Bilingualism is it good? Or is it bad?

[Guest Soiboist]

I'd like to tackle the problem from another perspective, because what's always bothered me was how easy it is for Spanish, German, Italian people to learn each of these languages. I mean they're so similar, so I don't think that being able for example for a spanish person to speak English widens their horizons much. I'm saying this to draw your attention that not bilingualism itself is valuable but also what kind of languages you can speak. For example my native language is Polish and when I listen to Russian even though I don't speak it I understand most of it, therefore I don't see much value in learning Russian. But English or French which are COMPLETELY different gave me kind of new way of thinking, describing things and so on. I know that it sounds a lot like TOK reflexion but this is basically what I'm trying to say .

This is so true. I am learning French and to me it basically feels like learning another way of speaking English, if ignoring their funny accent. I cannot recall for that I have ever whilst learning French experienced that I have achieved a new way of thinking as you described.

[olga]

I think there is some trurh in that statement that you get less fluent in your native language when you get to know and use the other one more... I mean i was not naturally bilingual, both my parents are Polish, but since childhood I was learning English, and the full transition into bilingual zone took place in IB DP.. I somehow feel like right now i don't speak ANY language, my Polish deteriorated. And I have always been good in Polish, known the vocab that is not commonly used and now... I have forgotten all those.

[ninety]

In Hong Kong we have English and Chinese as the official languages, though usually only the more privileged/those who come from top schools speak English at a decent, conversational level.

I myself find that multilingualism is a great thing. In fact, I can speak four languages: my mother tongues, which I consider to be English and Chinese (Cantonese), Spanish, which I've been learning since Year 7, and Japanese, which I learnt through my interest in Japanese culture. And if you consider Mandarin to be separate from Cantonese, I actually speak five languages.

Of course there'll be some loss of culture for those who are bilingual, but tend to speak more in one language over the other. Although I'm ethically Chinese, sometimes even I can't totally relate to my friends who speak only Chinese. But I think that the ability to speak a second language just opens you to so much more in this world. It's certainly been my experience, anyway, on the internet. For example, when I'm using Google, I start off by searching in English. If I can't find the results I'm looking for, I'll try again in a different language. More often than not, by using this method I'm able to find what I need.

Another benefit is that I'm now able to guess the meaning of sentences in Italian and Portuguese, because of the similarity of the Romantic languages.

Also, there are many concepts that are exclusive to one language. For example, there's 'saudade' in Portuguese, which roughly means 'a sense of longing' (not that I can speak Portuguese). When you grasp a new language and you begin to understand the culture, all these new concepts appear. Initially, you can't relate to them, but over time they grow onto you. When I first started learning Japanese, I found the whole hierarchy of respect in Japanese society quite difficult to understand, but now I'm pretty happy with it. It almost seems natural to me, in a way.

The only thing that annoys me about being multilingual is that sometimes when I want to say something in a particular language, the relevant vocab comes up in another language and I'm momentarily lost for words... Sometimes the listener also speaks that language and it's okay, but other times when he/she doesn't I end up stuttering a bit... Though these days I find that this isn't such a big problem in conversations, but when I'm writing essays. I end up staring at my piece of paper/the computer screen, trying to articulate that one word

Argh, sorry for the long ramble!

Edited May 11, 2011 by ninety

[TwoSaints]

How would being bilingual ever be a "bad" thing?! Not only can you communicate with

people in other countries, but it looks great in a resumé or a college app

[ChikkyD]

How would being bilingual ever be a "bad" thing?! Not only can you communicate with

people in other countries, but it looks great in a resumé or a college app

I definitely agree The more languages you know, the better! And once you know more than one language, it's instantly easier to acquire more

[Loeszie.]

I would say bilingualism is good. I have been bilingual (Dutch, which is my actual mothertongue, and English) since I was 8.

My two little cousins are being raised bilingually (English and Dutch) and, if I marry someone who is not Dutch, I'll definitely do the same.

Like Lillian said, being (raised) bilingually makes it much easier to learn other languages at a later stage in life, and it also just very useful because you can talk to so many people :]

[haley.the.great]

I always thought German was from a different linguistic family/root/whatever from French and Spanish.

Also, English and French share a lot of similarities; 70% of the vocabulary, in fact.

