“Children don’t need to choose between languages or identities,” says Francesca La Morgia, the founder of Mother Tongues. Ferrari helped to develop Mother Tongues’ language explorers programme which sees artists work with children to examine, share and be proud of their home languages. You can learn a language late in lifeOpens in new window ]Jaber’s family has a third language, Irish sign language. Agnieszka Pedrak, a lecturer in language development at Maynooth University, will be speaking at the Mother Tongues festival. It’s joyful, it’s moving and it’s deeply human.”The Mother Tongues festival takes place in Tallaght, Dublin, on February 20th and 21st and is timed to coincide with International Mother Language Day.

Source: The Irish Times February 15, 2026 10:51 UTC