This summer I spent five weeks in Salamanca, Spain, known as the Golden City because its buildings are made of the Villamayor golden sandstone. Walking through the city was like taking a step back in time and reliving history, and the experience is a piece of my history I will never forget. I fell in love with its culture, its history and its beauty.

I studied at the Universidad de Salamanca, which was founded in 1218 and is one of the oldest universities in Europe. It has had its key role in history and was home to writers such as Fray Luis de León, Miguel de Unamuno and Miguel de Cervantes. During one of the lectures, our professor took us to the old 12th century cathedral where we had class for the day and had the opportunity to sit in the same pews as many of these historical greats.

The professors were extremely passionate and transmitted their excitement and passion to the students. They had the ability to spark interest in every subject, whether it was syntax, literature or history. The professors encouraged students to take advantage of the beautiful city and attend the Noche de Fonseca outdoor plays, to watch the street performers and the university Tunas at the Plaza Mayor at night in order to immerse ourselves in the culture.

After class, I would head down to the Plaza Mayor to sit at a café and study. This was the perfect op-portunity to watch how people interacted with each other and to practice my Spanish with the locals. My afternoons also included guided tours of the palaces, cathedrals, convents, churches and the University. One the weekends, I took advantage of tours to Trujillo, the hometown of Francisco Pizarro, Ciudad Rodrigo, a small city occupied since the Neolithic Age and built along the River Áqueda, Segovia to visit the Roman Aqueduct and the Alcazar Castle and La Granja; just to name a few of my many travels.

It is extremely difficult to summarize my five week experience in such a short writing. I found this experience to be invaluable and I encourage others to take advantage of study abroad experience UMBC offers. At the closing ceremony, the university director stated, “Once a Salamanca student, always a Salamanca student.” I strongly agree. This experience will stay with me forever, along with the friendships made while I was there. The Golden City offers a golden opportunity to challenge oneself as a student and as an individual; it opens the doors to a heightened awareness of diversity, which will only help our society become more culturally proficient. —Jennifer Street, MLL–Spanish.

Summer Study in Salamanca is a joint graduate program offered by UMBC and the Universidad de Salamanca in Spain. Practicing high school Spanish teachers will study in Salamanca from late June - early August 2009 where they will engage in classroom activities focusing on Spanish language, culture and pedagogy. Upon successful completion of the program, students will earn nine graduate transfer credits that may be applied to the INCC, MAT, or MAE graduate degree programs at UMBC. For additional information, please contact Dr. Alan Bell, the Salamanca Program Director, abell@umbc.edu.

Groeten uit Nederland, MLL!

Greetings from the Netherlands, MLL! My name is Christianna Stavroudis and I am recent UMBC graduate, having received my B.A. in Modern Languages and Linguistics (concentration: Applied Linguistics) in May. I'm now here in Groningen, the Netherlands, at the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen pursuing an M.Sc. in clinical linguistics—the theoretical study of speech and language disorders—as part of the European Union's Erasmus Mundus program. This program allows non-EU citizens to have an Erasmus experience, which up until 2004 was only open to citizens from EU member countries. Now, through Erasmus Mundus, non-EU citizens can apply to over 80 Masters programs held at European universities and be sponsored by the EU on a full tuition scholarship, plus monthly stipend, travel allowance and insurance coverage. A full list of the Masters programs and their individual requirements can be accessed here: http://ec.europa.eu/education/programmes/mundus/projects/index_en.html

The Erasmus Mundus award is very generous (the equivalent of 1100 EUR per month) and sends students to at least two different EU-member countries during the course of study. For example, I will be studying in the Netherlands until December, spending an intensive winter semester in Joensuu, Finland, studying speech corpora design and autism, and finally taking courses in neuro-imaging and research design in Potsdam, Germany, during the spring semester. I then have the chance to write my thesis with faculty at any of these three universities or in Milan during the fourth and final program period, which extends from August 1-November 30, 2009. In addition to making connections with international universities and studying in a truly interdisciplinary way, the administration also encourages making a local life for yourself outside the classroom, which is one of the most rewarding parts of the experience.