Ultimately, good and bad are such subjective terms. If an individual wants to learn 6 languages, and feels that each and every one of them will be good to know, then I suppose it's still ultimately good to the individual. From a national policy perspective, it would vary on a case-by-case basis (Belgium: yes; Canada: maybe not so much.)

Yeah, French and Spanish are both Romance languages (Roman roots) and English and German are Germanic Languages (I'm guessing German root).

The reason English and French and English and Spanish share a lot of similarities is because of Latin, which influenced many languages.

That's what I've been taught; however, my teachers could be wrong so don't quote me on that.

IMO the ability to speak multiple languages is awesome! Not only does it exercise those parts of your brain, but it allows you to communicate with people from all over the world and also serves as a bridge between cultures. Yes, a "loss of culture" is possible when trying to juggle multiple languages, but I believe that is up to the individual to know their limits and decide how important their origin is to them. Ultimately cultural roots are only as important as the individual delegates.

If I marry someone who is bilingual, I plan on learning his language if I don't already know it, and then teaching the kids both languages from birth. If I don't marry a bilingual guy, idk. I might teach the kids the languages I know, but it would be difficult unless the father also knows the language. My goal is to have my children be bilingual when they enter school. Lol it's a little soon to be thinking of that!

Edited June 5, 2011 by haley.the.great

[Guest Ahmed Mazlom]

Bilingual? Yes please. Especially that communication, travel and globalisation are already rapidly progressing...

[An Almost Graduate]

For a completely different angle, imagine a country like Canada, where the majority is being forced to take on the language of the minority. Basically, Quebec is allowed to pass laws that prohibit English signs from being placed in roads, but if English provinces did that, then that would be breaking a constitutional right. Making sure we hire bilingual people to federal government jobs, even when it isn't necessary, costs about $1.6 billion each year. This, however, was done as an attempt to make sure Quebec didn't hate English Canadians. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Trudeau, the Prime Minister who pushed all of this onto us, when terrorists in Quebec committed violent crimes in the name of separating from Canada a few months after bilingualism became law. Also, Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been implimented even though we were told the opposite. English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted.

The Liberal Party (the party of Trudeau) promised in the last election to put $50 million more into language training in Canada.

Stephen Harper (who is bilingual), our current Prime Minister from the Conservative Party, has been critical of bilingualism and said he opposed it because it's a waste of money, but said he was too cowardly to take it on because "enforced national bilingualism in this country has attained the status of a religion; it is a dogma no one can question".

Bilingualism just happens to be a waste of money in a federation like Canada, where the majority of provinces have over 99% of their populations able to speak English. The only agencies that should be bilingual are provincial New Brunswick and Quebec ones. Ironically, despite having a large population of English speakers who cannot speak French, Quebec provincial agencies do NOT have to have to hire English speakers.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

Edited June 21, 2011 by An Almost Graduate

[Proletariat]

For a completely different angle, imagine a country like Canada, where the majority is being forced to take on the language of the minority. Basically, Quebec is allowed to pass laws that prohibit English signs from being placed in roads, but if English provinces did that, then that would be breaking a constitutional right. Making sure we hire bilingual people to federal government jobs, even when it isn't necessary, costs about $1.6 billion each year. This, however, was done as an attempt to make sure Quebec didn't hate English Canadians. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Trudeau, the Prime Minister who pushed all of this onto us, when terrorists in Quebec committed violent crimes in the name of separating from Canada a few months after bilingualism became law. Also, Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been implimented even though we were told the opposite. English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted.

The Liberal Party (the party of Trudeau) promised in the last election to put $50 million more into language training in Canada.

Stephen Harper (who is bilingual), our current Prime Minister from the Conservative Party, has been critical of bilingualism and said he opposed it because it's a waste of money, but said he was too cowardly to take it on because "enforced national bilingualism in this country has attained the status of a religion; it is a dogma no one can question".

Bilingualism just happens to be a waste of money in a federation like Canada, where the majority of provinces have over 99% of their populations able to speak English. The only agencies that should be bilingual are provincial New Brunswick and Quebec ones. Ironically, despite having a large population of English speakers who cannot speak French, Quebec provincial agencies do NOT have to have to hire English speakers.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

Some fact checking for you:

The last time terrorism was committed in the name of Quebec sovereignty was in 1970 with the October crisis of the FLQ. Bilingualism became law in 1982 (constitutional law, I may add.) You're kinda getting your historical sequencing a little bit wrong there, by a decade or two.

