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NY Times debate about learning languages | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| zenmonkey Bilingual Tetraglot Senior Member Germany Joined 6340 days ago 803 posts - 1119 votes  1 sounds Speaks: EnglishC2*, Spanish*, French, German Studies: Italian, Modern Hebrew | Message 17 of 20 31 January 2012 at 6:57pm | IP Logged | ||
Ha, thank you. I'll try to make sure my head doesn't explode. ;) His analysis was intended as a discussion piece to push people to address that disparity - that whole speech got him into so much trouble in the court of public opinion by the sound-bites and misquotes it engendered (pun intended) that I feel it led to part of the reason he evetually resigned. I was surprised. While I strongly disagree with his politics in other areas and even the poor use of variance in that study (as if somehow a correlative normal distribution of intelligence occurs in academia - science or not), I find that he was unfortunately hung out to dry for as much as being the establishment as well as being politically incorrect. And the issue wasn't really addressed. Edited by zenmonkey on 31 January 2012 at 7:00pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Hoppy Diglot Newbie United States Joined 4403 days ago 26 posts - 32 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Spanish, Russian | Message 18 of 20 24 April 2012 at 3:44pm | IP Logged | ||
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Of course learning a language isn't universally worthwhile. If you live somewhere isolated from the world outside your immeadiate community, don't enjoy trying new things, and abhor learning, then you probably won't enjoy learning or using a foreign language.
For the rest of us though, it is very enjoyable to learn and use foreign languages. Regardless of its value as an "investment", it is still worthwhile to engage in for the joy it brings us. If you can find uses for it at work, then that's great, although I don't think it's necessary to do so in order to justify learning a foreign language. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| zerrubabbel Senior Member United States Joined 4388 days ago 232 posts - 287 votes Speaks: English* Studies: Japanese, Mandarin | Message 19 of 20 25 April 2012 at 5:28am | IP Logged | ||
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It would seem all Lawrence Summers did was embarrass himself
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 emk Diglot Moderator United States Joined 5320 days ago 2615 posts - 8806 votes Speaks: English*, FrenchB2 Studies: Spanish, Ancient Egyptian Personal Language Map | Message 20 of 20 25 April 2012 at 6:28pm | IP Logged | ||
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Do English-speaking professionals need to learn foreign languages? I'm reminded of a
quote from Willy Brandt, a former Chancellor of West Germany:
Sure, many young European professionals speak comprehensible English. I've never had any problems carrying on friendly conversations, for example. But in a business context, you often need advanced linguistic skills: You need to clarify, to negotiate, to persuade, to stand firm without giving offense. And this gets tricky. I've spoken with some ambitious, young business professionals over Skype, trying to set up language exchanges. We typically use a mix of French and English, and we try to explain what our goals are, what kind of corrections will help us the most, and when we're each available. And it's hard. Within a few emails, I often resort to long, careful explanations in French, with more Je vous remercie, etc., than I've ever seen a native Francophone use. Sure, Anglophones can often rely on other people to learn English. But this only works when (1) we have something they want, or (2) we have a vast reservoir of goodwill. I'm not convinced that (1) will last forever, and every time we claim that we really don't need to learn foreign languages, we diminish (2). A huge number of educated Americans actually agree with the HTLAL community, at least in spirit: They wish they spoke a foreign language. They took classes in school, they buy Rosetta Stone, and they'll occasionally say, with a sigh of envy, "Do you know that she speaks 3 languages fluently? I could never do that; I'm just awful at languages." It's a defeatist attitude, but at least it's perceived as a defeat, not as a point of pride. It's better to have a vague yearning to learn a foreign language (or to have a 100 word vocabulary and an enthusiastic smile), than it is to speak of foreign languages as a bad investment. 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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