Newsgroups: soc.culture.german,soc.culture.french,alt.politics.ec,soc.culture.europe,sci.lang
From: philip@storcomp.demon.co.uk (Phil Hunt)
Path: cantaloupe.srv.cs.cmu.edu!das-news2.harvard.edu!news2.near.net!news.mathworks.com!uunet!cs.utexas.edu!news.sprintlink.net!peernews.demon.co.uk!storcomp.demon.co.uk!philip
Subject: Re: talk & travel
Distribution: world
References: <elnaD3oBsD.IE7@netcom.com> <BLUME.95Feb8200539@atomic.cs.princeton.edu> <3hmv97$h6g@fido.asd.sgi.com> <3hnqn0$q1a@cosmos.imag.fr>
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Date: Tue, 14 Feb 1995 18:01:58 +0000
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In article <3hnqn0$q1a@cosmos.imag.fr> Alain.Fagot@imag.fr "Alain FAGOT" writes:
> |> For what it's worth, the Econmist published some numbers the other
> |> day on second-language learning in the EC.   The numbers of people
> |> studying English in school as a second language was:
> |> 
> |> Holland    96%
> |> Germany    93%
> |> Denmark    92%
> |> Spain      92 %
> |> France     84%
> |> Belgium    68% (Flemish areas, 68% in French areas)
> |> Italy      61%
> |> Portugal   55%
> |> 
> |> This says nothing about the merits of English per se.   It simply
> |> says that when left a free choice, this is what European people
> 
>         En France, la libert est trs restreinte.  Les deux langues
> proposes comme premires langues trangres sont l'allemand et l'anglais.
> Seulement, il n'y pas toujours assez de place dans les classes avec
> allemand premire langue alors les moins bons lves sont "redirigs" vers
> des classes d'anglais.  Je n'appelle pas cela un libre choix.

There is no free choice for the student forced to learn English. There is
free choice for the government who decide language policy. I think the
previous poster's point was that countries are deciding to teach 
English to lots of children so it is becomimng a de facto 2nd language.

>         D'autant moins, qu'il est trs difficile de convaincre les
> directions des tablissements qu'un lve ayant appris l'allemand comme
> premire langue souhaite apprendre l'espagnol ou l'italien comme seconde
> langue.  Cela "perturbe" leur grille de cours.  Libre choix des peuples
> europens, je ris :-)).

People should be allowed to study what they want (within reason), because
people learn better when they want to do something.
 
> |> and countries do.    It's also not "linguistic imperialism"; each
> |> of these countries can decide for itself what it teaches.
> 
>         Bien sr, c'est l'tat qui dcide mais pas les gens.  Essayez donc
> de faire suivre  votre enfant comme cours d'initiation aux langues
> trangres en cycle lmentaire, une autre langue que l'anglais.  Et
> pourtant cette initiation est obligatoire.  Ce n'est pas de l'imprialisme
> peut-tre ?

It is not imperialism, because it is the French govmt deciding what France
should do. It is not as if the British are forcing the French to learn
English.

-- 
Phil Hunt...philip@storcomp.demon.co.uk
Majority rule for Britain!
