Quote:
Originally posted by wellard:
quote: Originally posted by Aelia Jusa:
Schools I think need to be more consistent with teaching other languages and there needs to be more congruency between lower and upper schooling so that kids learn one other language well rather than pointless spatterings of a number of different languages. The problem in English-speaking countries is, though, there isn't a clear obvious second language to teach, so schools end up offering a number of different languages, or the language taught at primary school is not the same as the one taught at high school. In non-English speaking countries, there is a much more clear choice for a second language.
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I had not thought of that before Aelia, but it is so true. Maybe this is an underlying reason for English speaking people being lazy in taking up the challenge of a foreign language. What should I choose as a language for my kids down here in Australia? Chinese, Japanese, Spanish, Indonesian or ??? There is no obvious choice as you say. [img]graemlins/1ponder.gif[/img] Not an easy choice is it?
As posted by Grojlach "On a similar note, linguists predict that by the end of this century, 75 to 90 percent of the 5000 current languages will have died out." I have heard this before and I believe many of those languages are Aboriginal and Papua New Guinean languages. This really makes me sad, If it was my culture I would be angry about it.
Is it a form of imperial arrogance? Do members of this forum get annoyed that it is English based or so many films and TV and music for that matter, or just accept it as given without a second thought? [/QUOTE]I'd say Chinese, Japanese, OR Spanish would all be useful for your kid. Not much point in learning Indonesian, unless you plan to live there. Ok kind of the same for Japanese, but it is a more important industrial power. Chinese is a world language since chinese are everywhere, but it's not officially the language anywhere except in China, and maybe one or two other places like Malaysia (?) Spanish is the official language in many more countries, so maybe that is the most generally useful one for your kids.
I'd still like to know why they predict the growth of german in Asia?? Anyone know? I am thinking of taking German back up as I studied it for 6 years before.
As for TV programs and films: no one has a right to be angry about most of them being english, since America produces most films and the native language there is english, so why SHOULD they produce it in another language and alienate their own audience??? That would be stupid...