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Lack of languages stifles Brits and USers | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Luso Hexaglot Senior Member Portugal Joined 6060 days ago 819 posts - 1812 votes  Speaks: Portuguese*, French, EnglishC2, GermanB1, Italian, Spanish Studies: Sanskrit, Arabic (classical) | Message 65 of 95 12 July 2014 at 7:30pm | IP Logged | ||
As a non-native anglophone (and also non-resident), I'll tread carefully here: I don't feel equipped to an in-depth analysis of this subject. Having said that, the sentence above reminded me of how conventional wisdom may not apply at times. In recent months, I've read extensively about the development of software companies. One thing they have in common is the ability to attract talent from all over the world. For instance, when Google had to address multilingualism (for their search engine), they already had in their ranks people fluent (read "native") in most of the languages they were going to use. My point is: in countries like the U.S., U.K., and Canada, you don't really have the problems other ones have in finding multilingual talent, as you have local resources. I have a couple of other examples (from different countries) disproving conventional wisdom, but that's a little besides the point right now. Disclaimer: I'm not saying these resources are enough or available everywhere, just that we have to keep things in perspective. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| James29 Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5374 days ago 1265 posts - 2113 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French | Message 66 of 95 13 July 2014 at 12:56am | IP Logged | ||
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EMK wrote:
"As I've been arguing throughout this whole long thread, I certainly don't believe US employers are "on board": They're not exactly working hard to hire lots of multilingual employees. But if poor language skills really do impose a 10% tariff (or worse) on foreign exports, they probably should start hiring." And if they can do 12% better by putting the resources into better tax accountants or 14% better by putting the resources into better marketing? Do you still tell them they need "get on board" and put their resources into multilingual issues? That's the situation with my small business... better multilingual skills would be helpful, but there are many other priorities that are simply more important. If so many people can see that the businesses are leaving so much money on the table why don't those people simply stop talking about it and go into business and make the money? The reality of the situation is that it is easy for a professor or activist to isolate something like "language skills" and show how much it will help a business (in isolation), but putting it into practice is something totally different. It reminds me of the perpetual sales pitch I hear... "Just invest $_____ in ______ with us and it will pay for itself in ____ months!!! We can prove it, here are the numbers!!!" What they never tell me is where I am supposed to take the $_____ from and how much I am going to lose by diverting those resources from something more important. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5429 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 67 of 95 13 July 2014 at 4:28am | IP Logged | ||
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Although I agree with emk on many things, I don't think that US employers are not "on board" in terms of
multilingual employees. I think there's a fair amount of evidence that those employers who need foreign language capability are able to find it readily where necessary. At the same time, it's also probably true that second language learners are not the natural solution because the linguistic requirements are much more demanding that what these learners can provide. As something of an anecdote, Montreal where I live is a major centre of the video game industry. I regularly see ads for localization specialists in major languages. I suppose that the work consists of consulting on dialogues, the language on the screen and other cultural issues. I strongly doubt that nonnatives dare apply for these sorts of jobs. What is interesting is that many of these jobs can be filled here in Montreal. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 6124 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 68 of 95 14 July 2014 at 2:47am | IP Logged | ||
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I'm in the videogame business also. The company I work for is large enough to have an overseas branch offices, and localization happens in Europe. I've never been there, we send them emails and then stuff comes back translated. Sometimes we go back and forth a few times if the text doesn't fit the little box.
For the most part, American and European games still sell well with translations and no content change. China, Japan and Korea, though, are kind of their own separate domains -- you can translate from English to Asian languages but it doesn't always play well in their markets. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5429 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 69 of 95 14 July 2014 at 3:04pm | IP Logged | ||
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One of the conclusions that I draw from this debate is that in an environment like that of the US, foreign-
language learners have to achieve high levels of proficiency if they want to use these languages professionally. The reason is pretty simple: there is overwhelming competition from immigrants and heritage speakers. This, of course, eliminates nearly all those students whose knowledge of a foreign language consists solely of high school classes. It's a different story for those who go to immersion and those exclusive independent schools that do produce relatively proficient speakers. It should be pointed out that in the US there is nothing comparable to the CEFR in terms of a standardized system of assessing foreign language skills. There is of course a vast array of tests of English aimed at the market of foreigners wanting to immigrate or study in the US (and in the UK. In Canada there are a number of language benchmark systems aimed at immigrants. It's also interesting to note that more and more school systems in Canada are adopting the CEFR model with great success. The moral of all this for North American language learners? If you want to use your language skills in your job, you have to aim very high; otherwise don't bother. However there are lots of other valid reasons for learning languages to varying levels of proficiency. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Jeffers Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4908 days ago 2151 posts - 3960 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Hindi, Ancient Greek, French, Sanskrit, German | Message 70 of 95 15 July 2014 at 8:50am | IP Logged | ||
This has already been said, and it is certainly true for the person who gets hired as a "speaker of X language". However, when a company has a division that deals regularly with foreign nationals from a specific country, it is worth all of the employees who have to deal directly with nationals picking up a "smattering" of the language. Enough to say hello, make a tiny bit of small talk, and then switch to English for business. The contacts will be happy that they're making an effort to understand them. In my travels I have met loads of people working for American companies (petro-chemical companies, engineers, government workers, healthcare workers) posted for a few years in Europe and India who made no effort to learn any of the language, because they get by with English. Of course, there is little chance of them learning the language to C1 in a few years, but it is visibly true that they were treated with a lot more respect when they made the effort to learn a bit of the language and culture. Of course this doesn't mean they will get a salary bonus. But US companies which post people overseas really should make more of an effort to give a bit of language/culture lessons when they send people overseas. What's my evidence? My mother did a lot of work in healthcare in India, and did research for US-AID, including co-writing what was "the textbook" on village healthcare. So we had a lot of contact with employees of the Embassy, diplomats from other countries, other foreign aid workers, employees of multinationals, and even marines (one of them drew the graphs for the textbook). There were clearly two types: those who stuck to their own people, staying on their compounds whenever possible, and those who got out and enjoyed the country, learnt to say hello, etc. The latter people were much more appreciated by the locals, and therefore generally more successful. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| s_allard Triglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5429 days ago 2704 posts - 5425 votes Speaks: French*, English, Spanish Studies: Polish | Message 71 of 95 15 July 2014 at 3:17pm | IP Logged | ||
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I totally with Jeffers observations. In my original writing, I was thinking of using one's foreign languages
professionally in the US. It should also be said that there are, among others, two categories of Americans abroad who demonstrate excellent foreign language skills. I'm thinking of the Mormon missionaries and the Peace Corps volunteers. Most of them demonstrate really down-to-earth knowledge of the local spoken languages. I've always wondered what they do with the language skills afterwards. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| cathrynm Senior Member United States junglevision.co Joined 6124 days ago 910 posts - 1232 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Finnish | Message 72 of 95 15 July 2014 at 3:41pm | IP Logged | ||
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Also some of these jobs are commodities. That is you need translations and then hire an outside shop and that gets bid down. So the final guy, who knows how much he makes? I don't think it's a lot.
There are times when you really need someone inside with deeper knowledge, negotiating with companies in Asia something like this, but for this you want native speakers. I suggest -- learn language for fun, but have an additional field, law, science, something like this -- where you have deeper knowledge. I have a BSEE and am a computer programmer. (It has come up a few times that maybe I could work with Japanese code, but so far it has never actually happened. Partially because I kind of suck at Japanese though.) 1 person has voted this message useful |
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