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#TheFutureIsYours Transversal and cross-cutting issues
Simplify, improve efficiency, cut expenses: pick English as solely used official language. Cut out translation and interpretation services. High time to pick one mandatory language for institutionalized usage.
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A little more for the road: According to the Grin report, the 5 points leading to unfair redistribution are: — monopoly on the markets for the translation, interpretation and writing of texts in English, the production of teaching materials for the teaching of English. 700,000 people visit the United Kingdom each year to learn English and spend an estimated £1000 per person there; — savings of time & money in international communication, with non-native speakers making every effort to express themselves [and read] in English; — saving of time & money for Anglophones who no longer make the effort to learn other languages; — return on investment in other forms of human capital, resources that Anglophones no longer need to invest in language learning; Dominant position of Anglophones in any situation of negotiation, competition or conflict taking place in English
This seems to me rather a half bitter, half envious position. The acquisition of a foreign language also brings a comprehension of the culture in question- and those who have never made the effort miss it completely (no advantage in negotiation in my opinion but often, they do not realise it....). I agree with regard to the negotiations conducted on English- but it is for those who do not speak English well. Those who speak it well but who ALSO speak other languages have a major advantage. And apart from that, I'm sure that French courses (sorry, it’s on Swedish keyboard...) are also lucrative....
This text is not mine, they are excerpts from the Wikipedia page devoted to the Grin report (sorry, I forgot to specify it). I do not know if you have heard of it, it was carried out in 2005 to determine the different consequences for the EU according to the language policy it would adopt (all-English, trio EN-FR-DE or Esperanto). And what emerged from this is that the scenario of using a single national language (in this case English, but it would be the same with another) is the worst case scenario of the three: The one that generates the most expenses for less profit and is the most unfair to non-native speakers. I put these excerpts because the proposal suggested that the EU would save money if it switched to all-English, whereas in reality it is the opposite.
Of course, learning a foreign language is also interested in another culture, but that’s not the question here. People against all-English do not hate this language, but they know that all-English across Europe has consequences that go far beyond the mere cultural interest: — very large money gains for English-speaking countries; — less access to information for people of lower social class, who are less likely to speak English at a sufficient level. How can they access information about the EU, when most of its websites are only available in English? — and for people who master English: Faster dissemination of works, productions and ideas from outside the EU. But the two most influential English-speaking countries are the UK, which is becoming more and more Eurosceptic and the EU which has always taken good care to keep the EU in a position of dependence...
Thank you for the source! I need to read up on it but so far, I feel that this evaluation very much depends on whether you conduct it with a European perspective of with a global perspective. I consider it dangerous to think of Europe 'out off context'- we don't exist alone in this world and as it is, we are already becoming overall less and less relevant.
2005 is also well pre-Brexit.....and the world has changed dramatically since then. I personally put a very high value on a 'common language', whatever that might be. Medical records (I'm a medic by training....) are comprehensible worldwide thanks to their Latin nomenclature, this keeps patients safe every day. However, scientific and medical updates today are in English, whether you like it or not (and I built an entire European patient network to help Melanoma patients with THAT). So I think the answer will never be an all-or-nothing-response. It's not English OR our own languages. It has to be 'the best of both worlds'.
2005 Indeed, it begins to date and the Brexit has taken place; But linguistically speaking, not really... It cannot be said that there has been much progress in this area; On the contrary, now many European leaders are pushing for Anglophone unilingualism in the EU because, as the UK left English would be more “neutral”... Of course you should not eliminate English from the landscape, because as you say there are areas where this is not possible anyway; And even if for some reason the importance of English was to decrease internationally, with 400M native speakers that would still remain an important language. But precisely; English does not need to be overvalued in the EU, given that this language has the support of the rest of the world? Reducing the monopoly position it occupies would be just justice for other languages (especially the smaller ones), and would make sense to the EU motto, “united in diversity”
I agree with you, English by the number of natives is a “big” language. Today, however, its development is mainly financed by countries that pay for its teaching and use. The European Union is therefore one of the first contributors to the development of English. This is a pity because today the “small” EU languages are taught very little and beyond symbolic actions, such as the year 2019, the international year of indigenous languages decided by the UN, very little is done to promote the development of these languages. In order to promote the use of the languages of the European Union, they should be promoted and offered for teaching.
Esperanto in medicine.. It exists since the origins of the language since Zamenhof was a doctor of medicine specialising in ophthalmology: “Medicine sans frontières”: Http://www.ipernity.com/blog/32119/90111?t=99197&c=1&s=edit
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