Mary Lyndon Language Community (Spanish Program)

As UGA’s Spanish-language Graduate Resident, or GR, I live in Mary Lyndon Hall with all eighteen of my students, which is like always teaching and never teaching. Even with the current shift in pedagogical trends, moving from more of a binary teacher-student structure to one in which this oppositional dynamic is broken down, the on-campus language community is still a step (or two) beyond. My role and responsibility as the GR are in some ways very much unlike those of the traditional classroom instructor. My “office hours” could also be called “apartment hours,” since they really are one-and-the-same, as well as nearly ‘round the clock. And as it is just as likely for my students and me to see each other at 11:00 at night as it is 11:00 in the morning, or folding clothes in the laundry room as it is in our weekly conversation class, there is a level of trust and friendship that develops that is simply not possible in a traditional classroom setting. This aspect is one of the more positive ones of the language program, allowing for much unplanned, spontaneous Spanish to be used.

Because Spanish (or French for the other half of the community) is the principal language used on our floor of the residence hall, class is, in a sense, always in session. With the exception of the one-hour informal conversation class we have every week, there is no clock-watching, waiting for the professor to arrive or dismiss. The residents of the language community know that in order to communicate with me they must speak in Spanish. Although in their rooms, the students are free to use whichever language they choose, in the areas common to all and at official functions of the community, they must use Spanish.

Because the primary goals of the language-immersion program are to provide students a rare and excellent opportunity to improve verbal communication and insights into Hispanic cultures, an array of extracurricular activities are planned. In the fall semester of 2006 these activities ranged from cooking classes to making homemade piñatas to having the chance to interpret at a Latin health fair. We also watch and discuss film in Spanish and attend musical and Fine Arts performances (e.g. Don Quixote performed by the Festival Ballet of Moscow), all of which is paid for with the funds that UGA established for the program.

The Mary Lyndon Language Immersion program allows for students with an interest in language to connect with each other outside the classroom. With the help of a facilitator (the GR), as a community they are able to share an uncommon, on-campus living experience unavailable to most undergraduates at any university.

- Joey Warner