What is the Mesa de Español?
Mesa is a Spanish conversation club that is open to everyone – whether you already speak Spanish, want to start learning from the beginning, or just want to meet new people. Meeting weekly in the Turlington Language Studio, our goal at Mesa is to develop and foster an inclusive community centered around a passion for the love of the Spanish language and talking about spicy topics in a chill and low stakes environment. Learning and practicing another language can be especially intimidating due to language anxiety. Speaking from our experience as language learners ourselves, Mesa aims to provide a safe environment where everyone feels empowered to express themselves without fear of making mistakes or being judged on how one speaks. Pasarlo bien is our number one goal as a community.
Who organizes Mesa?
Since 2011, Mesa has been run by graduate students in the Spanish department collaborating with tutors from the Turlington Language Studio.
- Co-director and Volunteer Tutor Alexandre Menager – master’s student in Hispanic linguistics
- Co-director and Volunteer Tutor Zachary Mott – master’s student Hispanic linguistics
- Past Director and Volunteer Tutor Sergio Casado Ariza – doctoral student Hispanic linguistics
- Volunteer Tutor Cole Erickson-Cartaya – undergraduate student.
- Volunteer Tutor Jodi Neely-Ritz – UF Shands Hospital
What does a typical session of Mesa look like?
Over the past couple of semesters, the number of active participants in Mesa has increased significantly! On any given day, between 15-30 people come to interact with others in Spanish! We generally start every session with brief introductions and then break out into multiple conversations based on language proficiency. While a lot of participants enjoy talking about whatever they have on their mind, we also have offered a variety of activities and games such as “Would You Rather”, “Puerto Rican Bingo”, and “Fishbowl” among others. An absolute group favorite is the “Cartas de conversación” that always brings us spicy and exciting topics to explore. Due to this setup, there are always multiple conversations going on at any given time.
