And now for something completely different! This week I'm joined by Dr. Taghreed Al-Saraj who is actively researching the phenomenon of language anxiety. We also talk about cultural differences between the middle east and the west as well as her recent book: The Anxious Language Learner: A Saudi Woman's Story.
Dr. Taghreed Al-Saraj
I first became aware of Dr. Al-Saraj and her work on language anxiety, when I was contacted by the publisher of her book. They sent me a free copy to read and I enjoyed it so much that I just had to have Dr. Al-Saraj on to discuss the topic.
I've previously dealt with language anxiety here on the blog in various forms. I've shared how my clinical depression deeply affected my confidence to use the languages I was learning. This is just one way of being anxious about language learning.
The book: The Anxious Language Learner: A Saudi Woman's Story also includes a lot of back story and cultural references contrasting Saudi Arabia with the US, where Dr. Al-Saraj now resides. As an ignorant westerner from Denmark I really enjoyed getting to know more about how the traditions and culture work in a society that is so different from what I'm used to.
Show Notes
In this episode you will hear about:
- Language Anxiety
- How to reduce anxiety as a student or teacher
- Cultural differences between the middle east and the west
- How Dr. Al-Saraj became interested in anxiety
- Her experience learning Turkish
- And much more
Episode Resources
This lists the resources relevant to the episode. For other language learning resources please go to the resource page for more information.
The Episode
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Thank you to this week's guest: Dr. Taghreed Al-Saraj
Kris is the founder of Actual Fluency, and has spent the last 8 years becoming an expert in language learning software, methods, and techniques.
He lives in Denmark and speaks 5+ languages at varying levels. His other interests are Wine, Online Marketing, and Travelling.