Thread: Why We Don't Learn Spanish

Nothing wrong with learning a foreign language but this article came off very condescending to me.

http://www.americanchronicle.com/articl ... cleID=2568

Why We Don't Learn Spanish

By Doug Bower
September 27, 2005
I just bet you had absolutely no idea that the U.S. Senate, on February 17, 2005, declared this the "Year of the Foreign Language Study". You didn't know, did you? Ah ha! I knew it!

It is true.

Yes, this year is the Official Year of Foreign Language Study. And it's about bloody time, I would like to add. In case you are wondering why your elected officials bothered with passing this resolution, on taxpayer's time and money, it is because most of America is afflicted with a dreadful and painful lack of foreign language ability.

This, my foreign-language-illiterate fellow American, is because we have this disorder (and this is true) called, xenoglossophobia, which is the fear of foreign languages. Moreover, in America it is â€â€

How about you imbeciles learn english first before we even consider learning Spanish since your on our land and you came here.

Quote:
At the writing of this article, the Minuteman Project Movement is growing leaps and bounds that will, in my view, cause an even greater U.S. isolationism from Mexico. Perhaps this regression will take the U.S. back to the days when learning a foreign language will be outlawed or at least dropped from the school's curriculum altogether. Anything is possible and stranger things have happened.

RELAX, DOUG. Keep reading and studying and maybe, just maybe someday you'll get it. "Anything is possible, and stranger things have happened."

Well folks, many Americans who move to (or even just visit) Mexico do not bother to learn Spanish.

What kind of a retard moves to Mexico from America!

When he says that line about Americans visiting in Mexico I think of Milton in the movie "Office Space" complaining about the salt on his margarita glass.

From the web site:

Expatriates Doug and Cindi Bower have successfully expatriated to Mexico.

They don't even live in the US any more.

The web site also has his e-mail address.

I saw a Cheerios commercial today where a Hispanic family was eating breakfast and speaking spanish to each other. Then some White girl (the maid, I guess) came in with a box of Cheerios and said "Who wants some more!"

Then at the end the announcer read (in English) "Cheerios: they're just that good!" or something like that.

I'm still trying to figure out the full meaning of it, but it seems like they will finally conquer English through breakfast cereals.

At the writing of this article, the Minuteman Project Movement is growing leaps and bounds that will, in my view, cause an even greater U.S. isolationism from Mexico. Perhaps this regression will take the U.S. back to the days when learning a foreign language will be outlawed or at least dropped from the school's curriculum altogether. Anything is possible and stranger things have happened.

I can only hope.

Xenoglossophobia. Soon to make appearances in the Liberal Arts departments of state schools nationwide, along with homophobia, xenophobia and other constructions of the "other" against the imperialist White heterosexual male, who has ruined the world in order to rule it.

There will be classes on it, drilling into the heads of our college kids to abandon the white imperialist empire building code speak of English for the more diverse and "pleasant sounding" Spanish.

Then they'll pound on drums and pack the bong (again) and maybe call Mom and Dad for more money...[/b][/quote]

This is simple stupid o believe that we aren’t able or willing to learn foreign languages, we used to be nonexistent in languages before WWI and know we have one of the best language dept within our foreign service, so to say that we need to do more to learn is nothing more than BS. Hell I have been learning Arabic for the past year and ill tell you what their 10 classes in Arabic and also 5 Russian, which are in my school and surpass Spanish. You know what also, when I was on the UN team Spanish wasn’t a main concern on foreign languages; it was English, French, German, Japanese and Chinese!

P

Learning a foreign language is to me, an exercise, one that can strengthen your own language skills.

English especially can benefit from studying German, Latin, and French, the elements of English are all contained therein. Spanish is a Latin based language, so English speakers share those roots with their Spanish/Latin speaking counterparts.

In can only think that at this point we all here at alipac learn Spanish ourselves so we can more easily make our points clear at the grass roots levels, with the Latino and illegal communities themselves.

For example, I am practising my Irish brougue, for the purposes of interacting with the no small number of illegal irish that live in our Country.

Mi Hablo Espanol mui pequena! Yo soy un Gringo muchacho.

Tu eres illegal. 2 years of high school Spanish, I'm commited to learning.

Yo Estudio Espanol.

cheers glenn