Overall Integrative Narrative
I chose to major in Spanish because I have an interest in languages. I have always wanted to learn other languages and travel the world. So, in order to achieve that, I want to become fluent in English and Spanish (Spanish is my mother tongue while English is my second language). The first step is to get a B.A. in Spanish with a concentration in language and linguistics because I think that it would be helpful for me as I want to become an interpreter and/or translator of English and Spanish. After I obtain my degree, I plan on learning other languages, like Korean and Russian. I have learned many things from this major like Spanish grammar, the history of Latin America, Hispanic literature, tips and tricks of English and Spanish translation (and vice versa), and many more thing that I did not have the knowledge of until now. My initial goal was to just learn the Spanish grammar as I thought that was the only thing that I need to become fluent in Spanish, but I was wrong. My goal evolved when I took a Spanish linguistics class. I was fascinated with how the Spanish language functioned, especially that there is a Phase Structured Tree (PST) in every sentence that has ever been written down (it also includes other languages like English, Korean, etc.). Some areas that I am the most proud of through my learning in this program are the areas related to the history of the Spanish language and linguistics in general. SPAN 313, LING 392 and SPAN 302 are related to the areas I mentioned before. This clases, especially SPAN 302, had a huge impact on my learning experience because it made me realize how interesting the history of Spanish (e.g. translation of Latin to Spanish) can be and so on and so forth. Some areas that I wish to develop in the future are in the areas of hispanic literature and culture. Since my concentration in Spanish is language and linguistics, I only took two classes related to hispanic history and literature. Because of this, I would like to expand my knowledge in these specific areas.