Also, "Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been [implemented]" is arguably incorrect. You would have to define what you mean by "hatred", which is really quite a sensationalist term to use, and if it's grown "significantly", then why hasn't Quebec separated yet? 1995 was close, but it was defeated, n'est pas? And following Harper's definition of Quebec's nationhood in 2006 separatism tendencies have consistently been at the losing side of the 60/40 breakdown.

"English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted." -> Want to provide some statistics to support this contention?

Plus what does Harper's bilingualism have to do with anything? No one can become a PM without being bilingual in our political climate, and Harper has the worst French ability out of all five leaders of the national parties, worst than the Green's Elizabeth May. Also, I'd like to know where you pulled that alleged Harper quote, because there's a difference between what a man says when he's running a far-right think tank, and what he says when he's running a country.

Having lived in Quebec, I have to say that I'm not the biggest fans of populist Quebecois culture. It's fundamentally different from English Canada's, and I harbour no real love for Quebec. But your post is so out of touch with mainstream Canadian sentiments (as well as factual evidence in many cases) that even I find myself in disagreement with your post.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

You know, that is EXACTLY the antithesis of what Canada is. In fact, that's the antithesis of what modern democracy is.

[Classof2013]

I think it is great, but only if your 1st language is not hurt because of it. I know many french immersion kids who have very poor english grammer and spelling because of the french.

[An Almost Graduate]

For a completely different angle, imagine a country like Canada, where the majority is being forced to take on the language of the minority. Basically, Quebec is allowed to pass laws that prohibit English signs from being placed in roads, but if English provinces did that, then that would be breaking a constitutional right. Making sure we hire bilingual people to federal government jobs, even when it isn't necessary, costs about $1.6 billion each year. This, however, was done as an attempt to make sure Quebec didn't hate English Canadians. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Trudeau, the Prime Minister who pushed all of this onto us, when terrorists in Quebec committed violent crimes in the name of separating from Canada a few months after bilingualism became law. Also, Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been implimented even though we were told the opposite. English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted.

The Liberal Party (the party of Trudeau) promised in the last election to put $50 million more into language training in Canada.

Stephen Harper (who is bilingual), our current Prime Minister from the Conservative Party, has been critical of bilingualism and said he opposed it because it's a waste of money, but said he was too cowardly to take it on because "enforced national bilingualism in this country has attained the status of a religion; it is a dogma no one can question".

Bilingualism just happens to be a waste of money in a federation like Canada, where the majority of provinces have over 99% of their populations able to speak English. The only agencies that should be bilingual are provincial New Brunswick and Quebec ones. Ironically, despite having a large population of English speakers who cannot speak French, Quebec provincial agencies do NOT have to have to hire English speakers.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

Some fact checking for you:

The last time terrorism was committed in the name of Quebec sovereignty was in 1970 with the October crisis of the FLQ. Bilingualism became law in 1982 (constitutional law, I may add.) You're kinda getting your historical sequencing a little bit wrong there, by a decade or two.

Also, "Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been [implemented]" is arguably incorrect. You would have to define what you mean by "hatred", which is really quite a sensationalist term to use, and if it's grown "significantly", then why hasn't Quebec separated yet? 1995 was close, but it was defeated, n'est pas? And following Harper's definition of Quebec's nationhood in 2006 separatism tendencies have consistently been at the losing side of the 60/40 breakdown.

"English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted." -> Want to provide some statistics to support this contention?

Plus what does Harper's bilingualism have to do with anything? No one can become a PM without being bilingual in our political climate, and Harper has the worst French ability out of all five leaders of the national parties, worst than the Green's Elizabeth May. Also, I'd like to know where you pulled that alleged Harper quote, because there's a difference between what a man says when he's running a far-right think tank, and what he says when he's running a country.

Having lived in Quebec, I have to say that I'm not the biggest fans of populist Quebecois culture. It's fundamentally different from English Canada's, and I harbour no real love for Quebec. But your post is so out of touch with mainstream Canadian sentiments (as well as factual evidence in many cases) that even I find myself in disagreement with your post.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

You know, that is EXACTLY the antithesis of what Canada is. In fact, that's the antithesis of what modern democracy is.

You're right on the constitutional part, but the Official Languages Act was passed in 1969. So, no, when I did my French IA on this, I know what I'm talking about.

