Language Deterioration

Being from another nationality, I can speak two languages, Hmong and English. When I was younger and lived in California, I grew up speaking Hmong because that is all I ever heard from my parents and relatives, who I spent most of my time with. However, over time when I was about 5 years old, I began to pick up English more and more from my cousins and siblings who were currently enrolled in school. When we moved to North Carolina in 1999, I did not hear Hmong being spoken much anywhere. I believe I began to lose my tongue in it when we finally moved to Glen Alpine in 2001 because that is when I was placed in the AIG program and kind of forced to read difficult literature.

Those days I still spoke Hmong to my parents at home, but because I didn't have much exposure to it, my speaking skills slowly began to deteriorate. Nowadays, I still cannot speak it will since I haven't had much practice and my parents criticize me because I barely speak it. Communicating with my older relatives who barely understand English has been a struggle fro me as I always have trouble finding words to say.

To help overcome this, I hope to begin speaking my native language more whenever I can and listen to older people speak it so I know how to continue on my people's language. However, I believe that won't happen for a long time because, like most of my classmates, my life is consumed by school, band, sports or all of the above.