Bilingual Being: My Life as a Hyphen

✍ Scribed by Saint-Onge, Kathleen

• Book ID: 107897591
• Publisher: MQUP
• Year: 2013
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 216 KB
• Category: Fiction
• ISBN-13: 9780773541191

✦ Synopsis

Written by a survivor of childhood abuse, this moving memoir traces the influence of the author's mother tongue in the formation of her identity, and the role her second language played in providing a psychological sanctuary. Kathleen Saint-Onge reflects on the ambiguities of growing up in a primarily French household while attending English schools as she richly recounts the emotional gains and losses of a life lived in two languages.

A testament to the power of language in determining feelings of belonging or alienation, Bilingual Being also presents a portrait of the 1960s in Quebec and the changing role of the Catholic Church. Depicting with warmth and humour her own developing independence gained at school, Saint-Onge reveals the tensions between the social world of her evolving English and her deep roots in French-speaking Quebec City. It is an exploration of hope where language provides an escape from traumatic memories and a chance to reconstruct a secure sense of... ϡ쯦랠