The photo is a picture of me on my birthday with a cake that my classmates made: I experienced my first surprise party ever during my first week of classes with the other thirteen students in my program. I've been amazed at how well we've hit it off with one another, a great result of us all coming from different academic backgrounds and cultures. We just recently began presenting articles in the developmental language disorders class, which later launched into a class discussion of the nature of cognition and language and its representation in the brain/mind. It was open and stimulating and elicited a satisfied sigh in me: man, I'm really in graduate school!

Recent alumna Melissa Stockbridge (MLL-Applied Linguistics) spent this past summer as a subject-matter expert for the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The FDA reviews proposed proprietary names for drugs and biological products in an effort to reduce medication errors due to phonological and orthographic similarities in trade names. There she assisted in the development of a protocol for a linguistics-based approach to proprietary name review. This included writing a concept paper on the application of linguistics to the question of name-based medical error, creating a standard operating procedure document to address the issue from this perspective, and assisting in the development of a guidance for industry. Additionally, she held staff training concerning applied linguistics in the Advertising and Promotional Labeling Branch of the Center for Biologics Evaluation and Research (CBER). This branch reviews proprietary names for biological products.

Medication errors due to “name-related” causes are projected to account for up to 20% of all medication errors. Under the Food and Drug Amendments Act (FDAAA), the FDA received appropriated funds to re-evaluate and revise several processes concerning the drug review and post-marketing surveillance process, including making new considerations for phonological and orthographic disambiguation. The FDA has employment opportunities concerning this initiative open to students with a bachelor's degree in applied linguistics.

Melodee also published a book review on Dr. Elizabeth Shakman Hurd's The Politics of Secularism in International Relations in International Topics Journal, Volume 2, Issue 1 (Spring 2008).

For a second time, Melodee received a Critical Language Scholarship from the U.S. Department of State. Melodee continued her studies in Arabic at the American School in Tangier, Morocco and the American Institute Maghrib Studies. She is now in her final year of coursework in the Ph.D. program in International Studies at Old Dominion University.

During my UMBC Fellowship Leave, I worked on three chapters of my book and submitted three articles, one of which, I just heard has now been accepted for publication by the journal Nouvelles Francographies. Title: "Retour ou détour: Le dilemme des exilés dans L'exil selon Julia de Gisèle Pineau." I am very optimistic about the other ones and I look forward to submitting my book manuscript by the end of this year.

In Morocco where I had spent three months, I was invited by "L'Association Essaouira-Mogador" to give a lecture on the history of coexistence of Jews and Muslims in Mogador. It so happened that my Jewish friend from Israel, Asher Knafo, was also visiting the city of his birth, so we ended up with a genuine idea: to present two lectures. It was quite an emotional moment, since he spoke about his youth in Essaouira, which he left when he was 12 and never returned until 1995 for the first time. He also read from his novels and translations. The event was followed by questions and answers; tea and pastries were provided by the association. Three journalists were present and they published a small piece on the event.

During the stay in Morocco, I also met with Houssein Miloudi, one of the most prominent artists in Morocco, who also lives in Essaouira. Talking with him was very helpful for an ongoing project on art in Essaouira that I have been working on for some time now.

In all, the leave was quite fruitful and helped my projects advance dramatically. As much as I am proud of having won the fellowship, I am very grateful to UMBC for the opportunity.

Photo: Moroccan artist Houssein Miloudi (foreground left) and his assistant.

Meet Vira Zhdanóvych!

n heels far too high for a native-born American to wear every day, Vira Vladimirovna Zhdanovych paces back and forth in the small classroom, occasionally looking over students' shoulders and often correcting their easily-made Russian grammar mistakes. She speaks Russian with her mouth wide open, a habit carried over from her days as an opera singer and actress in the former Soviet Union, enunciating every difficult Russian consonant cluster and each individual vowel.

This is only Vira's third semester teaching Russian at UMBC, but her qualifications extend back to her childhood in Kiev, Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union. As an ethnic Russian living in Ukraine, Vira grew up speaking both Russian and Ukrainian. Her childhood was the poster childhood that the communist government wanted the West to believe every Soviet child experienced. Her father worked for a company that made missiles for the Soviet government (potentially to use against America during the Cold War). His good standing with the government combined with living in the capital of Ukraine provided Vira with an extremely safe and pleasant childhood, which she now realizes, was not the fate of most children in the Soviet Union.