How would you provide stats on English people hating Quebec? Those polls aren't conducted. But I think that when the federal Progressive Conservatives basically split into two parties with the Western half actively criticizing Meech Lake for giving special status to Quebec, you can certainly argue that English disdain for the French has grown.

And no, Canada is about freedom. It is not about forcing English people to learn a language they don't want to. I'm just using Harper as an example of how you can be bilingual and not support mandated bilingualism. I'm bilingual and I certainly don't support it.

Actually isn't the antithesis of modern democracy giving more rights to a minority over a majority? I always thought democracy was about MAJORITY RULES.

Do you honestly not see a problem with federal offices in my town, which might have...zero people...who don't speak English being obligated to serve people proficiently in French?

[Proletariat]

For a completely different angle, imagine a country like Canada, where the majority is being forced to take on the language of the minority. Basically, Quebec is allowed to pass laws that prohibit English signs from being placed in roads, but if English provinces did that, then that would be breaking a constitutional right. Making sure we hire bilingual people to federal government jobs, even when it isn't necessary, costs about $1.6 billion each year. This, however, was done as an attempt to make sure Quebec didn't hate English Canadians. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Trudeau, the Prime Minister who pushed all of this onto us, when terrorists in Quebec committed violent crimes in the name of separating from Canada a few months after bilingualism became law. Also, Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been implimented even though we were told the opposite. English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted.

The Liberal Party (the party of Trudeau) promised in the last election to put $50 million more into language training in Canada.

Stephen Harper (who is bilingual), our current Prime Minister from the Conservative Party, has been critical of bilingualism and said he opposed it because it's a waste of money, but said he was too cowardly to take it on because "enforced national bilingualism in this country has attained the status of a religion; it is a dogma no one can question".

Bilingualism just happens to be a waste of money in a federation like Canada, where the majority of provinces have over 99% of their populations able to speak English. The only agencies that should be bilingual are provincial New Brunswick and Quebec ones. Ironically, despite having a large population of English speakers who cannot speak French, Quebec provincial agencies do NOT have to have to hire English speakers.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

Some fact checking for you:

The last time terrorism was committed in the name of Quebec sovereignty was in 1970 with the October crisis of the FLQ. Bilingualism became law in 1982 (constitutional law, I may add.) You're kinda getting your historical sequencing a little bit wrong there, by a decade or two.

Also, "Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been [implemented]" is arguably incorrect. You would have to define what you mean by "hatred", which is really quite a sensationalist term to use, and if it's grown "significantly", then why hasn't Quebec separated yet? 1995 was close, but it was defeated, n'est pas? And following Harper's definition of Quebec's nationhood in 2006 separatism tendencies have consistently been at the losing side of the 60/40 breakdown.

"English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted." -> Want to provide some statistics to support this contention?

Plus what does Harper's bilingualism have to do with anything? No one can become a PM without being bilingual in our political climate, and Harper has the worst French ability out of all five leaders of the national parties, worst than the Green's Elizabeth May. Also, I'd like to know where you pulled that alleged Harper quote, because there's a difference between what a man says when he's running a far-right think tank, and what he says when he's running a country.

Having lived in Quebec, I have to say that I'm not the biggest fans of populist Quebecois culture. It's fundamentally different from English Canada's, and I harbour no real love for Quebec. But your post is so out of touch with mainstream Canadian sentiments (as well as factual evidence in many cases) that even I find myself in disagreement with your post.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

You know, that is EXACTLY the antithesis of what Canada is. In fact, that's the antithesis of what modern democracy is.

You're right on the constitutional part, but the Official Languages Act was passed in 1969. So, no, when I did my French IA on this, I know what I'm talking about.

How would you provide stats on English people hating Quebec? Those polls aren't conducted. But I think that when the federal Progressive Conservatives basically split into two parties with the Western half actively criticizing Meech Lake for giving special status to Quebec, you can certainly argue that English disdain for the French has grown.

And no, Canada is about freedom. It is not about forcing English people to learn a language they don't want to. I'm just using Harper as an example of how you can be bilingual and not support mandated bilingualism. I'm bilingual and I certainly don't support it.

Actually isn't the antithesis of modern democracy giving more rights to a minority over a majority? I always thought democracy was about MAJORITY RULES.

Do you honestly not see a problem with federal offices in my town, which might have...zero people...who don't speak English being obligated to serve people proficiently in French?

