S1 E4: Lingo Flamingo – Robbie Norval

Much Language Such Talk

In this episode, we talk with Robbie Norval, a social entrepreneur who founded the organisation Lingo Flamingo in 2015. He is passionate about empowering individuals, especially those with cognitive impairments, and wanted to create an organisation which provides both stimulating and interactive activities. His goal is to show that it is never too late to learn and to highlight the amazing cognitive benefits of learning a second language. Lingo Flamingo is a social enterprise which focuses on providing language lessons to older adults in care homes and day centres across Scotland. Since 2015, they have provided hundreds of classes and opened a brick and mortar locations in Glasgow. Outside of care homes, the Lingo Flamingo "Hub" is open to anyone interested in language learning, where they offer classes in Spanish, French, Italian, German, and Japanese, to name a few.

In addition to his work with Lingo, Robbie is a PhD student at Glasgow Caledonian University focusing on the role that social enterprises play in delivering non-pharmaceutical interventions for older adults and people living with dementia.

Go to our website to read the transcript!

MLST is brought to you by volunteers at Bilingualism Matters Edinburgh. The views of our guests don’t always reflect our own, as we hope to provide an accessible platform for the findings of current research and the perspectives of experts. For more resources like definitions of linguistic terms, episode transcripts, and information about the team, go to our website at www.mlstpodcast.com.

Recorded on: 10/07/2020

Music: Arc of the Sun by The 126ersssssss