to think learning a language

[Aribura]

is not "pointless" or a "waste of time" even though apparently, everyone in the universe speaks English? (!)

Since when did learning anything become a waste of time? Much less something that allows you to understand another world of literature, music, film, culture, people...even tiny languages have that. Can we not enjoy learning for fun anymore? We're so "busy" watching Eastenders and scratching our bums that anything we bother to learn has to be worldly "useful" by everyone's standards? It's just sad...

Learning Swedish is definately pointless and a waste of my time. I spend hours upon hours learning it. The I know it. Then I go to sleep. Then I wake up in the morning and everything I learnt has leaked out of my ear and is in a puddle on my pillow. See. Pointless.

YANBU at all. I find English useful (!) but often worry that I should know a European language too. Trying to get 3 inside my 22mo DS as we speak them at home. And he is finally starting to speak two. But I would encourage him to learn yet another one when he is older.
Developing languages uses logic and rational application in your brain and thus enhances parts of the brain to work harder. It's challenging, annoying and hard work. My sympathies to the Turkish learner! It's easier to get Turkish if you know Persian

Definitely not BU op.
About the title of the thread - bah!
'wasting' time on a thread, on MN is exactly why I come here to MN when I have a few moments on free time. I get useful advice, but also interesting reading. So I find it strange when people complain.

Being trilingual I could not agree with you more.

Visiting certain EU countries makes you realise that in the UK we are very disadvantaged. Knowing 2 languages is nothing as they know 3 languages by the time they are in secondary school.

YANBU. I did a degree in modern languages. The other day my boss kindly used it as an example of completely useless degrees that you'd never expect people to have done. I replied that everyone I know seems to think that until they go on holiday with me.

I'm with Cote on Italian grammar not being an imponderable nightmare. Try learning a nice language where the nouns decline, like Polish, or Romanian, where you have to put feminine nouns into the plural before they can be made genitive (or something like that), then criticise Italian grammar.

Wszystkiego dobrego with the Polish, MsAverage.

I work with someone who has a 1st class honours degree in French from a RG university. Her spoken and written French is really atrocious - not just her accent, but her grammar is utterly appalling. And she spent a year of her degree in France, at university, so I would have hoped for a reasonable degree (ho ho) of fluency.

Mmm, not sure. Did a single European language degree, which isn't particularly helpful unless I'm in that country, or one it may have colonised at some point, but this particular country doesn't have a brilliant history when it comes to occupying other countries. Plus, I spent most of my time on my year abroad trying to get people to stop speaking English to me.

Learning another language was useful insofar as teaching me more about grammar in general. My English definitely improved.

Good English gets you a long way.

YANBU. Of course it's not a waste of time.

I have a degree in German and French and after I graduated I moved abroad to work in an international office where I needed to use 2 languages all day every day for years, so it definitely wasn't a waste of time for me. I'm glad that my language skills helped open up wider possibilities for me and made it really easy to settle into a country I love (back in the UK now though).

Rubyhorse, gobsmacked at your rude boss!

Ok ok - so maybe Italian grammar isn't that hard but I've never tried learning Polish or Romanian or Latvian or Swahili! I bow to your obviously superior knowledge!

rubyhorse I hope that is not how most people feel. My DD is reading Spanish and Latin American studies. She did French and Spanish 'A' levels. In the first year of her degree she learns Portuguese to 'A' level standard. She didn't have to learn another language and needed permission to change her timetable. She could have just done some easy literary module but fought to change. I hope it pays off for her...............

Scholes, are you talking about German? I agree that learning languages is never a waste of time. However, some are more useful than others. Trying to get Germans to allow you to speak their language is a real battle, they always want to practise English if possible. Whereas having French was always a bonus as I generally found French people keener to speak French in France. Same in Spain, especially with older generation. Japanese is essential if travelling over there or you won't have a clue what is going on. Generalisations, sorry. Languages are certainly very useful to me, they allow me to understand what people are saying when I travel and I love being able to communicate with everyone. Having a languages background also makes programming easier to pick up, in my experience anyway.

Have a degree in 3 separate languages does not have seemed to increase my earning power in the current economic climate! As a PA/Secretary I can pull in £21k as a bilingual PA/Secretary in the same city for an international company the most I've seen is £18k... So I didn't use my languages, because I wanted to earn more!!

Harbinger - I really wish I could have spoken a little Portuguese when I went to Rio. The vast majority of people I was dealing with spoke very little English and it was a real struggle when my interpreter wasn't with me.

