When I came to UMass Amherst as a freshman I was not originally a Spanish major, I was actually a Sociology major. Upon one or two courses as that major, I quickly realized I didn’t have a passion for it, and I found myself leaning towards becoming a Spanish major. Cut to me meeting Luis Marentes for the first time and talking to him about becoming a Spanish major. I was immediately asked the following questions: Why did I want to be a Spanish major? Why don’t I just use a language teaching app or program to learn Spanish? What did I ultimately want to get out of this major? I will admit that I didn’t know the answers to all of his questions but I just knew I wanted to continue (from high school) learning Spanish because of my lifelong passion for it.
Here is a small tangent/backstory about me and the Spanish language:
My mother is born and raised El Salvadoran, however, she came to the United States when she was 12 and never believed she spoke proper Spanish. She is often ashamed of her Spanish even though she can fluently hold a conversation. As a result of her own insecurities, she never taught me or my younger sisters Spanish. It is something she gets shamed for by almost everyone who finds out. When I was younger, say a freshman in high school learning Spanish for the first time, I was angry at my mother. I wanted to have had some background with the Spanish language even if she thought her Spanish wasn’t great. It wasn’t until I got older, and heard my mother’s stories about being held back in school because she missed so much school because it was too dangerous to walk outside (there was a civil war in El Salvador when my mother was a young girl). She missed out on the basis of an education because it was too dangerous to leave the house, and she was traumatized by the sounds of guns and bombs going off in the night. My mother has gone through so much in her life and is my role model and biggest inspiration. Growing older and realizing her story and why she never taught us Spanish makes sense to me now and I no longer hold it against her. Instead, it is the fuel for my passion to learn Spanish and become fluent.
I wanted to learn her first language. I wanted to be able to communicate with my grandmother. I want to have a basic understanding of Spanish to help ESL learners. I now understand why I wanted to become a Spanish major even though freshman Kaitlan did not. I think she knew in the back of her mind, but for the most part, it was all about a passion she wanted to keep on pursuing.
Through these past four years I have gone through a lot of… well… “phases” is what I call them. At first, I wanted to be a teacher! Quickly changed my mind and decided I wanted to study nutrition and integrate that with Hispanics. Nope. That didn’t work out. Then after taking a translation class with Regina Galasso, I discovered I really enjoyed translating. It kind of clicked for me in a weird way. While my mother never taught me Spanish she would often give us (my sisters and me) commands or tell us things in Spanish and I would speak back in English. I understand Spanish if I hear or see it, but to speak it back is a whole other story. So translating almost came naturally to me, as I would see the words in Spanish and understand them perfectly in my English mind.
So here we are today. I am a senior, expected to graduate May 2019 with a Spanish major and intentions to pursue a career in translation or even something with ESL. My journey to get to this point was truly a journey, and it has shaped me and helped me understand myself in ways I never thought was possible. I have so many people to thank for getting me to where I am now today, but it really all comes back to my mother. While people may think she made a huge mistake by not teaching me Spanish, I have to thank her because it truly fueled me to pursue learning Spanish; something that is my culture and now (hopefully) my career.