Greetings everyone! I'm on a bus heading to Fukushima today, and on the way, I reread an article I found a while ago. It's a blogger writing about monolingualism in Australia, and he makes some points that are relevant to America and other English-speaking countries. I like how he compares the attitude many English speakers have with a type of imperialism. Anyway, here's the link:
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/fullysic/2011/12/13/too-monolingual-for-our-own-good/?wpmp_tp=0 I've previously looked (very quickly, and I know it's Wikipedia!) and it turns out that America, as a nation, has no official language. Seriously. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_the_United_States Not even English. Some states have made it the official language, but many others haven't. I used to fall into the same boat with the "if they're going to live here, they should speak our language" people, but being in a place where almost no one speaks English has been eye opening, and so has learning another language. I guess I'm just writing this one to make a few more people aware because I think a lot of the reason Americans are so monolingual is the attitude. Heck, maybe allowing citizens who don't speak English would actually be a good way to encourage bilingualism, but I sure am not a politician. Just a thought. Have a great weekend everyone!
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