OP - YANBU at all...

Butkin Portuguese is quite different from Spanish. Mainland Portuguese is very different to Brazilian. Listening to the differences helps them learn. My DDs 'A' level conversation person was Columbian Spanish. Then she lived in Sevilla in a gap year.

wot is MLF?

MLF is whatever you want it to mean.....:o
MFL is Modern Foreign Language.

HTH

The problem is, by the time most British children start to learn a second language at the age of 11, it's too late. Interest has waned, and the part of the brain that's needed to grasp grammar has "closed up".

I live and work in China, and even though Mandarin is the most widely spoken language in the world, kids start to learn English here as soon as they start pre-school. The same goes for the European countries where language skills are strong, I would imagine.

In England we are lazy because "everyone speaks English" around the world, and a lot of those people speak it fluently. It's too late for most people in England. Learning "a bit of French" at the age of 32 is only useful for personal fulfilment or to use on holiday. For it to benefit at work, you'll need a lot more than "deux cafes, s'il vous plait".

CaoNiMa to some extent I agree with you BUT I studied French for 5 years at school and could barely string a sentence together. I motivated myself to learn German when I was 25 and reached a very good level of fluency within a year. What does this prove? I had the potential but not the motivation when in school and still have the potential to learn now.

Problem with leaarning langauges as an English mother tongue person, esp british in particular (cos i can only speak with the experience of a british person having gone through british schools) are 3 fold

1. The 'everyone speak english anyway' attitidu.
2. The standard and quality of language teaching is shockingly low.
3. Fact is that as an english person, there are so many language to choose from. In many countries it's a given that learning english is seen as extremely important and it's the first langauge taught ( as pointed out, often from a young age, the the motivation is usually high).

But for english speaker, what do you chose -

French, due to proximity, or German, strong economy, or spanish, widely spoken, or mandarin - chinese emerging global economic super power etc etc etc.

I learnt 4 mfl to varying levels. I was on holiday in spain, in a lift, had to speak to the man in the lift in english. He has a go at me, what is it with you arrogant english, never learning language yourself blah blah. I point out my 4 languages, just doesn't happen to include his. For 'foreigners' there is one obvious choice, for brits there isn't.

Kids in other countries speak english so much better, imo cos they start earlier, it is considered important, so the motivation is high, and the teahing is demanding and with high expectations, the the kids rise to it. In one school year in may countries the kids are alread at GCSE standard.

Never a waste of time! I grew up abroad, so languages was a very important subject at school. I speak 4 fluently and 1 to conversational level, and did a language degree in UK, which got me my very enjoyable job. But they are not just good for work. Learning languages "stretches" your brain in a way that no other subject does. Once you speak a language well enough, you always find out fascinating facts about that culture. Holidays in those countries become more interesting, and overall, it changes your attitude to life. I am bringing DS bilingual and I think it is the best decision I ever made.

I dont want to divert from the main conversation in this thread. But I feel that multi lingual DS struggles to make himself understood at nursery as he speaks a language other than English. I wonder at times if teaching him the English word for everything is a better idea. I hope that he will figure all 3 languages and then be able to use the right one when needed (depending on what the other person is speaking) does that happen? Or am I expecting a confused and frustrated 2 year old?

MaMattoo your ds has the languages separated out in his brain, he isn't muddling them but what takes time is his understanding that not everyone speaks all the languages he does :) So at the moment he is reaching for the best word to describe what he wants regardless of language. Don't worry, he will soon start speaking English to English speakers and the same with his other languages. I still sometimes get a block and reach for a French word even though I've not spoken it with any regularity since I was 18!

I think languages are great, they open the world up and give you a far better understanding of different cultures. Language degrees are a bit of a waste though unless you want to work as a teacher, translator or academic. For anything else what people want is someone with, for example, a maths degree who happens to speak a language too. Dh did French and German and works in project management, he doesn't use languages because what people want is the experience PM not the language. He hope his languages will give him advantage once he has built up more experience. I did Spanish and Russian and grew up speaking French but there are no jobs I could do around here that would pay enough to cover childcare.

YANBU.

Though I think often the: "learning languages is a waste of time" attitude is often more of a defence than an attack. Languages do seem to be one of those things some find far easier than others, and if you find languages hard and know you will never be any good at them, it's comforting to reassure yourself that much of the world speaks English at a basic level and you can get by without it.