There's a different between "hatred" and "disdain." Polls are indeed done, but they typically use words like "favourable/not favourable opinion" rather than "hate". If you don't have a poll to back such strong assertions, then don't use inflammatory language.

No one is "forcing" anyone to learn a language. If you can't speak French, then don't apply for a federal job. The only situation that would be "forcing... people to learn a language they don't want to" would be if Francophones were forced to speak English to acquire the federal services for which their tax dollars paid.

It's a commonly held oversimplification that democracy is just "majority rules." Democracy is the ultimate egalitarian system, for better or worse, and that means equal participation in political, social and economic matters.

Read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

Then read your previous quote: " it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful."

[mathlete94]

I was born in Turkey, living in the US, speaking English. I am also in the process of learning Spanish. I took 1 year of Latin (didn't learn much). I think multilinguilism in a great thing. When you learn one language, and you already know two anothers, it helps because there are similarities between them. For example, many of my English speaking classmates have trouble with Spanish, whereas I find it much easier to learn because there are similarities between Turkish and Spanish that there are not in English. So my theory is that the more languages you learn, the easier it becomes to learn more.

I also believe it widens your perspective of the world. You can look at an 'ear' of corn, in Spanish and Turkish they call the kernels 'teeth'. Little things like that changed my perspective. I can walk down the street and understand (somewhat) what non-english speaking people are saying. It truly does bring you to a totally different world. Instead of losing culture, you enhance it.

[Guest PoisonousPumpkin]

Completely in favour of bilingualism since it opens you the door to new cultures as long as it doesn't damage your first language. I speak english, spanish and German but sometimes it is very difficult for me to correlate spanish with german since I confuse some terms even though they're completely different languages. My english has been intact as far as I know

[An Almost Graduate]

For a completely different angle, imagine a country like Canada, where the majority is being forced to take on the language of the minority. Basically, Quebec is allowed to pass laws that prohibit English signs from being placed in roads, but if English provinces did that, then that would be breaking a constitutional right. Making sure we hire bilingual people to federal government jobs, even when it isn't necessary, costs about $1.6 billion each year. This, however, was done as an attempt to make sure Quebec didn't hate English Canadians. Therefore, it came as a surprise to Trudeau, the Prime Minister who pushed all of this onto us, when terrorists in Quebec committed violent crimes in the name of separating from Canada a few months after bilingualism became law. Also, Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been implimented even though we were told the opposite. English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted.

The Liberal Party (the party of Trudeau) promised in the last election to put $50 million more into language training in Canada.

Stephen Harper (who is bilingual), our current Prime Minister from the Conservative Party, has been critical of bilingualism and said he opposed it because it's a waste of money, but said he was too cowardly to take it on because "enforced national bilingualism in this country has attained the status of a religion; it is a dogma no one can question".

Bilingualism just happens to be a waste of money in a federation like Canada, where the majority of provinces have over 99% of their populations able to speak English. The only agencies that should be bilingual are provincial New Brunswick and Quebec ones. Ironically, despite having a large population of English speakers who cannot speak French, Quebec provincial agencies do NOT have to have to hire English speakers.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

Some fact checking for you:

The last time terrorism was committed in the name of Quebec sovereignty was in 1970 with the October crisis of the FLQ. Bilingualism became law in 1982 (constitutional law, I may add.) You're kinda getting your historical sequencing a little bit wrong there, by a decade or two.

Also, "Quebec's hatred for English Canada has grown significantly since this policy has been [implemented]" is arguably incorrect. You would have to define what you mean by "hatred", which is really quite a sensationalist term to use, and if it's grown "significantly", then why hasn't Quebec separated yet? 1995 was close, but it was defeated, n'est pas? And following Harper's definition of Quebec's nationhood in 2006 separatism tendencies have consistently been at the losing side of the 60/40 breakdown.

"English Canadians hatred for Quebec has grown significantly, which is logical, because their money is being wasted." -> Want to provide some statistics to support this contention?

Plus what does Harper's bilingualism have to do with anything? No one can become a PM without being bilingual in our political climate, and Harper has the worst French ability out of all five leaders of the national parties, worst than the Green's Elizabeth May. Also, I'd like to know where you pulled that alleged Harper quote, because there's a difference between what a man says when he's running a far-right think tank, and what he says when he's running a country.

