To be honest, I was just going to skip X this year. But then something happened this morning. Every Monday I give my students a vocabulary packet, and when I flipped to this week's unit in my trusty vocabulary book I had to laugh. The words all include the suffixes phobia or philia. One of the words is xenophobia and that was my very first X back in 2011. In 2012, I went flip side of the coin and did xenophilia, a word that, quite frankly, was new to me at the time. So as I made my copies before school, I decided I wouldn't skip X after all.
I certainly prefer Xenophilia, an attraction to foreign peoples, cultures, or customs. The opposite of xenophobia if you will. I love learning about foreign cultures and customs, and some of my very favorite people hail from other countries. I may be making up a word here, but I would even consider myself a xenophiliac.
As you can imagine, my students weren't particularly happy to see their weekly vocabulary homework coming at them this morning, but this little X coincidence put a smile on my face.
Hey, at least one person in the room was happy.
I was going to skip X, too. Unfortunately I don't have a room full of students for inspiration but if you can do it, hey, maybe I can do.... you xenophiliac, you.
ReplyDeleteFunny how the world conspires to help us with these posts, eh?
ReplyDeleteLiz A. from Laws of Gravity
Xenophiliac is a good word, even if you did make it up. It is fun to meet people from other places and learn about them, their culture, and their world view.
ReplyDeleteI love how life works sometimes. That is a wonderful turn of events!
ReplyDelete