Re: Why Americans feel no compulsion to learn foreign languages

[mike@fionn.lbl.gov (Michael Helm)]

On Mar 27,  3:13am, Timothy C. May wrote:
> Americans are typically thousands of miles away from those speaking
> Japanese, Mandarin, Tagalog, Polish, Italian, Dutch, Spanish, Hindi,
> Talegu, and the hundreds of other languages. It is not at all clear what
> language Americans should pick as a "second language" to study.

I don't really disagree with the conclusions drawn by this poster, or
with the quasi-economics argument he makes.  However, I must say that
the above is completely wrong.  MOST Americans live in large urban
areas, & as such are within seconds/footsteps of people whose native
languages are not English (or who don't have a single "native language",
but several!).  There are probably _hundreds_ of languages spoken in the
San Francisco Bay Area.  The school districts here routinely report double
digit languages in the school age population.

There are 3 Spanish language channels (& another 2 ... "multiple
choice") on my tv cable system.  That anglophones choose to tune them
out, or to not even notice the Noah's ark around them, says something
about this culture.