Isabel Johns 05/20/13

Mrs. Hanson
Honors English Pd. 2
Speak the Speech, I Pray You

Hola y bienvenidos a todos! Comment allez-vous? I just greeted you all in Spanish and
French, and if you dont speak any language other than English, you had no clue what I just
said. I dont know about you all, but Im always insanely curious as to what people are saying
when theyre speaking in a different language. If you knew said language, you really wouldnt be
so curious, you would know! That is just one of the many benefits there are in learning another
language.

Speaking English may get you far enough in this world that you can survive, as people
all around the world speak it out of necessity, but it wont help you advance very much. In fact,
as so many people now speak English, its not an advantage anymore- a 2006 report from the
British Council, an international English educational organization found that its a near-universal
basic skill. The same report concluded that because of this, those who only speak English face
a bleak economic future. The British Council estimates that the number of English speakers
around the world will peak at two billion in around a decade, and then decline. Therefore, all
those English speakers who chose not to become bilingual will find themselves falling behind
multilingual speakers.

I understand you completely when you say that learning a foreign language is a difficult
task. Youre just going to have to trust me when I say IT CAN BE DONE, and if you do it, there
are many advantages that you will gain. Economically speaking, Ray Clifford, 2002 chancellor
for the Army's Defense Language Institute, says that If you want to sell products, you have to
speak the language of the customer. Speaking the language of someone who you want to have
business with creates positive feelings, and it shows to them that you made the effort to connect
with them and that you truly value their business, which increases their loyalty to you.
These positive feelings may even transfer to your personal life, because if you begin a
relationship with someone who doesnt speak English primarily, learning to speak in their native
tongue is both impressive and romantic. It certainly doesnt hurt your attractiveness if you speak
a different language either. Even CNN.com agrees: A foreign language can be the best
aphrodisiac.

Aside from the business and love advantages in learning a foreign tongue, there is
another benefit: countries who teach new languages to their students more often and who give it
greater importance enjoy high performances as a whole in literature and mathematics. The Age,
an Australian newspaper, cites an example of this in Finland. All Finnish children study three
languages throughout school, 44% take a fourth language, and 31%, a fifth. Finland is also
consistently the best-performing country in the [Organisation for Economic Co-operation and
Development] in literacy and numeracy. The United States is another member of the OECD,
and unfortunately, Forbes reports that only 18% of Americans report speaking a language other
than English. This reflects a lot onto our school system, our educational performance as a
whole, our economy, and even our culture.

This brings me to my last point: learning another language affects your perception of
other cultures and introduces them in a whole new light. As the Australian newspaper the Age
says, as a society that celebrates cultural diversity, we should realize the value of learning
another language or two to better appreciate and contribute to the colorful world we live in.