Kaley's Chronicles

I'm done with my studies in Texas and back in the North for a few months. Here's an update: New Assignment: Central African Republic God has guided me through the process of deciding where to serve and  has led me to the Central African Republic (CAR). CAR is a country that’s about the size of Texas in the heart of Africa. I’ll be living in the capital, Bangui, working closely with the national translation organization that’s one of Wycliffe’s strategic partners. As I start out, I’ll serve by helping with linguistic analysis which lays the foundation for Bible translation projects. One thing that has drawn me to the central part of Africa is the great need there. CAR has around 72 languages and around 53 of those have no Scripture at all. Don't know a lot about CAR? Here's a video that will give you an intro to the country: CAR Quick Facts: Population: 5,000,000 Capital: Bangui Number of Languages: 72 Number of Languages withou...

I've finished the first 6 months of classes in Dallas. It's amazing how quickly it's flown by. Here are some things I've been up to: I've completed most of the classes required to start linguistics in languages needing a Bible Translation: Phonetics, Grammar, Phonology, Cultural Anthropology, Sociolinguistics, Second Language and Culture Acquisition, and Intro to Language Development. Whew! It's been by God's grace that I've made it through these courses. I've been attending a French-speaking African church for the last couple of months, learning about the culture, trying to improve my French skills, and learning to sing in several languages (French, Swahili, Lingala, Tchiluba, and English). There are several miles of beautiful trails around campus-a hike or a jog have made for a nice break from studying. In Second Language and Culture Acquisition, a group of us were learning Swahili to practice our language-learning skills. ...

I've been studying linguistics for about a month now. Here's what I've been learning about: Phonetics "Boats" and spittle Phonetics involves learning the sounds that comprise human languages. A big part of my homework is trying to produce these sounds and paying attention to what my mouth does. I have mimicry quizzes where I have to try to repeat a phrase in another language making it sound as close as possible. We also have quizzes where we listen to words in other languages and have to transcribe them into the international phonetic alphabet. The human's ability to make a multitude of distinct sounds to form a language and communicate is amazing. I never thought to praise God for all the various sounds in my language. God is very creative in all the ways he's given us to express meaning. He's also very gracious, because it's through these sounds that we hear and share the Gospel. Fun tidbit: My phonetics textbook mentioned th...