Registering for Spring Spanish Classes!

Sign up now to reserve a spot in the class of your choice!

To view schedule and to register for classes, see attached pdf or go to www.saludspanish.com. If you have any questions, call Sarah at 360-383-7002 or email her at sarah@saludspanish.com.

See you this spring!

Spring12Sched.pdf Download this file

The Danger of the Single Story by Chimamanda Adichie

With all the negative politics surrounding Mexican immigrants, this speech by Chimamanda Adichie, a Nigerian novelist, may help all of us construct a much more complete view. In it she talks about “the danger of the single story,” the stereotypes that people use to define other people. Also, if you click on the subtitles tab at the bottom, you can read the speech translated into Spanish!

“I remember walking around on my first day in Guadalajara; watching the people going to work, rolling up to…the marketplace, smoking, laughing. I remember at first feeling slight surprise, and then, I was overwhelmed with shame. I realized that I had been so immersed in the media coverage of Mexicans, that they had become one thing in my mind: abject immigrant. I had bought into the single story of Mexicans and I could not have been more ashamed of myself. So that is how to create a single story: show a people as one thing, as only one thing, over and over again, and that is what they become.”

http://www.ted.com/talks/lang/en/chimamanda_adichie_the_danger_of_a_single_st...

Spanish Classes Start This Week-REGISTER NOW!

Register now for Winter Spanish Classes beginning this week!

• Beginner to Advanced conversation courses for adults

• Spanish workshops for health care, counselors and educators

To view schedule, open attached pdf or go to www.saludspanish.com.

Questions? Contact Sarah Rowan at 360-383-7002 or sarah@saludspanish.com.

 

Winter12SpanishSched.pdf Download this file