She spent her summers at Soviet recreation camps, swimming, hiking and playing sports. In the tenth grade Vira won a singing, acting and modeling competition and because of that she was one of only eighteen girls who were accepted into the Fine Arts University in Kiev. She trained to be a professional singer and actress and later performed and coordinated government concerts and productions. After graduating from university, Vira was elected to be a Komsomol leader—a representative for students in the communist party. She stayed involved in the Soviet education system until the collapse of the Union in 1991.

Vira began singing at the modest age of five, to calm her father when he came home from work. By request of family and friends, she would sing classical songs and perform folk songs. She remembers how even then, she enjoyed the different styles of music because it involved acting. After listening to old opera records, Vira would memorize the sounds, and soon sing the foreign songs from memory. “People were interested in my voice, but also were interested because I was singing in different languages that I was too young to know.”

Vira continued her singing career until the fall of the Soviet government, when she had to adjust to the new regime. She got a second degree in banking and finance and worked as an analyst for one of the first free-market banks in Ukraine. During the period of glasnost and perestroika, Vira saw possibilities beyond her native country and debated with herself whether she could not find a better life outside the former USSR. In 2000, Vira made the decision to move to America because “the future in Russia is always unpredictable and the U.S. always offers opportunities.”

When her husband received a professorship at St. John's College in Annapolis, Vira decided to use her Russian skills and was hired to teach at UMBC in 2007. She now sings along with the UMBC Russian Chorus and teaches several levels of Russian grammar and conversation, encouraging unwilling students to open their mouths wider and enunciate those tricky Russian vowels.

She is worried about the growing power of Russia and the possible actions it might take against its weaker neighbor, Ukraine. But after living in the United States for 8 years, “I have become very patriotic as an American,” Vira states. “I think that people who grew up in other parts of the world understand very clearly how lucky we are to be in America and how much freedom we have here.” —Randi Leyshon.

• Nicoleta Bazgan (9:45-10:15): Star Couples in French Cinema: the Pygmalion Myth and Artistic Collaboration
  
  
• Lisa Fink (10:15-10:45): The Language of Advocacy: Analyzing Discourse Used in Materials Published by a Domestic Violence Victims' Advocacy Agency
  
  
• Jieyu Wang (11:00-11:30): Chinese Language Education of the Heritage Chinese in the United States: From Cultural and Historical Perspectives
  
  
• Anna Shields (11:30-12:00): Trust and Sincerity in Medieval Chinese Views of Friendship
  
  
• Omar Ka (2:00-2:30): Teaching Culture in the African Language Classroom: Learning Scenarios in the New Standards for Foreign Language Learning: Preparing for the 21st Century
  
  
• Zakaria Fatih (2:30-3:00): The Canon and the Culture Wars
  
  
• Tom Field (3:15-3:45): Historical Sociolinguistics: Deducing Cultural Dynamics from Linguistic Data
  
  
• Ana Oskoz (3:45-4:15): Bimodal Approaches: Combining Wikis and Chats for L2 Collaborative Writing
  
  

MLL has revised its certificate program in Intercultural Communication. The certificate program is 18-19-credits, and is intended for students who wish to combine the study of intercultural communication with advanced foreign language study.

Requirements:

• 3 credits: MLL 305 Introduction to Intercultural Communication
  
  
• 3 credits MLL 306 Intercultural Communication: Community Issues in Maryland/D.C.
  
  
• 4 credits: CHIN/FREN/GERM/HEBR/RUSS/SPAN 202 (A more advanced student may substitute a three-credit higher-level language course.)
  
  
• 3 credits: CHIN/FREN/GERM/HEBR/RUSS/SPAN 301
  
  
• 6 credits of elective courses from language, MLL, or related disciplines to be chosen in consultation with the faculty advisor. At least 3 of the 6 elective credits will come from outside the student's primary language of study.
  
  
  

Through The Shriver Center, UMBC students gain practical work experience in their fields of study and get involved in their communities by participating in internships, co-ops, community service, and international work and service. The Center's resources are free and allow students to have their resumes critiqued, prepare for interviews, and attend professional development seminars. Students benefit from their experiences as they are able to strengthen their resumes, refine their skills, earn money, assemble a network of professional contacts, and receive academic credits that will fulfill graduation requirements. Many students even convert their current part-time and full-time jobs to internships and co-ops.