Last night I accompanied a friend to the adult literacy class he teaches. For last night's class there were four students present and the lesson involved reading a short passage in English. Although the students had varying levels of proficiency in English, overall they were still in the beginning stages of mastering the language. This resulted in a large portion of the class involving my friend explaining words and phrases from the passage to them in Zulu, as well as discussions amongst the class members in Zulu about what they were reading. This got me thinking about the power of language. But it also got me trying to think in Zulu, to follow what was going on in the lesson. I tried to gather all my focus and my very limited Zulu vocabulary, to figure out what was being said. By paying attention to facial expressions, gestures and context I was able to understand what was being said most of the time.
While reflecting after the class I realized that I was having my own lesson in Zulu literacy. But more importantly, in empathy. It's not all that often where I am in a situation where I am surrounded by people speaking a language that I do not understand, but for some people it is. It's not all that often that I have to use all my focus to figure out what people are saying, for some people it it.
