TIPS ON ARGENTINA

Planning to visit Argentina? This beautiful country offers tourists a wide range of attractions, striking places to visit and high-quality accommodation at reasonable prices but before embarking on this trip, we suggest you read this article to get to know the Argentine people and their culture.

Identity
The majority of the Argentines descend from European immigrants, especially from the Italian and the Spanish. Argentines often see themselves as Europeans rather than Latin Americans because of their strong family bonds. Who doesn’t know an Italian grandma who prepares pasta on Sundays? An Argentine will ask or tell you the origin of his/ her surname when filling a form or doing any other administrative task.


Communication
Argentines are by nature expressive so they will greet you with a kiss or two, depending on the province you are visiting and they will usually touch you when speaking. Cheek kissing for the Argentines means friendliness, sociability and respect. Handshakes are merely used in business contexts.


There’s always a good reason to celebrate
A hen, stag or the recently fashionable divorce party; a promotion; a reunion, the purchase of a new house or just passing an exam .Argentines have thousands of reasons to celebrate and if they don’t have one, they will make it up. The best option for them is to gather in a house to eat the typical “asado”. The meeting can begin at 11 in the morning and continue until the wee hours of the next day. If you have the opportunity to visit an Argentine family, you will be the reason to celebrate.

Football is everything
In Argentina, football is not just a sport. It is a lifestyle. A true Argentine must support a football team and this choice is normally imposed, before the time of birth, by the supporter’s parents. Heated discussions about football are very common everywhere: at the office, around the table while having lunch or dinner, or even on the bus among strangers. Different opinions about football have even caused family feuds. So be careful when you discuss football with an Argentine football fan: they tend not to bear diverse points of view.

In a nutshell, don’t feel intimidated if an Argentine kisses you on the cheek and kiss him/her back. Prepare yourself to celebrate and also prepare your stomach to eat and drink till bursts! Argentines have a motto: “Never discuss politics, religion and football at the table.” Try to follow it to avoid bitter memories and last but not least, enjoy your stay!

SCs&AWRs

Abortion: A controversial issue

Abortion has always generated a heated debate all over the world, with supporters claiming that it is the right of pregnant women to decide over their body, while opponents maintain that abortion is equivalent to infanticide.

Firstly, abortion supporters, known as “pro-choice,” strongly believe that every woman should have complete control over her body and no law should forbid her to decide what to do with it. Furthermore, they consider that women should also choose how many children they desire to have. Therefore, if a woman gets pregnant and the pregnancy is not desired, for instance when a woman has been raped, she should have an induced abortion in a secure hospital or clinic.

Secondly, supporters are convinced that safe abortions will result in a decreased number of deaths per year. Hundreds of women die every year due to back-street abortions in Argentina. Regardless of the fact that only therapeutic abortions are legal, most of the abortions that are practiced do not follow therapeutic reasons, hence they are considered illegal and ninety per cent of the women having them belong to the lower class. Since they cannot afford the expenditures of a clinic admission or professional care, they resort to clandestine clinics with non professional “specialists”, exposing themselves to high risks such as hemorrhages, infections, convulsions or incomplete abortions.

In contrast, abortion opponents, known as “pro-life”, are divided into two types. On the one hand, there exist those who are in favour of therapeutic abortions and reject elective abortions and, on the other hand, those who are against any kind of induced abortion. Therapeutic abortion is performed to save the life of the pregnant woman or to safeguard the woman’s mental health. Pro-life activists believe that killing a fetus is equivalent to killing a child or an adult human being. Moreover, they consider abortions unconstitutional acts because they violate the Argentine National Constitution which guarantees the right to life.

In addition to this, pro-life advocates emphasize the physical and psychological consequences of abortions. As regards the former, abortion increases the risks of breast, cervical and ovarian cancer. It also increases the risks of uterine perforation and placenta praevia in later pregnancies. What is more, women who have had induced abortions are more likely to have spontaneous abortions later in life than those who have never had one. Regarding the latter, abortion may cause stress and nervous disorders. Women also experience recurrent and guilty thoughts about the abortion which tends to lead them to a deep depression.

All things considered, it can be concluded that since abortion is an ethical and moral issue considered one of the most arguable subjects of controversy, an agreement between supporters and opponents will be difficult to reach. Both sides seem to have strong beliefs and to be reluctant to change their minds. As far as I am concerned, I believe abortion should be legal for therapeutic reasons or when a woman has been raped. However, I believe that we would not be discussing this topic if there were preventive measures, if people were taught from an early age how to prevent unwanted pregnancies and if they had easy access to contraceptives.

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Bilingualism

People may become bilingual either by acquiring two languages at the same time in childhood or by learning a second language sometime after acquiring their first language. Many bilingual people grow up speaking two languages.
The exposure must involve interaction; a child growing up in an English-speaking household who is exposed to Spanish only through Spanish-language television will not
become a Spanish-English bilingual, but a child who is regularly spoken to in both English and Spanish will. Children who hear more than one language virtually from birth are sometimes referred to as “simultaneous bilingual”, whereas those who begin to learn a second language later are referred to as “sequential bilingual”

It is also possible to learn a second language sometime after early childhood, but the older you get, the harder it is to learn to speak a new language as well as a native speaker. Many linguists believe there is a “critical period”. The critical period refers to the idea that the ability to acquire language is biologically linked to age. The hypothesis claims that there is an ideal “window” of time to acquire language in a linguistically rich environment, after which this is no longer possible. Hence, the first few years of life is the crucial time in which an individual can acquire a first language if presented with adequate input. If language input does not occur until after this time, the individual will never achieve a full command of language, especially grammatical systems.

Research has shown that bilingualism is beneficial for children’s development and their future. Children exposed to different languages become more aware of different cultures, of other people and of other points of view. According to these linguists, knowing a second language actually benefits a child's cognitive development. They also state that if the child comes from a family that has recently immigrated to the U.S., the family may speak other language than English at home and may still have strong ties to their ethnic roots. In this case, being able to speak the language of the family's ethnic heritage may be important for the child's sense of cultural identity. To be unable to speak the family's language can make a child feel like an outsider within his or her own family; speaking the family's language gives the child a sense of identity and belonging.