Do you want to learn more Yiddish than the occasional Oy Vey? Get a crash-course in Hebrew and/or Arabic before setting off to the Holy Land? Learn to Sign? Or have you recently moved to this rainy country, and need to work on your English? We have a course for you.
Babel’s Blessing is a grassroots language school set up in summer 2015. We run affordable language classes for adults in a number of languages that are politically relevant for our communities. The income we get from these helps us to run our programme of free English classes for migrants, refugees and asylum seekers.
We see language learning as being about cultural exchange, community building, and a way for members of diaspora communities to reconnect with their/our heritage. In our classes, we talk about politics, culture, art and history through language as it is spoken – valuing street language and varied accents rather than one ‘correct’ version.
We apply critical pedagogy methods and principles across all our classes, and we run as a democratic community of learners, where students are actively involved in shaping the learning process. Our teachers are also our team members, administrators, fundraisers, event hosts and blog writers. We are a non-hierarchical organisation and everyone is encouraged to take an active role in the direction of the project.
Follow us on facebook and twitter for up to date info on classes, campaigns and events.
This project is inspired by This Is Not An Ulpan:
“Here every student is a teacher and every teacher is a student. Even though each course has a facilitator, we work according to the principles of critical pedagogy – everyone is actively involved in shaping the learning process.”
I think Babel’s Blessing/ the Radical Language School is one of the best ideas I’ve heard in a long time, and I am going to pass on the idea to people in Toronto and Paris. Good wishes.
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Thanks Natalie, feel free to put interested people in touch with us at babelsblessing@gmail.com
p.s. love your work, was an inspiration to me in my undergrad degree!!
(from one of the historians on the Babels Blessing team)
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Hey!
I can speak, read and write Ladino and would love the chance to run ladino classes/workshops. I have experience of teaching English as a foreign language in Guatemala as well as experience leading workshops
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Brilliant, we’d love to work with you!! Someone from the team is going to be in touch – your email is nataglondon@gmail.com, right?
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