Having lived in Quebec, I have to say that I'm not the biggest fans of populist Quebecois culture. It's fundamentally different from English Canada's, and I harbour no real love for Quebec. But your post is so out of touch with mainstream Canadian sentiments (as well as factual evidence in many cases) that even I find myself in disagreement with your post.

Basically bilingualism in Canada has been a one-way door where the French are demanding of the English because they are the minority and we're supposed to pity them. Funny, it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful.

You know, that is EXACTLY the antithesis of what Canada is. In fact, that's the antithesis of what modern democracy is.

You're right on the constitutional part, but the Official Languages Act was passed in 1969. So, no, when I did my French IA on this, I know what I'm talking about.

How would you provide stats on English people hating Quebec? Those polls aren't conducted. But I think that when the federal Progressive Conservatives basically split into two parties with the Western half actively criticizing Meech Lake for giving special status to Quebec, you can certainly argue that English disdain for the French has grown.

And no, Canada is about freedom. It is not about forcing English people to learn a language they don't want to. I'm just using Harper as an example of how you can be bilingual and not support mandated bilingualism. I'm bilingual and I certainly don't support it.

Actually isn't the antithesis of modern democracy giving more rights to a minority over a majority? I always thought democracy was about MAJORITY RULES.

Do you honestly not see a problem with federal offices in my town, which might have...zero people...who don't speak English being obligated to serve people proficiently in French?

There's a different between "hatred" and "disdain." Polls are indeed done, but they typically use words like "favourable/not favourable opinion" rather than "hate". If you don't have a poll to back such strong assertions, then don't use inflammatory language.

No one is "forcing" anyone to learn a language. If you can't speak French, then don't apply for a federal job. The only situation that would be "forcing... people to learn a language they don't want to" would be if Francophones were forced to speak English to acquire the federal services for which their tax dollars paid.

It's a commonly held oversimplification that democracy is just "majority rules." Democracy is the ultimate egalitarian system, for better or worse, and that means equal participation in political, social and economic matters.

Read this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tyranny_of_the_majority

Then read your previous quote: " it should be the English being demanding of the French because we are the majority and we're more powerful."

SEMANTICS!?! Really? I did enough of that for IB English, which is the certainly most employable subject in the world...

People aren't forced to learn French? In every province, French is a mandatory subject in the public school system. You fail French and you fail the year. In Quebec, English isn't a mandatory subject in French schools. Somehow this strikes me as Quebec forcing the majority to do something...oh that's right, because it IS the majority forcing the minority to do something. You would think since English was the majority, Quebecers would have to learn it as a second language. Suggesting that makes you worse than Hitler though because they have to protect their heritage. Too bad you can't put heritage on a balance sheet and even if you could, it wouldn't go against the $1.6 billion spent each year in any significant way. You know, running a country isn't a joke. $1.6 billion could be spent on health care to you know, save people's lives, not thrown away casually in a way that doesn't even employ more people.

Sorry it's just that I'm complaining about something practical and you're complaining about semantics...I can't go on. This is too Orwellian for me to comprehend. My head is exploding. It seems Harper was right when he said that Official Bilingualism has become a religion in this country.

[Proletariat]

Yes, the world would be so lovely if everything was "I love" or "I hate" wouldn't it? All black and white.

Unfortunately, there's this thing called colour.

I don't think the English language is your only shortcoming however. Spending 3min on Google search, out of BC, Alberta, Saskatchewan, Ontario and Nova Scotia, Ontario is the only province that requires any kind of French as part of a high school diploma (and that's at 1 credit.) So I'm not sure where you'd get "in every province" from, but Ontario does have a tendency to think it speaks for all of Canada. Having established that now, I'd wonder what is the percentage of Quebec students who take the optional English versus the percentage of Albertan students who take the optional French? As someone who's lived in la Belle Province, I can tell you that almost everyone speaks English, and almost everyone speaks at a level better than my French as a Second Language equivalent.

But hey, I'm sorry that debate is all "semantics" for you. And I was just thinking how much clearer you sounded recently versus your initial posts. Here, let me hand you a paper and crayons; maybe you can draw out your anger for us.

Suggesting that makes you worse than Hitler

Angsty teens: making Godwin's Law relevant into the 21st century =/

http://en.wikipedia..../Godwin%27s_law

Edited June 23, 2011 by Proletariat

[Babydolleyes]

I have felt the same before. Some times I was telling myself I'm undergoing an identity crisis cuz I've got a triple nationality, Swedish, French and English and I sometimes saw this as an uggly trait because I wanted to be of just one nationality.

