[HPforGrownups] Re: Kashrut / Languages (ot)

[Amanda Lewanski]

No: HPFGUIDX 6723

Kimberly wrote:

> I don't know about the British, but I'd say for most of us (U.S.)
> Americans, learning English as a first language seems to do more
> damage to the humility areas of the brain than the language-learning
> areas.
>
> I was a grad instructor in Begining French in the midwest for a couple
> of years, and I can't tell you how many of my students grumbled that
> it was rediculous to have a foreign language requirement, and I'm
> ashamed to mention some of the reasons they gave, but the gist was
> either everyone already speaks English, they will if they want to make
> any money, or they simply should, since it's the 'most important
> language in the world'.

Whatever they perceived as the reason they didn't want to learn, there is a
certain reality that unless you live up North, near Quebec, or down here
near the border to Mexico, you probably will never need or use a second
language. In Europe, homelands where other languages are spoken are much,
much closer than in the U.S. and it's much more relevant.

Now, if one is from a household where another language is spoken, or if one
is lucky enough to have the funds to globe-trot or move to another country,
then multiple languages are tremendously useful. But for the majority of
Americans, they really will never need them. The argument that it broadens
the horizons and opens other windows of perception (I follow Worf's
hypothesis) carries little weight in our minimum-education, minimum-effort
attitudes.

--Amanda, Texas native who always wondered why they taught Spain's Spanish
and not Mexico's at school, and who can gesture fluently in Polish.