How the brain can lose — and reclaim — an abandoned mother tongue.

“I don’t remember my first language anymore, or at least not most of it. When I was 2, I immigrated with my family into the United States from South India, and we all spoke Tamil. I didn’t know any English before I started school, so when my teachers noticed I was behind, my parents decided to stop speaking to me in Tamil. This was a common approach in the 1980s. Now, educators are more aware of the value of bilingualism...

How the brain can lose — and reclaim — an abandoned mother tongue.

“I don’t remember my first language anymore, or at least not most of it. When I was 2, I immigrated with my family into the United States from South India, and we all spoke Tamil. I didn’t know any English before I started school, so when my teachers noticed I was behind, my parents decided to stop speaking to me in Tamil. This was a common approach in the 1980s. Now, educators are more aware of the value of bilingualism...