Sandra Cisneros Quotes

Languages are the pedigrees of nations.

One thing I wish I'd been told in school is that my language is valid.

The character of our language defines us, and dictionaries say as much about us as about the way we speak.

Lots of people speak Afrikaans. It's not a statement; it's just a language that we use to communicate. It has its own flavour; it's got its own slang. People laugh. People like it. They like us being open.

A writer can have only one language, if language is going to mean anything to him.

Language has no independent existence apart from the people who use it. It is not an end in itself; it is a means to an end of understanding who you are and what society is like.

I speak English, so I am no longer cute. My tongue itches for French.

I love accents.

It's like learning a language; you can't speak a language fluently until you find out who you are in that language, and that has as much to do with your body as it does with vocabulary and grammar.

People are always saying, English, English, English rose, and I just feel so completely different.

Even if I think in English, it's more a language of acting than French.

I don't feel guilty about expressing myself in French; nor do I feel that I am continuing the work of the colonizers.

I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse.

I grew up having two different perspectives - one in English, one in Spanish. Two different cultures, very different - but I think that, to me, it's one. I'm just as American as I feel Latin.

Well, I like how people talk. I like language. You know, Linda Richman spoke in Yiddish.

I am the only British writer who writes in Spanish.

Even though many Indians can read or speak English, for most, it is not their first language. At the office, we speak in English, but we consume our culture in our own language.

My biggest regret is that I didn't teach my two children how to speak Spanish.

Insist on one language. English for all Americans.

We will never have "a" Chicano English or Spanish because of regional differences. But I think that because of our bilingual history, we'll always be speaking a special kind of English and Spanish. What we do have to do is fight for the right to use those two languages in the way that it serves us.

The greatest guarantee for the preservation of a person’s identity is language and faith, and all Armenians must carry these two values.

The idea of Homo monolinguis - one-languaged man - the idea of children having to grow into one system before we confuse them with another mental system, is an idea with which, unfortunately, many people are brought up now.

Here's my advice to my brown friends: The next time you're on an airplane in the U.S., just speak your mother tongue. That way, no one knows what you're saying. Life goes on.

I love dialects and accents; they're something that really resonate with me and that I find fascinating.

I grew up speaking Arabic at home.