What is the mother tongue?

What is the mother tongue? This is a problem. A thousand people might have a thousand answers, because a thousand people would have a thousand different mother tongues. Even for me personally, the answer to this question is complicated.

Nanjing

China

My hometown

If mother tongue is the language of her hometown. So, my answer to this question is Chinese, it's Mandarin, it's the Nanjing dialect of Mandarin. I grew up surrounded by Chinese, my parents spoke Mandarin, my grandparents spoke Nanjing dialect, and I learned the most standard Mandarin from my childhood. From the first cry of a baby to the moment I boarded a plane to the United States, Mandarin has been the language of my life. After 18 years, I can communicate, write, read and speak Mandarin fluently, and I have even won many awards for it. But it seems to me that if Mandarin is my real mother tongue, then I think the question is too simple.

My mother, my grandmother and me

My second answer to the opening question is that my mother tongue is the language of my parents. Specifically, my parents' Chinese accent and my father's English accent. Although I spent my childhood with my grandparents, I did not learn their Nanjing dialect of Mandarin well. Instead, my parents' standard, Mandarin is the language I am most proficient in now. As for English, I am honored to have a father who is familiar with English. Although he has a relatively ordinary number of words, his accent is relatively standard American English accent, at least in the comparison of my classmates' parents, my father is the best English. And I am very honored that he became my first English teacher. Until now, I still remember a scene in my kindergarten, the teacher one day suddenly asked us children, "Who knows the English numbers 1 to 10?" When I was the only one to speak these words in the most standard English, the envious eyes of the children around me and the approving eyes of the teacher made me feel like bathing in spring. Many years passed, even though my father had stopped teaching me English, even though I had left school in China, and even though I had left my parents' side to go to college in the United States. Neither of my parents ever came to the United States, but I don't think they're far away. Because whenever I speak Chinese, I can feel that my voice is a combination of their voices, and whenever I speak English, my accent is exactly the same as my father's accent, and it makes me realize that they are still there for me, and always will be.

My dad, my mom and me

What is mother tongue? I also think that mother tongue is a kind of inheritance. If you look at the history of our family, even though my grandparents' generation, they didn't speak English, my grandmother's father, my father's grandfather, was a very legendary figure. He built his business empire at a young age, trading with the United States when China was still relatively backward. According to his family, because he has business all over the United States, he knows the dialects of all parts of the United States, and he has seen many things. When he was finally too old to work, he began to live with his family. Of all his children, his favorite was his grandson, my father. He told my father stories about America and taught him his English. My father's grandfather planted a seed in my father's heart. He once dreamed of going to the United States to live or work, but reality prevented him from pursuing his dream. Now, he has passed on the seed of that dream to me, and he wants me, as his son, to come to the United States, see all kinds of cultures, meet all kinds of people, and do what his grandfather did. Now I'm in America, speaking the same language as my ancestors, and I'm proud of it.

Now it's time to go back to the original question, what is mother tongue? For me, my mother tongue is the language I speak at home, it's the language my parents speak, it's my Chinese accent and my English accent, it's the romance that belongs to our family alone.

What is mother tongue? 1000 people will have 1000 different answers, in general, my interpretation of mother tongue is: mother tongue is the language I have been speaking in my hometown for so many years - Mandarin; But it was not ordinary Mandarin. In my language, it was a mixture of my mother's knowledge, my father's ease, my grandfather's caution and my grandmother's patience. My mother tongue is not only Mandarin, but also my great-grandfather's English, mixed with my father's accent. In the English I speak, there is the long history of my family, the story of inheritance, and the romance between me and my father.