The Day of the Dead: El Día de Muertos – A Lesson in Adapting to Change By Reme Bashi [caption id="attachment_37368" align="alignright" width="225"] A striking portrayal of La Catrina in front of an intricately carved stone archway during El Día de Muertos celebrations[/caption] If you are unfamiliar with El...
The Couch is a place to exchange ideas and brainstorm, not only for its contributors but also for our readers who engage in the ensuing discussions. Sometimes, to certain people, “keep calm and keep interpreting” may not be enough. A thank you goes out to this...
The following article by Athena was published a while back. The NAJIT Observer team would like to offer it for your reading pleasure once more. Enjoy! Have you ever taken a dash of one language with a sprinkle of another, mixed them together and simmered to taste?...
“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy not on fighting the old, but on building the new” —Socrates Jon Leeth was the Special Assistant to the Assistant Director in Charge of Court Reporting and Interpreting Services, also referred to as Chief of the...
Have you ever taken a dash of one language with a sprinkle of another, mixed them together and simmered to taste? Of course you have! You’re bilingual. You’re bound to have stirred your languages together at one point or another. There’s actually a fancy name for...
“No me falte usted al respeto, no soy cualquier cosa, soy el acusado. Yo ahí afuera tengo otro detalle, no así no se porta con uno la gente.” - Cantinflas, “El juicio,” available here No small ripple In 1992, the Real Academia Española accepted the term “cantinflear” for...
Uprooting While I was sitting on the couch with my mother, who is currently visiting me from Mexico, she sighed deeply, and when I asked her why she was sighing, she looked at me and said: “I so regret the decision I made years ago to...
I was born Puerto Rican. I was actually born in New York, but that doesn’t make me a New Yorker any more than being born in Hawaii or Japan makes my cousins Hawaiian or Japanese just because their military parents happened to be stationed there...
This post was first published in November 2018. Exactly a week ago today, you would have found me in New Orleans with a colleague at an oyster bar on the banks of the Mississippi, discussing the Dunning-Kruger effect. For those of you who are unfamiliar with...