Mixing Languages



(who and where we learn from) 


Exercises used in:
Slogans
SOMQ Collage Training
Palestinian Children’s Songbook

Modes: Production, Surrealization

This technique is used in a range of exercises that aim to produce new phrases or slogans that are derived from the different languages spoken by the participants (even at a beginner level).

One of the most common forms of internationalism is the learning of particular words and phrases in another language. Consider:

A luta continua
El pueblo unido jamás será vencido
Inquilab Zindabad
Amandla, Awethu
Azadi

One of the characteristics of these slogans and phrases is that they have been deliberately learned and taught, often through songs. They will not continue unless there is a deliberate effort to proliferate them, and it’s important that people learn the words and slogans that are currently used in movements around the world.

Another reason to engage in this technique is that in any given room, people will have a range of languages to draw from. These languages have been formed through the development of proletarian culture and struggle in different parts of the world, and when we learn about them we also learn about those struggles.

What is the technique?

The technique involves gathering words and phrases from the languages known in the room, and then using the words together in phrases or sentences. These can be written or spoken as each way encourages the person who knows the language to teach words and their use to others who don’t.

In one workshop we used a big roll of paper with words in English that we had chosen due to the limited time we had. Some of these words were:

Student
Soul
Youth
Farmer
Long live


We asked people to write out these words in any other language they knew and then created a dictionary that could be used throughout the rest of the workshop.

In another workshop, we gathered words in this fashion, and then asked people to make slogans using words from several different languages.

































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