[HPforGrownups] Language instruction

[Amanda Lewanski]

No: HPFGUIDX 6709

Suzanne Burns wrote:

> At some point doesn't somebody point out Crouch's fluency in many different
> languages, including Goblin, Troll, and Merish? I seem to remember that Bagman
> is anxious to find him at the Quidditch match because he knows Bulgarian. I'm
> going on memory here.
>
> The accents are highlighted, maybe evn stereotyped, but I think the
> provincialism of some of the wizards and witches is also noted. I thought about
> this when Ron turned his nose up at Boullibase, and later when he said to
> Hermione "You can't trust these foreigners."

I'm thinking that the education system of the wizarding world is like the early
universities, which were student-motivation-driven. So if someone wants to learn
languages, they'll do it, and the school will likely help them if they ask, but it
won't tell them "you must learn X." Hogwarts seems less the degree factory that
most American universities are, and more a place to learn how to learn and how to
deal with life.

--Amanda