Remembering Mother Tongues

Available for over a year

Michael Rosen asks Julie Sedivy about what happens when we lose our first language. Julie Sedivy's family left their home country, the former Czechoslovakia, when Julie was a small child. They arrived in Canada as refugees with no English. Michael and Julie discuss the role of language within Julie's family story: how young children assimilate, how parents adapt and what can learned from these family experiences for the whole of society. Julie Sedivy is a Canadian writer and language scientist, whose book on losing and reclaiming her first language is called Memory Speaks. Producer: Eliza Lomas for BBC Audio, Bristol.