In my opinion it's great to be bilangual because you have two or more cultures and some times are more open to new cultural aspects. And as you said, if your away from your initial home country there is the chance it might go slightly dow hill if you don't practice it, but you could always go back there and live for a few years.

BTW who else has got a triple-nationality or kinda?

I'm a proud member of triple-nationality as well! English-Icelandic-Danish. Born in Iceland, grew up in England, (Spain) and Denmark. I'm almost 4 nationalities. I have never ever envied those of one nationality. When I was little I used to always feel sorry for my friends - Their life seemed so dreary and boring in comparison to mine; they rarely traveled and when they did they were mere tourists on holidays which sounded very dull to me at the time. Plus they had usually been in the same school and in the same house their whole life etc. I travel a lot because of my background and I only really have positive things to say about being bilingual. I'm fluent in all three languages, however I usually dream in English. My parents have always made such a big deal out of being bilingual - It made me feel extremely special when I was younger. I still feel that nostalgic pride today

[Babydolleyes]

In Hong Kong we have English and Chinese as the official languages, though usually only the more privileged/those who come from top schools speak English at a decent, conversational level.

I myself find that multilingualism is a great thing. In fact, I can speak four languages: my mother tongues, which I consider to be English and Chinese (Cantonese), Spanish, which I've been learning since Year 7, and Japanese, which I learnt through my interest in Japanese culture. And if you consider Mandarin to be separate from Cantonese, I actually speak five languages.

Of course there'll be some loss of culture for those who are bilingual, but tend to speak more in one language over the other. Although I'm ethically Chinese, sometimes even I can't totally relate to my friends who speak only Chinese. But I think that the ability to speak a second language just opens you to so much more in this world. It's certainly been my experience, anyway, on the internet. For example, when I'm using Google, I start off by searching in English. If I can't find the results I'm looking for, I'll try again in a different language. More often than not, by using this method I'm able to find what I need.

Another benefit is that I'm now able to guess the meaning of sentences in Italian and Portuguese, because of the similarity of the Romantic languages.

Also, there are many concepts that are exclusive to one language. For example, there's 'saudade' in Portuguese, which roughly means 'a sense of longing' (not that I can speak Portuguese). When you grasp a new language and you begin to understand the culture, all these new concepts appear. Initially, you can't relate to them, but over time they grow onto you. When I first started learning Japanese, I found the whole hierarchy of respect in Japanese society quite difficult to understand, but now I'm pretty happy with it. It almost seems natural to me, in a way.

The only thing that annoys me about being multilingual is that sometimes when I want to say something in a particular language, the relevant vocab comes up in another language and I'm momentarily lost for words... Sometimes the listener also speaks that language and it's okay, but other times when he/she doesn't I end up stuttering a bit... Though these days I find that this isn't such a big problem in conversations, but when I'm writing essays. I end up staring at my piece of paper/the computer screen, trying to articulate that one word

Argh, sorry for the long ramble!

Wow! Being bilingual is one thing, especially if you are bilingual in very similar languages (like swedish and danish for example) but WOW you speak English AND Mandarin fluently? Wow that is SUCH a dream. You truly get the best from both worlds. My ultimate dream is to learn Mandarin or Cantonese - However I doubt I will ever achieve a fluent level due to my age. Usually people don't become amazingly fluent in any language 100% unless they learn the languages before the age of 12. Or at least that's what I've heard. Damn, though! I could turn green from envy. Lucky lucky lucky! English and Chinese are most likely the most important languages to understand and speak. I bet you're very rare!! Which language did you learn first?

[Arrowhead]

Bilingualism is an almost-necessary aspect of a globalised economy and world. Speaking more than one language afford people the opportunity to be better connected with the world around them and be able to travel in it with fewer worries. I'm fluent in English, Hindi, and French. Most people (outside of India) count the languages we speak here as dialects, but we (Indians) consider them to be different languages to an extent. If we were to count them, then I guess I'm also fluent in Sindhi, Punjabi, Gujarati, Bengali, and Marathi.

I agree with one of the OPs about romance languages, if you can speak one of them, the others become much easier to understand. I can always infer what a sign in Spanish or Italian intends to mean and find my way around despite not knowing how to speak those languages, because of knowing French and English. There's really no end to the advantages you can gain from knowing more languages.

Arrowhead.